Joseph is named a EUREKA Scholar!
June 2025
Joseph Salceda, a freshman studying Chemical Engineering, was named a Early Undergraduate Research Knowledge Acquisition (EUREKA!) scholar for the summer. He will be working on developing a 'protein Velcro' system for use in probiotic oral vaccines. Welcome to the lab Joe!
Janelle is a PhD candidate!
May 2025
Janelle has advanced to candidacy in the Chemical Engineering PhD program. Her project is "Developing an anaerobic cell-free protein expression platform for non-model microbes." Congrats Janelle!
Mills Lab Presents at ACS Spring 2025 Meeting In San Diego, CA
March 2025
August, Janelle, and Shoili presented their work at the conference! The titles of their talks and posters are listed here:
August: "Developing a virus-like particle vaccine scaffold to enable oral vaccine delivery" (BIOT oral presenter)
Janelle: "Developing a cell-free protein expression platform for anaerobic gut fungi" (BIOT poster session)
Shoili: "Examining the role of subcellular spatial organization in microbial ethylene glycol degradation" (BIOT poster session)
Natasha is named an ExFAB fellow!
March 2025
Natasha was named an ExFAB fellow! She will be working towards automated analysis of LLPS in cell-free systems.
Mills Lab Presents at Biophysical Society Annual Meeting 2025 in Los Angeles, CA
February 2025
Juyeon and Natasha presented their work at the conference! The titles of their posters are listed here:
Juyeon: "Utilizing homo-FRET polarization detection to characterize liquid-liquid phase separation of proteins in cell-free lysate systems"
Natasha: "Cell-free protein synthesis as a platform for studying liquid-liquid phase separation"
Mills Lab joins CNSI glove recycling initiative!
January 2025
We have joined the Laboratory Glove Recycling Initiative in collaboration with CNSI and support from the Green Initiative Fund. If your lab is interested in joining, contact Rachel Schoeppner!
Shoili receives Schmidt Family Foundation Research Accelerator Award!
January 2025
The Schmidt Family Foundation Research Accelerator Award focuses on funding projects for advancing science that have direct applications for environmental problem solving, leading to near-term solutions for conservation of the natural world. Shoili received this award for their research on "The Development of Spatially Organized Tools For a PET-Remediating Microbial Factory"
Janelle is named an ExFAB fellow!
January 2025
Janelle was named an ExFAB fellow! She will be working towards developing automated anaerobic cell-free protein expression platforms.
Jenna joins the lab!
January 2025
Jenna, a graduate student in the Chemical Engineering PhD program, joins the lab. Welcome Jenna!
Braeden joins the lab!
September 2024
Braeden, a graduate student in the Materials PhD program, joins the lab. He is co-advised with Prof. Rachel Segalman. Welcome Braeden!
ExFAB: an NSF Biofoundry
August 2024
The National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a six-year, $22M grant to UCSB for the establishment of the BioFoundry for Extreme and Exceptional Fungi, Archaea and Bacteria (ExFAB), a collaboration led by UC Santa Barbara (UCSB), together with UC Riverside (UCR), and Cal Poly Pomona (CPP). Read more in UCSB's news release and learn more about ExFAB facilities on their website!
Mills Lab presents at the 1st year Chemical Engineering Symposium
August 2024
Janelle, Juyeon, and Shoili wrap up the first year of their PhD program and present their work at the Chemical Engineering summer symposium.
August presents at the Undergraduate Summer Research Symposium
August 2024
August wraps up his time in the lab this summer and shares his findings at the undergraduate poster session for summer researchers.
Natasha joins the lab!
June 2024
Natasha, a graduate student in the BioEngineering PhD program, joins the lab. Welcome Natasha!
Eureka! The Mills Lab is Offically Open for Business
January 2024
We have set up our lab space in the BioEngineering department at UCSB. We can't wait to share what we are working on!