LVC Biochemistry and Molecular Biology News

The Undergraduate Science Research Program (USRP) of Merck-AAAS has awarded Lebanon Valley College a grant of $60,000 to support interdisciplinary research projects at the interface of chemistry and biology. The grant proposal, written and submitted by Dr. Walter Patton, Associate Professor of Chemistry, will provide funding for three primary projects:

  • The Design of Molecules to Study Intracellular Signaling Events
  • The Development of Nanoparticles for Therapeutic Applications
  • The Discovery of Natural Products that Affect Microbial Organisms

The projects will be carried out by teams of students and faculty from both the chemistry and biology departments over a period of three years, and the grant will provide summer stipends for participants and necessary supplies. The grant will also provide funds for undergraduate travel for presentation of student research, an ongoing seminar series, and a capstone undergraduate research symposium to be held at Lebanon Valley College. LVC was one of 14 colleges and universities nationwide to receive a 2009 Merck-AAAS award.

The Merck Institute for Science Education and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) sponsor the USRP, whose purpose it is to enhance undergraduate science education in the areas of chemistry and biology through undergraduate research experiences that foster an understanding of the interrelationship of these sciences. The world’s largest general scientific society and publisher of the journal, Science, AAAS was founded in 1848 and serves 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, reaching 10 million individuals.


LVC students from the research group of Professor Timothy Peelen participated in the 9th Annual Graduate and 4th Annual Undergraduate Student Poster Session at Temple University on January 22, 2009. The symposium is sponsored by the Philadelphia Section of the American Chemical Society. Five LVC undergraduates participated in the poster session which featured 36 graduate posters and 26 undergraduate posters. Posters were judged by scientists from industry and academia and three posters from each division were honored. This year, LVC students won two of the three top undergraduate awards as Nathaniel Bair and Kenneth Potter were recognized for having outstanding poster presentations. Presenting at the meeting were:

  • Nathaniel Bair ('09, chemistry) "Leaving Group Effects in Acyl Iminium Chemistry: Opportunities for Novel Reactivity."
  • Kenneth Potter ('09, biochemistry), "Lewis Acid-Catalyzed Reactions of alpha-Acetoxy Glycine Esters: Toward the Asymmetric Synthesis of Unnatural Amino Acids"
  • Adam Wier ('09, biochemistry) "Diastereomeric Interactions in Esterifications of Chiral Trifluoromethyl Alcohols."
  • Sara Schwanger ('09, chemistry) "Diastereomeric Interactions of Trifluoromethyl Containing Compounds: A Window into the Origins of Homochirality."
  • Brandon Parks ('10, chemistry and biochemistry) "An Exercise in Drug Discovery: Parallel Synthesis of Lidocaine Derivatives and Analysis of Their Metabolic Stability Using LC-MS-MS."

For the 7th consecutive year, LVC research students participated in the 11th Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium in the Chemical and Biological Sciences at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County on October 11, 2008. Twenty LVC undergraduates participated in the symposium, presenting or co-presenting a total of sixteen posters. The annual Baltimore symposium highlights interdisciplinary research in areas of biochemistry, biology, cell biology, chemistry, computational chemistry & molecular biology. The symposium, sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, featured 214 presentations by undergraduates representing 42 different colleges and universities from nine different states and the District of Columbia. Scientists from industry and academia heard student presentations, quizzed the students on their work, and then awarded a number of first and second place awards to top papers. This year, LVC students won a total of eight awards, as listed below:

  • Samantha Burkey ('09, chemistry) first place for her work with Dr. Marc Harris, entitled "Investigating Host-Guest Interactions between Bipyridine Azacrown-Ether Macrocycles and Alkylai Ion Guests."
  • Nathaniel Bair ('09, chemistry) first place for his work with Dr. Timothy Peelen, entitled "Leaving Group Effects in Acyl Iminium Chemistry: Opportunities for Novel Reactivity."
  • Sara Schwanger ('09, chemistry) first place for her work with Dr. Peelen, entitled "Diastereomeric Interactions of Trifluoromethyl Containing Compounds: A Window into the Origins of Homochirality."
  • Nicholas Boaz ('10, chemistry) first place for his work with Dr. Christopher Siedlecki of the Hershey Medical Center, entitled "The Effect of Protein Adsorption Competition on FXIa Generation in Material-Induced Blook Plasma Coagulation."
  • Charles Schmidt ('10, biochemistry) second place for his work with Dr. Walter Patton, entitled "Ruthenium Bipyridine Compounds as SDS-PAGE- and MALDI-Compatible Protein Labels."
  • Khevna Shukla ('11, biology) and Patricia Cunfer ('11, biology) second place for their work with Dr. Kristen Boeshore, entitled "Modeling Neuronal Regeneration in PC12 Cells."
  • Michael Porambo ('09, chemistry) and Heather Howard ('11, chemistry) second place for their work with Dr. Andy Marsh, entitled "Development of a User-Friendly Software Program for Temperature-Programmed Desorption Studies of Interstellar Chemistry."
  • Brandon Parks ('10, chemistry and biochemistry) second place for his work with Dr. Peelen, entitled "An Exercise in Drug Discovery: Parallel Synthesis of Lidocaine Derivatives and Analysis of Their Metabolic Stability Using LC-MS-MS."

Professors Timothy Peelen and Walter Patton from the Chemistry Department and Kristen Boeshore from the Biology Department accompanied the students to the symposium.


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Julia Cupp was a recipient of the prestigious Howard Anthony Neidig Award at graduation on May 10, 2008.  The Neidig Award is given annually to the top senior; this year Julia was a co-recipient with Greg Strohman, a Music and Physics double major.  Julia, a Biochemistry & Molecular Biology major and a Mathematics minor, was nominated for her superior academic performance, her research achievements and extensive service contributions.

