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31 May 2026
31 May 2026
In advance of World Oceans Month, members of the Avalon Lab traded pipettes for trash grabbers and joined a beach cleanup in Huntington Beach organized by the Surfrider Foundation.
As scientists who spend our days studying marine organisms and natural products, we believe being ocean advocates is part of the job description. Together, our team removed more than 50 pounds of trash from the shoreline while helping keep our local beaches a little cleaner. We are grateful to the Surfrider Foundation for organizing the event and bringing the community together in support of healthier coastlines and oceans.
26 May 2026
26 May 2026
Congratulations to Avalon Lab members Jeremiah Meloch, Riley Benedict, and Jana Mitrevska on earning their PADI Open Water Diver Certification!
Whether pursuing discoveries in lab coats or new missions in wetsuits, their curiosity continues to take them to new depths. This certification marks the first step on their journey toward becoming scientific divers. Congratulations on this exciting milestone!
15 May 2026
15 May 2026
Avalon Lab undergraduate researchers and UROP (Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program) scholars, Julian Masloub and Nayoung Chung, presented their research at the UCI Undergraduate Research Symposium Poster and Performance Showcase.
Representing both the Avalon Lab and UCI's next generation of scientists, Julian and Nayoung shared their work with fellow students, faculty, and researchers from across campus. We are proud of their hard work and dedication to research and congratulate them on this achievement!
8 May 2026
8 May 2026
The Avalon Lab celebrated the 100th birthday of Sir David Attenborough by gathering to watch Ocean with David Attenborough (2025)!
Few individuals have inspired a greater appreciation for the natural world than Sir David Attenborough. For many of us, Sir David's work sparked a lifelong fascination with the natural world and the oceans we study today.
Here's to 100 years of curiosity, wonder, and nature advocacy!
15 April 2026
The Avalon Lab is excited to welcome Dr. Désirée Schlemper-Scheidt as a Postdoctoral Researcher!
Désirée recently earned her Ph.D. in the von Reuss Lab at the University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland and will share her expertise in isolation, characterization, and total synthesis of secondary metabolites bringing valuable new perspectives to the lab's ongoing efforts to explore bioactive natural products and their applications in human health.
We are thrilled to have Désirée join our team and look forward to the scientific discoveries and collaborations ahead. Please join us in giving her a warm welcome to the Avalon Lab and to UCI!
1 April 2026
UPCOMING EVENT! Professor Avalon is co-leading Oceanic Impressions: Cyanotypes of Cyanobacteria with artist and marine scientist Oriana Poindexter. This interdisciplinary workshop funded by UCI Illuminations will bring together students across UC Irvine for an interactive and collaborative event blending art, marine science, and the wonders of the ocean. Participants will create cyanotype prints of cyanobacteria while exploring ocean conservation and the role of science in shaping a more sustainable future. Making waves at the intersection of art and drug discovery!
20 February 2026
A huge congratulations to Julian Masloub on the publication of his review article with Dr. Avalon in the Journal of Natural Products: “Diversity in Structure and Function: How Cyanobacterial Metallophores Reveal a Broadening Perspective of Microbial Metal-Chelators” (2026). As an undergraduate researcher, Julian worked with Professor Avalon to develop this scholarly review, highlighting the expanding structural and functional diversity of cyanobacterial metallophores. We are incredibly proud of this outstanding achievement!
10 February 2026
We are excited to welcome Mia Muzitani to the Avalon Lab as an Undergraduate Researcher. Mia, a first year Biological Sciences major, is interested in biotechnology and biopharmaceutical research and is eager to explore new techniques in the Avalon Lab!
9 February 2026
We are excited to share that Jeremiah Melcoh and Riley Benedict have officially joined the Avalon Lab, where they will pursue their Ph.D. research. We look forward to seeing their projects in neurotherapeutics and marine natural products advance in the coming years! Congratulations on this exciting milestone!
6 January 2026
Dr. Avalon contributions to “MITE: the Minimum Information about a Tailoring Enzyme database for capturing specialized metabolite biosynthesis” in Nucleic Acids Research (2026) represents an important step towards improving data integration and accelerating discovery across natural products research. This international collaborative effort introduces MITE, a framework and database designed to advance annotation and understanding of tailoring enzymes in specialized metabolite biosynthesis. Congratulations, Professor Avalon!
