About Me
I’m an experimental cell biologist with the longterm goal of understanding how cell cycle control is interfaced with other essential cellular functions. I’m currently interested in how cell size affects cell cycle progression and DNA damage signalling in mammalian cells. I love using proteomic and genomic tools to ask and answer mechanistic questions about what regulates the cell cycle.
I have a long-standing interest in science pedagogy with a focus on communicating university-level science to students from non-traditional and under-served background. Outside of the lab, my hobbies include distance running, rock climbing, and enjoying the Alps with my dog, Milu.
Current research
I was awarded an SNSF Ambizione career grant to join the Department for the Molecular Mechanisms of Disease at University of Zürich as a junior group leader, starting in October 2024.
My group is studying the relationship between cell size, senescence, and genome homeostasis, with a focus on how cell size impacts the integrity of DNA damage repair pathways.
Postdoctoral research
I was an ETH Fellow in the Institute for Biochemistry at ETH Zürich from 2021-2024. My work focused on understanding how cells sense their own size and how this is communicated to the cell cycle regulatory apparatus. I also studied how excess cell size (which is observed in senescence) compromises essential cellular processes and how this leads to longterm proliferative failure. Part of this work can be found here and here.
During this time, I was awarded an ETH Career Seed grant , an ETH Fellowship, and the public prize of the Life Sciences Switzerland PIs of Tomorrow competition.
PhD research
I earned my PhD in Chemical Biology from Harvard University in 2020. My graduate work focused on understanding how ubiquitin-mediated proteolysis by the Anaphase Promoting Complex/Cyclosome affects processes outside of cell cycle regulation. This work can be found here.
During this time, I was also active in teaching, serving as the head teaching fellow for CHEM27: The Organic Chemistry of Life at Harvard, co-director of the Wellesley College Biochemistry Winter Session program, and an adjunct professor in the Biology Department at Emmanuel College.
Before starting my PhD, I did my Bachelor’s thesis in the Biology Department at New York University. There, I worked on characterising the cellular response to oxidative stress in the context of protein turnover in budding yeast. This work can be found here.
