About
Ismail is a New York native with a long-standing interest in biochemistry. As an undergraduate at The City College of New York (CUNY), Ismail worked in Dr. Ronald Koder’s lab, where he engineered synthetic electron transport proteins and developed a deep interest in de novo protein design. After earning his Bachelor of Science (B.S.) in biochemistry in 2011, Ismail spent a gap year in the NIH Postbaccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP), working under the mentorship of Dr. Matthias Buck. As a PREP scholar, Ismail investigated the structure and dynamics of protein-protein interactions implicated in calmodulin-mediated signaling transduction. The experience further deepened his appreciation for the critical role that novel biochemical tools play in uncovering fundamental principles of biochemistry.
In 2012, he pursued his graduate studies in the Biochemistry and Molecular Physics program at the University of Pennsylvania. Under the mentorship of Dr. Feng Gai, and with the support of an NIH F99/K00 award from the NINDS, Ismail conceived and validated a series of minimally disruptive unnatural amino acid derivatives and nucleic acid analogs for use as biological spectroscopy and microscopy tools. During his time with the Gai lab, Ismail pioneered the development and application of various unnatural amino acids as sensors to monitor protein conformational changes, structure, dynamics, local pH, hydration, protease activity, peptide membrane penetration, and other biologically relevant processes. Most notably, he designed and optimized a compact blue-fluorescent amino acid and nucleoside for biological spectroscopy and microscopy applications—the smallest visibly fluorescent amino acid and nucleoside engineered to date.
Currently, as a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Robert Froemke at the New York University (NYU) School of Medicine, Ismail develops novel chemical tools to manipulate and track oxytocin signaling to study maternal behavior and physiology (nursing and labor). His work is supported by the NIH K00 from the NIMH, the Burroughs Wellcome Fund Postdoctoral Diversity Enrichment Program (PDEP) award and Career Awards at the Scientific Interface (CASI), and the Scholar to Faculty Program from NYU Langone.
Ismail is an incoming tenure-track assistant professor at the University of Utah Department of Neurobiology. He aims to establish an independent research group to study how neuropeptide signaling modulates physiology and behavior. Learn more here about Ismail’s future research directions.
Outside of the lab, Ismail values spending time with his friends and family, traveling, eating good food, playing sports (basketball, soccer, and fantasy football), weightlifting, and working on weight loss.