Olivia Fiebig

Olivia Fiebig is a biophysical chemist interested in how the lipids and proteins in cell membranes impact biological processes. She seeks to take an interdisciplinary approach- combining biochemistry, spectroscopy, and other physical tools to study cell membrane behavior at the fundamental level.

Prior to Smith, she completed her Ph.D. in Chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and was an Eberly Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Penn State.

Current research in the Fiebig lab utilizes a variety of model membrane systems, including vesicles and nanodiscs, to 1) study lipid behavior and lipid-protein interactions and their significance in biological processes and 2) determine what influences model membrane assembly and their physical properties. Combining these two goals will allow us to optimize model lipid bilayers as a method to understand and replicate complex biological systems.

Selected Publications

(*denotes equal contribution)

D. Wang*, O. C. Fiebig*,D. Harris*, H. Toporik, Y. Ji, C. Chuang, M. Nairat, A. L. Tong, J. I. Ogren, S. M. Hart, J. Cao, J. N. Sturgis, Y. Mazor, G. S. Schlau-Cohen, “Elucidating inter-protein energy transfer dynamics within the antenna network from purple bacteria” Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2023, 120, e2220477120.

O. C. Fiebig*, D. Harris*, D. Wang*, M. P. Hoffmann, G. S. Schlau-Cohen, “Ultrafast dynamics of photosynthetic light harvesting systems: Strategies for acclimation across organisms” Annu. Rev. Phys. Chem. 2023, 74, 493-520.

A. L. Tong*, O. C. Fiebig*, M. Nairat, D. Harris, M. Giansily, A. Chenu, J. N. Sturgis, G. S. Schlau-Cohen, “Comparison of the energy transfer rates in structural and spectral variants of the B800-850 complex from purple bacteria” J. Phys. Chem. B. 2020, 124(8), 1460-1469.

C. M. Renda, Y. K. Patel, L. R. Henshaw, K. T. Munson, O. C. Fiebig, A. T. Tran, J. Shriver, J. Cruz, L. Yu, T. D. Vaden, “Thermodynamic and conductivity properties of acetic acid - EMIMOAc ionic liquid solutions” J. Mol. Liq. 2016, 216, 710-715.

M. C. Miller, S. L. Hanna, K. G. DeFrates, O. C. Fiebig, T. D. Vaden, “Kinetics and mass spectrometric measurements of myoglobin unfolding in aqueous ionic liquid solutions” Int. J. Biol. Macromol. 2016, 85, 200-207.

O. C. Fiebig, E. Mancini, G. Caputo, T. D. Vaden, “Quantitative evaluation of myoglobin unfolding in the presence of guanidinium hydrochloride and ionic liquids in solution” J. Phys. Chem. B. 2014, 118(2), 406-412.