Greg Newkirk

Directed a volunteer board and set strategy, budget, and programming for science education as president of a 501(c)(3) nonprofit science organization.

Advised curriculum and workforce readiness for students entering biotechnology from outside traditional pipelines as a member of the program advisory committee.

Led the host strain engineering team to push an antibody production host past a 10x titer target using recombineering, multi-gene knockout screens, and iterative fermentation. Confirmed intended edits and identified secondary mutations using whole genome sequencing, and summarized findings for non-molecular biologists.

Built nanoparticle-mediated gene delivery systems for plant and algal chloroplasts, validated via confocal microscopy and quantitative mRNA expression analysis. Produced research that resulted in U.S. Patent 11,186,845 B1 and published laboratory reproducibility standards and an electronic notebook workflow for onboarding graduate students.

Ran discussion and review sections across multiple Microbiology and Microbiology Laboratory offerings, including weekly office hours and returning graded work with planned turnaround. Supported course delivery across five quarters.

Advised graduate and undergraduate researchers through cloning, imaging, and analysis projects by reviewing experimental plans and manuscript drafts. Provided line-level written feedback to support research iteration and publication preparation.

Served as president of the Microbiology Graduate Student Association and helped found campus science-to-policy programming, including science-fair judging and K-12 science-camp instruction.

Led technical development of CRISPR/Cas9 editing in a proprietary Yarrowia yeast strain from guide design through recovery of edited isolates. Increased product yield more than tenfold through metabolic pathway engineering and built Illumina amplicon workflows for SNP detection to support commercial product launches.

Purified single-chain variable fragment antibodies expressed in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii chloroplasts and performed mammalian-cell bioassays of anti-cancer immunotoxins against lymphoma cells.

Built standalone guest lectures that brought molecular biology methods into a chemical engineering audience by translating concepts into domain-specific vocabulary. Delivered content for Microbiology and Biochemical Engineering course offerings.

Produced a filmed, peer-reviewed video protocol that teaches a laboratory assay to researchers who cannot watch it performed live. Authored the asynchronous methods instruction used by an online audience.

Owned a 239-student upper-division Microbiology course end to end, including setting the lecture sequence and writing and grading all assessments. Closed the term using student instructor evaluations and achieved a 4.05/5.0 score.

Ph.D. in Microbiology and Plant Pathology at UC Riverside, completed in 2023. Conducted doctoral research on nanoparticle-mediated gene delivery to plant and algal chloroplasts and taught microbiology as instructor of record.

B.Sc. in Biology (Evolution, Ecology, and Behavior) from UC San Diego, completed in 2012.