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The Blair Lab Members
Dr. Ian Blair, Ph.D.
Ian Blair, Ph.D. Research in the Blair laboratory is heavily involved in the use of mass spectrometry for proteomics and DNA analysis.
Oxidative stress, carcinogenesis, and cardiovascular disease
The reactive oxygen species superoxide, peroxide, and hydroxyl radical, are generated constantly in vivo from ground state triplet oxygen. This occurs by a variety of endogenous processes including, normal mitochondrial aerobic respiration, phagocytosis of bacteria or virus-containing cells, and peroxisomal-mediated degradation of fatty acids. Catechols, which arise in vivo through the metabolism of drugs, environmental chemicals, and endogenous hormones, generate reactive oxygen species through redox cycling.
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Jasbir Singh Arora, Ph.D.
Jasbir Singh Arora re-joined Dr. Blair’s lab as a research associate in January 2008. Earlier he had worked for two years (2002-2004) in Dr. Blair’s lab and was involved in the synthesis of bi-functional electrophiles which were used to study the modifications in biological systems to understand mechanism of oxidative stress. During his one year stay at University of Central Florida, he worked on the chemical ligations especially the amide bond facilitating the formation of peptide bond in aqueous conditions. He was also involved in the studies of the self assembly of a phase III molecule for diabetes in collaboration with Mannkind Biopharmaceuticals. He received his Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from Guru Nanak Dev University Amritsar, India. The key features of the Ph.D. work involved synthesis of tetrahydrofolate Coenzyme Models (Oxazolidines and Oxazinanes) and study their potential as carbon transfer reagents.
As a result a new methodology for the synthesis of alpha-tetralones, 4H-pyrans and benzopyrans, xanthanediones, acridinediones, pyridines, pyridopyrimidines was developed. He also has extensive experience in the industrial set up. He served in the New Drug Discovery Department of Ranbaxy Research Laboratories, India for seven years. At Ranbaxy, he worked on different therapeutic areas like diabetes, cancer, anti-infectives and was involved in the design and synthesis of new chemical entities. He also led a team of scientists in a GSK-Ranbaxy collaborative anti-infective project. Presently, he is working on the synthesis of labeled and unlabeled intermediates, generated during various stages of oxidative stress. He is also working on the development of quantification methods for PUFA in biological systems, using LC-MS/MS.
Showket Bhat, Ph.D.
Showket Bhat received his PhD in 2007 He completed his studies at the Aligarh Muslim University in India and worked as a Research Associate at the Indian Institute of Science, Molecular Biophysics Unit, Bangalore, INDIA He began his postdoctoral work in the Blair Lab in February of 2007. His current research efforts in the Blair Lab are directed at understanding the cellular changes that occur due to exposure of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) and their downstream oxidized metabolites. The near future goal of the work would be to validate certain isoforms of Aldo-ketoreductases as candidate biomarkers of tobacco smoke exposure. His work will also investigate the validation of several low MW compounds- specific DNA adducts and oxidized lipids, as candidate biological response biomarkers to carcinogen exposure.
Arnaldo J. Diaz, Ph.D.
Arnaldo J. Diaz joined the Blair lab in August 2008 as a postdoctoral research fellow. He received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Texas A&M University in 2008. As a NIH-predoctoral fellow, Arnaldo focused his dissertation project in the development of new analytical tools to purify and characterize transmembrane and membrane-associated species. He also participated as a team member in the study of multivalent ligand-receptor interactions between toxins and membrane-bound glycolipids, the development of biological platforms for sensing applications, and the use of supported phospholipids membranes to study the role of trehalose in the mechanism of anhydrobiotic preservation. At Professor Blair's Lab, his research efforts are directed to develop a LC/MS method for identifying biomarkers in EBC (exhaled breath condensate) with the goal of creating a panel of biomarkers to distinguish nonsmokers from smokers. At Penn, Arnaldo is actively involved with the Biomedical Postdoc Council, where he serves as the Treasure and as member of the Diversity Committee. He is also involved with the Leadership Alliance National Organization.
Stacy Gelhaus, Ph.D.
