2022-2023 ARCS Northern California Scholars

ARCS Northern California Chapter is thrilled to recognize the work of our outstanding scholars for 2022-2023

To view an archive of our 2021-2022 scholars, click here.

San Francisco State University

Marina Bozinovic

Department of Geography

Marina is broadly interested in geographic information sciences in the context of marine sciences. Her research will use passive acoustic monitoring to identify spatial and temporal distributions of baleen whales around the San Francisco Bay in relation to vessel threats such as collisions and noise pollution. This work around threatened whale species is of particular interest to the NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center. Prior to graduate school, Marina earned her B.S. in Aquatic Biology and worked at the California Academy of Sciences overseeing scientific and occupational diving and supporting safe mesophotic coral reef research using mixed-gas rebreathers. Her outside interests include vegetarian cooking, exploring new cities, and reformer Pilates.

Anthony Bravo

Department of Chemistry

Anthony is interested in solving environmental issues. His undergraduate research consisted of studying the origins of organic carbon sequestered in bay area saltmarshes. This culminated with a paper recently published in the journal of Limnology and Oceanography on which he is second author. His current research revolves around using low-cost optics and computer vision software to image and monitor the motility of plankton as a function of pollutant concentration. He has presented at San Francisco State’s COSE Symposium and SACNAS National Diversity in STEM Conference. He has been a MARC Scholar and is currently a Genentech Foundation MS Scholar.

Eric Coyle

Department of Biology (Integrative)

Eric is a member of the Stillman and Vredenburg labs where his research interests span physiology, behavior, microbiology, and disease ecology with the aim of investigating the muti-level impacts of co-occurring environmental stressors and perturbations resulting from natural processes and human activity. He is also a Genentech Foundation Masters Scholar at San Francisco State and a recipient of the BioLuminaries award. Outside of research, Eric is involved in a diversity, equity, and inclusion effort at UC Davis called the Student Voices Project. This project seeks to make a platform for more open sharing between students and faculty to build a bridge between these two central elements of the university experience. Eric’s future plans entail a Ph.D. program and postdoctoral position to continue developing as a researcher and scientist.

Huy Do

Department of Chemistry (Biochemistry)

Huy’s research focuses on examining structures and functions of uncharacterized acetyltransferase proteins using both in-silico and in-vitro techniques. He has incorporated computational skills learned from the courses offered by San Francisco State’s Graduate Opportunity to Learn Data Science (GOLD) program to analyze large scale datasets for his research projects. He has also worked as a part-time assistant in both the Chemistry department office and Chemistry stockroom, all while maintaining continuous productivity on his research project. Huy’s research experience and engagement with international collaborators have caused him to switch his career path from medicine to a goal of obtaining a Ph.D. in biosciences.

Kloe Keeter

Department of Chemistry (Biochemistry)

Kloe has been conducting research in biochemistry/molecular biology since her sophomore year as an undergraduate. Her current project is applying synthetic adhesion molecules as a toolkit to investigate how ligan intracellular signaling impacts synthetic Notch and CAR T cell activation, in Dr. Wendell Lim’s laboratory at UCSF. Kloe also has a passion for teaching and will be teaching introduction to chemistry lab at San Francisco State in fall of 2022. She hopes to encourage more people to fall in love with research like she did early on.

Ken Luu

Department of Physics

As an undergraduate, Ken conducted research in a variety of topics in computational nuclear physics at San Diego State University where he graduated cum laude. He then had a summer internship at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) with the Parallel Computing School, where he studied the physics of fireballs and how they evolve over time and also worked on the stability of molecules in the atmosphere of white dwarfs. At San Francisco State he is working on 3D General Relativistic simulations of jets in black hole-disk systems. His research interest is motivated by the fact that computation can be used alongside experiments and theory to stimulate progress. Outside the lab, Ken enjoys rock climbing and learning guitar, with the goal of performing in front of a live audience.

Charlie McMenomy

Department of Mathematics

Charlie is interested in partial differential equations, particularly in their applications to scientific fields such as physics and engineering. His mathematics thesis research will focus on determining the response of a composite material in time when at least one of the two component materials has a lossy behavior. Charlie spent this past summer learning about integral equations and their applications at the graduate summer school at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute in Berkeley. He hopes to begin working towards a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics in Fall 2023 with the goal of one day conducting research for the Department of Energy.

Kira Miller

Department of Biology (Integrative)

Kira combines her interests in ecology with her love of the mountains by studying amphibians in the Sierra Nevada. Over the years, field research has taken her from these alpine meadows to the red desert of Utah; from vernal pools in California’s Central Valley to the longleaf pine flatwoods of Florida. Her research interests focus on amphibian disease and resilience, and at San Francisco State she aims to study the interactions between amphibian skin microbiome and the amphibian chytrid fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis. She hopes her work will remind us of the link between wildlife and human systems and emphasize the importance of ecological conservation. When she’s not thinking about frogs (and even when she is), Kira enjoys recreating outdoors and being creative in the kitchen.

Katherine Montana

Department of Biology (Integrative)

As a graduate student at San Francisco State and the California Academy of Sciences, where she conducts her research, Katherine is proud to conduct ground-breaking spider systematics research, reveal untold stories found in the Academy Library’s archives, and mentor other emerging scientists. Katherine has been hard at work in both archival research and systematics research. She finished a project entitled Untold Stories from the Archives in which she advised interns in researching the lives of marginalized staff at the CAS throughout its history. She also traveled to the southeastern US to collect spiders from the family Dictynidae, which she will use to revise the genus Lathys -- the focus of her research throughout the second year of her master's program. She is advising an undergraduate intern on a spider research project though the Summer Systematics Institute at the CAS and is a student coordinator for the program.

Lekha Priya Patil

Department of Mathematics

Lekha is interested in the properties of fractals through the lenses of real analysis, topology, and measure theory. Fractals exist everywhere in the real world, from snowflakes and clouds to the circulatory system. By studying fractals, we gain the tools to model real life objects which occur in irregular shapes with non-smooth perimeters. Lekha earned her bachelor’s degree in applied mathematics at UC Berkeley, where her interest in pure math first began. She is currently a graduate teaching associate at SF State, where she has taught precalculus and calculus I.

Andres Patino-Lopez

Department of Biology (Integrative)

Andrés (they/them), a first-generation Latinx graduate student, is working towards becoming a Wildlife Ecologist and strives to one day work in urban-rural gradient environments helping to manage threatened and non-threatened wildlife species at both the state and federal level. They were selected this summer as a Mosaics in Science Intern, a program coordinated by the National Park Service and Environment for the Americas, to work in the Golden Gate Recreation Area as an Assistant Biologist. They worked for the San Francisco Recreation and Park Department for five years and were recognized for their outstanding outreach work leading the Love Dolores campaign at Dolores Park. They now work as a Graduate Teaching Assistant at SF State. During their free time, Andrés enjoys hiking, rock climbing, backpacking, searching for wildlife, and practicing poi.

