Student is being watched by mentor
Ashley Vater watches as Patrick Fournier works with a sample. (Gregory Urquiaga/UC Davis)

Catalyzing Change: Engineering Enzymes to Meet Human Needs

Design2Data Program Equips Student Researchers to Innovate in Food, Energy and Health

This article originally appeared in UC Davis News and the full article is found here, written by José Vadi.

Design2Data, or D2D, is a project that provides undergraduate students with early laboratory experiences learning about enzymes and related protein structures with findings that contribute to a national network of data. D2D is an extension of chemistry professor Justin Siegel’s lab at the UC Davis Genome Center.

The program revolves around an enzyme design-build-test workflow, where students are instructed through and then independently conduct a series of field-standard experiments. The program has been incubated as a Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience, or CURE, in the first-year seminar program, and is part of a collection of classes to encourage new undergraduates to explore laboratory experiences.

An average of 30 independent undergraduate researchers have worked in the Siegel Lab, starting with the D2D project and then advancing into graduate-mentored enzyme engineering research projects in the lab.

Student at laptop
Amanda Lastimado, a microbiology major, works on her laptop during the Design2Data class. (Gregory Urquiaga/UC Davis)

Read the full article here
To learn more about the Siegel lab, click here

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