Yuval Elani - Group Leader 

Yuval Elani is a UKRI Future Leaders Fellow and Reader (Associate Professor) in Chemical Engineering at Imperial College London. He previously held EPSRC and Imperial Research Fellowships in Chemistry at Imperial and studied Natural Sciences at the University of Cambridge.

Yuval is a leading expert in synthetic cells, microfluidics, BioHybrids, synthetic biology, lipid nanoparticle design, and membrane engineering. Since earning his PhD in 2015, Yuval has secured numerous large-scale grants to conduct both frontier and applied research in these areas and has developed a broad portfolio of collaborations with clinicians and industry (Syngenta, GSK, AstraZeneca, Neobe). He has won multiple prizes and medals for his research breakthroughs, including the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee Roscoe Medal, Rita & John Cornforth Medal, Felix Franks Medal for Biotechnology, IChemE Nicklin Medal, and RSC Harrison-Meldola Memorial Prize. His work has been recognised by the World Economic Forum, who selected him to be part of their Young Scientist Community (50 under 40 worldwide). Yuval is co-director of the Membrane Biophysics Platform and co-founder and member of the executive of fabriCELL. He sits on the management team for the Leverhulme Centre for Cellular Bionics, and on the EPSRC Early Career Forum for Engineering. Yuval’s full CV can be found here.

Ignacio Gispert Contamina - Postdoc

Ignacio “Nacho” is working on synthetic cells for biomedical applications using cell-free protein synthesis and microfluidic techniques. After studying Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at Institut Químic de Sarrià (IQS, Barcelona), he joined the lab in 2017 as an MRes student. He then secured a Leverhulme Trust scholarship to complete his PhD on artificial/biological hybrid cells using stimuli-responsive systems to control cell behaviours. His skill set includes the design and production of a wide range of soft-matter nanodevices, plasmid design, protein expression, and flow cytometry.

He also works on Biomolecular Neural Networks in the context of Synthetic Biology and collaborates with the Imperial Graduate Biotechnology Network (GradBio), Outside the lab he participates in workshops and outreach activities for children, and coaches basketball.

Andrew Stannard - Postdoc

Andrew obtained his PhD from the School of Physics & Astronomy at the University of Nottingham, where he subsequently held postdoctoral research fellowships, working in the fields of 2D self-assembled nanostructured systems and ultra-high-resolution scanning probe microscopy. He had a career break as a secondary school science teacher via the Researchers in Schools programme, before returning to academia in the Department of Physics at King’s College London, shifting focus to the nanomechanical characterisation of biophysical systems. Andrew is now in the Department of Chemistry at Imperial College London, researching the roles of topology and homology in DNA-DNA interactions.

Zalike Keskin Erdogan - Postdoc

Zalike is a Bioengineer (BEng) with an MSc degree in Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering from Ege University in Turkey, then she did her PhD at University College London (UCL) on developing hydrogel-based tissue constructs for neural tissue engineering applications.
Dr Zalike Keskin Erdogan holds competent experiences in natural hydrogels, 3D cellular structures and cell-material interactions with a strong background in biomaterials design and development for the state-of-the-art biomedical applications. Her current research in the team focuses on the utilisation of biomaterials and hydrogels for cell encapsulation, for the functionalisation of whole-cell biosensors via hydrogel droplet microfluidics.

Colin Pilkington - Postdoc

I began my studies in medicinal chemistry at Trinity College Dublin, where I wrote my dissertation on biomimetic inorganic complexes, and completed a 1-year placement at GSK, Stevenage. I went on to research droplet microfluidics as part of a University of Cambridge spin-off. I then worked as a polymer and materials chemist at Illumina. Under Dr. Y. Elani and Prof. J. Seddon, my PhD focused on microfluidic generation of complex lipid nanoparticles, which I am continuing for my postdoc.