Carolyn Schwartz

Department of Biology (Integrative)

Carolyn is researching how the sense of hearing changes in response to noise generated by human activity. Many city-dwelling animals change their vocal signals in ways that help them cope with the negative effects of noise. However, little is known about how human-generated noise affects hearing. Carolyn is studying ear anatomy and physiology of Pacific chorus frogs that live in urban and rural areas across the San Francisco Bay Area. Carolyn’s B.S. is from Colorado State University, where she conducted research in a variety of fields including forestry, chemical ecology, behavioral biology, and biocontrol of invasive species. Outside of school, Carolyn enjoys hiking, drawing, and spending time with her dog Joey.

Stanford University

Sean Cotner

Department of Mathematics

Sean studies algebraic groups, especially over fields of positive characteristic. Algebraic groups are generally well understood over the complex numbers, but over fields of positive characteristic their study becomes more complicated. Sean’s work aims both to understand the differences between these two worlds and to unify them when possible. Outside of research, Sean has been involved in numerous outreach programs, including the Directed Reading Program and the Leland Scholars Program at Stanford. Apart from academics, Sean enjoys playing guitar, listening to music, and playing games with friends.

Nicole DelRosso

Department of Biophysics
Kimball Foundation Scholar

Nicole has been investigating the molecular principles that describe how some transcriptional activation domains are stronger than others. To answer this question, she developed a high-throughput in vitro assay to systematically measure affinities between these effector domains and their transcriptional cofactors. She couples these measurements to high throughput in vivo screens of effector domain transcriptional activities in human cells. She recently presented this work at the Cold Spring Harbor Systems Biology meeting. Nicole enjoys mentoring younger students and, beyond research, loves to learn new languages and spend time with her rescued mini poodle. Nicole is an author on five peer-reviewed publications, on three of which she is a first author, and was previously an NSF GRFP research fellow.

Mallory Harris

Department of Biology

Mallory studies how human behavior shapes infectious disease transmission. She uses quantitative methods to understand how infectious diseases spread through populations with social divisions, predict how climate change will affect malaria burden, and characterize sources of health misinformation. She earned her B.A. in Mathematics and Computational Biology from the University of Georgia, where she conducted research on predicting vector-borne disease outbreaks. As the co-president of Scientists Speak Up, she organizes seminars and workshops on communication and advocacy about scientific topics.

Jennifer Hofmann

Department of Chemical Engineering

Jen’s research interests lie in developing predictive computational models to connect microscopic details of protein interactions to bulk suspension properties and cellular behaviors. Her models have identified novel contributions of colloidal-scale physics, including ultra-weak electrostatic attractions and limited interaction valency, in organizing the cellular interior and orchestrating life-essential processes. Jen obtained her B.S. in chemical engineering from MIT and gained diverse experience across the biopharmaceutical industry, including internships at Novartis, Genentech, and the NIH. Outside of research, Jen served on the Society of Rheology’s Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Committee from 2018-2021 and enjoys reading and hiking with her dog in her free time.

Samantha Ting Hung

Department of Chemistry

Samantha gained experience with the design and characterization of materials in undergraduate research work on controlled drug delivery and semiconductors. Currently, she uses nonlinear infrared spectroscopy to study the effects of nanoconfinement on ultrafast liquid dynamics. Her 2021 publication compared the dynamics of different liquids confined in mesoporous silica, a confining framework with energy and biomedical applications. Besides being keen on understanding molecular systems, she is also passionate about sharing knowledge. She participated in STEM outreach programs and is a mentor in Stanford’s Enhancing Diversity in Graduate Education fellowship program, a trainer at the Stanford Nano Shared Facilities, and a language tutor. In lab, she is the laser and chemical safety coordinator, and recently received the departmental Safety STAR Award. As a music and philosophy enthusiast, Samantha produces art in addition to science.

William Hwang

Department of Electrical Engineering
NVIDIA Scholar

William is interested in energy-efficient computing enabled by emerging spintronic memories and its applications in AI at the edge, such as smartphones and wearable appliances. His research currently focuses on developing nonvolatile spintronic memory devices which promise both lower energy consumption and higher areal densities than today’s prevailing SRAM technology, and spur personalized machine learning and inference in mobile health devices, Internet of Things (IOTs) and beyond. He was an NSF GRFP research fellow. Outside of research, he enjoys playing piano, biking and skiing.

Matthew Liu

Department of Chemical Engineering

Matthew earned his B.S. in chemical engineering at UC Berkeley and interned at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he studied the chemical kinetics of aerosol oxidation processes. At Stanford he has been a NASA space technology research fellow and recipient of the Electrochemical Society’s student award in industrial electrochemistry and electrochemical engineering. Currently Matthew is applying principles of electrochemical engineering to advance the studies of electrocatalytic nitrate reduction, reaction microenvironments, reactive separation processes, and resource recovery from wastewater. Passionate about both teaching and research, Matthew aims to be a professor of chemical engineering and contribute to making transformative impacts in the field of electrocatalysis.

Anna Makar-Limanov

Department of Chemistry
ARCS Stanford Graduate Fellow

Anna is passionate about using chemistry to help tackle sustainability challenges. She is working on developing new resins for CLIP-3D printing to produce chemically recyclable materials. Anna received her B.A. magna cum laude with distinction in Chemistry and Mathematics from Amherst College in 2020. At Amherst, she worked on metal alkoxide initiators for the ring-opening polymerization of cyclic esters. In 2018, she was a Center for Sustainable Polymers Summer Undergraduate Fellow at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Outside of the lab, Anna enjoys singing in choirs, knitting, hiking, and listening to podcasts.

Courtney Payne

Department of Earth System Science

Courtney is studying how climate change is affecting phytoplankton (single-celled algae that form the base of the food web) in the Arctic Ocean, using a combination of satellite remote sensing, ecosystem modeling, and laboratory experiments. She has been a lead instructor in two classes at Stanford and has acted as the teaching assistant for three others. In her spare time, she enjoys rock climbing and spending time on the water with her wife and dog.

Richelle Smith

Department of Electrical Engineering
William K. Bowes, Jr. Foundation Scholar

Richelle’s research interests include energy-efficient systems, analog and radio-frequency integrated circuit design, oscillators, wireline transceivers, and brain-inspired computing. Her current projects include high-speed, energy-efficient modulation schemes for digital communications. Lowering the power consumption of the computer chips and transceivers that handle our communication traffic will reduce our carbon footprint on the planet. In addition to addressing computing’s energy overhead from communications, Richelle’s research also seeks to reduce the energy from computing operations by rethinking the architecture and circuits. Richelle has held internship positions at Linear Technology, Rambus Labs, Stanford Brains in Silicon Lab, and TDK-InvenSense. Outside of research, she enjoys horseback riding/horse polo, playing electric guitar/bass, and growing carnivorous plants.

