Musah Lab Attends PITTCON 2025

Dr. Dane, Benni, Alexa, and Niara

Niara, Benedetta, Alexa, and Dr. Dane attended PITTCON 2025 Conference and Expo in Boston, MA March 1-5. Niara was first up with her oral presentation “Holy smokes! The detection and identification of cannabidiol pyrolysis products” on March 3. Benni’s oral presentation “High-level Density Functional Theory Calculations Reveal a Rapid Approach for Differentiating Marijuana from Hemp by DART-HRMS” and Alexa’s oral presentation “Utilizing Mass Spectrometry to Reveal the Eggs-citing Volatiles Emissions of Lucilia sericata Eggs as a Function of Age - Towards Development of New Approaches for Postmortem Interval Determination” were both presented on March 4.

Musah Lab Attends AAFS 2025

Benni, Lex, and Dr. Musah

Alexa, Benni, and Professor Musah attended the American Academy of Forensic Sciences 2025 Annual Conference in Baltimore, MD February 17-22.  Alexa presented 2 posters titled “Eggs-ploring the Volatiles Profiles of L. sericata Eggs for Postmortem Interval Determination” in the NIJ-hosted session on February 18 and “Cracking the Case: Toward the Development of Mass Spectral Analysis of Blow Fly Eggs for Postmortem Interval Determination” on February 19. Benedetta presented a poster “What a Trip! Investigating the Stability of Psilocybin and Psilocin Infused within Complex Edible Matrices” in the NIJ-hosted session February 18. Dr. Musah gave an oral presentation “Caught Green-Handed: The Detection of Potential Cannabis-Use Biomarkers in Fingerprint Residues Using Mass Spectrometry” during the Seized Drugs and Toxicology Session on February 18.

Article Published in ACS Omega (Open Access)

Dr. Urucu and Benedetta’s paper titled “Efficient Phytoremediation of Methyl Red and Methylene Blue Dyes from Aqueous Solutions by Juncus effusus” was recently published as an open access article on January 9.

ACS Omega 2025, 10, 2, 1943–1953.

Cover Article Published in Organic Letters (Open Access)

Benedetta and Dr Musah coauthored a publication with Dr Eric Block entitled Re-examination of the Claimed Isolation of Stable Noncyclic 1,2-Disulfoxides that appeared on the cover of Organic Letters in November.

Org. Lett. 2024, 26, 9619−9624.

Alexa Figueroa Awarded Carol de Forest Student Research Grant (NEAFS)

Alexa Figueroa attended the 2024 Northeastern Association of Forensic Scientists (NEAFS) Annual Meeting in Atlantic City, NJ this week where she presented her research Development of a Mass Spectrometry-Based Species Identification Prediction Model for Entomological Samples for Postmortem Interval Estimation. While attending the meeting, she was awarded a Carol de Forest Student Research Grant (one of two awarded annually!) to support her continuing research in forensic science. Congratulations Alexa!!

Article Published in The Journal of Physical Chemistry A (Open Access)

Dr. Arathala’s publication entitled Atmospheric Chemistry of Chloroprene Initiated by OH Radicals: Combined Ab Initio/DFT Calculations and Kinetics Analysis was recently published as an open access article on October 8.

J. Phys. Chem. A 2024, 128, 41, 8983–8995

Musah Lab Attends ASMS

Professor Musah and Allix at ASMS.

Professor Musah and Allix traveled to Anaheim, CA to attend the American Society for Mass Spectrometry 2024 72nd Annual Meeting. Professor Musah gave a talk titled “Eggs-amination of Volatiles Emissions of Blow Fly Eggs - Implications for Lucilia sericata Egg Age Estimation and Post Mortem Interval Determination”. Allix presented a poster titled “(H)Ear Me Out: Utilization of Earwax for the Identification of Chemical Markers of Ménière's Disease” as well as a lighting talk titled “Can You Believe Your Ears? Chemical Marker Identification for the Diagnosis of Ménière's Disease using Earwax" at the Twenty Years of Ambient Ionization: Where Are We Now? Workshop.

Paper accepted by Talanta Open

Benedetta and Megan’s paper titled “Utilizing Derivatizing Agents for the Differentiation of Cannabinoid Isomers in Complex Food Beverage and Personal-care Product Matrices by Ambient Ionization Mass Spectrometry” has been accepted by Talanta Open. This is Benedetta’s first first-author paper.

Musah Lab Attends Emerald Conference

Benedetta and Niara traveled to San Diego, CA to attend the Emerald Conference. Both presented posters titled “Universal Protocol for the Extraction of Psychoactive and Non-psychoactive Compounds from within Complex Matrices: The Past, Present and Future” and “An Unbe-weed-able Approach for the Detection of Cannabis Ingestion using Fingerprint Residues and High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry”.

