Principal Investigator

cfromen
Catherine A Fromen
Associate Professor
Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
Office: 209 CLB
Phone: 302-831-3649
Fax: 302-831-1048

Current Staff

Jenny Yun

Jenny Yun

Laboratory Manager

Joint with A. Kloxin Lab

Joined Winter 2024

Research Interests:Understanding fundamental of CAR-T cell therapy and optimize in engineering

Hobbies: Gardening, Photographing, Birdwatching

Email: zyun@udel.edu 

Pronouns: She/Hers

Fun Fact about the Lung: There are 600 million alveoli in the lung! If we add the surface area it is 75 square meters, it equals to the size of a tennis court.

Current Postdoc Members

Aida Lopez-Ruiz

Aida Lopez-Ruiz

Postdoc Fellow

Joined Winter 2023

Research Interests: Using nanoparticles as drug delivery systems to achieve better drug efficiency and immune engineering to target specific diseases in the body without a negative immune response.

Hobbies: Running, reading

Email: alopezr@udel.edu

Pronouns: She/Hers

Fun Fact about the Lung: The right and left lung are not the same sizes!

Patrick McCauley

Patrick McCauley

EDH Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Joined Fall 2023; co-advised with A. Bayles

Research Interests:  Improving throughput and cell viability in 3D bioprinting using advective assembly   

Hobbies: Hiking, reading 

Email: patmccau@udel.edu 

Pronouns: He/His   

Fun Fact about the Lung: Blue whales have the largest lung capacity, holding up to 5000 liters!

Dewansh Rastogi

Dewansh Rastogi

Postdoc Fellow

Joined Winter 2024

Research Interests: Engineering Aerosols: phase, morphology, and size; Electron microscopy, and visualization of in situ aerosol phenomena; Technology development and testing for aerosol capture; Testing TIDAL lung model to understand aerosol deposition inside lungs.

Hobbies: Listening to podcasts, cooking, and reading

Email: drastogi@udel.edu 

Pronouns: He/Him

The lungs are good at maintaining a high-humidity condition inside the body (>90 RH%)!

Current Graduate Student Members

Emma Sudduth

Emma Sudduth

PhD Candidate and CBI Fellow

Joined Spring 2022

Research Interests: Inhalable vaccines using model PEG-based hydrogel nanoparticles for more effective aerosolized immunotherapies of the elderly population.

Hobbies: Soccer, Volleyball, and Softball

Email: esudduth@udel.edu

Pronouns: She/Hers

Fun Fact about the Lung:  The average adult breaths 13 pints of air every minute!

Michael Trautmann Rodriguez

Michael Trautmann Rodriguez

PhD Candidate and GAANN Fellow

Joined Fall 2021

Research Interests: Nanoparticle-Antigen Presenting Cell  interactions, and development of  PEG-based hydrogel nanoparticle immunotherapies for driving immune tolerance.

Hobbies: Volleyball, Reading, and Painting

Email: matr@udel.edu

Pronouns: He/His

Fun Fact about the Lung:  The lungs only use 5% of the oxygen we breathe in!

Yinkui Yu

Yinkui Yu

PhD Candidate

Joined Fall 2021

Research Interests: Exploiting in-vitro and in-silico engineering tools including 3D printing and CFPD to model aerosol transport and deposition in human lungs.

Hobbies: Rock Climbing, Motorcycle, and Lego

Email: yinkui@udel.edu

Pronouns: He/His

Fun Fact about the Lung: The lung is the only human organ that can float on water!

Jodi Graf

Jodi Graf

PhD Candidate and GRFP Fellow

Joined Fall 2022; co-advised with A. Kloxin

Research Interests: Engineering macrophages in different micro environments to better model respiratory therapeutics in vitro.

Hobbies: Volleyball, Exercising and Cooking/Baking

Email: grafjo@udel.edu

Pronouns: She/Hers

Fun Fact about the Lung: The lung is able to float on water because of the aveoli which expand their diameter nearly 20x when filling with air!

Eric Slaughter

Eric Slaughter

PhD Candidate

Joined Fall 2022; co-advised with A. Kloxin

Research Interests: Improving CAR T-cell therapy manufacturing through tangential flow filtration and tunable hydrogel materials.

Hobbies: Tennis, Cooking/Baking, Video games w/ friends

Email: ersla@udel.edu

Pronouns: He/His

Fun Fact about the Lung:  You lose water when you exhale. At rest, the body loses approximately 0.5 ounces of water!

Spencer Wolfe

Spencer Wolfe

PhD Candidate and CBI Fellow

Joined Fall 2022

Research Interests: Trained immunity; the immunological memory of the innate immune system.

Hobbies: Reading and cooking

Email: spwolfe@udel.edu

Pronouns: He/His

Fun Fact about the Lung: An average person breathes in around 11,000 liters of air every day! 

Lisa Bain

Lisa Bain

PhD Student and GRFP Fellow

Joined Winter 2024

Research Interests: Engineering nanoparticle immunotherapies to investigate the effect of degradation on macrophage survival and cellular structure

Hobbies: MLB Baseball (Go Cardinals!), Broadway Musicals, and playing my Ukulele

Email: lbain@udel.edu

Pronouns: She/Hers

Fun Fact about the Lung: Women have a faster breathing rate than men. This is because women have a higher physiological cost of moving a given amount of air in and out of the lungs coupled with a smaller lung volume.