Paul Summers

Department of Geophysics
Kimball Foundation Scholar

Paul is working with the Thwaites Interdisciplinary Margin Evolution group focusing on numerical modeling of the physical processes governing Antarctic shear margins, with special focus on Thwaites Glacier. He also works with the Stanford Radio Glaciology group on resolving thermal anomalies in ice. Paul’s research interests focus on data model integration in the cryosphere. He is a mentor to undergraduate researchers and passionate about making glaciology more accessible for rising scientists. He also enjoys running, climbing, and sewing in his free time.

University of California, Berkeley

Ahmad Abassi

Department of Mathematics

Ahmad completed a double bachelor’s degree in Computer Engineering and Mathematics and a master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the Technion in Israel. His current research focus is on moving boundary problems in fluid mechanics using high-performance computing and asymptotic expansion methods. In addition to his studies, Ahmad is a passionate educator with four years of teaching experience at the Technion and UC Berkeley, has years of work experience in the life sciences, and is interested in linguistics and world cultures.

Alanna Cooney

Department of Mechanical Engineering

Alanna’s research project in Berkeley’s Energy and Multiphase Transport Laboratory involves performing experiments to characterize the performance of thermal energy storage devices or "thermal batteries. These devices capitalize on the energy stored and released during solid-liquid phase change processes. By better understanding the performance characteristics of these devices, we can create models to predict how they would function in building heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems in order to utilize them to offset peak demand loads and run buildings more efficiently using model predictive controls.

Jacquelyn "Jackie" Galvez

Department of Integrative Biology

Jackie is a native of sunny southern California, where she grew up fishing in the highly diverse watersheds around the Golden State. Her current research in the Functional Anatomy and Vertebrate Evolution Laboratory focuses on the skeletal changes in freshwater fish populations that relate to varying migratory behaviors, food preferences, and seasonal changes. Her current study animals include cichlids, trouts, and chars. Jackie is passionate about community building and public outreach, and has worked tirelessly to organize and lead community events in her department and the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology on the UC Berkeley campus.

Cynthia “Abby” Harris

Department of Molecular & Cell Biology

Ferroptosis is an iron-dependent type of cell death that results from the accumulation of reactive lipid peroxides. Abby is looking into elucidating the participation of copper and potentially other redox-active metals in ferroptosis, with the aim of expanding our understanding of its mechanism and allowing the development of new ways to induce ferroptic cell death in cancer and other disorders. She pursued another side of cancer research as an intern at Genentech, where she worked on identifying novel drug targets.

Logan Horowitz

Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science

Logan is interested in working on novel power converter design, focusing on applications in renewables integration and implementation. Commercial air travel accounts for a large proportion of pollution and wasted energy all over the world, but new technologies are emerging which have enabled hybrid aircraft. Logan’s project focuses on the design optimizations required for a high-power-density, high-efficiency, high-frequency electric drivetrain.

Nicholas Karavolias

Department of Plant & Microbial Biology

Nicholas is looking at drought tolerance in cereal crops with the goal of finding discrete gene targets for genetic engineering of monocotyledonous crops for improved water use efficiency. CRISPR/Cas9 mediated editing of genes involved in stomatal development in rice can improve water-use efficiency. As global aridification and erratic rainfalls threaten the food system, improved water-use efficiency and overall photosynthetic capacity are essential to safeguard food security and farmer livelihoods.

Lourenco Martins

Department of Integrative Biology

From a young age Lourenco always knew he wanted to be a biologist, having spent his childhood chasing after the bugs in his family’s backyard garden. Lourenco is interested in understanding how some species can have a vast species distribution; how one genome is able to cope with vastly different environmental factors like climate. In the Williams lab, he is using genomics to study the evolution of cold tolerance in the willow leaf beetle, Chrysomela aeneicollis, whose species distribution ranges from the California coast to the Canadian Rockies. As an immigrant and first-generation college student, Lourenco strives to make the science community more accessible and inclusive to people of all identities.

Maria McSharry

Department of Molecular & Cell Biology

Maria completed her B.S. in Cellular Biology and a B.A. in Spanish at Western Washington University. Her research in Dr. Liana Lareau’s lab leverages genetic engineering in budding yeast to better understand how synonymous codon choice impacts protein output. In addition to her lab work, Maria engages the wider community in science: she has a track record of volunteering in K-12 schools as a science fair judge and as a Bay Area Scientists in Schools volunteer. She is a contributing author at GeneBites, in line with her aspiration of making cutting-edge science accessible to a wider audience.

Reesab Pathak

Department of Computer Science

Reese’s current areas of interest include distributed and non-convex optimization problems as well as the estimation problems with deep ties to applied probability, such as matrix completion and community detection. Recently he has been working on algorithms for distributed optimization in large networks. These types of problems arise in many modern applications of statistical learning.

Robin Peter

Department of Nuclear Engineering
Ramsay Family Foundation Scholar

Robin is pursuing research at the intersection of particle physics, quantitative biology, and humanitarian application. She is currently involved in projects in medical imaging, radiation detection, and radiation therapy. Her multidisciplinary interests stem from an eclectic mix of past research endeavors: memory device simulation with IBM Research, construction of a spark chamber, and studies in cuttlefish camouflage.

Sophie Ruehr

Department of Environmental Science, Policy & Management

Sophie’s graduate work is focused on the ecosystem-scale dynamics of water cycling. Using date from satellites, she studies the links between the carbon and water cycles over space and time to better understand how the terrestrial land sink may respond to climate extremes in the future. Her research has implications for both sustainable water management and predicting future climate change.

Rachelle Stark

Department of Metabolic Biology

As an undergraduate at UCLA, Rachelle utilized murine models to study the molecular mechanisms behind Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a severe muscle wasting disease. Additionally, she participated in a summer research internship in Dr. Jicheng Gong’s lab at Peking University in Beijing, China, where she performed experiments to detect biomarkers of recurrent lung adenocarcinoma. Rachelle enjoyed her molecular biology education but is also intrigued by the relationship between diet and disease, and therefore chose to pursue a Ph.D. in Metabolic Biology.

