Gao Research Group

Living organisms are composed of structures spanning orders of magnitude in size, and are assembled from tens of thousands of, if not more, distinct molecular entities. Our group’s research centers on the molecular nature of biological structures and processes. We explore how basic molecular building blocks—such as proteins, lipids, and RNAs—assemble and interact with one another to achieve specific biological functions, or instead cause dysfunctions.

We develop chemical, physical, and biomolecular tools that map and track these molecular building blocks at their natural length scale and temporal resolution. Basing our approach on chemical synthesis and molecular biology, we apply state-of-the-art methods in light/electron microscopy, bioengineering, and computational sciences to a range of biological questions at the molecular scale.
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“The net is vast and infinite.”
​–Motoko Kusanagi​

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Department of Chemistry and Biological Sciences
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Illinois Chicago (UIC)
845 W. Taylor St.
Chicago, IL 60607
© 2021 Gao Research Group