Marcus Fletcher - Postdoc

Marcus focuses on the study of bottom-up synthetic cell systems with a particular emphasis on understanding cell membrane phenomena like membrane transport regulation and sub-cellular membrane architecture. He completed a BA and MSci in Natural Sciences (Physics) at the University of Cambridge, followed by a PhD in the group of Prof Ulrich Keyser at the same university. In his PhD, he worked on studying the ion transport properties of cellular membrane models by combining DNA nanotechnology, optofluidics and mathematical modelling. Now, he is developing new microfluidic methods to controllably design and study artificial cell architectures with precisely defined compositions. These efforts will form part of a collaboration between the Elani and Ellis groups at Imperial and the Murray group in Caltech to build a synthetic nucleus and study the rules governing eukaryotic cell structure. The tools developed will also be used to explore the large multivariate parameter spaces which control fundamental biological processes such as protein/membrane interactions and protein synthesis.

 Roberto Di Blasi - Postdoc

Roberto obtained his BSc and MSc in Industrial Biotechnology (University of Palermo) and then his PhD in Chemical Engineering (Imperial College London). He has since joined the Elani group as a postdoctoral researcher. Roberto has leveraged synthetic biology and cell engineering to build complexity in yeast and mammalian systems. Now, he is working on interfacing synthetic and living cells for advanced therapeutic applications. Outside the lab, Roberto is a committee member of the Imperial Graduate Biotechnology Network (GradBio) and leads outreach activities for Imperial College. 

Jyoti Prakash Gurung - Postdoc

Jyoti obtained his Ph.D. from the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences at the University of New South Wales, Australia, in 2024 under the supervision of Dr. Matthew Baker. His doctoral research encompassed genetic engineering, microfluidics techniques, and optogenetic control of motile bacteria. At the Elani Lab, Jyoti continues his post doctoral research work on engineering liposome-attached motile bacteria for targeted delivery applications. Beyond his scientific pursuits, he enjoys outdoor activities such as gardening, hiking and playing sports, particularly football.

Matt Allen- EPSRC Doctoral Prize Fellow  

 I completed my undergraduate degree in chemistry at Imperial College during which I looked at the influence of methylation of lipid headgroups on phase behaviour.  During my undergraduate studies I also had a research placement at the University of California Los Angeles where I helped develop a novel method for preparing supported lipid bilayers. My PhD focussed upon further developing stimuli responsive artificial cells for drug delivery.

Aileen Cooney - PhD Student

Aileen is completing a PhD funded by the Leverhulme Trust under the joint supervision of Yuval, Lorenzo di Michele and Pietro Cicuta. Her focus is on applying DNA nanotechnology to engineer motile artificial cells. Prior to starting her PhD, Aileen was living in Tokyo as a Scholar of the Daiwa Foundation, where she conducted research into α-Hemolysin nanopores in the Kawano lab at Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology. She previously completed her integrated Bachelors-MSci at Imperial College London with a year in industry spent in organic synthesis at GlaxoSmithKline. Her Master's project under Professor Sophia Yaliraki utilised network theory to investigate allosteric protein signalling. She is interested in combining computational and synthetic chemistry methods during her doctoral research. In her spare time she enjoys boxing, football and cooking in community kitchens.

Tom Kitto - PhD Student

Tom is a PhD student supervised by Yuval Elani, Laura Barter, Nazila Kamaly and Oscar Ces working on artificial plant cells. His work at Imperial is co-funded by Syngenta. He completed his undergrad at the University of Bath in chemical engineering, but decided to pursue a career in scientific research after a research internship at Polytechnique Montreal on organic electronics. Before his PhD, Tom worked briefly in Sydney on next-gen QR codes for industry.

 Tom has diverse interests outside of his research, with constants being fencing, art and science communication.

Hannah Cooke - PhD Student

My interests in soft matter began in the final year of my MChem (Hons) degree in Chemistry at the University of York, where I researched the patterning of stimuli-responsive supramolecular hydrogels by spatiotemporally controlling gelator self-assembly, for their application as biomimetic stem cell scaffolds in tissue engineering. Now, I am an EPSRC funded MRes student on the 1+3 years MRes + PhD ICB CDT studentship at Imperial College London. My project focusses on the fabrication of compartmentalised biomembrane capsules using microfluidics technology, and their application as novel vaccine delivery vehicles. In my spare time, I love cooking, making music and rock climbing!

Shameem Golestaneh - PhD student

I started my microfluidics and biophysics journey during my Masters in Physics degree at the University of Warwick, looking at Chlamydomonas responses under external stimuli before moving on to utilising microfluidics to differentiate malarial cells from background healthy cells in my final year. I will now be developing a lab-on-chip to profile metabolic degradation as part of the 1+3 Mres + PhD ICB CDT program at Imperial College London, which is co-funded by EPSRC and Syngenta.