University of California, Davis

Jonathan “Jon” Aguiñaga

Population Biology Graduate Group

Jon is a first-generation Mexican American who believes education is his key to a better future. He became the first in his family to graduate college, earn a master’s, and enroll in a Ph.D. program. He is broadly interested in behavioral ecology, cognition, animal personality and mathematical modelling and he integrates ideas and techniques from across these fields to investigate the drivers of mixed-species grouping. He is deeply committed to outreach and teaches biological models and coding to high school students in the Davis Young Scholars program. In his free time, he enjoys landscape photography, playing with his dog, cooking, dancing, and watching movies.

Peter Andrew

Department of Pharmacology & Toxicology

Peter’s research interest is to better understand the processes that drive epilepsy. His current project is focused on understanding the role of neuroinflammation in acquired epilepsy following acute intoxication with organophosphate pesticides. He is a three-time ARCS Scholar and was a recipient of the 2020 Graduate Student Achievement Award by the Northern California Regional Chapter of the Society of Toxicology. When not in the lab, Peter enjoys biking and cooking.

Lilia Baldauf

Department of Chemistry
Agilent Technologies Scholar

Lilia is a second-generation Mexican American and the first in her family to pursue a graduate education. She graduated from the University of San Diego and was funded for summer undergraduate research in the Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate program. Currently, she works on functionalizing the surface of fullerenes (aka buckyballs) with the goal of using synthetic techniques to open the surface of the fullerene and insert a paramagnetic metal inside. She has published two papers, one in Nanoscience, on elucidating the complex structures of fullerene cocrystals. Additionally, Lilia is heavily involved in outreach for underrepresented groups and helped develop a chemistry co-class to assist marginalized students and to increase their representation in STEM.

Mattea Berglund

Ecology Graduate Group

Mattea integrates field and lab techniques to study human impacts on aquatic ecosystems. Through collaboration with stakeholders, she aims to conduct management-relevant research. Her prior research spans algae, viruses, salt marshes, artificial reefs, and hatcheries. At UC Davis, Mattea is investigating the impact of habitat change on the salmon microbiome, with the goal of better understanding how habitat change impacts salmon health. Mentorship, community engagement, and equity work are central to Mattea’s research program; she strives to create research opportunities for undergraduates, collaborate with community organizations, and increase accessibility in research.

Alena “Laney” Casella

Department of Biomedical Engineering

Laney’s broad research interests are in the development of biomaterials to promote the clinical translation of engineered tissues. She is especially interested in using conductive biomaterials to promote nerve cell survival and regeneration in biologically challenging conditions. Currently, she is working to develop an electrically and mechanically tunable hydrogel platform to both direct cell behavior and provide more insight about the specific benefits of using electroactive materials for medical applications. Outside of the laboratory, Laney is involved in the Biomedical Engineering Student Association, where she has served in various leadership positions, and STEM for Girls, an outreach event that engages minority students in underserved communities. In her spare time, Laney enjoys reading, watching movies, and exploring ways to live more sustainably.

Savannah Conlon

Department of Chemistry

Savannah is currently working on elucidating fundamental features of the MUTYH and NEIL DNA repair enzymes. She has developed several new approaches for studying these enzymes through unique cellular repair assays to reveal insight into the enzyme’s unique ability to repair various modified or damaged bases in human cells. She recently presented her work at ACS San Diego, where she was selected for presenting in the Division of Biological Chemistry National Awards, while also receiving the Women’s Chemist Committee Travel Award. In addition, she maintains an active role in supporting her graduate student community, serving on several various departmental committees, STEM outreach activities, and as Chair of the Chemistry Graduate Student Association

Eleanor Fadely

Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering
Lakeside Foundation Scholar

Eleanor is passionate about connecting fundamental scientific concepts and applied engineering tools to improve environmental quality. Her research focuses on the ubiquitous biogeochemical process of manganese biomineralization, which is the formation of reactive manganese oxide nanoparticles by microorganisms. These biominerals can remove or degrade toxicant metals and organic compounds in contaminated water and waste streams. Eleanor uses “soil-on-a-chip” microfluidic reactors to investigate how parameters such as fluid flow rate and oxygen availability control manganese biomineralization in porous media, such as soils and sediments, and how they may be optimized for in situ bioremediation applications. Prior to beginning her Ph.D. research, Eleanor worked for a consulting company specializing in water quality monitoring at waste disposal sites. Outside of the lab, Eleanor enjoys running, rock climbing, and exploring California.

Jane Fudyma

Department of Soils & Biogeochemistry

Jane is researching soil viral ecology in natural systems. More specifically, her research focuses on understanding the fate and transport of viruses in complex soil matrices, how the heterogeneity of soil and viruses can dictate where a virus can move, and how these properties affect small scale ecological processes. Before graduate school, she received her B.S. in General Science from Seattle University, spent nearly five years working in mining bioremediation, and spent two years in academia in an environmental metabolomics lab. In her spare time, she enjoys skiing, dispersed camping, playing soccer, and attending live music.

Brooke Genovese

Integrative Pathobiology

Brooke is a fellow within the UC Davis Wildlife Health Center. In the lab, she studies the immune dynamics and spillover of zoonotic viruses in natural reservoir hosts, including bats. Prior to her graduate training, Brooke worked on several emerging disease research and scientific capacity building efforts that sought to identify novel zoonotic viruses with pandemic potential. A first-generation college student, Brooke currently serves as a Co-PI on a pilot grant aimed at advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in academia. Her long-term career aspirations are to advance our understanding of host-virus ecology for high-consequence viruses and improve human and animal health in vulnerable ecosystems and communities. In her free time Brooke enjoys making homemade pasta and live music concerts.

Elizabeth Grant

Geology Graduate Group

Elizabeth studies magma assembly and storage timescales at volcanoes in New Zealand. She uses a suite of geochemical tools, including radioisotope chemistry, to understand the timescales on which these large eruptions are built prior to eruption. Most recently she spent a year working with the U.S.G.S. conducting phase equilibrium experiments to determine the pressure and temperature conditions at which caldera-forming magmas are stored in the crust. Elizabeth is a native of Seattle and obtained her B.S. in geology at the University of Washington. Outside of academia she enjoys dance, theatre, and music.

Carly Hawkins

Animal Behavior Graduate Group

Carly seeks to understand how birds choose their mates in a socially complex mating system, where males and females form pair-bonds and work together to raise offspring, but the genetics of the offspring reveal that many are sired by males other than the male raising them. She is interested in how males vary in their mating tactics when choosing whether to pursue additional mating opportunities at the expense of caring for the nest within their pair-bond. Carly completed her M.S. at The College of William & Mary, where she studied the effects of noise pollution on the social behavior of birds in Australia. As a first-generation college student, Carly is committed to undergraduate mentorship on campus and in the field. Outside of academia, Carly loves to bake, hike, and play with her sassy cat named Moop.

