Departments
Roles
Ms. Evitts is a Bioengineering graduate student performing her Ph.D. thesis studies in the labs of Jessica Young and Ying Zheng. Her thesis project is focused on developing a stem cell based model of the human neurovascular unit (NVU) to study neurovascular interactions in the brain and investigate neurovascular dysfunction in age-related neurodegenerative diseases. Her […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Phil Abitua is an assistant professor in the Department of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington. The Abitua lab works on annual killifish, an emerging model to study aging due to its remarkable adaptation to an ephemeral environment, which compressed its lifespan to approximately 4-6 months. We are interested in how environmental pressures […]
Departments
Roles
Dr. Armstrong is a postdoc in Maitreya Dunham’s lab in the department of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington. His research focuses on using baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) and modified continuous culture systems known as aging chemostats to evolve yeast cells to extend replicative lifespan. In the wild, there is little evolutionary pressure to […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Innovation in protein design to target aging and age-related disease Dr. Baker has pioneered methods to predict and design the three-dimensional structures of proteins. He is the Henrietta and Aubrey Davis Endowed Professor in Biochemistry and an adjunct professor of Genome Sciences, Bioengineering, Chemical Engineering, Computer Science, and Physics. He serves as the Director of […]
Roles
Ellen Bakotich is a Neuroscience PhD candidate in the Buffalo Lab, studying the neurobiological mechanisms of cognitive aging. Her thesis work investigates how normative aging affects eye movement behaviors in aged non-human primates viewing natural images. Ellen’s research aims to understand how aging influences recognition memory and eye movement viewing behaviors. This work has important […]
Titles
Departments
Division of Gerontology, Medicine, Psychiatry
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Decline in blood-brain barrier function during aging Dr. Banks is Professor, Division of Gerontology & Geriatric Medicine and Associate Director for Research of the Puget Sound Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center. The major focus of his research is the study of how the brain and body communicate with one another through the transfer of […]
Titles
Departments
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Medicine
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Genome replication and its role in aging Dr. Bedalov is an Associate Member in the Clinical Research Division at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. Dr. Bedalov is a bone marrow transplant specialist who treats people for blood disorders, leukemia, lymphoma, multiple myeloma and myelodysplastic syndrome. He runs an active research laboratory that uses S. […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
Former BMHA Trainee, Former BMHA Trainee
Dr. Beichman is a postdoc in Dr. Kelley Harris’ Lab at UW Genome Sciences. Her research uses genomics to learn about mutation and demographic history in wild mammals that have experienced extreme demographic events or remarkable evolutionary transitions, including sea otters, bears, and whales. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Basia Belza, PhD, RN, FAAN, FGSA, is the de Tornyay Endowed Professor in Aging at the UW School of Nursing and an Adjunct Professor at the School of Public Health. As an Investigator at the Health Promotion Research Center she served as lead of the CDC-funded Healthy Brain Research Network. Her program of research includes […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
The Berg lab studies the effect of mutations that disrupt cell fate and cell migration during development. Using Drosophila as a model system, they explore how gene dysregulation impacts organ structure and function, leading to reduced viability and fertility. The underlying cell and molecular mechanisms involved in these processes also contribute to human disorders, for […]
Departments
Roles
Former BMHA Trainee, Former BMHA Trainee
Dr. Brandon Berry is a postdoctoral researcher in the Kaeberlein laboratory. His research focuses on how aging and metabolism are linked. Brandon is interested in how mitochondria, the powerhouses of cells, contribute to and modulate aging. He uses novel tools to precisely control mitochondria to better understand the fundamentals of healthy aging and metabolism. Brandon […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Beth Buffalo is a neuroscientist whose lab focuses on understanding the neural mechanisms that support learning and memory. Dr. Buffalo is widely recognized for her studies on the relationships between eye movements and neural activity in the hippocampus and adjacent cortical structures, and for her discovery of grid cells in the macaque entorhinal cortex […]
