Graduate Students

University of Delaware

Daseul Jang

Daseul joined the Korley lab in 2017 and received her B.S. and M.E. in chemical engineering from Inha University. During her master’s course, she worked on the development of nacre-mimetic nanocellulose/montmorillonite nanocomposites. Her current research focuses on developing spider silk-inspired peptide/polymer hybrids and studying the relationship between morphology and mechanics of composite materials.  She loves to travel and cook

 

Kris Van de Voorde

Louisiana native, Kris came to the Korley group in July of 2016 with a B.S. in Polymer Science from the University of Southern Mississippi. In his research, Kris utilizes multilayer coextrusion as a high-throughput method for producing biocompatible microfibers for use in tissue scaffolds supported by a NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. In his spare time, Kris enjoys wearing boots, hiking, Taylor Swift, and cheesy slasher flicks.

 

 

University of California – San Diego

Justin Hochberg

Justin joined the lab in August of 2017 as a graduate of the University of Florida with a degree in biochemistry while working in the lab of Dr. Kenneth Wagener. Justin’s graduate work involves both synthetic tissue engineering and polymer encapsulation strategies for regenerative medicine. In his spare time Justin enjoys various types of music, craft beer, and whiskey.

 

David Wirth

David joined the Pokorski lab in 2018, a San Diego native with an M.S. in Aerospace Engineering, he began his career in Dr. Laurent Pilon’s lab at UCLA where he developed novel re-startable solid rocket motors.  Following graduation he served 4 years in the Air Force as an engineering officer, and founded a company, Fabric8Labs based on his novel approach to electrochemical metal 3D printing.   He is currently working to develop novel techniques for bottom up manufacturing, 3D printing and nanobiotechnology.

 

University of Chicago

Charles Lindberg

Charlie was born and raised in Frederic, Wisconsin. He attended the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire where he received his B.S. in Chemistry with a Materials Science emphasis. In his time at UWEC, he worked on several diverse projects with topics including: reversible diblock copolymers (Dr. Elizabeth Glogowski), hydrogen bonded liquid crystals (Dr. Kurt Wiegel), and excited state chemistry computations (Dr. Stephen Drucker).

 

Sean Lee

Sean received his B.S. in Chemistry with a specialization in Materials Science from the University of Virginia. During his undergraduate, he worked with Dr. Brooks Pate on developing a new analytical method using rotational spectroscopy and machine learning and also with Dr. Liheng Cai on microfluidics device for double emulsion fabrication. Currently, Sean is pursuing a PhD in Chemistry under the mentorship of Dr. Stuart Rowan and Dr. Sihong Wang. Sean enjoys listening to music in his free time.

 

Case Western Reserve University

Evan Chou

Evan is a graduate in Chemical Engineering from Cornell University.  His hobbies include: Anime, games, tennis, music, drawing, and writing. Evan’s area of specialization is Biomimicry.

 

Austin Mills

Austin attended the University of Dayton where he received his B.S. and M.S. in Mechanical Engineering. He joined the Bio-inspired team in August 2020 with his current research focus being soft robotic thermo-mechanical analysis. In his free time you can catch him planning a new aquarium or trying to cook something new.

Nehal Nupnar

Nehal attended the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee for his undergraduate work in Polymer Science and Technology. He is currently working with Professor Michael Hore on polymer-grafted gold nanocomposites. He is an enthusiastic swimmer and volleyball player and is passionate about Indian food.

 

Shane Riddle

Shane received his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from The Ohio State University in 2019. He is currently a graduate student working in the Biologically Inspired Robotics Lab at Case Western Reserve University. His areas of research are biomimicry, soft robotics, and neuroscience-inspired control.

 

 

University of Fribourg – Adolphe Merkle Institute

Trevor Kalkus

Trevor is a PhD candidate in Biophysics

 

 

Livius Muff

Livius earned his Bachelor and Master degree in Materials Science at ETH Zurich and joined the Polymer Chemistry and Materials group at the Adolphe Merkle Institute in 2018 as a PhD candidate. His research focuses on polymeric composite and stimuli responsive actuators for deployment in soft robotic systems

 

Giovanni Spiaggia

Giovanni is a PhD candidate in BioNanomaterials

 

 

University of Strathclyde

Sam Russell

Sam completed his Master’s degree in chemistry at the University of Strathclyde.  He worked in Nico Bruns group on encapsulation and release of fragrances from polymersomes. The focus of his research is on polymersome-laden hydrogels for out-of-equilibrium-materials. In his spare time I Sam enjoys cooking, live music and sports.

 

Sara Tatiana R. Velasquez

Sara earned her bachelor’s degree in Materials Engineering at the Federal University of Santa Catarina in Brazil and her MS in Materials Science at ETH Zurich where she worked with nacre bio-inspired composites.  She is currently working on her PhD entitled, Bio-inspired amphiphilic polymer co-networks (APCNs).  Her research mainly focuses on developing cellulose reinforced APCNs that report local deformation through color change.

 

Alumni

Akhil Kandhari

Susan Kozawa

 

 

 

 

Yefei Zhang

 

 

 

Gogol (Anirvan) Guha

 

 

 

Alexandre Redondo