Meredith Lutz

Animal Behavior Graduate Group

Meredith’s research examines how animal societies respond to environmental change over multiple temporal and spatial scales. Since 2015, she has conducted a long-term comparative study on lemur social behavior in the Maromizaha Protected Area, in collaboration with local managers, scientists, guides, and graduate students from University of Antananarivo. To complement her field research, she is also undertaking a phylogenetic comparative analysis to explore the range of documented behavioral flexibility across primates. Meredith is part of the inaugural cohort of the Future Undergraduate Science Educators program. Meredith is passionate about providing opportunities for undergraduates to get involved in research, by mentoring six students on their senior theses and co-leading a team of 185 additional interns in the phylogenetic comparative analysis of behavioral flexibility.

Abby Niesen

Department of Biomedical Engineering

Abby seeks to optimize patient outcomes after knee replacement such that the artificial knee joint functions as well as the natural knee joint. She currently has six first-author, peer-reviewed journal publications which propose new methods to improve the accuracy of measuring in vivo knee implant micromotions and evaluate limitations of current metrics used to predict early implant loosening. At Davis, Abby was a finalist in the 2021 Grad Slam and was recently accepted to the prestigious Professor's for the Future Program where she will develop a series of workshops to empower women in STEM.

Julia Owen

Ecology Graduate Group

Julia studies the evolution and ecology of wildlife using genetic and genomic tools. She recently published a study using DNA from scats to identify individual bears and estimate their abundance in the Tahoe Basin. Her current research uses whole genome sequencing to illuminate the evolutionary history of the spotted skunk species complex. Julia has been awarded several fellowships/scholarships, including a prestigious Provost’s Undergraduate Fellowship, and has presented her research at multiple National and regional conferences. She is committed to helping other first-generation college students and other underserved populations, having mentored over 30 undergraduates in multiple retention programs on campus. Julia enjoys running and is currently training for her first marathon.

Nathanial Chase Stevens

Department of Pharmacology & Toxicology

Chase is a toxicologist at heart. He uses large-scale metabolism data and a range of toxicology tools to understand the impact of air pollution on lung function in animal models and has published his results in peer-reviewed journals as well as at multiple conferences. Starting his academic career at University of North Carolina, he entered the graduate program at UC Davis in 2017. He has won multiple fellowship and poster awards and is dedicated to research and outreach. As member of several scientific organizations, he teaches courses both on the academic level and in professional education.

Tanner Stevenson

Neuroscience Graduate Group
Niantic Charitable Trust and Commerce Ventures Scholar

Tanner has been fascinated by the brain ever since learning about deep brain stimulation (DBS) as an undergraduate studying Biomedical Engineering. After searching for his calling by working first as a R&D engineer at a neurotechnology startup and then as a software engineer for Agilent Technologies, Tanner has found his true passion pursuing neuroscientific research. His research interests lie at the intersection of experimental and computational neuroscience, where he is using methodologies from both disciplines to understand how biological networks of neurons can flexibly retrieve, maintain, and modify information for the purposes of intelligent behavior. To this end, Tanner is collaborating on an innovative multi-disciplinary project investigating the role dopamine plays in flexibly updating or maintaining information in working memory. Outside the lab, Tanner enjoys getting outdoors by hiking, running, biking, or swimming, and he loves to spend time with his wife and newborn son.

Micah Swann

Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering

Micah is a passionate environmental advocate who has dedicated his career to improving water resource management in the face of stresses from population growth and climate change. During his tenure at UC Davis, Micah has led lake monitoring and modeling programs spanning the trophic spectrum from nutrient impaired systems in Northern California to the pristine lakes in Northern Patagonia. This experience has taught him the importance of utilizing numerical modeling to understand how water bodies are changing at the system scale. After completing his degree, Micah plans to continue this work by developing integrated monitoring programs for lakes and their watersheds around the world that can both provide a holistic view of current watershed conditions as well as foresight into how these systems will change in the future.

University of California, Merced

Hope Hauptman

Department of Environmental Systems

Hope’s research centers around 1,2,3-Trichloropropane (TCP) a suspected legacy contaminant and probable human carcinogen that contaminates thousands of wells in the United States, Europe, and Asia. Hope aims for clean drinking water for all. She uses machine learning to predict TCP levels in groundwater and will evaluate household treatments and almond-based carbon to remove TCP from drinking water. She has published a systematic review of TCP treatment technologies and a policy paper. She taught high school science for ten+ years and was a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in Kenya. Hope volunteers at a community garden and pantry to provide fresh produce for those in need.

Zunaira Iqbal

Department of Cognitive & Information Sciences

Zunaira graduated from UC Davis in 2019 with a B.S. in Psychology with an emphasis in biology. Inspired by her work at UC Davis in cognitive neurolinguistics, Zunaira’s research passion is at the intersection of bilingual language processing and neurobiology. Currently, her work looks at understanding how Spanish-English bilinguals phonetic representations differ from English monolinguals, through both behavioral and EEG experiments. She is part of UC Merced’s NSF Research Traineeship (NRT) Program, through which she has received several fellowships. Outside research, Zunaira enjoys watching movies, journaling, art, and taking care of her house plants.

Alauna Wheeler

Department of Physics

A 5th-year Ph.D. candidate and mother to a 3-year-old (with #2 on the way), Alauna’s research interests include soft matter and self-assembly of biological systems. Her current projects include a study of the self-assembly of nanoparticles in a liquid crystal solvent undergoing a phase transition, self-assembly of the COVID viral particle, and the effect of e-cigarette chemical additives on lung surfactants. She also recently published a collaborative paper on the structure of electrosensory gels in cartilaginous fishes. She is the recipient of many honors and awards, including the 2020-2021 Outstanding Physics TA Award. Pre-Ph.D., Alauna spent 3+ years as a rocket propulsion and testing engineer. Her current outreach focuses on conducting hands-on science activities for elementary students using common household items. She is developing an accompanying YouTube channel so kids everywhere can do the activities at home with their adults. She is also a bargaining team member for the new UC Student Researcher’s Union, negotiating for more equitable working conditions. Alauna enjoys small boat sailing, visiting national and state parks with family, and board games for 3-year-olds.

University of California, San Francisco

Jessica “Jessie” Blumenfeld

Department of Neuroscience

Jessie is interested in understanding the cellular pathways underlying neurodegenerative diseases. She began her studies at MIT, where she majored in bioengineering with a minor in neuroscience. Following graduation, she joined Denali Therapeutics where she assessed the efficacy of therapeutics for various neurodegenerative disorders. Now, as a third-year neuroscience graduate student at the Gladstone Institutes, Jessie seeks to understand how APOE4 may drive neuronal vulnerability in Alzheimer’s Disease. In particular, she investigates how neuronal MHC-I – an immune factor seemingly regulated by APOE expression – mediates downstream AD pathologies. Beyond lab, Jessie enjoys cooking, traveling, SCUBA diving, and exploring San Francisco.