Departments
Roles
Ms. Bugg is an M3D graduate student in Pathology performing her Ph.D. thesis studies in the Davis Lab focusing on how various cardiac fibroblast cell state changes affect cardiac physiology over time. In particular she is focusing on understanding how fluid these changes are and if there is the possibility to revert to a healthy […]
Titles
Departments
Chemistry, Molecular Engineering and Science Institute
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
The Bush Lab works at the interface of analytical and biophysical sciences. We develop mass spectrometry and ion mobility spectrometry technologies that provide novel insights into structures and assembly of biomolecular machines and biotherapeutics, and apply these technologies to targets that are heterogeneous, dynamic, and interact with complex chemical matrixes. […]
Departments
Roles
Mr. Coig is a graduate student in the M3D Ph.D. program in the Promislow lab, conducting dissertation research on the genetic and molecular basis of sex differences in aging and metabolism, with a focus on biological heterogeneity in big data (metabolomics). The primary pathways at the focus of his research are Kynurenine and Lipid metabolism, […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
Dr. Crane is a general internist based at Harborview with a broad spectrum of research interests. Dr. Cran serves as multiple principle investigator (MPI) of the Adult Changes in Thought study. ACT is a prospective cohort study of older adults who are members of Kaiser Permanente Washington (KPW). The study enrolls randomly selected individuals over […]
Titles
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Davis is a movement disorder neurologist and researcher at the VA Puget Sound Healthcare System and and Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurology at the University of Washington. Her research focuses on understanding the mechanisms underlying the production and spread of pathogenic protein aggregation in aging and aging-related neurodegenerative diseases, in particular Parkinson’s […]
Roles
Dr. Dhanekula is a current cardiothoracic surgical resident at UW and a postdoc in Dr. Marcinek’s lab. He is studying aging in the aorta; specifically, he seeks to understand the interplay between mitochondrial dysfunction, senescence, and pathology in the aging aorta. He received his MD from Wayne State School of Medicine in Detroit, MI. […]
Departments
Electrical & Computer Engineering
Roles
Dr. Dowsett is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab of Dr. Georg Seelig, in the UW Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering. His research focuses on studying the unique genetic differences between single cells in aged organisms, the effects of aging interventions on clonal dynamics, and developing advanced next-generation sequencing tools as part of a […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty, Invertebrate Core Director, NSC Core Director, Shock Center Executive Committee
Aneuploidy, evolution, and aging. Dr. Dunham develops and applies genomic tools to study genome evolution and genetic variation in yeast and humans. She has a special interest in how gene and chromosome copy number variation contributes to adaptation, the mechanisms by which such variation arises, and the relationship between aneuploidy and aging. They utilize the budding […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Eisenberg is a biological anthropologist who studies how evolution has shaped human biology and aging. Dan’s research is primarily on telomere biology and has principally been in collaboration with population-based studies in non-western contexts such as the Cebu Longitudinal Health and Nutrition Survey in the Philippines and the Tsimane’ Amazonian Panel Study in Bolivia. […]
Departments
Molecular Engineering and Science Institute
Roles
Dr. Frost is currently as a postdoctoral fellow in the Kane lab. She is studying epigenetic patterns, including DNA methylation and histone modifications, and their relationship with frailty and sex differences in aging. This builds upon her thesis work completed in the Heinrich Lab at the University of California, Riverside, which was rooted in unraveling […]
Departments
Roles
Cristina Gildee is a PhD student in the department of Anthropology. She studies osteological health and aging in humans through her joint work with the Primate Evolutionary Biomechanics Lab (PEBL) and the Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology (CSDE) Biodemography Lab. Her work investigates the influence of reproductive effort, physical activity, and immune function […]
Titles
Departments
Biological Structure, Lab Medicine and Pathology
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