Professor Musah Featured in Pittcon 2024 Recap

Professor Musah was recently highlighted in the Pittcon 2024 Recap. The link to the video can be found here and her comments are featured at approximately 1:35 min.

Musah Lab Attends MSACL

Allix with her poster at MSACL 2024.

Professor Musah and Allix traveled to Monterey, CA to attend the Association for Mass Spectrometry and Advances in the Clinical Laboratory 14th Annual Meeting. Allix presented a poster titled “Let Me Talk Your Ears Off: Determination of Chemical Markers of Ménière’s Disease in Earwax” and received first place in the poster competition.

Paper accepted by Water Research

Daman’s paper titled “Experimental and Density Functional Theory Investigation of Surface-modified Biopolymer for Improved Adsorption of Mixtures of Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances in Water” has been accepted by Water Research.

Paper Accepted by Journal of Physical Chemistry A

Daman’s paper titled “Theoretical Insights into the Gas-Phase Oxidation of 3-Methyl-2-butene-1-thiol b the OH Radical: Thermochemical and Kinetic Analysis” has been accepted by the Journal of Physical Chemistry A.

Musah Lab Attends Pittcon

Allix, Professor Musah and Niara at Pittcon 2024.

Professor Musah, Allix and Niara traveled to San Diego, CA to attend Pittcon 2024. Professor Musah gave two talks titled “Deep into the Weeds - A Combined DART-HRMS and Chemometric Approach for Differentiating Hemp and Marijuana Varieties of Cannabis sativa” and “Towards Development of a Rapid Approach for Differentiating Marijuana from Hemp - Insights from High-level Density Functional Theory Calculations. Allix and Niara also presented talks titled “Can You See(d) It? Laser Ablation Direct Analysis in Real-Time Imaging — Mass Spectrometry (LADI-MS) Analysis of Small Molecules in Voacanga africana Seeds” and “Weed the Fine Print: The Detection of Cannabis Ingestion using Fingerprint Residues and High-Resolution Ambient Ionization Mass Spectrometry”, respectively.

Musah Lab Attends AAFS

Professor Musah and Benedetta traveled to Denver, CO to attend the American Academy of Forensic Sciences 2024 Annual Meeting. Professor Musah presented two posters titled “Towards an ‘Eggs-perimental’ Approach for Species Determination of Blow Fly Eggs to Facilitate Estimations of Post-mortem Interval” and “Application of Insights from High-level Density Functional Theory for the Differentiation of Marijuana and Hemp”. Benedetta gave a talk titled “Then vs. Now vs. the Future: An Overview of Extraction Protocols for Cannabis-derived and Cannabinoid-infused Products and the Development of a Universal Extraction Method”.

Musah Lab Featured in Forensic Articles

The Musah Lab’s work on differentiating hemp and marijuana have been featured in two articles. Marijuana Moment highlighted the work in an article titled “Federally Funded Researchers Discover Two New Methods of Distinguishing Hemp and Marijuana to Assist Crime Labs” which can be found here and the NIJ highlighted the work in an article titled “New Forensics Methods to Accurately Determine THC in Seized Cannabis” which can be found here.

Professor Musah Interviewed by LCGC International

LCGC International recently interviewed Professor Musah on the mass spectral imaging work on Voacanga africana seeds. The interview is titled “Exploring the Small-Molecule Composition of Voacanga africana Seeds Using LADI-MS: An Interview with Rabi Musah” and can be found here.

Musah Lab Featured on NIJ Podcast

In the NIJ podcast, “Justice Today”, Professor Musah’s research on hemp and marijuana are highlighted. The episode titled “What’s Known and Unknown about Marijuana (Part One)” can be found here.

Professor Musah Presents at EAS

Professor Musah traveled to Plainsboro, NJ to present at the 2023 Eastern Analytical Symposium. She presented a talk titled “Things WE’ED Like to Avoid – Circumventing Measurement Challenges When Analyzing Cannabinoid-infused Complex Matrices”.

Musah Lab Presents at NEAFS

Benedetta, Alexa, Niara and Monica traveled to Mystic, CT to attend the Northeaster Association of Forensic Scientists 2023 Annual Meeting. Benedetta, Alexa and Niara all presented talks titled “Progress Towards the Development of a Universal Protocol for Extraction of Cannabinoids from Within Complex Matrices”, “Towards Development of a Mass Spectral Approach to Facilitate More “Eggs-act” PMI Determination Using Entomological Samples” and “The Proof is in the Print: The Detection of Cannabis Ingestion Using Fingerprint Residues and High-Resolution Ambient Ionization Mass Spectrometry”, respectively. Monica also presented in the student forum on “Empowerment in STEM: A Discussion about Supporting Women Scientists”.