Project Scientist
I am currently a Project Scientist of the Cellular Organelle Segmentation in Electron Microscopy (COSEM) Project Team at HHMI – Janelia Research Campus. My previous research background is in biophysics, with an emphasis in microscopy, and my formal training is in physics and engineering.
During my graduate work I was the co-discoverer of ergodicity breaking in cells along with Diego Krapf, driving a pivotal shift in the field of diffusion analysis in living systems. Throughout my postdoctoral career under the guidance of Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz, I applied my training in physics and microscopy directly to answer biological questions. Here, I helped unravel the underlying structure of the endoplasmic reticulum and revealed its complex dynamics. I also uncovered the nano-anatomy of early secretory compartments and discovered a new, dynamic organelle, responsible for delivering newly synthesized cargo from the endoplasmic reticulum to the Golgi. More recently, I am leading the COSEM Project Team. We are developing an invaluable tool for cell biology - an analysis pipeline based on deep learning architectures for segmentation - allowing comprehensive reconstruction and analysis of organelles within entire cells imaged by volume electron microscopy. I am committed to integrating my multi-disciplinary training into facilitating large-effort, collaborative, team projects to take on challenging scientific problems and sharing these resources with the broader scientific community.