Gauree Chendke

Department of Bioengineering

Gauree is interested in applying principles of fundamental biology to design clinically relevant medical implants. Prior to joining graduate school, Gauree demonstrated expertise in using biomaterials for drug delivery and designing clinically translational devices for enhancing treatments used for Type I Diabetes. Her thesis work builds off her previous research, as she focuses on further understanding cell-material interactions, notably with the immune system. Specifically, Gauree has created an independent, niche project that explores how biomaterials can be designed to modulate the local immune microenvironment and promote tissue regeneration post transplantation of material implants.

Jessica Cook

Department of Oral Craniofacial Sciences

After completing her B.S. in Biology at UCLA, Jessica began pursuing dual DDS/PhD degrees at UCSF in 2018. Her project focuses on uncovering the subpopulations of fibroblasts within the oral mucosa and deconvoluting their roles in the efficient wound healing that occurs in the oral mucosa, a project with strong translational potential that Jessica hopes to apply in her clinical work. Jessica is also a NIDCR F30 recipient and a UCSF Discovery Fellow. In her free time, she prefers to be outdoors, either rock climbing, backpacking, or just relaxing and reading a book.

Jacqueline “Jackie” Ernest

Department of Pharmaceutical Science & Pharmacogenomics

Jackie is broadly interested in early clinical drug development and developing quantitative models to predict clinical trials. Currently, she is applying principles of pharmacokinetics and pharmacometrics to predict drug concentrations of multidrug regimens into the lungs of patients with tuberculosis. She has been awarded the Presidential Trainee Award at the American Society of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics in 2021 and was a Top Poster Ribbon Recipient at the annual meeting. Jackie is passionate about teaching and was awarded the Dean’s Apple Award for Teaching two times for her work as Teaching Assistant. Jackie hopes to pursue a career in clinical pharmacology.

Amanda Everitt

Department of Biological & Medical Informatics

Amanda studies the molecular mechanisms underlying human neurodevelopment, and in particular, how the dysregulation of these mechanisms may contribute to neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders. Towards this end, Amanda’s career goals center on the development and improvement of bioinformatic frameworks which allow researchers to maximize the information gained from their experiments. Her current research focuses on transcription factors and how machine learning frameworks can improve their binding site predictions. Outside of research, Amanda prefers to be outdoors, either gardening, backpacking, or reading.

Joe Germino

Department of Biomedical Sciences

Joe’s research interests center around gaining a better understanding of the mechanisms responsible for regulating the complex interactions of the immune system to prevent uncontrolled immune responses that could be detrimental to the host’s health while still maintaining adequate host defense. Joe is also interested in extending his education in computational biology from his undergraduate degree at Washington University in St. Louis by developing and applying cutting edge bioinformatics tools, particularly in the field of single-cell multiomics, to help answer some of the longstanding questions about immune tolerance alongside traditional wet lab approaches.

Carolyn Smith Hughes

Department of Epidemiology & Translational Science

Carolyn is passionate about helping to improve experiences of care and clinical outcomes for birthing persons and their infants in the US and around the world. As a survivor of severe intrapartum and postpartum complications and birth trauma, Carolyn focuses on research in the provision of person-centered prenatal, maternity, and postpartum care; the social and clinical causes of hypertensive disorders of pregnancy (HDPs); and strategies to improve outcomes among those who experience HDPs. In her free time, Carolyn enjoys cooking, long walks, reading, and learning about sea creatures with her 3-year-old son and husband.

Ketrin “Katie” Gjoni

Department of Pharmaceutical Science & Pharmacogenomics

Katie completed her B.S. in Chemistry at UC Berkeley and transitioned to full time research on gene editing approaches for targeting macular degeneration using in vitro cell models. She then developed an interest in bioinformatics and joined the department of pharmaceutical sciences and pharmacogenomics to study functional genomics. In the Pollard lab, she focuses on functional consequences of the 3D organization of the genome. Her initial work involved lamina associated domains across developmental cell types. Her current goals are to decipher noncoding disease-causing variants that disrupt 3D genome folding in disease. Outside of graduate school, Katie enjoys backpacking, skiing, surfing, and park days with friends.

Miguel Guardado

Department of Biological & Medical Informatics

Miguel is a computational biologist whose research focuses on dismantling disparities inside precision medicine by addressing inequities in the development and application of genomic technologies and methods. While most of the thesis work will involve understanding the basic science of complex traits, his research is also focused on investigating respiratory diseases caused from preterm birth though computational omics approaches. Miguel seeks to advocate for historically excluded communities in academia and the industry of computational biology. Miguel is additionally on the executive board of the Associated Students of the Graduate Division at UCSF and is an HHMI Gilliam Fellow.

Rachel O’Sullivan

Department of Neuroscience

Rachel majored in biology with a concentration in neuroscience at Williams College. After graduation, she worked at a biotech startup, Kallyope, studying the gut-brain axis and exploring novel cell-types along this axis that could be targeted by therapeutics. Now, at UCSF, she is interested in understanding the heterogeneous circuitry of the ventral hippocampus (vHPC). vHPC sends non-overlapping projections to many downstream brain areas and ultimately promotes the selection of a diverse array of motivated behavioral responses. She wants to identify how these projections differ in terms of the emotionally salient information they encode and the adaptive reactions they promote. Outside of lab, Rachel loves to spend time outdoors, skiing, biking, running, and surfing.

Manuela Richter

Department of Cell Biology

Manuela received her B.S. in Biology from Stanford University where she worked on chromatin biology. She then spent two years as a scientist at EpiBiome Inc. before starting graduate work at UCSF in Fall 2017. She is broadly interested in self-organization and its mechanistic underpinnings. In her thesis work, she is asking how the cell sets the size of its internal structures. Specifically, she is using cell biological and biophysical approaches to uncover how the mammalian spindle sets its size to perform its function. Manuela is an NSF GRFP recipient, speaks four languages, and loves puzzles and the outdoors.

Lauren Schechtman

Department of Developmental & Stem Cell Biology

Lauren discovered her passion for stem cell and developmental biology as a research assistant in the Barlow lab at CU Anschutz, which studies taste receptor cell development and regeneration. At UCSF, she aims to further explore the cellular and molecular mechanisms regulating stem cells with the hope of building on these findings in the context of regenerative medicine treatments. As a new member of the Roose lab, she plans to investigate epithelial regeneration in the context of the intestinal stem cell niche. Lauren is also passionate about scientific mentoring and teaching. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, volleyball, scuba diving, yoga, and exploring the Bay Area.