Among Julia’s numerous accomplishments, Julia has presented her research at ACS National Meetings in Binghamton, NY and New Orleans, LA and she also presented at the 9th Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium in the Chemical and Biological Sciences at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.  Julia served as a research assistant in biochemistry (Patton), organic chemistry (Peelen) and cell biology (A. Wolfe – Bio) at LVC from 2005 through 2007.  She is currently involved in a two-year Post-Baccalaureate Intramural Research Training Award Fellowship at the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. J ulia works under the direction of Dr. Forbes Porter, an expert in inborn errors in cholesterol metabolism.   After completing her research at the NIH, Julia plans to attend medical school.


Chemistry and Biochemistry Students Present Research at Undergraduate Convention

LVC research students gave presentations to students and faculty at the 72nd ISC Convention held at Elizabethtown College April 19, 2008. Participating undergraduate students from Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Maryland and Pennsylvania were evaluated on presentation, design, interpretation and response to questions as well as the relevance of their chosen research project.

Charles Schmidt ('10 , BCMB) presented his work with Drs. Walter Patton and Marc Harris (LVC Chemistry), entitled “Ruthenium Bipyridine Compounds as SDS-PAGE-and MALDI-Compatible Protein Labels.” Brandon Parks (‘10 , BCMB) presented his work, also with Drs. Walter Patton and Marc Harris entitled, “Cation-Exchange Chromatography as a Purification Step in the Preparation of Ruthenium (II) Tris-Bipyridine Complexes.”

Three student researchers in Chemistry brought home two first-place and one second-place awards for their presentations. Timothy Garrett (’08, chemistry) scored a first place in the Inorganic Chemistry division for his work with Dr. Harris entitled “Nosyl as an Efficient Protecting Group for the Synthesis of Bipyridine Aza-Crown Ether Macrocycles; An Ion Encapsulation Study of Macrocyclic Amines,” Michael Porambo (’09, Chem), earned first place in the Physical Chemistry division for his work with Dr. Anderson Marsh (LVC Chemistry), , entitled, “Photocatalytic Degradation of 2-Chlorophenol by Undoped and Doped Zinc Sulfide Nanocrystals Capped with Poly(vinylpyrrolidone).” and Carrie Kauffman (’08, Chem) earned second place in the Physical Chemistry for her work was entitled “Hydrogenation of Cyclohexanone by Colloidal Platinum Nanocatalysts.”

Also presenting were Christopher Berg (’09, BCMB) for his work with Dr. Marsh entitled, “Kinetic Study of the Photocatalytic Activity of Zinc Sulfide Nanocrystals Capped by Amino Acids"; Kenneth Houser (’08, Chem) for his work with Dr. Harris entitled, “Cu(II), AG(I) and Pt(II) Bipyridine Oligomer Metallomacrocycles that Function as Efficient Host Complexes for the Encapsulation of Alkali Ion Guests”; Nathaniel Bair (’09, Chem) for his work with Dr. Timothy Peelen (LVC – Chemistry) entitled, “Mechanistic Studies in Enamine Organocatalysis: A Simple Assay For Identifying Kinetically Controlled Organocatalysis”; Kenneth Potter (’09, BCMB) for his work with Dr. Peelen entitled,” Lewis Acid-Catalyzed Reactions of Allyl Silanes with N,O-Acetals: Toward the Asymmetric Synthesis of Unnatural Amino Acids”; and Benjamin Lengle (‘08, Chem) for his work with Dr. Peelen entitled “Nucleophile-catalyzed Ireland-Claisen Rearrangements of Allylic Acrylate Esters.”  (Accompanying group picture: (from l to r) Brandon Parks, Chris Berg, Kenny Houser, Nate Bair, Ben Lengle, Dr. Tim Peelen, Carrie Kaufman, Tim Garrett, Dr. Walter Patton, Mike Porambo, Kenny Potter, Rich Carr, and Chuck Schmidt.)


Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education

Assistant Professor Walter Patton has published a paper, "Identification of bacteria using matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry", in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education (BAMBED), a journal published on behalf of the International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Student coauthors from Patton's research group and from his biochemistry laboratory course worked with Dr. Patton to develop a tested laboratory experiment in which students rapidly and accurately identify bacteria by MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry. Also contributing to this work was Dr. Sidney Pollack, a microbiologist from the LVC Biology Department. The cumulative results of their efforts are experimental techniques and analysis methods that introduce MALDI mass spectrometry into the upper-level laboratory courses in biochemistry or microbiology, in a “wet” lab setting or in a even in a “dry” setting using data available at a supplementary website.

Using MALDI, intact bacteria produce spectra (see figure below, to the left) that can be used as a “fingerprint” for the purpose of identification. Spectral peaks, most less than 20,000 amu, are primarily derived from cytosolic proteins that are basic in nature. The studies described here were originally proposed in a successful grant application to the NSF Course, Curriculum, and Laboratory Improvement (CCLI) Grant Program in 2002 by Dr. Owen Moe (PI) and Dr. Patton (Co-PI). Since obtaining the MALDI mass spectrometer under that grant, MALDI has been widely incorporated into the teaching and research activities of the chemistry faculty.

Student co-authors on this paper included Mollie Kedney (‘04 - Officer, U.S. Army Chemical Corps), Kevin Strunk (‘05 - Research Technician, Charles River Laboratories), Lisa Giaquinto (‘05 – Sinofia Pasteur), and Jennifer Wagner (’07 – Physician’s Assistant Program, Pennsylvania College of Optometry. The abstract for this paper can be viewed at the BAMBED website.