Postdoctoral Development

watershed management and climate change EFFECTS on NYC water supply

Postdoctoral research fellow, Soni Pradhanang, PhD
Mentor: Professor Allan Frei, PhD

Dr. Pradhanang received PhD from the State of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Watershed Hydrology, and MEsc in Forest Ecology and Management from Yale University.  Her research goals are to understand how hydrologic processes influence water quantity and movement of sediments and nutrients through watersheds, aiding in the development of policies and management practices to protect water and soil.

She works primarily with the scientists in NYCDEP applying and developing models to evaluate the effects of watershed management practices and climate change on the New York City water supply. The generation, transformation and transport of sediments and nutrients within the watershed are the major focus of her research.

As part of this effort she is currently using different versions of Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) models, one of which is recent development from Cornell University called SWAT-WB (water balance) which captures the complexity intrinsic to saturation excess runoff. Her research also focuses on uncertainty analysis on measured data and modeled results. Future research in this area will build and expand on identifying and quantifying processes controlling biogeochemical processes in the landscape, especially those most relevant to anticipated environmental changes associated with climate change.

biomimetic optoelectric devices & Mutational screening in material science

Postdoctoral research fellow, Yoshiaki Maeda, PhD
Mentor: Professor Hiroshi Matsui, PhD

After completing his PhD in Biotechnology at Tokyo University of Agriculture & Technology, Yoshiaki Maeda joined the research group of Dr. Hiroshi Matsui at Hunter College in spring 2010 as a postdoctoral fellow. Yoshiaki quickly became a leader in the lab and he is anchoring two critical projects in Dr. Matsui's lab - biomimetic reconfigurable optoelectric device development and novel material discovery methodology using evolution. The reconfigurable device is currently a hot topic as promising future technology for various federal agencies such as DOD and NSF, and Yoshiaki is applying protein-protein interaction to assemble magnetic nanoparticles that are extracted from bacteria. This interaction can be turned on and off by external stimulus such as pH, ionic strength, and enzyme, and multiple proteins in the membranes around nanoparticles enable the programming of assembly/disassembly.  Yoshiaki is the only researcher in the world to accomplish this technology with biomolecular interaction. 

In the second part, Yoshiaki is developing automated screening process for material discovery. Traditionally, materials with specific properties are synthesized by random trials one by one, but Yoshiaki’s technique can change this process much efficiently with the large genetic screening method. He uses evolution of viruses that bind and develop target materials and the library of this evolution will provide us the sequences of peptides to grow these materials, so-called phage display.  Therefore, this selected peptide can be used as a scaffold to synthesize target materials at room temperature. Again, nobody is currently applying evolution analysis to materials synthesis and this project can revolutionize current material sciences.

Self-Assembly and biomimetics of soft nanomaterials

Postdoctoral research fellow, Vijai Shankar Balachnadran, PhD
Mentor: Professor George John PhD

Dr. Vijai Shankar Balachandran did his Masters in Applied Chemistry from Anna University, Chennai. He received his Ph.D from the Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IITM), India, under the supervision of Prof. Archita Patnaik. His research was on the supramolecular architectures of functional amphiphiles in two and three dimensions for fabrication of functional materials and evaluating chiral discrimination at interfaces. His thesis earned him the Werners’ Prize for Best Thesis 2008 and Prof. Ms. Ramamurthy award for Best Thesis 2008.

Currently he is a postdoctoral research associate in Dr. George John’s Soft Materials Laboratory, (Chemistry) at City College. His current research interests are design and development of soft nanomaterials from renewable resources through self-assembly, reconfigurable assemblies, biomimetic molecules, molecular gels and supramolecular aggregation phenomena. One of his recent research works has featured in Angewandte Chemie (International Edition) as a cover page article.

structure & blood-flow-pattern-induced reorganization of the endothelium

Postdoctoral research fellow, Eno Essien Ebong, PhD
CUNY Mentor: Professor John Tarbell, PhD / Albert Einstein SoM Mentor: Professor David Spray PhD

Although, Dr. Eno Essien Ebong is currently a postdoctoral researcher working with faculty members both at City College and Albert Einstein College of Medicine, her passion for scientific research started early, when she was a summer undergraduate trainee. In 1995, when Ebong began her studies in Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, she worked as an NIH-sponsored summer apprentice with Dr. Lorraine Flaherty at the New York State Department of Health Wadsworth Center. Under Dr. Flaherty’s guidance she employed the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique to analyze the genetic effects on mice of the chemotherapy drug Chlorambucil. Ebong later worked with Dr. Ernest Cravalho, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT, to investigate approaches for measuring in vivo tissue stiffness, with a view towards designing a “glove” device for prostate cancer detection. Throughout her undergraduate studies, Dr. Ebong was also involved in industry research with Hewlett- Packard’s (HP) Chemical Analysis and Health Solutions Groups (now part of Agilent and Philips, respectively). At HP she used sophisticated statistical and engineering methods to design, execute, and analyze experiments related to chromatograph and ultrasound transducer development.