The Gillespie Lab strives to understand how the neural mechanisms underlying memory processes degrade over the course of healthy aging and in the context of neurodegenerative disease. The lab uses in vivo electrophysiology to record simultaneously from hundreds of hippocampal neurons in rats as they learn and perform complex memory-dependent tasks. We use advanced computational […]
Departments
Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine
Roles
Dr. Gómez is a postdoc in the Musculoskeletal Systems Biology Lab in the Department of Orthopedics and Sports Medicine and the Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine where she is advised by Dr. Ronald Young Kwon. Dr. Gómez’s work integrates genetics, aging, and bone biology. She seeks to develop zebrafish as a discovery platform […]
Roles
BMHA Executive Committee, HALO External Advisory Board
Dr. Hansen (she/her) is Chief Scientific Officer and Professor at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging in Northern California. She obtained a Master of Science in biochemistry in 1998, and a doctorate in molecular biology in 2001, both from Copenhagen University, Denmark. Dr. Hansen carried out postdoctoral studies at the University of California, San […]
Titles
Departments
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Genome Sciences
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Harris uses population genetic theory and high-throughput biological sequence analysis to study recent evolutionary history in humans and other species. One are of particular interest is the evolution of mutagenesis the forces that control DNA replication fidelity, the mutational breakdown of established traits, and the ultimate origin of new traits. Although DNA is replicated and […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Suzanne Hoppins joined the UW Biochemistry faculty as an assistant professor in 2013 and was promoted to Associate professor in 2020. She has studied different aspects of mitochondrial biology for her entire career. As an undergraduate researcher and then a graduate student she studied mitochondrial protein import, a complex system of translocation and sorting […]
Departments
Biochemistry, Biochemistry Graduate Program
Roles
Mr. Abdiasis is a PhD candidate in the department of biochemistry performing his thesis research in the laboratory of Professor Hannele Ruohola-Baker. He previously studied an intermediate pluripotent step, embryonic diapause, which disrupts the transition from the pre-implantation naïve to post-implantation primed embryonic. He foun that diapause has a distinct lipid metabolic profile compared to […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
Dr. Janowska is a post-doctoral researcher in the Klevit laboratory. Her interests lie in understanding the biochemistry of the protective mechanisms utilized by proteins to prevent the formation of toxic protein aggregates in the brain. When she is not at work, she enjoys the beautiful Pacific Northwest, either skiing or hiking, and when stationary at […]
Titles
Departments
Molecular Engineering and Science Institute
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
[…]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty, Training Program Alumnus
Dr. Kennedy is an Associate Professor in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology. He has a strong interest in the role of the fidelity mechanisms that cells employ to maintain genetic information and the ways these mechanisms are involved in diseases of aging. Research in the Kennedy lab focuses on developing and using Next-Generation […]
Titles
Departments
Immunology, Lab Medicine and Pathology
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Khor’s lab is focused on understanding healthy aging through the lens of Down syndrome. Down syndrome is the most common chromosomal condition, and immune dysregulation significantly impairs the health of these individuals. This is manifest by predisposition to autoimmunity, susceptibility to infections and impaired vaccine response, amongst other features. Recent work in the lab […]
Departments
Lab Medicine and Pathology, M3D Ph.D. Program
Roles
Former BMHA Trainee, Former BMHA Trainee
Mr. Kiflezghi is a graduate student in the M3D Ph.D. program and pre-doctoral trainee in the Biological Mechanisms of Healthy Aging Training Program. He is performing his Ph.D. thesis studies in the Kaeberlein Lab, where he has developed and applied novel technology for identifying small molecule inhibitors of the mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR). As […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Aging factors in complex heritable conditions. Dr. King’s group uses next generation sequencing approaches to identify genes responsible for complex human conditions. Since the 1970s, her group has exploited approaches from genetics, then molecular biology, then genomics to discover and characterize genes for inherited disease. There are four areas of her work that offer insights […]
Titles
Departments
Biochemistry, Chemistry, Pharmacology