Stacy Gelhaus received her Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County in 2005. Her thesis work focused on the mechanism of ion-pairing reversed-phase liquid chromatography and its application to the separation of unique nucleic acid structures and conformations. Her postdoctoral research has focused on the metabolism of environmental carcinogens, such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and their relation to lung cancer, for which she has received an NRSA Postdoctoral Fellowship. She is also looking at the interaction between hydrocarbon metabolism and the formation of oxidized bioactive lipids. Aside from her research, Stacy is a Co-chair of the Biomedical Postdoc Council at Penn and a member of the National Postdoc Association Board of Directors.
Stefanie Khartulyari, M.S.
Stefanie Khartulyari joined the Blair lab on October, 2007 as a researcher. She received her masters degree in chemistry from the University of Tuebingen. Her master thesis was focused on the LC-MS analysis of modified nucleosides from plasma of women with breast cancer. She is currently studying free thiol amino acids and peptides by stable isotope dilution LC-MS in cells.
Clementina Mesaros, Ph.D.
Clementina Mesaros joined the Blair lab in September 2004. She received her Ph. D. in organic chemistry from CASE University, Cleveland. Her graduate research in Prof. Robert Salomon's lab, involved the total synthesis of several oxidized phosphoplipids and mechanistic studies of lipids oxidation. During her three years of post-doctoral training in the Blair lab, she worked on the synthesis of reactive bifunctional electrophiles derived from AA. Clementina was also involved in identification of a novel 4-oxo-2(E)-nonenal adduct with glutathione (TOG) as a biomarker of oxidative stress using LC/MS approaches. She developed an LC/MS method for quantification of epoxy-eicosatrienoic acids and dihyrdroxy eicosatrienoic acids in biological samples. Clementina is now a Research Associate in the Blair lab and she is working on developing LC/MS assays for urinary biomarkers of oxidative stress.
Kannan Rangiah, Ph.D.
Kannan Rangiah joined the Blair lab on 10th of April 2006 as a visiting scholar. He has done his research work at International Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB), New Delhi, India and submitted his thesis to University of Delhi, New Delhi, India. His PhD thesis is mainly focused on the mode of action of the most promising antimalarial drug artemisinin. He has shown the formation of mono and dialkylated adducts in the reaction of artemisinin with free heme and heme of hemoglobin. The formation of adduct seems to be crucial to inhibit the hemozoin biosynthesis, which forms during the hemoglobin degradation pathway of malaria parasite. His current interest is to develop biomarker for colon cancer using proteomics approach and understanding the mechanism of oxidative stress, which produced almost all the diseases.
Vineet Sangar, Ph.D.
Vineet Sangar has a Bachelors degree in Agricultural Sciences with Honors from Punjab Agricultural University. He then completed his Masters in Plant Molecular Genetics from the Penn State University. He worked in a X-ray crystallography lab for a year before starting his PhD. He received his PhD in Biochemistry from The Pennsylvania State University. His thesis work focused on the analysis of protein function using sequence and structure. He developed computational tools to analyze the relationship between protein sequence and function and also contributed to prediction of the ligand for proteins. Vineet joined Blair lab in the June of 2008 and is working on developing novel proteomics based assays to identify biomarkers for pre-term labor. He is also developing bioinformatics tools for analyzing the proteomics data using the systems biology approach.
Sumit Shah, Ph.D.
Sumit Shah joined the Blair Lab in January 2007 to gain expertise in applying various proteomics strategies for discovering novel protein biomarkers in different human diseases and disorders. Sumit has a Bachelors’ degree in Pharmacy from University of Mumbai, India (1994-1998), and a PhD in Pharmacology from The University of Louisiana at Monroe, USA (1999-2004). His dissertation research focused on identifying the molecular targets of vitamin E (tocotrienols)-mediated growth inhibition and apoptosis in breast cancer cell models. He then completed his post-doctoral training in the Dmitrovsky Lab at Dartmouth Medical School (2004-2006), where he worked on characterizing the significance of protein degradation pathway (ISG15 conjugation) as a molecular target of vitamin A (retinoids) in acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL); and validating cyclin D1 as a biomarker for drug response to Targretin® (novel rexinoid) and Tarceva® in human clinical trials for advanced lung cancer.