University of California, Santa Cruz

Stephanie Adamczek

Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology

Stephanie’s academic and professional career prioritizes conservation, basic scientific knowledge, and equitable learning opportunities. Her research balances an improved understanding of the mechanisms driving health, behavior and fitness with practical management applications for conservation. She has five first-authored publications, nine co-authored publications, and has presented her work at international conferences and workshops. Stephanie’s dissertation examines how individual growth and attainment of large body size influences fitness outcomes and resilience to disturbance in harbor porpoises and northern elephant seals and uses a combination of advanced statistical methods, computer programming, and empirical data derived from field work. In addition to her research interests, Stephanie prioritizes mentorship and teaching to train the upcoming generation of scientists and has taken part in important initiatives such as Skype a Scientist, Frontiers for Young Minds, and Women in Science and Engineering.

Will Chapman

Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences

Will specializes in understanding processes of erosion and sediment transport in rivers. His research, which focuses on how rivers both respond to and reflect changes in land use and climate, combines careful fieldwork, analysis of high-resolution topographic data, and big data analysis. Will’s first project, for example, explored how a coastal California river still records the legacy of 19th century forestry practices. Currently, Will is exploring a fundamental problem in fluvial geomorphology: how do non-perennial rivers in arid settings move the same amount of sediment as perennial rivers in temperate settings, despite having far less water? Both subjects pertain to Will’s core interest in the interactions between geologic forces, natural ecosystems, and humans.

Sean Cummings

Science Communications Master’s Program

Having completed reporting internships at Mountain Journal and the Santa Barbara Independent and written for the Stanford Daily and regional newsletters of the Sierra Club and Audubon Society, Sean is thrilled for the chance to develop his skills as a science and environmental journalist at UC Santa Cruz. He hopes to focus on stories about biodiversity, extinction, conservation, climate change, and the intersection of human society with these topics, practicing longform, narrative-style writing whenever possible. Sean is grateful not only to ARCS but also to the Scholarship Foundation of Santa Barbara for their support and to the Outdoor Writers Association of America for awarding him a Bodie McDowell Scholarship. He holds a B.A. in Environmental Humanities with Honors from Whitman College.

Jerry “Tyler” DeWitt

Department of Molecular, Cell & Developmental Biology

Tyler’s research is focused on discovery of the molecular mechanisms that control cell growth and size, with the goal of understanding why nearly all cancer cells have severe defects in control of cell size. In addition to being an exceptional researcher, Tyler has an uncommon commitment to leadership, service and teaching that impact science and society beyond his research. A major focus of his work has been to help build an inclusive and supportive environment where everyone feels welcome and has an equal chance to pursue their dreams and be successful.

Rosa Everson

Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics
Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation Scholar

Rosa is active in one of the most challenging and novel areas of modern astrophysical research: the evolution of binary stellar systems, including black holes and neutron stars. An NSF Graduate Research Fellow, she has won a number of awards for her research. Through membership in the AAS National Osterbrock Leadership Program and Lamat Institute, Rosa works vigorously to support the promotion and retention of women and historically marginalized students in STEM.

Francis Joyce

Department of Environmental Studies

Francis studies ecological processes affecting recovery in tropical forests to inform restoration and conservation strategies. His dissertation focuses on factors limiting the recruitment of late-successional tree species in former agricultural land in southern Costa Rica that was restored almost two decades ago using different methods. He is also analyzing long-term monitoring data to understand how bird communities change in restored forests over time. He cares deeply about undergraduate STEM education and has mentored four students from the US and Costa Rica as they develop their own field research projects. In his free time, he enjoys trail running, scuba diving, and observing wildlife.

Matthew Kustra

Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology

Matthew’s dissertation focuses on how cryptic female choice—a process where females bias fertilization to specific males—influences the evolution of male behavior and the creation of new species. He is also developing mathematical models to understand how microbes can influence the evolution of life-history strategies in marine invertebrates. Outside of research, Matthew is developing a web app for Cambodian fishing communities to visualize their own fisheries data. He is dedicated to mentorship and teaching, exemplified by the numerous students he has mentored and the weekly programming workshops he co-leads. In his free time, Matthew enjoys scuba diving, hiking, climbing, and cooking.

Joseph “Joey” Murphy

Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics
Wreyford Foundation Scholar

Joey is interested in what the population of precisely characterized “exoplanets” (planets orbiting stars other than the Sun) can tell us about the physical processes that govern planet formation and evolution in our galaxy. He is a member of the TESS-Keck Survey (TKS), a large, multi-institution Doppler survey of promising planet candidates discovered by NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. His work with TKS includes observing with the HIRES spectrograph on the Keck I telescope as well as the characterization of small planets amenable to future atmospheric observations. Prior to starting his graduate work at UC Santa Cruz, Joey received his undergraduate and master's degrees from Stanford University, where he studied the variable accretion processes of young stars. Beyond research, Joey is exploring the duality of his identity as a Native Hawaiian working in observational astronomy.

Jonathan “Jon” Philpot

Department of Chemistry

Prior to starting his graduate work, Jon gained research experience as an undergraduate at Cal Poly Humboldt on projects related to bioanalytical chemistry and enantioselective biocatalysis. His current research interests are to answer fundamental molecular level questions that could impact our everyday lives by using structural biology to draw connections between structure and function in the molecular circadian clock, which ultimately controls our physiology and behavior. His predoctoral research focuses on the mammalian circadian clock, using biophysical methods such as X-ray crystallography and NMR to interrogate the interactions between core clock components that give rise to ~24-hour rhythms. Particularly, he is focused on the interaction between PERIOD2 (PER2) and Casein Kinase 1δ (CK1δ), trying to understand how CK1δ regulates PER2 turnover and its activity as a transcriptional repressor. Before he began his journey to become a successful research scientist, Jon worked for many years as a carpenter/woodworker and in his free time he still enjoys making furniture.

Reilly Raab

Department of Computer Science & Engineering

Reilly is interested in socially responsible applications of machine learning. He is currently exploring the dynamics of prejudiced social norms in a multiagent setting as well as the long-term effects of fairness interventions using reinforcement learning. Reilly advanced to PhD candidacy with honors in Spring 2022, published a spotlight paper with NeurIPS (2021), and has helped run a seminar series for ethics and algorithms for over a year. Outside of research, Reilly programs his own digital guitar effects and has brought his telescope to student events for impromptu star parties.

Mays Mohammed Salih

Department of Molecular Cell & Developmental Biology

Prior to enrolling in the graduate program, Mays developed a variety of bench, communication and leadership skills through research and professional positions. Her current educational track allows her to develop and grow her skills as an immunologist with a focus on immune response regulation. Studying mechanisms of immune regulation will help better understand how organisms respond to pathogens and mechanisms by which inflammatory and autoimmune diseases arise and ways to target them via therapeutics. Mays also leads and participates in many student outreach activities to promote diversity in STEM and support fellow graduate students.

