Read about what our GCDB graduate students’ achievements and activities.
Researchers at the Indiana University Melvin and Bren Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center have identified a new potential therapeutic target for colorectal cancers with BRAF gene mutations, which occur in about 10% of metastatic colorectal cancers. Their findings, recently published in Molecular Cancer, provide new insights for addressing treatment-resistance to improve responses to cancer therapies.
Congrats to Vicky Lopez, Sophie Warren and Sophie Fleck on being awarded 2025 Robert Briggs fellowships, which provide summer funding to support their thesis research. All three graduate students are rising fifth-year students. Vicky Lopez works in the lab of Dan Tracey on discoid domain receptors in nociception. Sophie Warren works in the lab of Manuel Baizabal on histone methylation in mammalian brain development. Sophie Fleck works in the lab of Jason Tennessen on estrogen receptor biology. Congrats all!
Sixth-year GCDB graduate student Hunter Herriage was selected to present two oral presentations at the 66th Annual Drosophila Research Conference in San Diego, California. Hunter presented his thesis research in a session on Cell Division and Cell Growth and also presented in the Polyploidy Workshop. Congratulations to Hunter on this major accomplishment!
Congratulations to fifth-year GCDB graduate student Erica Nadolski for her two recent publications. For her article in Evolution and Development, Erica serves as senior and corresponding author on collaborative work with a high school mentee, Landon Mitchell. This month, Erica also served as first author on a book chapter entitled, "Insects in their environments: eco-devo and evo-devo perspectives,” which will appear in Comprehensive Molecular Insect Science. Erica’s thesis advisor, Professor Armin Moczek, also serves as co-author of the research article and senior author of the book chapter. Way to go, Erica!
Indiana University Bloomington graduate student Shefali Shefali has received the prestigious American Heart Association Predoctoral Fellowship supporting pre-doctoral and clinical health professional students pursuing careers in science, medicine, and related fields. The fellowship aims to improve global cardiovascular, cerebrovascular, and brain health.
Congratulations to Will Hamilton who published a review article “crANKing up the infection: ankyrin domains in Rickettsiales and their role in host manipulation” with his advisor, Irene Newton. Will is currently a fifth-year graduate student whose thesis research focuses on how effectors secreted by the parasite Wolbachia interact with and modulate host cell function in the model organism Drosophila melanogaster.
Fourth-year GCDB student Sophie Warren served as first author on a recent manuscript from the lab of Manuel Baizabel. The study presented tools for the depletion of histone H3 methylation, enabling insights into transcriptional regulation, cell differentiation, and identity in mammalian cortical neurons. Congrats to Sophie for publishing this first portion of her thesis!
Congratulations to Emily Erdmann for taking First place in the Outstanding Poster Presentation at the 2024 Rustbelt RNA meeting. This annual meeting focuses on all things RNA and had over 150 poster presentations from trainees.
Congratulations to Yi-Ting Huang who serves as first author on a manuscript entitled “An unscheduled switch to endocycles induces a reversible senescent arrest that impairs growth of the Drosophila wing disc.” This work revealed new inherent properties of unscheduled endocycling cells that impact tissue growth and has important implications for understanding their contribution to wound healing and cancer. Yi-Ting is a sixth-year student in the Calvi lab who also published a review article earlier this year.
Congratulations to Emily Erdmann who serves as first author on a manuscript entitled “ADR-2 regulates fertility and oocyte fate in Caenorhabditis elegant,” which was recently published in GENETICS. Emily is a sixth-year student in the Hundley lab and has previously contributed to three other articles during her time in the GCDB graduate program.
Congratulations to Chris Ladaika who serves as first author on a manuscript entitled “LSD1 and CoREST2 Potentiate STAT3 Activity to Promote Enteroendocrine Cell Differentiation in Mucinous Colorectal Cancer,” which was recently published in Cancer Research. Chris is a sixth-year student in the O’ Hagan lab and has previously contributed to three other research articles during his time in the GCDB graduate program.
The cover of the September issue of Cold Spring Harbor Protocols displays an image taken by Tennessen lab graduate student Shefali! The image shows the ventral side of central nervous system (CNS) from third-instar Drosophila larvae (juvenile brain), highlighting the neural stem cells in red and ganglion mother cells in green. The focus of the image has been adjusted to highlight the cellular morphology showing the neuroblast arrangement within the central brain and the optic lobe region. Shefali’s thesis work focuses on understanding how non-autonomous glucose dependent signals can regulate cellular homeostasis within the developing brain. The brain-body axis is a powerful system to study inter-organ metabolic signaling because not only is it conserved in many metazoans, but also has clear implications in diseases like diabetes, neurodegeneration and cancer. Congrats Shefali!
