Timothy C. Moore

I am currently a graduate student in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN. I work in the McCabe Group.

Research Interests

I am currently involved in work focusing on understanding the molecular level structure of lipid lamellae in the outermost layer of the skin, the stratum corneum (SC). This layer is responsible for the barrier function of the skin, making life on Earth possible. Although the lipid composition of the SC is known, the molecular level details of the observed structures are not, making the design of penetration-enhancing drugs a challenge. I use molecular dynamics simulations to study model lipid systems. The resolution available from simulation allows connections to be made between system composition and system properties. The overall aim of this work is to better understand the lipid structure of the SC, to aid in both skin barrier- and penetration-enhancing drug design.

A large part of my work on skin systems involves developing coarse-grained (CG) molecular models. CG models contain less detail than fully atomistic ones, and as a results are computationally less expensive. I am currently developing CG models of the SC lipids to enable simulations of these systems on larger time and length scales than what’s currently available with fully atomistic models.

Education

  • Ph.D., Chemical Engineering, Vanderbilt University, 2017 (expected)
  • B.S. (Magna Cum Laude), Chemical Engineering, North Carolina State University, 2011

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