From 2000 to 2006, Ebong pursued graduate studies (MEng and PhD) in Biomedical Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). She worked with Dr. Natacha DePaola, integrating biofluid mechanics and blood vessel cell biology to demonstrate that fluid shear stress augments cell-to-cell communication in the human endothelial cells (EC) that line blood vessel walls (Ebong et al., American Journal of Physiology Heart and Circulatory Physiology, 2006). For her achievements, Dr. Ebong was awarded the 2006 Karen and Lester Gerhardt Prize by RPI, and the 2006 Zelda and David G. Gisser Prize in Biomedical Engineering by the Rensselaer Department of Biomedical Engineering.

Dr. Ebong works with both Dr. John Tarbell in the Biomedical Engineering Department at City College and Dr. David Spray at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Using rapid cryopreservation and transmission electron microscopy techniques, she has begun to define the structure and blood-flow-pattern-induced reorganization of the endothelial cell sugar coat—or glycocalyx—that is shed in vascular disease (Ebong et al., Arteriosclerosis Thrombosis and Vascular Biology, 2011). Dr. Ebong also studies the mechanisms that determine how glycocalyx participates in the process of blood fluid forces affecting the endothelial cell function and dysfunction associated with vascular health and disease. Her long-term career goals are to identify mechanically-regulated cellular and molecular targets and to develop novel tools to prevent, diagnose, and treat disease.

Dr. Ebong has been an active and engaged member of the CUNY Postdoctoral Development Program. In a recent presentation to the CUNY Summer Undergraduate Research Program (C-SURP) she detailed a number of reasons why a postdoctorate position is necessary for laying the groundwork for a career in scientific research both inside and outside of academia. A postdoctorate extends the career decision-making and transition time period, which enables a researcher to: learn new techniques and/or a new discipline, expand a professional network of leaders and peers in the field, increase her number of publications, gain experience in writing grant and fellowship applications, and enhance her teaching skills. Dr. Ebong also strongly encourages all postdoctoral researchers to map out and adhere to a structured postdoctoral development plan, and to have regular progress reviews with their advisors.

Global climate models (GCM) & their performance in simulating current climate

Postdoctoral research fellow, Aavudai Anandhi, PhD
Mentor: Professor Allan Frei, PhD
Collaborators: New York City Department of Environmental Protection (NYCDEP) and Tammo Steenhuis, Cornell University

Dr. Aavudai Anandhi is a postdoctoral research associate at the CUNY Institute for Sustainable Cities (CISC) under Deputy Director Allan Frei.  Her present research focuses primarily on the statistical analysis of Global climate models (GCM), their performance in simulating current climate, their reliability in predicting future climate change at a regional level, estimating future scenarios of hydrometeorological variables at a watershed level using different downscaling techniques. Her present research also focuses on uncertainties in future scenarios due to GCMs, downscaling methods, emission scenarios and analysis of changes extreme events in the hydrometeorological variables.

Before joining CISC, she earned a Bachelor of Engineering (Agriculture) from  Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU), a Master of Engineering in Civil Engineering (Irrigation Water Management) from Anna University in Chennai India, and her PhD in Water Resources and Environmental Engineering from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc).

Her past experience includes research and consultancy in Remote Sensing and GIS applications in water resources, agriculture, and watershed modeling. Her future goals include working with organizations to develop methodologies for sustainable development of watersheds and also impact assessment of climate change in regions of the world and in various fields (such as hydrology, agriculture, aquaculture, health etc).

carotenoid compounds in enhancing stress tolerances in grasses

Postdoctoral research fellow, Abby Cuttriss, PhD
Mentor: Professor Eleonore Wurtzel, PhD

Dr. Abby Cuttriss, a postdoctoral research fellow at Lehman College, recently received one of twelve fellowships awarded to New Zealand's brightest young researchers. Every two years, under New Zealand's Foundation for Research, Science and Technology, a small number of postdoctoral researchers are awarded the three-year fellowships that provide stipends, and research and travel expenses (~ US$216,000). This program is designed to foster the development of New Zealand's emerging and future science leader. Among this round's recipients, Dr. Cuttriss was one of only two fellows awarded to conduct research outside of New Zealand.