Isabella Bowland

Isabella Bowland is a graduate student in chemical engineering working to develop renewable pathways for producing high-value aromatic amines—key ingredients in pharmaceuticals, dyes, and industrial materials. Her research centers on engineering Escherichia coli to convert glucose into these compounds through customized metabolic networks. Under the MathWorks Fellowship, Isabella will build on this work by refining pathway design and advancing predictive models to support industrial-scale fermentation. To support her research, Isabella draws heavily on MATLAB and its suite of toolboxes. She uses COBRA and GECKO to model genome-scale networks, simulate enzyme-constrained kinetics, and pinpoint rate-limiting steps. Additionally, she utilizes MATLAB’s numerical solvers to optimize bioreactor configurations, thereby bridging laboratory-scale discoveries with process development. Through this integrative approach, Isabella’s work could offer a viable alternative to petrochemical-based synthesis, advancing more sustainable and scalable bioproduction strategies.