UIUC Biophysics and Related Seminars

Sunday, October 11, 2026

• World of Genomics

  Time

  10:00 am - 4:00 pm

  Location

  Griffin Museum of Science and Industry, 5700 S. DuSable Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Il 60637

  Join us for the interactive, hands-on science experience that is World of Genomics, featuring multiple stations focused on specific aspects of science!

  • Festival/Celebration

  

Wednesday, October 14, 2026

• Probing the Link Between Cellular Metabolism, Circadian Rhythms, and Inflammation at the Blood-Brain Interface

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  612 Conference Center Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology

  “Probing the Link Between Cellular Metabolism, Circadian Rhythms, and Inflammation at the Blood-Brain Interface” Tanner Cress, Ph.D. Candidate Department of Chemistry, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, October 15, 2026

• MIP Seminar Student Seminar: Theresa Zepeda (Bagchi Lab) "Uterine HIF2ɑ is Essential for Embryo Implantation & Regulation of Polyamine Metabolism During Early Pregnancy" & Ashwitha Lakshmi (Fan Lab) "TBD"

  Time

  11:00 am

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102, CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• CHBE 565-International Paper Co Seminar-Prof. Hongliang Xin, Virginia Tech (Host: Prof. Alex Mironenko) "The New Alchemy of Scientific Discovery: From Electrons to AI Agents"

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Friday, October 16, 2026

• Biochemistry Seminar: Dr. Sam Sternberg (Columbia University) - "RNA-guided and RNA-templated antiviral immunity"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  Charles G. Miller Auditorium, B102 CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Monday, October 19, 2026

• Final Defense of Destiny Gray "TBA"

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  165 Noyes Lab

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, October 20, 2026

• Connecting Genetics to Behavior Using Machine Learning

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  612 Conference Center Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology

  Andreas Pfenning, PhD School of Computer Science; Carnegie Mellon University “Connecting Genetics to Behavior Using Machine Learning”

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, October 21, 2026

• Where Science Meets Society: How Outreach Brings the IGB Motto to Materiality

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  612 Conference Center Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology

  “Where Science Meets Society: How Outreach Brings the IGB Motto to Materiality” Dan Urban Assistant Director of Outreach Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology University of Illinois Urbana Champaign

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Prof. Michael Wasielewski, Northwestern University, "Molecular Optical-Spin Interfaces for Quantum Information Applications"

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Madhusree Seal (Stadtmueller Lab) - "Structural characterization of mammalian and avian Fcα/µR".

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 RAL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Qianjin Jiang (Shapiro Lab) - "Investigate Necrotic Cell Death Induced by Anticancer Drugs in Human Lung Cancers"

  Time

  4:30 pm

  Location

  Roger Adams Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• M.Eng. in Chemical Engineering Leadership Informational Webinar

  Time

  7:00 - 8:00 pm

  Learn about our M.Eng. in Chemical Engineering Leadership degree program.

  • Webinar

  

Thursday, October 22, 2026

• MIP Seminar: Dr. Malcolm MacIver, Northwestern University "Why Planning Began on Land: Robot-Rodent Experiments on an Evolutionary Hypothesis"

  Time

  11:00 am

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102, CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Hannah King CHEM 575 Seminar: "Thalidomide and the Unexpected Path to Targeted Protein Degradation"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  163 Noyes Lab, 505 S. Mathews Ave.

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Shuaiqi Yuan CHEM 575 Seminar: "Logic-Gated Systems for Targeted Therapeutics"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  163 Noyes Lab, 505 S. Mathews Ave.

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Seminar: Dr. Shady Amin, New York University Abu Dhabi -- "Steroid hormones produced by coral-associated bacteria modulate the coral immune response during thermal stress"

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Friday, October 23, 2026

• FINAL DEFENSE: Eric Gomez "Structure-Dependent Optical Properties of Nanomaterials Probed by Polarization-Resolved Single-Molecule Microscopy and Spectroscopy" Advisor: Professor Stephan Link

  Time

  3:00 pm

  Location

  Chem Annex 1024

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Monday, October 26, 2026

• Professor Nicholas L. Truex, University of South Carolina, "Protein Technologies for Unlocking Immunity and Expanding the Folding Code"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Lab

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, October 27, 2026

• Final Defense: Hina Zhou (van der Donk Lab) - "Beyond the Peptide: Physiological Function of LanC-like Proteins and Noncanonical Substrate Scope of Peptide Aminoacyl-tRNA Ligases"

