Kou Research Group Alumni

Postdoctoral Scholars:

Xuezhen Kou, Ph.D.

Email Address: xuezhenk AT ucr.edu
Biography: Xuezhen was born and raised in Shandong province, China. After he received his B.S. in chemistry, he joined Zengming Shen's Lab and Xiaofeng Tong's Lab for his Master's degree. Then, he moved to Wanbin Zhang's Group for his doctoral studies at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. In October 2018, he joined our group for his postdoctoral research. During his free time, he enjoys watching movies, running, and reading.

Maja Chojnacka, Ph.D.

Robert Crowley III, Ph.D.

Aaron Pan, Ph.D.

Past Experience: Ecolab, 3M, Measurement Technology Laboratories, Best Buy Corporate
Hobbies: gaming, music, puzzles/riddles (despite being really bad at them), anime/manga
Favorite Quote: "Sure, I'll be right there. Just give me like five...ten...forty minutes."
Favorite Shows: Archer, Bob's Burgers, Friends, Doctor Who, Running Man
Biography: B.S. University of Minnesota Twin Cities, 2016
Current Institution: International Flavors and Fragrance

Taylor Alexander, Ph.D.

Biography: Taylor was born and raised in Los Angeles, California before moving east to attend Indiana University-Bloomington, where he obtained his B.S. in Biotechnology as well as minors in Chemistry and Spanish in 2016. He likes to spend his free time weightlifting, boxing, snowboarding and watching football.
Time in Lab: 2019-2020
Current Institution: 858 Therapeutics, Medicinal Chemistry

Viviene Nguyen, Ph.D.

Biography: Born in the Bay Area, Viviene relocated to Southern California where she received her B.S. in Biochemistry in 2018 from University of California, Los Angeles. At UCLA, she developed a keen interest in chemical synthesis and biology. Upon graduation, Viviene joined our group to investigate and construct intricate organic molecules. When not running a column or munching on Clif Bars, she can be found listening to true-crime podcasts, swimming laps in the pool, predicting Oscar contenders, and cultivating her love of pickled foods.
Current Institution: OliX Pharmaceuticals

Andy Trinh, Ph.D.

Favorite Quote: “Rule 32: Enjoy The Little Things”
Biography: Andy was born in San Jose but traveled south to University of California, Irvine where he obtained his B.S. in Chemistry in 2018. He spends mornings at the gym and weekends at the dog park. Some of his hobbies include playing hockey, gaming, discovering new restaurants, and Netflix.

Nicholas Akkawi

Past Experience: Grossman Lab - Carnegie-Stanford; Julian Lab - UCR
Biography: Nick is currently a 3rd year Biochemistry major with medical emphasis. Previous to working in the Kou lab, he worked in The Julian Lab at UCR and The Grossman lab at Carnegie-Stanford. Research interests include immunotherapy, analytical application of mass spectrometry in proteomics, Biochemistry pathways of GPCRs in photosynthetic organisms, metal catalysis, and amino acid chemistry. Additional to this he loves sports, learning new mechanisms, hanging with friends and trying new food spots.
Current Institution: UNC Chapel Hill, Chemistry

Beter Zaki

Yaseen Hakim

Sabrine Hossain

Emil Dominguez

Email Address: dominguezray90 AT gmail DOT com
Biography: Born in Whittier, California, Emil attended Rio Hondo Community College, where he developed a passion for chemistry. In the spring of 2021, he joined our group to explore natural product synthesis and become familiar with a research laboratory's inner workings. In fall 2022, Emil will transfer to UCLA as a biochemistry major. Outside of the laboratory, Emil works as a physics tutor and volunteers as a course instructor with the Prison Education Project at the California Institution for Men and Riverside Southwest Juvenile
Time in Lab: 04/2021-06/2022
Current Institution: UCLA

Charlene Fan

Biography: Biology major and became interested in research after taking organic chemistry with Dr. Kou. Enjoys hiking, jogging, and cooking/baking in free time.
Time in Lab: 10/2021-06/2022

Alex Martinez

Melody Wu

Biography: Born in the U.S, Melody spent her elementary years in Hong Kong and Taiwan and moved back to America in the 6th grade. She is currently a fourth-year biology major and chemistry minor. Melody developed an interest in organic chemistry while taking Dr. Kou’s CHEM008B class and joined our group in the summer of 2021. When not setting up reactions in the glovebox or tutoring students, she spends her free time practicing yoga, bullet journaling, reading classics, and catching up on kpop content.

Jose Aleman

Biography: Originally from Peru, José transferred to UCR from Fullerton College and has been a peer facilitator for sophomore organic chemistry courses. In the summer of 2021, he acquired research experience at NC State University on high-throughput sequencing of tiny maize hoppers. Pfizer's $20,000 fellowship will fund his research in synthesizing medicinally-relevant natural molecules. As part of the fellowship, José will present his research at Pfizer in La Jolla and interact with Pfizer scientists in August 2022!

Jeffrey Doeve

Arpita Kanrar