Dr. Graham is a postdoctoral researcher in the Biochemical and Biophysical Systems Group within the Physical and Life Sciences Directorate at LLNL, where he develops molecular dynamics methods to predict the mechanics of protein-based materials. He is primarily interested in the assembly of structural proteins into high-performance fibers and adhesives. Previously, he investigated how primary sequence and processing conditions influence the mechanical properties of synthetic marine mussel adhesives and spider silk fibers.

Dr. Graham earned his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Northwestern University, where his dissertation, Toward Programmable Biomaterials: Simulating Sequence and Process Effects on the Mechanics of Mussel and Spider Silk Protein-Inspired Materials, examined sequence and process effects on bioinspired materials. He received his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Washington University in St. Louis, where he designed pool-boiling heat transfer experiments for cooling applications.

Ph.D. Mechanical Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL

B.S. Mechanical Engineering, Washington University in St. Louis

Graham, J.; Gerber, A.; Joodaki, F.; Keten, S. (2026) Dynamic reversible iron-catechol complexes toughen mussel foot protein assemblies. Cell Reports Physical Sciences.

Lu, G.; Graham, J..; Keten, S. (2026) Nanoconfinement of hydrophobic domains facilitate strong mesoscale networks in silk-inspired materials. Nano Letters.

Graham, J.; Subramani, S.; Yang, X.; Russell, T.; Zhang, F.; Keten, S. (2025). Charting the envelope of mechanical properties of synthetic silk fibers through predictive modeling of the drawing process. Science Advances.

Graham, J. and Keten, S. (2023). Increase in charge and density improves the strength and toughness of mfp5 inspired protein materials. American Chemical Society Biomaterials Science and Engineering.

Pandey, A.; Liu, E.; Graham, J.; and Keten, S. (2023). B-factor prediction in proteins using a sequence-based deep learning model. Patterns.

Graham, J. and Keten, S. (2022). Bacterial flotation devices enhance ultrasound imaging. Biophysical Journal.

Graham J.; Hawa A.; and Weisensee P. B. (2020) Evolution of heat transfer in pool boiling in contaminated water. ICNMM.

Northwestern University Leadership Fellow (2023)

National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow (2020-2023)

Northwestern International Institute for Nanotechnology Ryan Fellow (2020-2022)

Washington University in St. Louis Erwin C. Hoelscher Memorial Outstanding Senior (2020)