Sumit’s current research efforts in Blair Lab are focused on identifying and validating novel protein biomarkers for preterm birth in human patients by utilizing proteomics technology. Sumit has been working on developing LC-MRM/MS based quantitative assays for candidate biomarkers in cervical-vaginal fluid (CVF) and plasma samples obtained from pregnant women for diagnosis of preterm birth (PTB), a major health concern for OB-GYNs.
Kenneth H. Yu, M.D.
Kenneth H. Yu is an Instructor in the Division of Hematology/Oncology, University of Pennsylvania. He received his B.A. in Biology at Harvard University in (1991-95). He then went on to medical school at Johns Hopkins University (1995-99). Dr. Yu completed his residency training in Internal Medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (1999-02). Pursuing a life-long interest in cancer, he has recently completed a fellowship in Hematology/Oncology at Penn. During this time, he developed an interest in gastrointestinal malignancies, and pancreatic cancer in particular. In 2003, he joined the laboratory of Ian Blair in the Department of Pharmacology, and began investigating tumor markers for the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer using proteomic techniques.
Tumor markers hold the promise of earlier diagnosis of disease and insight into the mechanisms underlying disease progression. Using 2-D gel electrophoresis, multi-dimensional liquid chromatography, novel labeling techniques, high performance mass spectrometers and sophisticated bioinformatics, we have made significant progress in the development of potential biomarkers for pancreatic cancer. Tumor markers provide an ideal opportunity to translate basic research findings into the clinical setting, and I plan on continuing this work as part of the Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics fellowship. Our work has resulted in two manuscripts recently published in the Journal of Proteome Research. Our research advances with the active collaboration of Anil Rustgi, Department of Gastroenterology, and David Tuveson, Division of Hematology/Oncology.
Graduate Students
Sankha (Bobby) Basu
Bobby is a MD/PhD student in the Department of Pharmacology, and has recently begun his thesis work in the Blair Lab studying toxicology and novel mass spectral biomarkers of oxidative stress. He attended MIT as an undergraduate where he earned a B.S. in Biology and Chemical Engineering in 2003. After graduation, he worked on HIV vaccine development in New York.
Matthew MacDonald
Matthew MacDonald is a PhD candidate in the department of Pharmacology. He attended Oglethorpe University where he earned a B.S. in biology with a minor in chemistry. After graduation he worked as a technician at McLean Hospital researching psychiatric disease and psychotropic pharmacology. Matt joined the Blair Lab in 2007. His thesis work focuses on utilizing novel biochemical and proteomic techniques to investigate NMDA receptor complex dysfunction in schizophrenia.
Marissa Martinez
Marissa Martinez received a B.S. in biochemistry from the University of New Mexico in 2005. Her undergraduate research focused on the role of RRM3 helicase in DNA double-strand break repair, which has been shown to cause genomic instability and cancer. Currently her research will focus on platelet proteomics and subsequent nitrative protein modifications.
Xiaojing Liu
Xiaojing Liu graduated from University of Science and Technology of China in 2007. She is a Ph.D. candidate in the Chemistry department and arrived in the Blair Lab in September 2008. In her current project she is trying to identify a potential bifunctional electrophile, which is a possible product of the 15-HpETE decomposition. Its biological effect, such as the modification of DNA and proteins will also be studied, which can potentially serve as the biomarker of lipid hydroperoxide-mediated macromolecule damage.
Angela Wehr
Angela Wehr is a Ph.D. student in the Pharmacology Department. After completing her B.S. in biochemistry at Virginia Tech she worked for several years in the pharmaceutical industry as a bioanalytical chemist. Her thesis works is focused on improving the diagnosis and treatment of pancreatic cancer by studying tumor-stroma interactions. Using discovery based and quantitative proteomics approaches, she hopes to identify proteins that cancer cells and stellate cells use to communicate in the tumor microenvironment and promote tumor growth.
Cong Wei
Cong Wei is currently a graduate student in Pharmacology at Penn. She did her undergraduate study in the National Scientific Foundation at Wuhan University (Wuhan, China), and received her B.S. in Biology in 2002. She then went to Purdue University and received her M. S. in Neuroscience in 2005. She continued her graduate study in the Pharmacology Program at Penn and joined the Blair Lab in the summer of 2006.
Her current research is focused on quantifying the 15-lipoxygenase-derived lipid mediators using LC-ECAPCI/MS technique and characterizing the role of those lipid mediators in atherosclerosis.