Congratulations to Yadira Pena-Garcia for being awarded a one-year fellowship position on the Common Themes in Reproductive Diversity NIH T32 training grant. Yadira is a rising fifth-year graduate student in Matt Hahn's lab. Her fellowship project will focus on investigating the factors driving variation in mutation rates across mammalian species. Congrats Yadira!
Congratulations to Tim Cioffi who was selected to present his thesis research at the 2024 Plant and Microbial Cytoskeleton Gordon Research Conference. Tim is a rising sixth-year student in the lab of Sid Shaw and his talk was entitled, “Gain-of-Function EB1b Fusions Reveal New Properties of Transverse Cortical Microtubule Arrays.” Tim was also elected to serve as co-chair of the trainee seminar that occurs prior to the next GRC. Congrats to Tim on both honors!
Congratulations to Rosie Lanzloth for being selected to present her thesis research at the Immuno-Oncology Summit in Philadelphia! Rosie is a rising 4th year student in the O’Hagan lab. Her presentation was entitled “Understanding the interactions between tumor epithelial and mast cells in BRAF mutant colorectal cancer.”
Congratulations to Emma Lamb for being awarded a two-year fellowship as part of the NIH T32 in Quantitative Chemical Biology. Emma is a rising second-year student in the Hundley lab. Her thesis research focuses on how ADAR enzymes recognize intronic regions of nascent transcripts.
Congratulations to Yi-Ting Huang for receiving first place in the category of basic science graduate student poster presentation at the annual Cancer Research Day event at IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center! Yi-Ting is a graduate student in the Calvi lab. Her thesis research focuses on using Drosophila as a model to define mechanisms that regulate the growth of polyploid cancer cells.
Congratulations to Dorian Dale for receiving a John R. and Wendy L. Kindig Fellowship. The Kindigs donated this gift to the IU College of Arts and Sciences to support rising third-year students in the Departments of Biology, Biochemistry and Chemistry. Dorian is pursuing a double graduate major (GCDB and the Program in Neuroscience) and his thesis research is performed in the lab of Dan Tracey. Congrats again Dorian!
Erica Nadolski, her thesis advisor - Armin Moczek and postdoctoral fellow - Phil Davison, recently co-authored a review article entitled “Gene regulatory networks underlying the development and evolution of plasticity in horned beetles.” The review provides an excellent overview of developmental mechanisms that facilitate conditional development in horned beetles and provides an in-depth look at how chromatin remodeling and transcription factors may play an important role in these gene regulatory developments. Congrats Erica!
Congratulations to Hunter Herriage who co-authored the manuscript “Premature endocycling of Drosophila follicle cells causes pleiotropic defects in oogenesis” with his advisor, Brian Calvi. Hunter’s article appears in this month’s issue of Genetics. Check it out to learn what Hunter has been doing for his thesis research and to learn about how unscheduled endocycling of cells can disrupt tissue growth and function to negatively impact development.
Congratulations to Ananya Mahapatra who serves as first author on a manuscript entitled “ADAR-mediated regulation of PQM-1 expression in neurons impacts gene expression throughout C. elegans and regulates survival from hypoxia”, which was recently published in PLOS Biology. Ananya is a fifth-year student in the Hundley lab and has previously contributed to a review article during her time in the GCDB graduate program.
Congratulations to Haley Brown for her recently published article entitled “Polycomb safeguards imaginal disc specification through control of the Vestigial-Scalloped complex”. Haley is a sixth-year graduate student in the lab of Justin Kumar. This exciting work on the epigenetic control of eye fate was highlighted by the journal and uses a cutting-edge high-throughput sequencing method – CUT & RUN, for which the Kumar lab published a STARS protocol method paper earlier last year and which Haley was second author!
Congratulations to Qin Liao for receiving an IU College of Arts and Sciences Dissertation Research Fellowship. Qin is a fifth-year student in the Wang lab and has already contributed to four publications on bacterial chromosome structure and dynamics!
Congratulations to Hunter Herriage and Yi-Ting Huang for their recently published review article entitled, “The antagonistic relationship between apoptosis and polyploidy in development and cancer.” Hunter and Yi-Ting are fourth-year graduate students in the lab of Brian Calvi and collaborated on this article in Seminars in Cell and Developmental Biology.
Congratulations to Ahmed Ghobashi who serves as first author on a manuscript entitled “Activation of AKT induces EZH2-mediated b-catenin trimethylation in colorectal cancer,” which was recently published in iScience. Ahmed is a sixth-year student in the O’Hagan lab and has previously contributed to three other research articles during his time in the GCDB graduate program.
Congratulations to Spencer Gray for receiving an Honorable Mention poster prize at the FASEB Helicases and Nucleic Acid Machines Conference. Spencer is a fifth-year student in the Bochman lab. His thesis research focuses on characterizing the interactions of the helicase Hrq1 with G-quadruplexes in DNA.
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