 

Sam Fine

Sam Fine

PhD Student

Joined Winter 2024, co-advised with M Blenner

Research Interests: Using synthetic biology to increase viability of CAR macrophages as a therapeutic

Hobbies: personal finance, National Guard

Email: samfine@udel.edu 

Pronouns: he/him

Fun Fact: If you combined your lungs’ airways end-to-end, they would stretch about 1500 miles!

 

Dominic Hoffman

Dominic Hoffman

PhD Student

Joined Winter 2024

Research Interests: Aerosol Mass Transfer

Hobbies: Powerlifting

Email: domhof@udel.edu

Pronouns: He/Him

Fun Fact about the Lung: the lung is the only human organ that can float on water

Current Undergraduate Student Members

Saurav Padhye

Saurav Padhye

UD ChE Class of 2024

Research interests: Using a combination of in vitro and in silico methods to model aerosol particle deposition in the upper airways of pediatric patients

Hobbies: Basketball, volleyball, and video games

Email: spadhye@udel.edu

Fun Fact about the Lung: The shape of a child’s airways changes as they develop!

Nicole Gill

Nicole Gill

UD ChE Class of 2024

 

Research Interests: Investigate how nanoparticle uptake affects the cellular structures of macrophages.

Hobbies: Running and mountain biking

Email: nicoleag@udel.edu

Fun Fact about the Lung:  The surface area of the alveoli in both lungs sums up to approximately 160 square meters, which is 80 times greater than the surface area of an adult human’s skin! 

Joaquina Somma

Joaquina Somma

UD CBE Class of 2025

 

Research Interests: Understanding how different factors like diseases and age affect the lung’s structure and functionality.

Hobbies: Listening to music, swimming, and reading

Email: jfsom@udel.edu

Fun Fact about the Lung:  A person could live with one lung and life expectancy would not significantly change! 

Adhya Anilkumar

Adhya Anilkumar

UD BME Class of 2026

Research Interests: utilizing nanoparticles and therapeutics for pulmonary drug delivery, and exploring molecular transportation mechanisms for targeted delivery of biomedical interventions within the body

Hobbies:  Exercising, Solving Puzzles, Painting, and Baking/Cooking

Email: adhya@udel.edu

Fun Fact about the Lung: The lungs play a key role when we speak! Air is pushed up through the Trachea and into the Larynx (voice box), where the vocal cords vibrate and create sound as air passes.

Ning Zhang

Ning Zhang

UD ChE Class of 2024

Research Interests: Understanding how engineering tools including 3D printing helps to solve problems related to pulmonary delivery

Hobbies: Watching musicals and forest hiking

Email: zisaning@udel.edu

Fun Fact about the Lung: The left lung tends to be smaller than the right lung in people to accommodate for the heart, which is located on the left side of the body!

Nina Armstrong

Nina Armstrong

UD MechE Class of 2027

Research Interests: Understanding how engineering tools including 3D printing helps to solve problems related to pulmonary delivery

Hobbies: Reading, exercising, and playing guitar

Email: ninava@udel.edu

Fun Fact about the Lung: The lungs are never completely empty: There is always some air left in the lungs after a maximal exhalation. If this residual volume did not exist and the lungs emptied completely, the lung tissues would stick together.

Group Pictures

Holiday Party Winter 2017

Winter Session 2018

Winter Session 2018

Summer 2018

Printer Arrival March 2018

CBE Recruiting 2018

Spring 2018

First Grant Cake!

Lung Team Summer 2018

3D printing Summer 2018

TGA arrival!

Summer 2018

Quals Passed! Fall 2018

Summer 2018 Research Highlight

Frankie the Fro

CBI Contest Winners 2018

Holiday Party 2018

Undergrad Students Spring 2019

Grad Students 2019

Spring 2019

Bowling Summer 2019

Holiday Party 2019

Aiche 2019

Aiche 2019

Ian Passes Quals! 2019

Kartik Passes Quals! 2019

Polym Chem Paper Cake! 2019

Chem Mater Paper Cake!

Aiche 2019

Second Year Talks 2019

Halloween Apple Picking 2021

December 2021

December 2021

First PhD Graduation! 2022

SFB 2022

2022 Visiting the new Mass Spec

Lab Retreat 2022

Zach Defends! Spring 2022

Summer 2022

Jodi and Emma Summer 2022

Saurav and Joaquina Summer 2022

Emmanuel Summer 2022

CRS 2022

Summer 2022 Group Pic

Michael Summer 2022

Yinkui Summer 2022

Summer 2022

Zach's Defense Celebration Summer 2022

Lab Retreat Summer 2022

Summer 2022

Summer 2022

Bader's Defense Celebration Spring 2022

Grads Fall 2022

Fall 2022

Holiday Fall 2022

Holiday Fall 2022

Emily defends!

Emily's defense celebration

Spring 2023 - all the Fromen lab trainees to date

NSF CAREER feature 2023

NSF CAREER feature 2023

NSF CAREER feature 2023

Grads Spring 2023

Tenure Party Spring 2023

Graduation Spring 2023

Kartik Defends!

Kartik's Last Group Meeting

Emily's Last Group Meeting

Graduation Spring 2023 Go Hens!

CRS 2023

ISAM 2023

Ian Defends!

Quals 2023!

AIChE 2023

Nicole & Saurav Winning at AIChE 2023

Holiday Party 2023

Group photo 2024

ISAM 2023