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Premila P. Samuel Russell, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor
Chemistry

Education

B.A. in Chemistry, Berea College, Kentucky, 2012
Ph.D. in Biochemistry, Rice University, Texas, 2017

Practice Areas

For more information, please visit:
Premila Research Group website

Research Interests

Biochemistry, Physical Chemistry, Computational Chemistry, Biophysics


My research program centers on applying computational chemistry methods to build and simulate atomistic models of human cell environments. These "cells-on-computers" are being built to address the current challenges in characterizing biomolecular "hidden states" that arise from limitations of spatial-temporal resolutions of traditional experiments and in silico methods. My research program further complements the "cells-on-computers" with simple, yet high-throughput, experimental cell-free assays for testing and bench-marking the computational results.

Publications and Media Placements

For a complete list, visit Google Scholar.

  • Samuel Russell, P.P., Maytin, A.K., Rickard, M.M., Russell, M.C., Pogorelov, T.V., and Gruebele, M. (2024) Metastable states in the hinge-bending landscape of an enzyme in an atomistic cytoplasm simulation. The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters 15: 940-946; https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.jpclett.3c0313
  • Samuel Russell, P.P., Alaeen, S., and Pogorelov, T.V. (2023) In-cell dynamics: the next focus of all-atom simulations. The Journal of Physical Chemistry B 127 (46): 9863–9872; https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.jpcb.3c05166
  • Samuel Russell, P.P., Rickard, M.M., Boob, M., Gruebele, M., and Pogorelov, T.V. (2023) In silico protein dynamics in the human cytoplasm: partial folding, misfolding, fold switching, and non-native interactions. Protein Science 32(11):e4790; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/pro.4790
  • Samuel Russell, P.P., Rickard, M.M., Pogorelov, T.V., and Gruebele, M. (2022) Metabolons, quinary structure, and domain motion: enzyme choreography in the cytoplasm. bioRxiv 2022.09.13.507800; https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.09.13.507800
  • Samuel, P.P., and Case, D.A. (2020) Atomistic simulations of heme dissociation pathways in human methemoglobins reveal hidden intermediates. Biochemistry 59: 4093–4107; https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.biochem.0c00607
  • Samuel, P.P., White, M.A., Ou, W.C., Case, D.A., Phillips, G.N. Jr., and Olson, J.S. (2020) The interplay between molten globules and heme disassociations defines human hemoglobin disassembly; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpj.2020.01.031
  • Samuel, P.P., Smith, L.P., Phillips, G.N., Jr., and Olson, J.S. (2015) Apoglobin Stability Is the Major Factor Governing both Cell-free and in Vivo Expression of Holomyoglobin. Journal of Biological Chemistry 290: 23479–23495; https://doi.org/10.1074/jbc.M115.672204
 

Honors and Awards

  • Cooley’s Anemia Foundation Research Fellowship, 2023
  • D.E. Shaw Research Graduate and Postdoc Women’s Fellowship, D.E. Shaw Research, 2021
  • George J. Schroepfer, Jr. Award for Outstanding Ph.D. Thesis in Biochemistry & Cell Biology, Biosciences Department, Rice University, 2018.
  • George J. Schroepfer, Jr. Award for Outstanding Published Research in Biochemistry & Cell Biology, Biosciences Department, Rice University, 2017