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Understanding of molecular recognition, and interactions that play important roles in aging and disease Dr. Klevit is the Edmond H. Fischer/WRF Endowed Chair in Biochemistry, an Adjunct Professor of Pharmacology, and Adjunct Professor of Chemistry. Current research in Dr. Klevit’s laboratory is directed towards an understanding of fundamental molecular recognition events involved in the process […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
Dr. Knopp is a postdoctoral researcher working under Dr. William (Bill) Banks and Dr. Michelle (Shelly) Erickson. Her research focuses on blood-brain barrier (BBB) dysfunction during normal aging and in age-related diseases. Dr. Knopp’s main projects include 1) evaluating the age-specific effects of senolytic treatment to protect against BBB-dysfunction; and 2) characterizing the response of […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
As an investigator at the VA Puget Sound Health Care System, Dr. Kraemer’s research explores how protein aggregation contributes to neurodegenerative diseases. Dr. Kraemer has developed animal models of the TDP-43 pathology seen in ALS and the tau pathology seen in Alzheimer’s Disease and related dementias using both transgenic mice and transgenic C. elegans. Dr. […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Prof. Patricia Kramer is an evolutionary biomechanist whose research interest spans millions of years from the origins of bipedalism to the locomotion patterns of modern humans. She has investigated recovery of function after lower limb injury, assessed osteoarthritis development in aging humans and nonhuman primates, examined the energetics of walking on slopes with burdens, and […]
Titles
Departments
Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine, Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine
Roles
Dr. Kwon has helped to pioneer new tools and knowledge related to the genetics of skeletal disease and regeneration. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine. and a member of the Institute for Stem Cell Regenerative Medicine. He is also a member of the MCB and M3D graduate programs and adjunct […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
Administrative Core Faculty, BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Geropathology and mouse models in translational geroscience Dr. Ladiges is Professor of comparative medicine and Director of the Geropathology Research Network and the UW Nathan Shock Center Geropathology Resource. He has extensive experience in the pathobiological evaluation and modeling of mice for preclinical aging and intervention studies and has been a leader in the application […]
Titles
Departments
Computer Science, Genome Sciences
Roles
AI Core Director, BMHA Executive Committee, BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty, Shock Center Executive Committee
Understanding aging through explainable machine learning The Lee lab seeks to develop explainable AI for life sciences. Explainable in this context means understanding which features drive the prediction. The Lee lab has been collaborating with the Kaeberlein lab to develop and apply machine learning to aging biology, with the initial goal of using noisy human […]
Titles
Departments
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Nicholas Lehrbach’s research focuses on discovering the cellular pathways that normally function to remove unwanted proteins, and how they become mis-regulated in disease. High levels of abnormal or damaged proteins is a cellular feature of aging, cancer, adult-onset neurodegenerative diseases, and many rare genetic disorders. Dr. Lehrbach and his team use C. elegans to […]
Titles
Departments
Division of Gerontology, Geriatrics, Medicine
Roles
Nicole Liachko, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine, Division of Gerontology and Geriatric Medicine at the University of Washington, and a Core Investigator in the Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center (GRECC) at the VA Puget Sound Health Care System (VA PSHCS). Dr. Liachko’s research program centers on understanding the biology […]
Roles
Ms. Cheyne Littlesun is a MCB graduate student in the Kaeberlein lab, her research focuses on deciphering combinatorial drug interactions in aging biology. Currently she is looking at how a library of chemicals interact with metformin; a possible modulator of longevity now being investigated in humans and the 6th most prescribed drug in the United […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty, Metabolomics Core Director, NSC Core Director, Proteomics Core Director, Shock Center Executive Committee
Applications of mass spectrometry in the biology of aging The focus of Dr. MacCoss’ laboratory is in the development and application of cutting edge mass spectrometry based technologies for the analysis of complex protein mixtures. His primary area of expertise is in protein biochemistry, nanoflow liquid chromatography, mass spectrometry instrumentation, and computational analysis of mass […]
