Iqra Ahmad – Iqra is a sophomore who joined lab as an intrepid freshman. She is currently wreaking havoc on a biochemical pathway in H. pylori that creates acetyl phosphate to see the effects on gene expression mediated by TCS’s. Although she claims she wants to go to medical school, sources tell me her inner most ambition is to create a lab band dedicated to ancient jingles of 1960’s TV commercials

Jessica Ballance – Jessica is a junior, pre-pharmacy major joining the lab in fall 2023. Her project involves the role of methylation of the promoter of an anti-sense promoter of a gene encoding a different methyltransferase. We will post some fun facts about Jessica a bit later! I don’t want to scare away a #1 draft pick!!

Alexis Beck – Alexis is a sophomore, veteran of phage lab. She is currently trying to decide on a project. She may take on a tract assessing the role of acetone metabolism in H. pylori or she may opt for a our top secret, “Cure for Cancer” project!!

Yarik Posnyak – Yarik is a junior and a member of the Methylomics bioinformatics team. He is beginning bench lab work based on his bioinformatics finding this fall.

Joanna He – Joanna is a sophomore in our lab. Her projects span the role of DNA methylation on the expression of a small regulatory RNA molecule and the computational aspect of methylome sequence data mining Joanna has a secret longing of the theater and will one day have a featured role in an off-Broadway screen play mash up of Cats and the Pirates of Penzance!

Mallory Junker – Mallory is a senior homors scholar who joined the lab in fall semester 2023. Her project involves the regulation of expression of a Helicobacter specific protein by means of an anti-sense RNA molecule.

Amaya Lane – Amaya is a senior and just joined the lab. Amaya is examining the ability of an outer membrane protein of H. pylori in the ability to form a biofilm in vitro

Payton Nolan– Payton is a junior Biology major intending medical school and a career in the military. Payton is developing a means to determine the level of a Nitric Oxide induced protein via western blot and an epitope tagged version of the protein. I believe I’m safe in saying Payton is the only lab member to ever jump out of an helicopter in flight! Ask her about it!!

Nina Babb – Nina is a pre-veterinary student. Her project involves trying to alter the ArsRS TCS in a veterinary gastric pathogen, H. acinonychis, that infects large cats. Nina doesn’t know this yet, but her project will ulitmately call for her to isolate Helicobacters from the stomach large, lion with a tummy ache (we’re kidding Nina!! No sick kitties in the lab – sorry!)

Adam Barghouti – Adam is a pre-med student in the lab working on a phase variable TCS and its effects on gene expression in H. pylori. In his spare time, he loves to sing Funk classics at local Karaoke clubs.

Miranda Bate – Miranda is our varsity lacrosse/microbial molecular biologist. When she’s not at the pitch, she is investigating the role of acetone in the physiology and gene expression of H. pylori. As our resident British citizen, she is our source for all information on the monarchy as well as the history of the British rock invasion of the 1960’s. She’s been caught in the lab belting out Beatles lyrics several times now!

Jessie Horner – Another student destined for a career as a physician and a biomedical researcher, Jessie is creating mutants and tools to study the role of a specific outer membrane protein of H. pylori in the cell’s ability to resist host nitric oxide (NO). Jessie has missed out on several new friend opportunities because when someone asks her what she does research on, she just replies “NO” and suddenly the conversation ends!

Mia Houdek – Mia is a senior pre-med in her third year in the lab. She is looking as post translational modifications of a response regulator in H. pylori. Mia has a secret superhero persona that she keeps quite to herself, but now the truth can be told! On weekends she turns into a super sleuth dedicated to bringing truth and justice the opossum community of William & Mary’s campus

Ian Krajna – Ian is a pre-med student and a member of the W&M men’s soccer team. He is yet another Alabama native in the lab. His project examines the role of a signal transduction system in sensing acetone as an alternate carbon source in H. pylori. Soccer is not his only sport. He is widely recognized as a world class competitor in the three legged race.

Celeste Phillips – Celeste aspires to examine microbiomes in the natural world. In our lab, she is investigating the role of phase variation in a restriction endonuclease gene in the downstream expression of genes located long distances from this gene.

Jake “Augustus Microbe” Rodrigues – Auggie is a pre-med student in his third year in our lab. He has immersed himself in a study of some mutants in our lab that may be altered in their acid regulated gene expression. He is an authority of 1980’s rock bands with a borderline obsession with BonJovi!

Anna Stevens – Anna is a pre-medical student tasked with unraveling the the role of a gene found only in the genus Helicobacter that is expressed in response to nitric oxide (NO). A fun fact about Anna: she collects memorabilia surrounding 1970s Punk Rock bands!

Lauren Tramonte – Lauren aspires to a career in biotechnology, likely at home in Boston! In our lab she is involved in studies of nitric oxide induced gene expression in H. pylori. Lauren loves to discuss all the Boston sports teams, even the little known Boston Corn Hole team, The Boston Bean Bags!

Emma Holley – Emma is a CAMS major (Computational and Applied Mathematics and Statistics) and so she is immersed in our data on SMRT (single molecule real-time) sequencing of the methylomes of some mutants of H. pylori and various environmental stressors.

Keslar Just – Keslar’s project in the lab involves determining the role of phosphomimetic amino acid substitutions in a response regulator protein of H. pylori during laboratory acid stress.

Sarah Patterson – Sarah loves big data (and she cannot lie!) and so she too is immersed in our data on SMRT (single molecule real-time) sequencing of the methylomes of some mutants of H. pylori and various environmental stressors.

Trung Phi – Trung is a 2nd year pre-med student. His projects determining the role of phosphomimetic amino acid substitutions in a response regulator protein of H. pylori during laboratory acid stress. He is also a classically trained violinist AND plays a mean kazoo and recorder!