MSCollaboratory team

Pieter C. Dorrestein, Ph.D. (Principal Investigator)

Professor at Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Departments of Pharmacology and Pediatrics. Director, Collaborative Mass Spectrometry Innovation Center. Co-Director, Institute for Metabolomics Medicine. See Google Scholar Profile.

Mauricio Caraballo, PhD (Director MSCollaboratory)

Mauricio is a Project Scientist at the Dorrestein Lab and the Director of the MSCollaboratory. His expertise areas include detection, isolation, and structural characterization of small molecules by using Mass Spectrometry and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance. He is fascinated with understanding the role that small molecules play in nature, such as their involment in symbiotic interactions. He applies untargeted metabolomics approaches and data visualization that lead to reveal the chemistry behind different living systems and ecosystems. 

Janet Tseng (Undergraduate Student)

Janet is a sophomore General Chemistry major interested in analytical chemistry. She joined the MSCollaboratory team in Winter 2024 and is currently working as a lab assistant. She contributed to sample preparation of marine metabolomics projects with collaborators from various institutions. Her work focuses on all parts of the general workflow for the MSCollaboratory project, including (1) sample preparation, (2) LC-MS/MS data acquisition, and (3) computational data analysis. She is getting trained on acquiring data from the mass spectrometer and learning how softwares work in data analysis, focusing on the use of MZmines to process raw data, GNPS2 to run molecular networking workflows, and Cytoscape to annotate molecular networks.

Monica Wu (Undergraduate Student)

Monica is a sophomore Molecular and Cell Biology major on the pre-med track. She joined the MSCollaboratory team in Winter 2024 and has contributed to sample preparation for marine metabolomics projects with collaborators from different institutions. Her work focuses on LC-MS/MS sample preparation and computational data analysis. Monica is interested in molecular networks and applying computational tools to understand chemical interactions of different metabolites. She is currently developing introductory materials for new team members and visitors while expanding her skills in metabolomics data analysis.

Samantha Kawai (Undergraduate Student)

Samantha is a fourth-year Neurobiology major and Urban Studies and Planning minor. She joined the MSCollaboratory team in the Fall of 2024 as a communications student, managing the team's website and social media and highlighting visitors' experiences. She is interested in science communication and hopes to continue to engage diverse communities to enhance and democratize knowledge about scientific processes.