Titles
Departments
Bioengineering, Lab Medicine and Pathology, Radiology
Roles
BMHA Co-Director, BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty, Shock Center Director, Shock Center Executive Committee
Dr. Marcinek joined the UW faculty in 2006. He has over 15 years of experience developing and applying innovative tools to study mitochondrial biology in chronic disease and aging. A main focus of his laboratory is to understand how age-related changes in mitochondrial function at the biochemical and organelle levels translate to changes in in […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty, Invertebrate Core Faculty, NSC Development Core, Shock Center Executive Committee
Dr. Mendenhall’s laboratory utilizes the nematode C. elegans to understand how and why genetically identical populations of cells and animals in the same environment age differently. How much and what kind of physiological variation is intrinsic/chance based, or is programmed and heritable? The lab takes the approach of directly observing events inside of living cells […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Miller’s lab uses C. elegans to define relationships between proteostasis, the responses to hypoxia and hydrogen sulfide, and fasting. This work is also at the crux of understanding the relationships between stress response and aging. She has found that protein homeostasis is disrupted by exposure to specific hypoxic O2 concentrations [66]. One goal of […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Molecular Basis of Aging The goal of the Moreno lab is to understand how the function and regulation of ion channels change during the natural process of aging. Aging comes with a vast set of impairments, hearing loss, cardiac dysfunction, and hypertension, are only a few on the list. Most of these impairments are caused […]
Roles
Luana Paleologu is working in the Berg Lab on uncovering the signaling pathway of chitinase-like proteins, a class of proteins found to be upregulated in age-associated and inflammatory diseases. She works with fly eggs as a model system to test for genetic interactions and to image protein dynamics. […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Mitochondrial quality control in aging. Much of Dr. Pallanck’s current work stems from his studies of Drosophila homologs of the Parkinson’s disease-related genes parkin and PINK1. His work on Parkin and PINK1 led to his hypothesis that these factors promote the degradation of damaged mitochondria through mitophagy, a mitochondrial-selective form of autophagy. Work in many […]
Departments
Roles
Dr. Pharaoh’s research is focused on the role of mitochondria in aging and disease using a multifaceted approach that integrates physiological, pharmaceutical, genetic, molecular, and mitochondrial bioenergetic techniques. Dr. Pharaoh’s research specifically focuses on the role of mitochondrial dysfunction in skeletal muscle and cardiac aging. Dr. Pharaoh received his Ph.D. from the University of Oklahoma […]
Departments
Roles
Dr. Pomaville is a postdoc in Dr. Philip Abitua’s lab in the Department of Genome Sciences at UW. His research uses the extraordinarily short-lived African killifish to examine the mechanisms regulating the balance of apoptosis and senescence in aging animals. Matt is interested in using cell biology approaches and unique model organisms to explore multiple […]
Titles
Departments
Biology, Lab Medicine and Pathology
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Executive Committee, HALO Faculty, Metabolomics Core Director, Shock Center Executive Committee
Dr. Promislow studies natural genetic variation in aging and reproduction. His research is focused on aging in several systems – the fruit fly, companion dogs, and humans. He uses a diversity of approaches in his lab, including molecular and quantitative genetics, evolutionary theory, and systems biology to construct and analyze genetic and metabolomic networks. Among […]
Roles
Mr. Raiders is a PhD candidate in the Molecular and Cellular Biology Ph.D. program. He performs his research in the lab of Dr. Aakanksha Singhvi, studying molecular interactions between neurons and their supporting cells, glia, using the small nematode worm, C. elegans. Mr. Raiders studies the pruning of sensory neurons by associated glial cells and […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Internal Advisory Board, HALO Faculty