Juan Ivars Miñana - PhD student

Juan is a 3rd year PhD student funded by the Department of Chemical Engineering at Imperial, working on the design of bionic cells. His project focuses on the integration of artificial compartments with living cells to impart novel functionalities. Previously, he completed an MRes in Bioengineering supervised by Prof. Molly Stevens at the same university, where he worked on 3D printing of biomaterials. Before joining Imperial, he did his undergraduate degree in Biomedical Engineering at UC3 Madrid, with an exchange programme at the University of Sydney. In his final year, he did a project on skin tissue regeneration supervised by Prof. JL Jorcano. He is the co-chair of the newly-formed Imperial Graduate Biotechnology Network (GradBio).

Oliver Gonzales-Carvajal - PhD Student

I’ve recently graduated with an MChem degree from the University of York. My final year masters project was on developing azide-tagged ribitols to be used as metabolic labelling probes to investigate various neuromuscular diseases, including muscular dystrophy. Now, under the supervision of Dr Fets (at the MRC), Dr Elani and Dr Baron I have started my PhD at the MRC and Imperial College as part of the SAMURII scheme. My PhD involves measuring intratumor heterogeneity at the single-cell level using microfluidic lab-on-chip devices that interface with high-resolution mass spectrometry. In my spare time, I enjoy playing rugby, scuba diving and going on walks.

Yu Cheng - PhD Student

Yu Cheng is a CDT student sponsored by Syngenta. Under the co-supervision of Dr. Yuval Elani, Dr. Oscar Ces and Dr. James Hindley, his PhD project aims to build membrane/cell/tissue models for targeted discovery in the agri sector, involving applications of 3D bioprinting, microfluidics and membrane engineering. Yu Cheng studied chemistry at Fudan University (China) between 2014 and 2018 and graduated with an honours award in the National Top Talent Undergraduate Training program. During his MRes in chemical biology at Imperial College London (UK) in 2020, Yu Cheng mainly worked on microfluidic vesicle formation and membrane reconstitution. Yu Cheng is a fan of football and dota2 in his free time

Nina O’Toole - PhD student

Nina is a PhD student working between the Yuval Elani and Phil Jones’ lab in UCL. She works on exploiting optical trapping technologies for synthetic cell design and construction.

Lucy Sifeng Chen - PhD Student

I am an EPSRC funded PhD student co-supervised by Francesca Ceroni, and am working on artificial cells to synthesise and deliver anti-cancer peptides at tumour sites. I previously completed my Bachelors in Biochemistry and Masters in Systems and Synthetic Biology, both at Imperial College. In the summer following my Bachelors degree, I led the wet lab division of the Imperial team competing in the first annual iDEC (International Directed Evolution Competition) with our project on dual transcriptional regulators for quorum sensing, supervised by Prof. Mark Isalan. Outside of my studies, I like to write, play piano, and bake!

Zihan Zhang - PhD Student

I completed my MRes degree in chemical biology at Imperial College London in 2020. Now I am doing my PhD under the co-supervision of Prof. Oscar Ces and Dr. Yuval Elani. My MRes project was to fabricate vesicles with microfluidic methods, which aroused my interest in the design and application of artificial cells. My PhD project aims to develop a new microfluidic platform to create stimuli-responsive liposome formulation libraries and enable high-throughput production. I enjoy hiking and video games, and I am also an amateur singer.

Joshua Christopher - PhD Student

Josh is an EPSRC funded PhD student working on bacterial biohybrids. His project is focused on combining advances in liposome nanotechnology and synthetic biology to engineer a bacterial biohybrid system for targeted delivery of cancer therapeutics. He began his studies at the University of Oxford, completing an undergraduate master’s degree in biochemistry during which he wrote a research dissertation on generating SimCells, genome-free bacterial cells designed to be used as a novel platform for synthetic biology. Following this, he joined Oxford SimCell, a biotech start-up, where he worked on optimising the SimCell platform further. He went on to complete an MRes in Systems and Synthetic Biology at Imperial College London, designing novel immune receptors using denoising diffusion probabilistic models, before joining the Elani group to start his PhD. Outside of the lab, he hosts comedy nights and performs as a musical comedian.