Nolan Smyth

Department of Physics
Goldman Sachs Scholar

Nolan is a fourth-year graduate student in physics who works at the intersection of dark matter, black holes, astro-particle physics, and machine learning. He is a recipient of the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship, one of the most competitive and prestigious awards for graduate students in the natural sciences. As an institutional representative for the Mentorship Alliance, he works to create institutional support for mentorship in STEM at UCSC and partnering institutions. Outside of physics, Nolan is a passionate musician, writing, recording, and independently releasing his own music, as well as an avid pickleball player.

Rae Taylor-Burns

Department of Ocean Sciences
Wildcat Cove Foundation Scholar

Rae’s general research interests include climate adaptation, hydrodynamic modeling, coastal science and policy, physical oceanography, and coastal engineering. For her Ph.D. she studies the influence of marshes on wave transformation in a sheltered estuary, the impacts of stakeholder identified marsh restoration on flooding in San Mateo County CA, and the interactions between marsh habitat and levee failure in San Francisco Bay. Rae has worked at the Cape Cod National Seashore Lab, at the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies, and with the Central Coast Wetlands Group.  She has been honored as a California Sea Grant Graduate Research Fellow and in 2020 was the Norris Center Artist in Residency.

Michael Trebino

Department of Microbiology & Environmental Toxicology

Michael has been studying mechanisms and regulation of biofilm formation and virulence in Vibrio cholerae, the causal organism of the acute diarrheal disease cholera. He has been investigating the role of one of the major signal transduction pathways in biofilm formation. This regulatory system links biofilm formation of V. cholerae to environmental survival and virulence. Michael’s proposed studies will provide novel insights into V. cholerae biofilm formation during infection and transmission. He has been productive in his work and has communicated his scientific findings at departmental seminars and scientific meetings. In the future, Michael plans to work on projects designed to develop of targeted-therapeutics to combat infectious diseases.

Kateryna Voitiuk

Department of Biomolecular Engineering
Agilent Technologies Scholar

Kateryna has a background in computer hardware, software, networks, and digital technology. She is curious about how the brain processes information from the bottom up. Her interest moved her into neural interfaces, closed-loop neuroscience, and biologically inspired machine learning algorithms. Currently, she studies neural connectivity in 3D stem-cell-derived organoid and connectoid models of brain regions. Kate also works to translate research to enhance science education: from undergraduate course development to teaching high school biology students to design and conduct remote-controlled laboratory experiments through the Internet of Things (IoT). She also mentored the undergraduate NeuroTechSC team on the silent speech interface project, which won first place in the NeuroTechX competition. Kate enjoys hiking, cooking, reading sci-fi, nonfiction, philosophy, and psychology.

Anna Marie Yanny

Science Communications Master’s Program

Anna Marie completed her Behavioral Neuroscience B.S. from Western Washington University (WWU) in 2018, where she graduated as the Department’s Outstanding Graduate.  After graduation, she spent four years conducting genetic cell types research at the Allen Institute for Brain Science.  While at the Allen Institute, Anna Marie’s research comparing cell types in the human brain to those of other mammals was published in the journal Nature.  Her science communication pieces have been featured in the Seattle Times and the Allen Institute news. When she’s not writing about science, Anna Marie writes for poetry open mics. She also enjoys biking, lake swimming, climbing, hosting trivia events and searching for the best cake her city has to offer.

Jeremiah Tsyporin, University of California, Santa Cruz
“As I enter the final year of my PhD, I am beginning to look for mentors to oversee my post-doctoral training. One of the significant ways I can find a mentor is through the networking opportunities offered at conferences. Without this generous support, these opportunities to share my work with the greater neuroscience community would have been impossible for me. In addition to attending conferences and connecting with neuroscientists worldwide, support from ARCS has helped ease the economic burdens associated with the cost of living in Santa Cruz. Because I don’t have to focus so heavily on dealing with basic needs, I have the freedom to spend more time and mental energy focused on research and intellectual pursuits central to a successful PhD.”
Rachelle Stark, University of California, Berkeley
“I grew up in a low-income community in San Bernardino, California where I directly saw the harsh reality of how diet contributes to many diseases (diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity, etc.). These preventable diseases tragically took the lives of many people in my community. For these reasons, doing research related to nutrition/metabolism is extremely important and fulfilling to me. The [ARCS Award] gives me more options for labs because I will not have to rely on the funding of the lab I choose and can instead choose a lab purely based on my research interests. The funding will also give me more time to work on the research that I find so important and fulfilling.”
Katherine Montana, San Francisco State University
“I will be pursuing my master’s degree in integrative biology at San Francisco State University and conducting my research at the California Academy of Sciences. I am thrilled to get started on my research and mentoring projects. … This combination of research activities will offer me the opportunity to build my technical lab skills, storytelling abilities, and capacity to help other students succeed in science. ... I am deeply honored to receive the [ARCS Award] and take great joy in starting graduate school. I thank you for making this possible for me. I am ready to get to work.”
Micah Swann, University of California, Davis
“I’m conducting applied limnological research on the pristine lakes of Northern Patagonia, in collaboration with Fundación Chile Lagos Limpios. This model will be used to investigate how the physics and water quality of these pristine lakes wi1l be impacted by climate change and watershed development over the course of the 21st century. In September 2019, I had my first opportunity to visit Northern Patagonia … but due to Covid-19 safety and travel restrictions, I have not had the opportunity to return to Chile. With your financial support, I will be able to return to the region in January 2022 and continue collecting data to improve the accuracy of the lake model under development.”
Julie Chang, Stanford University
“The ARCS Award will allow me to focus on my PhD studies without worrying about finances. My research focuses on understanding the physics of breast cancer cell migration using 3D hydrogels and time-lapse imaging. The PhD journey itself has been a rollercoaster and I’m excited to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel! After my PhD, I am hoping to land a role as a clinical scientist in the biotech industry in the Bay Area. In this role, I can help analyze and interpret clinical trial data to develop drugs that can cure human diseases. Thank you again for the ARCS award—funding the next generation of scientific thinkers is truly an impactful mission!”
Nicholas Elder, University of California, San Francisco (UCSF)
“I am grateful to earn my degree at UCSF which is world-renowned for its stem cell research. Likewise, it has been a pleasure to be supported by the ARCS Foundation and wider community. Research is a costly endeavor and being awarded this fellowship has given me the time and space to focus on impactful research while also sharing it with an interested group of donors and other scholars. The fellowship has also been a reassurance. This fall, my supervisor announced that he was leaving academia for an industry position. As I searched for a new supervisor and lab in which to complete my research, I knew that I had financial support to ease my transition.”