Invited Speakers
Julia Laskin, Purdue University
Julia Laskin, M.Sc. in Physics from the Leningrad Polytechnical Institute; Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; Postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Jean Futrell at the University of Delaware and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). Dr. Laskin is currently a William F. and Patty J. Miller Professor of Analytical Chemistry at Purdue University. Prior to joining Purdue, she was a scientist at PNNL and was promoted to the highest scientific rank in 2011.
Dr. Laskin’s research is focused on understanding phenomena underlying collisions of complex ions with surfaces for selective modification of substrates using beams of mass-selected ions and development of new approaches for quantitative molecular imaging of biological samples using mass spectrometry. In her research, she has developed unique instrumentation to study soft landing of ions for highly selective surface modification for applications in energy storage, catalysis, and biology. Her work on the development of nanospray desorption electrospray ionization (nano-DESI) has enabled quantitative ambient imaging of fully hydrated biological samples in their native environment with subcellular resolution and analysis of complex mixtures directly from solid substrates. Her research has resulted in over 310 peer-reviewed publications including invited reviews and book chapters and 11 patents.
Shuzhao Li, The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine
Shuzhao Li is an associate professor at The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine and a visiting Associate Professor at Department of Immunology, University of Connecticut School of Medicine. His research lab employs ultrahigh-resolution mass spectrometry to measure the metabolome, lipidome and small molecules of dietary, microbial and environmental origins. This is supported by innovative sample enrichment and data acquisitions, and computational algorithms that identify pathway patterns and integrate chemical reactions and biology, including mammalian and microbial genomics. He pioneered the application of metabolomics to systems immunology. Along the way, he and colleagues developed mummichog for pathway/network analysis, asari for data processing, and multi-omics integration approaches.
Kevin Schey, Vanderbilt University
Kevin Schey received his B.S. in Chemistry from Muhlenberg College in Allentown, PA and his Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry from Purdue University working under Dr. Graham Cooks. After post-doctoral training at the University of Chicago he began his academic career at the Medical University of South Carolina. In 2008 he moved to the Mass Spectrometry Research Center and Department of Biochemistry at Vanderbilt University. He has secondary appointments in the Departments of Chemistry and Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences. His research interests lie in the areas of lens biochemistry, proteomics of aging, exosome proteomics, and imaging mass spectrometry. He directs Core laboratories in Imaging MS, Proteomics, and small molecule MS. He has published over 200 papers and has been elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology.
Lunch and Learn Speakers
Benjamin Blakley, Vanderbilt University (sponsored by Agilent)
Benjamin Blakley is a graduate student in Professor John McLean’s Research Group at Vanderbilt University. Born and raised in the mountains of East Tennessee, Ben completed his B.S in Chemistry at Carson-Newman University before joining the Chemistry Department at Vanderbilt University in 2021, where he is now a fourth–year graduate student in Prof. John McLean’s Research Group. His research interests lie in the development of ion mobility-mass spectrometry methods for clinical chemistry applications, including human exposomics and drug enantiomer separations. Ben was awarded the 2024 Eastern Analytical Symposium Graduate Student Research Award and the 2024 Vanderbilt Chemistry Graduate Teaching Award—he was also named an Honorable Mention for the NSF GRFP in 2023. When he is not in the lab, Ben can be found reading science fiction, finding weird roadside attractions, and training for a half marathon.
Daniel Hermanson, Thermo Fisher Scientific (sponsored by Thermo Fisher Scientific)
Daniel Hermanson is a senior product marketing manager at Thermo Fisher Scientific. He graduated from Duke University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry with a Concentration in Pharmacology and Certificate in Neuroscience. He then went to Graduate School at Vanderbilt University where he earned his PhD in Chemistry with a certificate in Chemical Biology studying eicosanoids and bioactive lipids. After his graduate work he did postdoctoral studies in the lab of Ben Cravatt at the Scripps Research Institute applying chemoproteomics and untargeted metabolomics and lipidomics to annotate enzyme function. He then began his career at Thermo Fisher Scientific as a field application scientist supporting metabolomics and proteomics customers. Daniel then moved into the product marketing team for life sciences mass spectrometry, where he is now the senior product marketing manager for the Orbitrap Astral mass spectrometer.
Jonathan Sweedler, University of Illinois Urban-Champaign (sponsored by Bruker)
Jonathan Sweedler is currently the James R. Eiszner Family Endowed Chair in Chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (USA) and is affiliated with the College of Medicine, the Departments of Bioengineering and Physiology, and the Neuroscience Program. His research interests focus on developing new mass spectrometry-based approaches for assaying small volume samples, including metabolomics and peptidomics and mass spectrometry imaging. He has used these tools to characterize small molecules and peptides in a range of animal models across the metazoan and in samples as small as individual cells and cellular domains. Sweedler, with large international teams of biologists and technologists, has performed comprehensive interrogation of the genome, transcriptome and peptidome in a range of animal models to uncover signaling peptides and pathways involved in wide range of functions and behaviors. Sweedler has published more than 500 manuscripts and presented 600 invited lectures on these topics. He has received numerous awards including the American Chemical Society’s Award in Analytical Chemistry and Torbern Bergman Medal from the Swedish Chemical Society. He is currently the Editor-in-Chief for Analytical Chemistry.