Bradley Diggines - PhD student

Bradley is a first year PhD student on the ICB CDT 1+3 program. His research aims to develop automated systems to synthesise, functionalise and characterise lipid-based nanoparticles in high throughput. In collaboration with AstraZeneca, Bradley will also screen novel particle formulations for the delivery of cargo to key cells in their drug development pipeline. During his MRes in the Elani Group, he was awarded the ICB prize for establishing a robotic-microfluidic system for the automated synthesis and expulsion of large nanoparticle libraries. Previously, Bradley completed a MEng in Materials Science at the University of Sheffield, for which he was awarded the Mappin Medal. During this period, he worked on the automated analysis of kinetoplast DNA using AFM (Pyne Lab) and undertook an internship at McGill University, engineering shape-morphing structures using 3D printed polymers.

Harry Lowe - PhD student

I completed my MChem (Hons) in Chemistry with Biological and Medicinal Chemistry at the University of York in 2023. My master's research project at Brigham Women's Hospital (Boston, US) was focused on developing new pharmaceutical compounds for novel targets to treat severe mental health conditions. I am currently in the first year of my PhD on the ICB CDT 1+3 years MRes + PhD, co-supervised by Nazila Kamaly, Yuval Elani and Oscar Ces, working to develop a cell-free system for protein synthesis via a microfluidic cell-on-a-chip platform.

Xuemin Chen - PhD Student

Xuemin is a PhD student funded by a Departmental Scholarship under the supervision of Yuval. Her project focuses on synthetic cell engineering. She completed her undergraduate and master’s studies at China Agricultural University, where her research primarily revolved around protein assembly, constructing functional protein hydrogels and lattices for applications in drug delivery and catalysis. She is interested in developing intricate nano- and micro-architectures, aiming to design macromolecular assemblies with unique properties and functions. In her spare time, she enjoys playing badminton and hiking.

Rohan Sekhri - PhD student

I am an EPSRC student funded by the Centre for Doctoral Training in Chemical Biology working on synthetic tissues. My project is focused on 3D printing synthetic tissues for patterned interactions with cellular populations. I completed my undergraduate degree in Chemistry from Durham University before undertaking an MRes in Biological and Physical Chemistry at Imperial. My MRes research focussed on protein aggregation in Parkinson’s disease, leveraging molecular dynamics simulations and microbiology techniques to gain insight into phase-separated aggregation pathways. Outside of my studies, I enjoy cooking, reading and playing sports.

Julia Breed - MCSA PhD student

Julia is an MCSA-funded PhD student working on exosome-based intercellular communication in synthetic cells. She began her studies at Northeastern University in Boston, earning a B.S. in Cell & Molecular Biology and an M.S. in Biotechnology. During integrated research placements at MIT and Bluebird Bio, she focused on next-generation sequencing and lentiviral vector optimization. She then went on to join Beam Therapeutics, where she helped to develop novel viral vectors for in vivo delivery of base editors and other nucleic acid cargos. Outside of the lab, she enjoys skiing, hiking, and scuba diving. 

Tom Vasudeva - PhD student

I recently completed an MSci degree in Physics at the University of Bristol. My final-year project focused on using microfluidic systems to generate aqueous droplets for ice nucleation studies. Due to an interest in biological sciences, I undertook a biophysics module, as well as continuing to read about current research in interdisciplinary science. This has prompted me to apply my skills in microfluidics to a synthetic biology setting. Under the supervision of Dr Yuval Elani, I will be working on the design and production of artificial cells using a microfluidic platform. 

Outside of my studies, I enjoy climbing, scuba diving and reading

MRes, MEng, and MSc students

• Alice Boninsegni

• Justas Zybartas

• Gabriel Fine

• Sadhurya Ramanathan

• Travis Xu

• Hanyu Wang

PhD and Postdoc Alumni

• Divesh Baxani (Microfluidics Innovation Hub)

• Claudia Contini (BBSRC Fellow and Lecturer, Life Sciences, Imperial College)

• Greta Zubaite (Lightcast Discovery)

• Federica Raguseo (PDRA - The Crick)

• Hannah Sleath (Aspect Capital)

• Carolina Monck

• Ion Ioannou (PDRA - Imperial Chemistry)