Current Position:

• Assistant Professor, Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, College of Art and Science
• Adjunct Professor, Department of Internal Medicine, Health Sciences Center
• Associate Director, Center for Computational Chemistry (C³)

Degrees:

• Ph.D. in Biophysics, 2009, Huazhong University of Science and Technology
• Postdoctoral Associate in Chemistry, 2009-2012, Cornell University
• Research Associate  in Chemistry, 2012-2017, Cornell University
• Research Scientist in Bioengineering, 2017-2018, University of California Merced

Honors and Grants(after joining UNM):

• NSF CAREER Award, 2023-2028
• SNL University Partnership Network Collaboration-Building Seed Funding, 2023-2024
• INBRE RAIN Award, 2023-2024
• NSF PREC Track 1, 2022-2025 (PI: Mark Walker - Experiments; Co-PI: Yi He - Computations)
• The Autophagy, Inflammation, and Metabolism Center Core Capability Enhancement Award, 2022
• NSF LEAPS Award, 2021-2023
• The 2021 Summer Research for Faculty (SuRF) Award, 2021 & 2022 (Twice)
• Research Allocations Committee (RAC) Award, 2020-2022
• The Substance Use Disorders Grand Challenge Pilot Research Award, 2019-2023 (renewed twice)

Email: yihe (at) unm.edu

Amy is a recent graduate from the University of New Mexico with a B.S. degree in Chemistry and a minor in Spanish. She is interested in developing a better understanding of intrinsically disordered proteins to ultimately aid in drug development.  In the future, she plans to teach chemistry to a younger generation.

Tongtong is a graduate with an M.S. degree in Materials Science and a B.S. degree in Chemistry. Her research focused on the optical properties of gold nanoparticle assembly with DNA nanostructures as a template. Now, she is interested in studying the structure and related biological mechanisms of certain proteins. Her ultimate goal is to gain more insight into the structure and bioactivity of biomolecules and provide fundamental data for rational drug design.

Honors:
2023 NSF-GRFP Awardee
2023 2nd Place LoboBITES
2023 ACS invited speaker

Emily is a graduate with a B.S. degree in Chemistry from Rollins College. She gained research experience that focused on the DEA of NO₂ and NO₂^-. She is currently interested in engineering proteins as biosensors to capture chemical compounds. Her goal after graduate school is to continue doing research for the pharmaceutical industry.

Xinyu Xia earned his Master's degree in Biomedical Engineering from Wuhan University of Technology. His graduate studies primarily centered on drug design, utilizing molecular dynamics simulations. Now, his core responsibilities within his research group involve investigating the interactions between peptides and proteins. He optimizes and designs peptide structures through the application of molecular dynamics simulations. As he progresses through his PhD research, he aspires to gain a deeper understanding and enhance his skills in computational chemistry and structural biology.

Karen received her high school diploma from Volcano Vista High School in 2021. She is pursuing a B.A. Chemistry, a minor in Management and second minor in Family Child Studies, she is expected to graduate during the Summer 2024 semester. Karen joined Dr. He’s group in order to expand her research experience, learn computational chemistry concepts and explore project management/administration skills. She hopes to pursue a master's in business administration and have a career in scientific project management or healthcare administration. Outside of academics, she enjoys snowboarding, traveling and trying new restaurants.