Another week, another defense and the last one for the year!✨🎓 Congratulations to María Fernanda Lizarazo on a spectacular PhD defense.🍾 Cheers to this incredible milestone and the exciting research journey ahead of you! Wishing you all the very best! 🔬🎉

4th PhD defense in the Bren Lab this year!! 🎓 Congratulations to Dr. Kaye Kuphal on her successful defense today! We wish her all the very best in her future endeavors and everything that lies ahead. 🤠🍾🎉

Shamitri passed her PhD qualifying exam today!!! Big congratulations and welcome to the post-quals gang! 👏🏻🎊

Mafe sharing her awesome work on biomolecular catalysts + CdSe quantum dots at ACS Spring 2026! ☀️👩🏻‍🔬

Cheers to Ryan on an incredible defense! One of our amazing mentors and an OG photochemist of the lab! Wishing you all the best for everything that comes next!🥳🥂✨

Second defense of the month!!!!! Congratulations Dr. Hafsa Irfan on a successful defense, can't wait to see what she does next, best wishes! 🎉🥳🎓

So great and honored to see our Bren Lab girls, Karishma @karishma11.bsky.social and Alana meet their Academic Grandpa, Prof. Harry B Gray at GRC Metals in Biology, 2026 presenting their cool work on cytochrome c proteins!!🥂🎓

So proud of Dr. Soraya Ngarnim! Congratulations on a fantastic thesis defense and excited to see what's next! 🎉🥂🎓

Happy to have our brand new Bren lab members here!!! 🎉 Welcome Rohith and Liz, excited to see some cool science our new grads will create!!🥂🥳

Shout-out to @karishma11.bsky.social for being awarded the Samuel A. and Ellen F. Lattimore Department Fellowship this year!! Huge congrats!! ✨🙌

Kudos to Alana Huynh for receiving the Robert and Marian Flaherty DeRight Department Fellowship this year!! Well done!!🥂👏

Cheering on Hafsa Irfan for her summer internship at Biogen, North Carolina, where she contributed to drug development and analysis. Way to go Hafsa!! 👏👩‍🔬

Congrats @kayekuphal.bsky.social on an exciting collaboration with the @matsonlab.bsky.social, exploring some really cool cluster chemistry with electrocatalysis! 👏🎉 Check out their latest work here! pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Proton Reduction with a Cobalt-Doped Thiomolybdate Cluster: A Structural and Functional Model of Co-Doped MoS2

A heterometallic thiomolybdate cluster, Cp*3CoMo2S4 (Cp* = 1,2,3,4,5-pentamethylcyclopentadienide) has been synthesized and identified as a molecular electrocatalyst for proton reduction in dimethylformamide. Compared with its homometallic congener (Cp*3Mo3S4), cobalt incorporation improves activity by lowering the overpotential for proton reduction, consistent with the contrasting catalytic performance of MoS2 and its Co-doped derivative. Isolation of the reduced form of Cp*3CoMo2S4 and subsequent reactivity studies provide insight into the reaction pathway. These findings establish Cp*3CoMo2S4 as a molecular model for extended sulfide materials.

pubs.acs.org

Proud of Maria Fernanda Lizarazo for earning a DAAD Scholarship and spending the summer doing research in Germany 🇩🇪 Welcome back to Bren Lab! ✨

Happy to share our recent publication presenting methods for photocatalytic hydrogen and carbon dioxide reduction using biomolecular catalysts! Check it out by following this link! www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Evaluation of biocatalysts for artificial photosynthesis

Catalyzing the light-driven reduction of carbon dioxide and/or protons is an important approach to storing light energy in the form of chemical fuels …

sciencedirect.com

Congratulations to @karishma11.bsky.social for winning the Best Poster at Western New York Inorganic Symposium (WNYIS), 2025! 🎉🌟

End of summer picnic, Bren Lab style!! 👜🌳 And cheers to celebrating Alana's birthday!

Happy to share our Nitrogen team's latest work on nitrate reduction with homogenous iron catalyst! 🎉 pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Homogeneous Electrocatalytic Reduction of Nitrate by an Iron Complex in Water

An iron complex of the macrocyclic pyridine(diimine) ligand 2,13-dimethyl-3,6,9,12,18-pentaazabicyclo[12.3.1]octadeca-1(18),2,12,14,16-pentaene (FeN5H2) is demonstrated as a homogeneous electrocatalys...

pubs.acs.org

Alana sharing her exciting research at the CBI retreat 2025!

End of Quals season celebration in the Bren Lab! Alana and Karishma passed their 2nd year oral exam!!!🎉

@brenlab.bsky.social at CanBIC-9

Congratulations Alana Huynh for winning the "Best Poster in Natural Sciences" at UofR's Graduate Research Day 2025. Way to go!🥳

I'm pleased to share our latest paper with our wonderful collaborators in the Lombardi lab on a biocatalyst for selective CO2 reduction: pubs.rsc.org/en/content/a...

Karishma and Shamitri representing Bren Lab at the Department's visitation week poster presentation! @karishma11.bsky.social

A huge shout out our amazing visiting student Serena from the Lombardi Lab, University of Naples for her time and hard work in the Bren lab! Your enthusiasm and positive energy have truly been appreciated. Wishing you all the very best for all your future endeavors!! 👏

Super excited to share our latest review on recent advances in engineered biocatalysts for hydrogen evolution and carbon dioxide reduction doi.org/10.1016/j.cb... by Ryan Kosko, Kaye Lin Kuphal and Alison Salamatian! www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Engineered metallobiocatalysts for energy–relevant reactions

Engineering metallobiocatalysts is a promising approach to addressing challenges in energy-relevant electrocatalysis and photocatalysis. The design fr…

sciencedirect.com

Big congratulations to Kaye Lin Kuphal @kayekuphal.bsky.social on being selected as a leader in Research Safety as part of the ACS Graduate Student and Postdoctoral Scholars Recognition Program! 🎉 Your dedication to ensuring a safe and responsible lab environment is truly inspiring! #LabSafety #ACS

Hello world! Bren Lab is now on Bluesky! We focus on developing new molecules, engineered proteins and systems to catalyze energy & environment relevant reactions, drawing inspiration from Nature's own catalysts. #chemsky #bioinorganic #UofR

Hello #ChemSky