  Time

  10:00 am

  Location

  393 Bevier Hall

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• The Dog as a Genetic Blueprint: Utilizing Population Structure to Map Complex Traits

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  612 Conference Center Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology

  Heidi Parker, PhD Associate Investigator, National Human Genome Research Institute "The Dog as a Genetic Blueprint: Utilizing Population Structure to Map Complex Traits"

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Junya Li/Martinez Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, October 28, 2026

• Prof. Saumya Saurabh, New York University, "Using Light to Decipher Life: Mapping the Chemical Environment Inside Biomolecular Condensates"

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, October 29, 2026

• MIP Seminar: Dr. Ekaterina Gribkova, UIUC, "From Cells to Societies: Fractal Modularity as a General Principle of Biological Intelligence and its Evolution"

  Time

  11:00 am

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102, CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Danielle Otero CHEM 575 Seminar: "Title TBD"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  163 Noyes Lab, 505 S. Mathews Ave.

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Kellen Sharpe CHEM 575 Seminar: "Title TBD"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  163 Noyes Lab, 505 S. Mathews Ave.

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Final Defense - Katrine Dailey (Wu Lab) - "Deep Mutational Scanning Reveals Patterns in Broadly Neutralizing Influenza and Betacoronavirus Antibodies"

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  124 Burrill Hall

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Seminar: Dr. Zoi Rapti, Mathematics/University of Illinois Urbana-Illinois -- "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Friday, October 30, 2026

• Biochemistry Seminar: Dr. Tom Cooper (Baylor College of Medicine) - "Mechanistic insights of RNA toxicity and disrupted RNA processing from modeling Myotonic Dystrophy in mice"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  Charles G. Miller Auditorium, B102 CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, November 3, 2026

• CHBE 565-International Paper Co Seminar-Prof. Sujit Datta, California Institute of Technology (Host: Prof. Ying Diao)

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Jiayue Yang/Whitaker Lab and Simrandeep Singh/Imlay Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, November 4, 2026

• Seung Jun Lee (Shapiro Lab) - “A Novel Small-Molecule Inhibitor of an mRNA-Binding Protein Elicits Immunogenic Anticancer Effects in Colorectal Cancer”

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 RAL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Subhashis Natua (Kalsotra Lab) - "Retained but Ready: Intron Retention as a Developmental Timer and Stress-Responsive RNA Reservoir"

  Time

  4:30 pm

  Location

  116 RAL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, November 5, 2026

• Natalie Shkolnik CHEM 575 Seminar: "Title TBD"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  163 Noyes Lab, 505 S. Mathews Ave.

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• CHBE 565-International Paper Co Seminar-Prof. Lorenzo Vergari, Nuclear, Plasma, & Radiological Engineering-Illinois

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Ada Doisy Lectures in Biochemistry: Dr. Andrew Dillin (University of California Berkeley ) - "Neuronal control of mitochondrial form and function: mitokines"

  Time

  3:30 pm

  Location

  180 Bevier Hall

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Seminar: Dr. Xavier Mayali, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory -- "Isotopes and high resolution mass spectrometry to quantify microbial biogeochemical cycling "

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Friday, November 6, 2026

• Ada Doisy Lectures in Biochemistry: Dr. Navdeep Chandel (Northwestern University) - " Mitochondrial signaling in physiology and disease"

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  Charles G. Miller Auditorium, B102 CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Monday, November 9, 2026

• Kenneth L. Rinehart Lecture in Chemical Biology, Professor Christopher J. Chang, Princeton University, "Activity-Based Sensing: Using Chemical Reactivity to Decode Single-Atom Chemical Biology"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Lab

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, November 10, 2026

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Brooke Ebner/Slauch Lab and Lindsey Grady/Hatoum-Aslan Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, November 11, 2026

• Ashley Holahan (Shapiro Lab) - "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 RAL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, November 12, 2026

• MIP Seminar Student Seminar: Laura Hovenga (Anakk Lab) "TBD"

  Time

  11:00 am

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102, CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Seminar: Dr. Benjamin Good, Stanford University -- "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Friday, November 13, 2026

• Biochemistry Seminar: Dr. Lucas Meirelles (Harvard/Mass General) - "Dynamic Host-Pathogen Co-Adaptation in Chronic Airway Infections”

  Time

  12:00 pm

  Location

  Charles G. Miller Auditorium, B102 CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, November 17, 2026

• CHBE 565-Thomas J. Hanratty Lecture, Prof. Timothy P. Lodge, University of Minnesota (Host: Prof. Alexa Kuenstler) "Spontaneous Fission and Fusion of Block Copolymer Micelles"