Dr. Reed graduated from Harvard Medical School and completed her residency in Internal Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. She came to University of Washington to train in clinical geriatrics and aging research. Dr. Reed is Section Chief of Geriatric Medicine at Harborview, Medical Director of the HMC Senior Care Clinic and UW Associate Professor in […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Mechanisms of tissue dysfunction during aging. Dr. Regnier is a Professor and Associate Chair for Research & Development in the department of Bioengineering at UW. Dr. Regnier’s research goal is to develop novel approaches to prevent or restore age- and disease-related loss of muscle function. Approaches include protein, cell & tissue engineering and gene therapy. […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Executive Committee, BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Genomic instability, cancer and aging The main focus of Dr. Risques’ research is the study of the molecular mechanisms that link genomic instability and aging. The main molecular alterations that her lab studies are telomere shortening, mitochondrial dysfunction, and age-related accumulation of somatic mutations. She has published on comparative analyses of aging relating telomere length […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Ariel Rokem received a Bachelors and Masters degree in Biology and Cognitive Psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (2002 and 2005). He then received a PhD in neuroscience from UC Berkeley (2010) and additional postdoctoral training in computational neuroimaging at Stanford (2011 – 2015). He was a Senior Data Scientist at the University of […]
Departments
Lab Medicine and Pathology, M3D Ph.D. Program
Roles
Mr. Rossner is a graduate student in the M3D Ph.D. program studying the role of flavin-containing monooxygenase proteins in aging. He is performing his Ph.D. thesis under the mentorship of Dr. Kaeberlein. He was awarded a position on the Genetic Approaches of Aging Training Grant in 2016 and is currently a pre-doctoral trainee in the […]
Titles
Departments
Biochemistry, Biology, Genome Sciences
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Adult stem cell aging Dr. Ruohola-Baker’s laboratory studies the molecules and cellular properties that are required for stem cell states and their differentiation capacity. During the recent years the laboratory has shown that microRNAs and the HIF pathway play key roles in regulating adult and embryonic stem cell self-renewal in model organisms as well as […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Schweppe’s research interests focus on the implementation of millisecond informatics to enable intelligent data acquisition strategies. His research group applies these technologies to quantify proteins as a readout for diverse cell states with broad interests spanning microbial protein interactions, small-molecule binding events, pre-clinical proteomics, and profiling primary tissue samples. Dr. Schweppe’s research group builds […]
Departments
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Roles
Dr. Severs is a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Aakanksha Singhvi, in the Basic Sciences Department at Fred Hutch Cancer Center. She is interested in studying how glia communicate with neurons to impact behavior, and how this changes with age. Specifically, Dr. Severs is examining how sense-organ glia in the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans […]
Titles
Departments
Bioengineering, Pediatrics, Seattle Children's Research Institute
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Shih is an Associate Professor at Seattle Children’s Research Instituteand the University of Washington. The research performed by his teamhas led to new discoveries related to the consequence of small-scalestroke, mechanisms of neurovascular coupling, and regulation of bloodflow through brain capillaries by pericytes. His research seeks to obtain aclear understanding the basic biology underlying […]
Titles
Departments
Biological Structure, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Singhvi’s lab investigates the role of glia in neural function, aging and disease. Our nervous system has two major cell types, glia and neurons, in about equal numbers. Glia communicate with neurons to modulate neuron shape and function, and thereby neural circuit activity and animal behaviors. To define the molecular basis of neural aging, […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Mariya Sweetwyne (she/her) is a Cell Biologist and Assistant Professor in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology (DLMP) in the UW School of Medicine. She earned a B.S. in Zoology and a B.S. in Cell and Molecular Biology from the University of Washington, followed by a Ph.D. in Cell and Molecular Biology from the University […]
Roles
Emily is a PhD candidate in the lab of Dr. Aakanksha Singhvi. Emily studies the effect of disease-relevant genes on glia-neuron interactions. They use C. elegans as a model organism to study the mechanism behind the glial engulfment of the thermosensory neuron, the AFD. […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Cardiac metabolism and mitochondrial energetics The Tian Lab studies cell metabolism and mitochondrial function in living systems. Our goal is to improve cellular resistance to environmental stresses and diseases through engineering metabolism. […]
Departments
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Roles
