profile picture

Drew C

- Research Program Mentor

PhD candidate at Princeton University

Expertise

Biochemistry, Chemistry, Biology, Biotechnology

Bio

Hello! My name is Drew, and I'm a third-year graduate student at Princeton pursuing my PhD in Chemical and Biological Engineering. I graduated from Penn State University in May 2019 with my B.S. in Chemical Engineering, with Honors, as well as a minor in Mathematics. I was the selected as the top student from my graduating class. At Penn State, I studied how to incorporate bacterial membrane proteins to be used in filtration and separation applications. Here at Princeton, I study bacterial natural products and novel enzymology. I very much enjoy meeting new people and learning about other countries and culture. I enjoy trying new foods, traveling, playing tennis (although I'm not that good!), and hiking. I have a pet guinea pig named Honey that I love spending time with. I'm hoping to mentor someone to get them as excited about science as I am, and share valuable skills I've learned during my academic journey.

Project ideas

Project ideas are meant to help inspire student thinking about their own project. Students are in the driver seat of their research and are free to use any or none of the ideas shared by their mentors.

Comparing Biosynthesis of Different Natural Products

Natural products are very diverse, but many share common families of enzymes in their biosynthetic gene clusters and thus are synthesized similarly. Comparing and contrasting the biosynthetic mechanisms of various natural products can elucidate commonalities as well as the differences that leads to their diversity.

Investigating Mechanisms of Action of Potential Antibiotics

We know that antibiotics kill harmful bacteria that make us sick, but how exactly do the antibiotics that we take actually enter and bind to cellular targets, stopping infection? Why does a certain antibiotic kill certain types of bacteria, but not others? Through a genetic engineering approach, we can investigate how many antibiotics are responsible for killing certain types of bacteria.

Coding skills

MatLab, Mathematica

Teaching experience

I have TA'ed three undergraduate courses at Penn State as an undergraduate (Chemical Engineering and the Environment, Chemical Process Safety, Introduction to Polymer Materials). I have also TA'ed an undergraduate course (Chemical Reaction Engineering) this past semester (Spring 2021) here at Princeton. I was also a virtual tutor for a high school student in Math during the shift to virtual learning due to COVID.

Credentials

Work experience

Penn State Department of Chemical Engineering, and Department Materials Science and Engineering (2018 - 2019)
Teaching Assistant
Penn State Department of Chemical Engineering (2017 - 2019)
Student Researcher
Eurofins Lancaster Laboratories (2016 - 2016)
Stability Services Intern

Education

Pennsylvania State University (Penn State)
BS Bachelor of Science (2019)
Chemical Engineering
Princeton University
MA Master of Arts
Chemical and Biological Engineering
Princeton University
PhD Doctor of Philosophy candidate
Chemical and Biological Engineering

Interested in working with expert mentors like Drew?

Apply now