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Yishuo Jiang/Sirk Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, November 18, 2026

• Xinyi Dai (Shapiro Lab) - "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Yujia Ji (Stadtmueller) - "Mexican axolotl SIgX structure reveals conserved pIgR mediated IgX(A) mucosal transport in amphibians"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 RAL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, November 19, 2026

• CHBE 565-International Paper Co Seminar-Prof. Amanda Marciel, Rice University (Host: Prof. Simon Rogers)

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Seminar: Dr. Mohammed Kaplan, University of Chicago -- "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, December 1, 2026

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Abigail Finn/Whitaker Lab and Jessica Hertig/Imlay Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, December 2, 2026

• Prof. Eli Pollak, Weizmann Institute of Science, TBD

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Evan Hebner (Leckband) - "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 RAL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Christina Li (K. Zhang Lab) - "TBA"

  Time

  4:30 pm

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, December 3, 2026

• MIP Seminar: Dr. Dave Zhao, University of Illinois "TBA"

  Time

  11:00 am

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102, CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Microbiology Seminar: Dr. Jizhong Zhou, University of Oklahoma -- "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Professor Xin Zhou, Harvard University, "Title: TBD"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  Location

  116 Roger Adams Lab

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, December 8, 2026

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Tori Boyle/Hatoum-Aslan Lab and Keegan Schoeller/Hatoum-Aslan Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, December 9, 2026

• Biological Physics Seminar: Ruobo Zhou (Penn State)

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  Rhondale Tso Seminar Room, Loomis 236

  • Lecture

  

• Terry Gao (Huang Lab) - "TBA"

  Time

  4:00 pm

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

• Amna Mehfooz (K. Zhang Lab) - "TBA"

  Time

  4:30 pm

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, December 10, 2026

• Final Defense: Jorge Calderin (Fratti Lab) - "The Detection of Vacuolar Phosphatidylinositol 3,4,5-trisphosphate (PI(3,4,5)P3), and its Control on SNARE-Mediated Membrane Fusion Through Binding Vam7 and Impacting the Assembly of Critical Membrane Microdomains."

  Time

  1:00 pm

  Location

  Charles G. Miller Auditorium, B102 CLSL

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, January 19, 2027

• Microbiology Student Seminar: New Student Presentations

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Thursday, February 11, 2027

• Biological Physics Seminar: Shixin Liu (Rockefeller University)

  Time

  2:00 pm

  Location

  Rhondale Tso Seminar Room, Loomis 236

  • Lecture

  

Wednesday, February 17, 2027

• Prof. Renee Frontiera, University of Minnesota, TBD

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, March 9, 2027

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Rodrigo Arana Garrido/Mera Lab and Courtney Hill/Hatoum-Aslan Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, March 10, 2027

• Prof. Matthew Crane, Colorado School of Mines, TBD

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, March 23, 2027

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Aniritha Ramalingam Balasubramanian/Hatoum-Aslan Lab and William Wightkin/Blanke Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, March 30, 2027

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Abagail Long/Mera Lab and Lance Pollitz/Hatoum-Aslan Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, March 31, 2027

• Prof. Teresa Head-Gordon, University of California Berkeley, TBD

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, April 6, 2027

• Microbiology Student Seminar: Claire Murphy/Slauch Lab and J.D. Norcross/Dr. Steven Blanke

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, April 7, 2027

• Prof. Allison Squires, University of Chicago, TBD

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, April 13, 2027

• Microbiology Student/Postdoc Seminar: Nathan Walker/Whitaker Lab and Thomas Cowell/Whitaker Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Tuesday, April 20, 2027

• Microbiology Postdoc Seminar: Motaher Hossain/Hatoum-Aslan Lab and Yumi Iwadate/Slauch Lab

  Time

  4:00 pm   5:00 pm

  Location

  Charles Miller Auditorium, B102 Chemical & Life Sciences Laboratory

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Friday, April 30, 2027

• 2027 Flygare Memorial Lecture: Professor Paul Alivisatos, University of Chicago, TBD

  Time

  4:00 - 5:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Lecture

  

Wednesday, May 5, 2027

• Prof. Haw Yang, Princeton University, TBD

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium

  

Wednesday, May 12, 2027

• Prof. Martin Zanni, University of Wisconsin Madison, TBD

  Time

  2:00 - 3:00 pm

  Location

  CLSL B102

  • Seminar/Symposium