People

Kyle McGuff serves at the Project Manager for the EPA P3 project. He is a co-founder of Alkylyst, a proud Army veteran, and aspiring biochemistry graduate student!

Charlie Knust is a biochemistry major with a minor In mathematics. He is an undergraduate researcher at Queens University of Charlotte working on thermochemical characterization of C2O2cetane. Charlie was recently the recipient of the 2024 Virginia Martin Scholarship Award in Biology. In his spare time, he enjoys playing D1 soccer and daydreaming of European pastries.

Griffen Gonzalez is a chemistry major/math minor, and undergraduate researcher at Queens University of Charlotte working on synthesis and evaluation of KGly2 catalyst. He is a member of the varsity wrestling team, the Queens ACS Club and the recipient of the 2023 Virginia Martin Scholarship Award in Chemistry. Griffen will work on municipal solid waste to fuel conversion at Oak Ridge National Lab in summer 2024.

Rahinatou Dabone is a sophomore majoring in Biochemistry with a minor focus on Computing & Data Analytics. She is a member of the ACS Club, an international student ambassador, and a general chemistry supplemental instructor.  She came to Queens from Burkina Faso.

Addison “Addy” Hitt is a junior chemistry major at Queens with an interest in organic chemistry, particularly the synthesis of ionic liquid antibiotics. She is an honor student and recipient of the Glaxo Smith Kline Woman in Science Scholarship as well as the Outstanding Chemistry Lab assistant award and will be working with ionic liquids for plastics recycling in summer 2024 at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab.

Minliang Yang is an assistant professor at North Carolina State University. Her area of expertise includes life-cycle assessment and technoeconomic analysis of agrifood systems and bioprocessing. She’s interested in developing models to explore diverse strategies to make the agrifood system more sustainable.

Aaron Socha serves at the PI on the EPA P3 project. He teaches organic chemistry Queens University of Charlotte and has research interests at the intersection of natural products, ionic liquids, and renewable energy. He has 15+ years of biodiesel experience, now prefers bicycles over cars and enjoys more grey hairs than can be seen in this outdated photo.