Sarah Tomlin is a graduate student in the Molecular and Cellular Biology (MCB) Ph.D. program, conducting her thesis research in the Lehrbach Lab within the Basic Sciences Division at Fred Hutch. Her research utilizes genetics, biochemistry, and molecular biology techniques in the model organism C. elegans to investigate the fundamental mechanisms by which cells regulate protein degradation. […]
Departments
Roles
Dr. Tsantilas is a postdoctoral fellow in Michael MacCoss’ laboratory in the Genome Sciences Department. She completed her PhD in the laboratory of James B. Hurley in the UW Biochemistry Department, where she studied metabolic activity in young, healthy retinas and examined how aging affects these norms. Her research as a postdoctoral fellow uses different […]
Departments
Roles
Lindsey is a PhD candidate in the Bush lab. Lindsey Ulmer’s research involves developing novel crosslinking mass spectrometry methods through working with the Bush Lab in the UW chemistry department and applying these methods to study small heat shock proteins (sHSPs). sHSPs are chaperones that prevent aging associated protein aggregation. Using the reagent benzoylphenylalanine, she […]
Titles
Departments
Genome Sciences, Lab Medicine and Pathology, Medical Genetics
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Age-associated changes in synaptic non-coding RNAs Dr. Valdmanis joined the University of Washington as an Assistant Professor in 2017. His lab studies genetic risk factors for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis and gene therapy methods for therapeutic intervention. Through a series of studies focusing on long-read sequencing of the genome […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Executive Committee, BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty, Proteomics Core Director, Shock Center Executive Committee
Dr. Villen is an Associate Professor in the Department of Genome Sciences. She earned her PhD in Chemistry from the University of Barcelona. During her postdoc at Harvard Medical School she was involved in several technology developments that enabled the robust characterization of thousands of phosphorylation sites: from biochemical methods to mass spectrometry acquisition strategies […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
BiographyOscar Vivas, Ph.D., is a Junior Faculty in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics at the University of Washington. Dr. Vivas is interested in understanding how aging alters the autonomic nervous system. Why the autonomic nervous system? As we age, we perceive a decline in our ability to maintain constant internal conditions (homeostasis) at rest […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Yan is an Assistant Professor of Psychology and Biology at the University of Washington, Seattle. She is a neuroscientist interested in the evolutionary and social dimensions of senescence. She uses emerging invertebrate model systems, such as the bee and the octopus, to investigate how the nervous system organizes, encodes, and mediates end-of-life transitions and death. […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Webel’s clinical research laboratory focuses on generating high-quality evidence to help people with HIV live and age well, with an emphasis on diet and exercise. She has spoken and published widely in this area with over 150 manuscripts on HIV and aging, behavioral science, and global health. Her work has been funded by the […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Training Faculty, HALO Faculty
Dr. Wills joined the UW Biochemistry faculty as an Assistant Professor in 2015. Her research is focused on understanding the genetic and epigenetic mechanisms of regeneration using the diploid frog Xenopus tropicalis as a model organism. Loss of regenerative capacity is a fundamental aspect of aging biology. The Wills lab uses high-throughput sequencing approaches (RNA-Seq, ChIP-Seq, ATAC-Seq) […]
Departments
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Roles
Dr. Yanagi is a postdoctoral fellow in Nicolas Lehrbach’s lab at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. Her research uses C. elegans genetics and reporter-based assays in combination with molecular biology and biochemistry to address how protein homeostasis is maintained as organisms age. Dr. Yanagi received her PhD in Neuroscience from Brown University. […]
Titles
Departments
Roles
BMHA Co-Director, BMHA Training Faculty, Development Core Director, HALO Director, HALO Faculty, Shock Center Director, Shock Center Executive Committee, Training Program Alumnus
Dr. Young joined the UW faculty in 2016 as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Lab Medicine and Pathology. Her research goal is to understand the molecular and biochemical mechanisms underlying age-related disorders, with a particular focus on neurodegenerative disorders. She has developed human stem cell models to further this line of research, as […]
