Dr. Juan Guillermo (Guillo) Cadena

Guillo was born in Chicago, IL. on November 22, 1969, and grew up in Tampa, Florida. Guillo was a graduate of Jesuit High School in Tampa where he excelled in athletics and was a member of the state champion soccer team. He moved to New England in the mid-1990s and received his undergraduate degree from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2000. After a brief return to Florida, Guillo moved back to Amherst in 2002 to join the Molecular and Cellular Biology (MCB) graduate program as a Ph.D. candidate. Guillo received his Ph.D. in 2009 under the mentorship of Dr. Larry Schwartz. Dr. Cadena’s research focused on understanding why a certain population of cells called dopaminergic neurons are uniquely vulnerable to degeneration in individuals with autosomal juvenile parkinsonism (ARJP).

Guillo was extremely dedicated to his research and had always credited the successful completion of his Ph.D. to the strong support of his advisor Dr. Schwartz, as well as many distinguished faculty members in the MCB program who guided him throughout the process. Guillo also conducted research at the Pioneer Valley Life Sciences Institute in Springfield, MA.

In his teenage years, Guillo was diagnosed with aplastic anemia and sought a suitable bone marrow donor for nearly 30 years. In 2010, Guillo was diagnosed with metastatic cancer and within a few months had succumbed to complications from chemotherapy treatment. At the time of his passing in July, 2010 Guillo was survived by his wife, 2-year old twins (Amaya and Gabriel), parents, siblings, and many close friends.

The Cadena Travel and Training Fund

The Cadena Travel and Training Fund was established in 2020, 10 years after Guillo’s passing. In memory of his dedication to science and teaching, Guillo’s close friends Nasser and Susanne Rusan, with help and support from Guillo’s family, believed it was only fitting to keep Guillo’s memory alive by giving back to the MCB program, a program that Guillo deeply cherished. Read more

There are more cells in the human body than there are stars in the Milk Way, and billions of these cells reproduce themselves every day through cell division. Essentially, a single cell splits, pulling apart its chromosomes perfectly, and then reforming as two separate cells with two separate, but full sets of perfectly identical chromosomes. Normally, this process works flawlessly, but when it doesn’t, when more chromosomes wind up in one cell than the other—a condition called aneuploidy—the results can be serious and range from cancer to birth defects.

Thomas Maresca, professor of biology at UMass Amherst, is an expert in cell division, and his work was recently recognized by the Fulbright Scholar’s program. Maresca will spend the Spring semester at Portugal’s Institute de Investigação e Inovação em Saúde da Universidade do Porto working closely with another leader in the field of cell division, Helder Maiato. Maiato has recently pioneered the use of Indian Muntjac (barking deer) cells to study cell division, which is a powerful advance because it allows cell division researchers to apply a reductionist approach to an incredibly complex process in living cells.

Maresca’s goal is to map the pathways that cells utilize to achieve faithful chromosome segregation, which is vital to normal embryonic development and the maintenance of healthy tissues through adulthood. To do so, he and his colleagues need to find answers to two crucial questions: how do cells detect and correct errors during division, and how do cells actually reinforce the physical connections between the chromosomes and the spindle, which is the structure that helps pull the chromosomes apart.

“Scientifically speaking, I can’t wait to get to work with Helder Maiato and his team to make important contributions to our field and to also establish an impactful international collaboration,” says Maresca. “Beyond the science, the Fulbright Program was formed after World War II to promote peace by building cultural bridges between the U.S. and nations around the world, which means that the program expects its awardees to serve as ‘cultural ambassadors.’ It is exciting and humbling that my family and I have been given the opportunity to serve in this role and to help advance the Fulbright’s mission.”

Wednesday, March 9, 2022
2:00 PM
Zoom
Dissertation Title:  Human Saposin B Ligand Binding and Presentation to α-Galactosidase A
Advisor:  Scott Garman

Like other scientists, Craig Martin, professor of chemistry at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, believes there is enormous potential in mRNA for both vaccines and therapeutics more broadly. Together with collaborators in UMass Amherst’s Department of Chemical Engineering, Martin is developing a new manufacturing process for RNA that promises to remove the key barriers that constrain its use in treating and preventing disease today. This, he said, would open doors to everything from personalized cancer treatments, to better therapies for genetic disorders like Tay-Sachs and cystic fibrosis, to the ability to quickly and inexpensively develop vaccines that could be deployed around the globe against the next pathogen to threaten public health.

For more than 30 years, Martin’s lab has studied the chemical mechanisms of RNA polymerase, an enzyme that controls the process of transcription; in which information from DNA is copied into a new molecule of mRNA. Several years ago, it pivoted to improving the process of RNA manufacturing to avoid the impurities from the start. Rather than using a traditional batch reactor to produce RNA—in which the components are mixed and sit for several hours—they wanted to create a flow reactor to enable chemical reactions in continuous, flowing systems. “The main benefit of this approach is that the RNA never sits around the enzyme for too long, preventing the secondary reaction,” that causes the impurity, said Martin.

On this endeavor, Martin has partnered with Sarah Perry, associate professor of chemical engineering, an expert in flow systems, and Shelly Peyton, professor of chemical engineering, whose work on biomaterials will be applied to the flow reactor. Perry and Peyton will work to refine and scale the initially developed smaller version of the process to be suitable for industrial uses.

This promising research has received support from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Massachusetts Technology Transfer Center, UMass Amherst’s Institute for Applied Life Sciences (IALS), and the Manning Innovation Program at UMass Amherst. In late 2021, it was also selected for funding from the Wellcome Leap R3 program, which seeks to create a global network of “biofoundries” capable of producing high quality, low-cost mRNA. Read more