CAST started as a core group of faculty researchers and students from the University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute and Department of Chemical Biochemical and Environmental Engineering, UMBC. With our 2007 expansion into a UMBC campus center, we now have faculty from several other affiliated departments and centers.
Research Faculty
Research Associate Professor
Research Staff / Assistant
Mike Tolosa
Postdoctoral Researchers
Dr. Pegah Rezaei (she/her)
Pegah is a medical doctor currently working on developing a continuous blood CO2 monitoring device in the opioid crisis to follow the dynamic changes in blood gases which is safer and faster than current sensors. Her research is focused on studying how continuous glucose monitoring is related to the amount of hemoglobin A1c (glycated hemoglobin), especially in hemoglobinopathies. In her free time, she likes to read books, listen to podcasts, and go to the gym!
Graduate Students
Aaron Thole (he/him)
Aaron is a Chemical Engineering PhD student co-advised by Dr. Govind Rao and Dr. Douglas Frey with a research interest in the use of chromatography in biosensor applications. He is currently developing a low-cost, chromatography-based system for the broad-spectrum detection of viruses. In his free time, he enjoys watching horror movies and baking!
Revati Kadolkar (she/her)
Revati is a Chemical Engineering PhD student co-advised by Dr. Govind Rao and Dr. Douglas Frey with research interests in downstream processing, application of scientific machine learning for the modeling of chromatography, and development of microfluidic chromatography columns. In her free time, she loves to travel, paint, play basketball and cook traditional Indian food!
John Biffl (he/him)
“Kelly” Yunqian Wei (she/her)
Kelly is a Chemical Engineering PhD student advised by Dr. Govind Rao. She is interested in implementing sensing capabilities to culture flasks (especially Grex) to improve process understanding and develop soft sensors to enable process decision-making without sampling. Her work aims to contribute to the overall automation trend as well as the effort of meeting current good manufacturing practice (cGMP) requirement and reducing operational risk. Applications include treatments like adoptive T cell therapy (ACT), in which Chemistry, Manufacturing and Control (CMC) plays a critical role in patient access. Adding monitoring capabilities to convenient and high throughput flasks can improve not only robustness and scalability, but ultimately patient safety and efficacy. In her free time, she likes reading and listening to music!
Neveen is a Chemical Engineering MSc student advised by Dr. Venkatesh Srinivasan and Dr. Govind Rao. Her research focuses on developing real-time biosensing platforms for monitoring glucose and therapeutic proteins in cell culture, with a focus on PAT-compatible monitoring in shake flask systems. In her free time, she enjoys working out, spending time with her family, and cooking traditional Palestinian food!
Undergraduate Students
Elias Gilotte (he/him)
Elias is a junior at UMBC majoring in Chemical Engineering, mentored by Chad Sundberg and Dr. Govind Rao, with a research interest in biotechnology. In his free time, he likes to hike and take care of his pet reptiles!
Julia Van Der Marel (she/her)
Julia is a junior at UMBC majoring in Chemical Engineering on the Bio Track. She is mentored by Dr. Chad Sundberg and Dr. Govind Rao. Her research interests include synthetic biology and biological engineering. She currently works on expression of therapeutics in cell-free systems. In her free time, she likes cooking, sewing, and listening to music!