Nathan Ennist came to NC State in August, 2025. He is an Assistant Professor with a joint appointment in the Department of Molecular and Structural Biochemistry and the Department of Physics and Astronomy. He obtained a Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics in 2017 under the supervision of P. Leslie Dutton and Christopher C. Moser at the University of Pennsylvania. Nate completed a postdoc with David Baker’s group at the University of Washington in 2025.

Nathan Ennist <[email protected]>

Derek Wei, Ph.D. joined the lab in September, 2025. Derek is a Simons Postdoctoral Fellow designing high-potential pigment-binding proteins with the goal of creating de novo photosynthetic reaction centers. His long-term research aims to engineer improved oxygenic photosynthetic pathways that could ultimately enable faster-growing crops and more cost-effective biofuel production.

Derek Wei <[email protected]>

Jesse Granstrom, Ph.D. joined the lab as a postdoc in February, 2026. Jesse completed his Ph.D. in Kevin Redding’s group at Arizona State University where he studied electron transfer in the Heliobacterial reaction center.

Jesse Granstrom <[email protected]>

Rene Ganoe, M.S. joined the lab in January, 2026. Rene is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Physics. She is using computational design to build de novo photosynthetic reaction centers, with the aim of characterizing charge separation and electron transfer in assemblies of excitonically coupled chromophores.

Rene Ganoe <[email protected]>

Camila Lewton is an undergraduate student at NC State majoring in Biochemistry. She joined the lab in February, 2026 and is working on designing oxygen-transport proteins to develop new proteins for blood substitutes.

Andrew Sauk is an undergraduate student at NC State majoring in Biochemistry. He joined the lab in January, 2026.

Andrew Sauk <[email protected]>