Principle Investigator

Rakesh Patel PhD is Professor and Vice Chair for Research in the Department of Pathology, and Director of the UAB Center for Free Radical Biology. He is a graduate of the University of Essex, England (BSc with Hons (1993) and PhD in Biochemistry (1996)) and moved to UAB in 1997. He is also director of the UAB Translational and Molecular sciences Certificate and T32 Program (for Predocs), and past Director of the Department of Pathology Graduate Program (7y), UAB Pathobiology and Molecular Medicine Graduate theme (5y)  and HHMI-UAB Med to Grad predoctoral program (6y). Since establishing his independent research laboratory in 2000, his lab has focused onunderstanding the role of oxidative / nitrosative intermediates in modulating acute and chronic inflammatory diseases. He spends his free time with all things related to soccer, attempting to play golf, and chauffeuring two unruly, but wonderful boys.  

Graduate Student

Alexandria Hernandez-Nichols completed her BS in Molecular Biology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 2017. She joined the lab as a pathobiology and molecular medicine doctoral student in 2019. Her research is focused on how redox signaling impacts the N-glycosylation of endothelial cell proteins that control monocyte rolling and adhesion during inflammation. She has published on how endoplasmic reticulum derived hydrogen peroxide inhibits a class of mannosidases contributing to the formation of high mannose N-glycoforms of an adhesion molecule and pro-inflammatory monocyte adhesion. In her free time she likes to go camping and hiking with her husband and her two Siberian huskies.  

Researchers

Joo-Yeun Oh,Ph.D., has been a researcher in Dr. Patel’s laboratory since 2013.  She obtained her Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Pathology from the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 2008 and did her post-doctoral training at King College in London, England. Her research focus is heme ladenextracellular vesicles and their effects on critical organ function during acute inflammatory disease. She is an outdoor person and sport maniac (golf, tennis and running) and enjoystravelling overseas especially for trekking through wilderness.  She goes by the life motto “work hard and play harder”! 

 Karina Ricart, Ph.D., has been a researcher in the Patel lab since 2016. She keeps the lab on the straight and narrow and oversees clinical study assessments of oxidative and nitrosative stress biomarkers in different diseases. She obtained her PhD degree in Neurobiology from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. In her spare time, she enjoys reading, gardening and traveling. 

Felipe Vendrame., PhD Felipe completed his PhD in Medical Clinic at the University of Campinas in Brazil, where he studied the interaction of heme with lipoproteins in patients with sickle cell disease. Currently, he focuses on studying the generation and interaction of hemolysis products in the lung and development of lung injury. In his free time he enjoys watching soccer matches and traveling with his wife to places he does not yet know.

Former

Kellie Regal-McDonald, Ph.D., was a graduate trainee (2016-2019) and a postdoctoral fellow (2019-2020). Her research focused on understanding the role of endothelial N-glycosylation in monocyte adhesion during inflammation. After growing up in the great steel city of Pittsburgh, PA, she traveled down South and completed her bachelor’s degree in Molecular Biology at Lipscomb University in Nashville, TN, followed by her PhD in Pathology at UAB. When not in lab, she was most likely be found watching football with her husband and cat, reading a good book, or cosplaying as Captain America. She is currently living in Tennessee pursuing a career as a science writer.