principal investigator
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Alexander Chase, PhDDr. Chase received his BS at UC Los Angeles (UCLA) and his PhD at UC Irvine, studying the biogeographic patterns of microbes with Jennifer Martiny. During his postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for Marine Biotechnology and Biomedicine at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography with Paul Jensen, Dr. Chase became interested in the way microbes respond to their environment through the production of small molecule natural products. His research aims to bridge chemical and microbial ecology to uncover the mechanisms maintaining microbial diversity across environmental microbiomes. He is currently an Assistant Professor in the Roy M. Huffington Dept. of Earth Sciences and an affiliate faculty of both the O'Donnell Data Science Institute and Center for Drug Discovery, Design, and Delivery at SMU.
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lab staff
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Ammara Khalid, PhD - Laboratory Operations ManagerBefore joining the lab, Ammara completed a postdoc at Iowa State University in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering. She earned her PhD in Biotechnology from RIKEN Japan in the Lab of Hiroyuki Osada where she focused on designing systematic approaches for discovering novel secondary metabolites and cellular regulation of secondary metabolite production in Streptomyces. Her research expertise includes metabolic engineering, CRISPR, synthetic biology tools development, GC/MS, HPLC, bioprocessing, and biosensor development. She has transitioned from a postdoc in the lab to a permanent departmental staff member co-supervised by Prof. Douglas LaRowe.
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graduate students
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Motahare Haghighatjoo - PhD StudentMotahare completed her BS and MS degrees at Alzahra University in Tehran, Iran where she investigated the degradation of microplastics by environmental bacteria isolated from the Caspian Sea. She is interested in applying her background in spectroscopy and chromatography to answer questions related to chemical ecology and metabolite mediated interactions in environmental microbiomes. Motahare was awarded an Iran Opportunity Award to come to SMU to complete her PhD.
Contact: LinkedIn | ResearchGate |
undergraduate students
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Kyra WatermanKyra is an undergraduate assistant majoring in biology. She is interested in microbial ecology and microbiology and plans to pursue a PhD. Kyra was recently awarded the SMU Summer Research Internship to work on fiber degradation of Bifidobacterium isolates from the human gut microbiome.
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past members
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Jaya ZhangJaya is an undergraduate majoring in biochemistry who joined the lab through the SMU First Year Research Experience (FYRE) during the 2025-26 academic year. Jaya is on the pre-dental track who is looking for a career in science and healthcare.
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Lainie BairdLainie is an undergraduate majoring in biochemistry who joined the lab through the SMU First Year Research Experience (FYRE) during the 2025-26 academic year.
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Vigna LavuVigna was an Office of Engaged Learning Undergraduate Research Fellow who graduated in Spring 2025. Currently she is an Environmental Investigator at Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and will start her PhD at the University of North Texas in biogeochemistry.
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Jamie TijerinaJamie was a graduate student in the lab from 2024-2025. Using her prior experience in flow cytometry at UPenn and Caltech, she explored the intersection of environmental exposures and health outcomes in aquatic systems. She is now pursuing a PhD in Planetary Health at the University of Lisbon.
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Millie MetchickMillie was an undergraduate who graduated in the Spring 2024 majoring in Earth Science. She is excited to apply her research skills to a future PhD program related to epidemiology and/or healthcare. After graduation, Millie started as a Clinical Research Coordinator at Columbia University Medical Center.
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Ruhani AhluwaliaRuhani was a Hamilton Undergraduate Research Scholar who graduated in 2025 as a physics major. She is also an excellent artist, hosting her own Art Exhibit "Inside Out and Outside In" at SMU. She was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship and will be starting her PhD at the Institute of Nuclear Physics in Krakow.
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