Megan Elizabeth Núñez

Assistant Professor of Chemistry

Specialization: Biological chemistry, specifically damage and repair of DNA

As an Irvine Postdoctoral Fellow at Occidental College, Megan Núñez used atomic force microscopy (AFM) to examine two biological systems of interest: nucleic acid structure and bacterial predation. She is extending this work at Mount Holyoke, using the College's new Veeco Dimension atomic force microscope to probe the structure and chemistry of biological systems at the nanoscale.

Her work in AFM has been supported by a $145,945 grant from the National Science Foundation's Major Research Instrumentation Program, which has allowed the College to purchase an atomic force microscope. Núñez, who is coprincipal investigator of the grant along with MHC chemistry department faculty members Wei Chen and Darren Hamilton, plans to use the microscope with her students to study how some predators alter the membrane structures of bacteria on which they prey and how some bacteria adhere to protozoans. The department also plans to integrate the AFM into their curriculum.

Núñez has also been the recipient of a Camille and Henry Dreyfus Faculty Start-up Grant for Undergraduate Institutions (2003) and a Howard Hughes Predoctoral Fellowship in Biochemistry (1996). She has published her research findings in numerous scientific journals.

At her former post at Occidental College, Núñez taught General Chemistry and a freshman writing seminar called The Scientists Behind the Science. At Mount Holyoke she teaches Protein Structure and Function; Organic I; Organic II; and General Chemistry.