• Cooley hails from Conway, Arkansas, where she attended Hendrix College. Her passion for the synergy of chemistry and biology was inspired by her undergraduate experiences, performing organic chemistry research at Hendrix during the academic year and neurobiology research in the summers at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. She went on to obtain a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Stanford University, working with Professor Paul Wender on drug delivery approaches. She then completed a postdoctoral fellowship in chemical biology at The Scripps Research Institute in San Diego. Working in the labs of Professors Jeff Kelly and Luke Wiseman, she developed new strategies to ameliorate protein misfolding diseases such as light chain amyloidosis by the activation of stress-responsive signaling pathways. All of these experiences led her to Trinity, where she hopes to inspire generations of students to learn organic chemistry and chemical biology while researching solutions to critical problems in human health and disease.

    • Postdoc in Chemical Biology, The Scripps Research Institute 
    • Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry, Stanford University 
    • B.A. in Chemistry, Hendrix College 
    • Julia M. D. Grandjean; Aparajita Madhavan; Lauren Cech; Bryan O. Seguinot; Ryan J. Paxman; Emery Smith; Louis Scampavia; Evan T. Powers; Christina B. Cooley; Lars Plate; Timothy P. Spicer; Jeffery W. Kelly; R. Luke Wiseman. “Pharmacologic IRE1/XBP1s Activation Confers Targeted ER Proteostasis Reprogramming” Nat. Chem. Biol. 2020, 16, 1052-1061. 
    • Jonathan E. Palmer; Breanna M. Brietske; Tyler C. Bate; Erik A. Blackwood; Manasa Garg; Christopher C. Glembotski; Christina B. Cooley. “Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS)-Activatable Prodrug Strategy for Selective Activation of ATF6 Following Ischemia-Reperfusion Injury” ACS Med. Chem. Lett. 2020, 11, 3, 292-297. 
    • Zachary T. Allen; Jemima R. Sackey-Addo; Madeline P. Hopps; Danyal Tahseen; Joseph T. Anderson; Tyler A. Graf; Christina B. Cooley. “Fluorogenic Atom Transfer Radical Polymerization in Aqueous Media as a Strategy for Detection” Chem. Sci. 2019, 10, 1017-1022.
    • Lars Plate;* Christina B. Cooley;* John J. Chen; Ryan J. Paxman; Ciara M. Gallagher; Franck Madoux; Joseph C. Genereux; Wesley Dobbs; Dan Garza; Timothy P. Spicer; Louis Scampavia; Steven J. Brown; Hugh Rosen; Evan T. Powers; Peter Walter; Peter Hodder; R. Luke Wiseman; Jeffery W. Kelly. "Small Molecule Proteostasis Regulators that Reprogram the ER to Reduce Extracellular Protein Aggregation" eLIFE 2016, 5, e15550. 
    • Christina B. Cooley;* Lisa M. Ryno;* Lars Plate; Gareth J. Morgan; John D. Hulleman; Jeffery W. Kelly; R. Luke Wiseman. “Unfolded Protein Response Activation Reduces Secretion and Extracellular Aggregation of Amyloidogenic Immunoglobulin Light Chain” Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 2014, 111, 13046-13051.
    • Mathew D. Shoulders; Lisa M. Ryno; Christina B. Cooley; Jeffery W. Kelly; R. Luke Wiseman. “Broadly Applicable Methodology for the Rapid and Dosable Small Molecule-Mediated Regulation of Transcription Factors in Human Cells” J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2013, 135, 8129-8132.
    • Erika I. Geihe;* Christina B. Cooley;* Justin Edward; Matthew K. Kiesewetter; Jeff Simon; James L. Hedrick; Robert M. Waymouth; Paul A. Wender. “Designed Guanidinium-Rich Amphipathic Oligocarbonate Molecular Transporters Complex, Deliver and Release siRNA in Cells” Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 2012, 109, 13171-13176.
    • Christina B. Cooley; Brian M. Trantow; Fredrik Nederberg; Matthew K. Kiesewetter; James L. Hedrick; Robert M. Waymouth; Paul A. Wender. “Oligocarbonate Molecular Transporters:  Oligomerization-Based Syntheses and Cell-Penetrating Studies” J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2009, 131, 16401-16403.
    • Christina B. Cooley; Brian M. Trantow; Fredrik Nederberg; Matthew K. Kiesewetter; James L. Hedrick; Robert M. Waymouth; Paul A. Wender. “Oligocarbonate Molecular Transporters” U.S. Patent 7,939,621, 2011.

    *denotes equal authorship
    Underline denotes Trinity University students or alumni

    Research in the Cooley Lab spans the interface of chemistry and biology. We harness the power of synthetic organic chemistry to solve problems in biology and human health. We are currently working on prodrug strategies to achieve site-specific drug delivery and the development of fluorogenic polymerization reactions as platforms for biodetection.

    • Organic Chemistry
    • Biochemistry Lab
    • 2021 National Science Foundation CAREER Award
    • 2021 Trinity University Early Career Award for Distinguished Research and Teaching
    • 2012 NIH NRSA Ruth L. Kirschstein Postdoctoral Fellowship
    • 2011 Stanford University Sessler Graduate Student Leadership Award
    • 2009 Stanford University Linus Pauling Teaching Award
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