Post-Docs

Dr Juan P. Rincon Pabon

Juan received his BSc (2011) and MSc (2014) in Chemistry from the Universidad de los Andes in Bogota, Colombia. Afterwards, he joined D. Weis’ research group at the University of Kansas, where he obtained his PhD (2021) using HDX to probe conformational dynamics and allosteric effects in monoclonal antibodies. Immediately after, he joined M. Gross’ research group at the University of Washington in St. Louis as a postdoctoral associate, where he continued to use HDX and other mass spectrometry techniques (FPOP, Native MS) to probe protein dynamics of membrane proteins. He joined the Politis research group in 2023.

email: juanpablo.rinconpabon [at] manchester.ac.uk


Dr Charlotte Guffick

Charlotte obtained an MBiochem from the University of York in 2017. After a brief stint at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), London, working within the Biometrology Unit, she completed her PhD at the University of Cambridge with Prof. Hendrik van Veen (2022), where she was introduced to membrane proteins, focusing on functional studies of clinically relevant bacterial transporters. She joined the Politis Group in 2023 as postdoctoral research associate studying the dynamics of membrane transporters and receptors in different reconstitution environments.

PhD Students

Zulaikha Akbar

Zulaikha received her BSc in Biochemistry from York University in Toronto, Canada in 2016, and her MSc in Cancer Biology from University College London (UCL) in 2018. She then joined Autolus Therapuetics from 2018-2022 as part of the Binder Discovery Team, where she worked on developing membrane protein binders for CAR T-cell development. In 2022, Zulaikha joined the Politis Lab for her PhD, focusing on studying the conformational dynamics of sugar transporters in more native membrane mimetics with HDX-MS.

Vanessa Duerr

Vanessa received her BSc Biomedical Science from Bangor University, Wales (2021) and MSc Biopharmaceutical Development from the University of Leeds, England (2023). During her MSc, she did a placement year in the analytical development department at FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies, which is a CRO and CMO for protein-based therapies. She is currently doing an iCASE PhD “in situ structural characterisation of membrane proteins for drug development” funded by the BBSRC and Waters Corporation (expected: 2027), focusing on a high throughput method for HDX cyclic ion mobility mass spectrometry.

Caitlin Otto

Caitlin received her MSci Biomedical Sciences from the University of Manchester in 2023. She is now undertaking a PhD in Biochemistry focussing on “Shrew: a novel modulator of the Dpp signalling pathway in Drosophila”. She will be utilising HDX to uncover the structure and potential binding of Shrew to other factors in this pathway.

Jueru Chen

Jueru received her BSc in Biological Sciences from Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, China (2021), and her MSc in Biotechnology from the University of Glasgow, Scotland (2022). After graduation, she joined the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, where she conducted research on protein function related to the bio-utilization of formaldehyde and Acetic acid, and the biosynthesis of Rhamnolipid. In the fall of 2024, she began her PhD at the University of Manchester, focusing on the structure and dynamic changes of XylE in liposomes.

Bahar Alizadeh

Bahar completed her MSci in Pharmacology at the University of Bristol in 2025, where her research projects centered on computational molecular modeling and in vitro functional studies of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). She began her PhD in the Politis Lab in September 2025, funded by the EPSRC. Her research aims to develop integrative approaches for the structural characterization of membrane proteins in their native environments.