5 January 2026
Riley Benedict, a first-year Ph.D student in Pharmacological Sciences, has joined the Avalon Lab for his five-week rotation. Riley earned his B.S in Chemical Biology from UC Berkeley, where he conducted research in Professor Jay Keasling’s lab on microbial platforms for producing complex natural products. In the Avalon Lab, he is focusing on accelerating the discovery of novel marine natural products. Welcome, Riley!
9 December 2025
Published in Nature Communications (2025), “A resource to empirically establish drug exposure records directly from untargeted metabolomics data.” features Professor Avalon as part of a large-scale collaborative effort to integrate metabolomics into clinical research. We celebrate Professor Avalon’s role in advancing this transformative publication!
31 October 2025
A viewpoint article published in Current Opinion in Biotechnology (2025), “Molecules to medicine: advances in metabolomics for natural product drug discovery,” highlights emerging strategies that integrate metabolomics into modern drug discovery pipelines. Co-authored by Professor Avalon, this work underlines the growing power of metabolomics to bridge the gap between chemical diversity and therapeutic innovation.
15 October 2025
The Avalon Lab is excited to announce the arrival of our new Orbitrap Exploris 240 system! This powerful addition significantly expands our capabilities in high-resolution mass spectrometry and will accelerate our discovery efforts. Because every peak has a story!
3 October 2025
Our group attended the Third Annual Symposium for the Center for Neurotherapeutics: “Shifting Paradigms in Neurotherapeutics” hosted by the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences at UC Irvine. The symposium provided an opportunity for our group to learn about the latest translational neuroscience research happening at UC Irvine and beyond, connect with fellow researchers, and explore emerging strategies in neurotherapeutics.
18 September 2025
This fall, the Avalon Lab welcomed first-year Ph.D students Adelynne Wagner and Jeremiah Meloch for their five-week rotations. Adelynne, a recent Chemistry and Psychology graduate from UC Merced, is interested in neurotherapeutic drug discovery, while Jeremiah brings industry experience in CNS drug development and natural products research. Welcome, Adelynne and Jeremiah!
8 September 2025
Jana Mitrevska joins the Avalon Lab as Junior Specialist. Jana previously worked under the mentorship of Dr. Nicole Avalon during her undergraduate studies at UC San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography and has now joined the lab at UC Irvine to continue her research in marine natural products :)
19 August 2025
Co-authored by Professor Avalon, a new study in the Journal of the American Chemical Society (2025), “Cyanobacteria Join the Kahalalide Conversation: Genome and Metabolite Evidence for Structurally Related Peptides,” showcases the discovery of new cyanobacterial peptides related to the kahalalides. We are excited to see Professor Avalon adding new waves to the kahalalide story!
1 August 2025
The Avalon Lab is delighted to have Nayoung Chung join the group as an Undergraduate Researcher. A Pharmaceutical Sciences major at UCI, Nayoung is especially interested in the role of marine-derived compounds in drug discovery, and we look forward to her contributions to our growing research efforts.
15 July 2025
Dr. Avalon co-authored a comprehensive review in Natural Products Reports (2025) titled “Green genes from blue greens: challenges and solutions to unlocking the potential of cyanobacteria in drug discovery.” This collaborative work brings together leaders in the field to address key barriers and emerging strategies for advancing cyanobacteria as platforms for natural product discovery and therapeutic development. Helping unlock the blue-green blueprint for tomorrow’s therapeutics!
1 July 2025
We are thrilled to welcome Julian Masloub, a second-year Biological Sciences undergraduate, to the Avalon Lab! Julian joined the group with a strong curiosity for the chemical foundations of biological processes, and we are excited to have him contribute to our work in bioactive molecule discovery!
24 May 2025
Nature Communications (2025) publication “Enabling pan-repository reanalysis for big data science of public metabolomics data,” features Professor Avalon introducing tools to integrate and reanalyze public metabolomics datasets at scale. Congratulations!
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