Meet the Principle Investigator
Dan Kober, Ph.D.
Dan joined the faculty in the Department of Biochemistry at UTSW in the fall of 2022.
Before coming to Biochemistry, Dan earned his B.S. from Evangel University in Springfield, MO in 2012. He received his Ph.D. from Washington University in St. Louis in 2017. There, he trained under Tom Brett and studied the biophysical basis for disease-linked mutations in the neuroimmune receptor, TREM2. As a postdoctoral fellow, Dan trained at UTSW with Dan Rosenbaum and Arun Radhakrishnan, where he began his journey into lipid metabolism through the cholesterol-regulating Scap-SREBP pathway. Dan’s independent lab continues this interest in understanding the interplay between protein homeostasis and lipid metabolism.
Dan has received several awards for his research. As a graduate student, he received two fellowships from the American Heart Association. As a postdoc, he received a fellowship from the American Heart Association as well as a K99/R00 NIH Pathway to Independence Award. As in incoming Assistant Professor, he received a UT Systems Rising STARs Award and joined the Department of Biochemistry as an Endowed Scholar.
Fun Fact: Dan spent more time making this website than you would think
Get to know us! Current lab members:
Bilkish Bajaj
Bilkish is a Senior Scientist and Lab Manager for the Kober lab. Bilkish graduated with BSc in Human Genetics (Honors) from Guru Nanak Dev University, India, in 2007. She earned her Masters in Biotechnology from Georgetown University in 2008. Her first projust was sex-specific modulation of the ACE2 enzyme in RAS at GUMC. She joined UTSW in 2012 and the Kober lab in October 2022. In the lab, you will see her doing experiments with expression and purification of proteins. She loves to cook and is a little OCD with cleaning.
Fun Fact: She may already be the only one who knows where everything is in the lab.
Pankaj Kumar, Ph.D. (Postdoc)
Pankaj earned his PhD at the University of Hyderabad, India, where he focused on the characterization of structure, epitope, and novel activities in multi-domain Bacterial Immunoglobulin (Big) like proteins from Leptospira. In the lab, Pankaj is working on the structural basis of ERAD events in mammalian cells.
Pankaj enjoys playing cricket, reading novels, clicking pictures and crafting scientific memes.
Fun Fact: Pankaj won a meme conference at a conference. But he didn't share this meme with the website, so you'll just have to take his word that it was a "Big" deal.
Vincent Dartigue (Graduate student)
Vincent obtained both his BS in biochemistry and his MS in animal and nutritional sciences from West Virginia University in Morgantown, WV. After graduating, he worked as faculty adjunct teaching human nutrition class to undergrads; he then worked in a lab at Brigham Hospital, MA studying the effects of lipids in liver disease. He is interested in using biochemistry in order to have a better understanding of the mechanism of diseases in metabolic disorders. Vincent is a graduate student in the Biological Chemistry program.
Fun Fact: For his Masters work, Vincent worked with chickens that he raised from day old chicks!
Sebastian Sanchez (Graduate student)
Sebastian Sanchez graduated with a BS in Biology at UT El Paso at the end of 2021. His research interests include molecular mechanisms of disease and novel regulatory pathways. He is quite the whiz when it comes to purification and enzymatic assays. In his free time he enjoys cooking, dancing, and meeting friends at the arcade. Sebastian is a student in the Biological Chemistry Program.
Fun Fact: A dual threat, Sebastian can dance you off the floor and teach you the science of protein purifications on his youtube channel. But Dan didn't know how to link that here so you'll have to find it yourself.
Ashley Bullington (Postbac)
Ashley completed her BS at Notre Dame where she was received the Outstanding Biochemist Award! Ashley began her research career developing assays to measure protein folding. She joined the lab in the summer of 2024 through the UTSW PB2PHD postbac program.
Fun Facts: Ashley is the resident Notre Dame superfan and expert on all things related to collegiate sports. She is also an aspiring choreographer who hopes to recruit the lab perform complicated routines at dept events.
Lab Alumni
Shrankhla Bawaria, Ph.D. (Postdoc) 2023-2024
Antonio Dimafelix, (STARS high school intern) Summer 2023. Current: Returning for summer 2024!
Hailee Hall. (Conrad Leadership program) Summer 2023. Current: Undergrad @ Vanderbilt.
Ysidro Motta. (PostBac) Summer 2023. Current: Postbac @ Wetzal lab