Graduate scholar Cassie Zaremba has been named a T32 fellow as part of the Anti-Infectives Training Grant. The NIH-funded training grant supports graduate students in the biomedical and biosciences enrolled in the Laney Graduate Schoola school that offers advanced degrees. Important! Some schoo... More of Emory University who conduct basic research dealing with mechanisms of antimicrobial resistance and therapeutic discovery to combat infectious diseases.
Cassie grew up in Cleveland, Ohio and earned her Bachelor degree in Chemistry in 2016 from Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio. During her undergraduate career, she completed her thesisa written work (long essay or multi-chapter document) descri... More work on the total synthesis of both enantiomers of pilosinine under the guidance of Dr. Richard Mullins. After her graduation, she went on to work as a technical associate at Milliken and Company in South Carolina for two years in the Plastic Additives division. Her desire to advance her career finally led her to join the Wuest Group in January of 2019. Outside of the lab, she loves to try out new recipes, spend time with friends, and cuddle her cat, George.
As a T32 Fellow, Cassie is investigating a novel natural product which has shown antibacterial activity against several gram-negative pathogens, most notably Acinetobacter baummann. A. baummannii is an opportunistic pathogen that is highly prevalent amongst many gram-negative, hospital-acquired infections. It is the causative agent of well-known diseases such as pneumonia and meningitis, as well as blood borne infections.