People

Meet the Principal Investigator

Wen-Hong Li, Ph.D.

Wen-Hong Li, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Endowed Title: Southwestern Medical Foundation Scholar in Medical Research

Department: Cell Biology | Biochemistry

Graduate Programs: Biological Chemistry, Biomedical Engineering

Lab Members

Ivan Arreola

Research Technician II

  • B.S. in Mathematics, minor in Statistics, 2018
  • University of Texas at San Antonio, Ronald E. McNair Scholar

Since 2020, Ivan has been testing and documenting the detailed nature of a fluorescent probe (designed/synthesized by Dr. Li and collaborators) to label intracellular amyloid aggregates in Type 2 Diabetic donors and RIP-hIAPP diabetic mice.

Ivan Arreola

Thomas Sin

Research Scientist

  • Ph.D., Hong Kong Polytechnic University
  • Postdoctoral work, UTHealth Houston

Since 2022, Thomas has developed a strong interest in studying the therapeutic potential of various novel, carefully-designed compounds that exhibit increased selectivity for pancreatic beta cells and water solubility in insults induced by lipotoxicity and high glucose challenges.

Thomas Sin

Juanzhu Yan

Postdoctoral Researcher

  • Ph.D., Xiamen University, Xiamen, China

Since 2022, Juanzhu has been focused on developing zinc-tropic agents for targeted delivery of therapeutics to islet beta cells for preventing or treating diabetes mellitus (DM), and imaging pancreatic islet beta cell mass with bimodal fluorescence and PET imaging probes.

Juanzhu Yan

Victoria (Tori) Lewis

Research Technician I

  • B.S. in Biochemistry, 2023
  • Baylor University

Since joining the lab in 2024, Tori has acquired skills for in vitro testing of drugs in cell lines. She has also become adept in various assays of proteins and molecules important to the characterization of diabetes.

Victoria (Tori) Lewis

Brendan O'Reilly

Lab Helper

  • B.S. in Biomedical Sciences, 2022
  • Texas A&M University - College Station, Magna Cum Laude

Since 2022, Brendan has spent time familiarizing himself with surgical techniques to further projects in the lab.

Brendan O'Reilly

Ipsita Chakraborty

Postdoctoral Researcher

  • Ph.D., Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India
  • Postdoctoral work, NCATS/NIH, Maryland, USA

Since 2023, Ipsita has been designing and synthesizing prodrugs of natural anti-oxidants to improve bioavailability and beta-cell targeting specificity.

Ipsita Chakraborty

Daniel Shin

Research Assistant I/Lab Manager

  • B.S. in Neuroscience, 2023
  • Baylor University - Waco

Since 2023, Daniel has been analyzing fluorescent probes and other research chemicals relevant to the mechanisms of diabetes mellitus. He has also been developing his surgical techniques for fiber optic transmission of zinc in murine models.

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