Welcome to the Howe Lab @ Queen’s University
Recent Updates
June 2026
Graeme and the group received the Queen’s Prize for Excellence in Research for Outstanding Emerging Researchers. Way to go, team!!!
Baoyan Liu received a Canada Impact+ Research Training Doctoral Award to drive AI-guided design of new nylon-degrading enzymes. Congratulations, Baoyan!
May 2026
Dr. Lee’s paper describing a novel screen for PETase engineering was published in RSC Chem. Biol! Congratulations Jaieck!
Josh Innis received an Ontario Graduate Scholarship to support his studies on enzymes involved in natural product biosynthesis. Contragulations, Josh!
Mechanistic Enzymology
Enzymes catalyze difficult reactions with very high efficiency and selectivity.
How do they achieve this?
Evolution of catalysis
Many biologically necessary reactions are too slow to sustain life. How did enzymes cross the “catalytic void” to bring these processes into the realm of biology?
biocatalyst development
Directed evolution facilitates the production of efficient enzymes with unnatural activities. How does this process
compare to natural evolution?