Principle Investigator
Michael Lynch
Our research focuses on mechanisms of evolution at the gene, genomic, cellular, and phenotypic levels giving special attention to the role of mutation, random genetic drift, and recombination. We are especially interested in building evolutionary theory from first principles in population genetics and biophysics, and using this theory to explain patterns of phenotypic variation across the Tree of Life. Model organisms employed include the microcrustacean Daphnia, the ciliated protozoan Paramecium, and various other microbial species. Methodologies include high-throughput methods in genomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics; high-performance computing; and mathematical analysis.
Staff
Aubrey Barkley
Research Technician
I am an undergraduate and former NASA intern who is researching the link between the Volvocine algae and the evolution of multicellularity.
Logan Graham
Research Technician
I am the technician responsible for the overview of Daphnia related projects, and maintenance of live daphnia and algae cultures. Currently, I am also pursuing a Master's degree in Microbiology. My project is focused on recombining evolved E. coli strains with an MMR- background to test the bounds of mutation rate.
Hannah Lew
Research Technician
I am a recent graduate from ASU with my degree in medical microbiology. I am working on the scRNA-sequencing project with Man Lin and hope to attend medical school in the near future.
Samuel Miller
Research Specialist Sr
In addition to leading day-to-day duties as the laboratory manager, I am involved in maintaining the Paramecium cultures and research duties in the lab. I also assist with experimental design/upkeep on multiple experiments and am completing/continuing a mass sequencing workflow required for various genomic analyzes.
Lea Stickling
Research Technician
I am an undergraduate majoring in Biological Sciences (Genetics, Cell, and Developmental Biology) with a strong interest in pursuing a PhD in molecular and cellular biology. My research is currently focused on investigating promoter regions in Paramecium to assess how whole genome duplication influences promoter architecture and gene retention. Additionally, I am working on a project utilizing spatial proteomics to explore the evolution of subcellular protein localization.
Ravina Telkar
Research Specialist
I focus on genomics analysis and population genetics in Paramecium, using bioinformatics to study genetic diversity, evolutionary dynamics, and species relationships.
Postdoctoral Researchers
Hisham Abu Ayyub Ali
Postdoctoral Researcher
I am interested in using mathematical models to understand the genomic effects of different microevolutionary processes. I am currently working on (1) modeling the effects of fluctuating selection, and (2) developing theoretical models to understand the conditions that favour or discourage different coevolutionary states.
Farhan Ali
Postdoctoral Researcher
I study variation in population-genetic environment, in terms of the effective population size, the recombination rate, and the mutation rate, in diverse species across the tree-of-life.
Stephan Baehr
Postdoctoral Researcher
Stephan researches mutation rates of all sorts, and is interested in the causes and consequences of mutation rate variation. Interests include the biology of aging, the mutagenicity of CRISPR, and the mutation rate of organisms with small genomes. Stephan shares a fundamental interest in the rate of variation increase in biological systems, and wishes to better understand the physics of organisms which have evolved lower rates of variance accumulation over time.
Peyman Fahimi
Postdoctoral Research Scholar
I am interested in living systems across scales, from biomolecules and organelles to cells, microorganisms, and ecosystems. My scientific journey began with nuclear physics, plasma physics, and discrete mathematics, and later pursued a PhD in chemistry, where I explored various aspects of mitochondrial biophysics. I will study the connection between bioenergetics and evolutionary cell biology, focusing on the transition from unicellularity to multicellularity.
Susmita Halder
Postdoctoral Researcher
My research interests lie at the intersection of mathematical biology and population genetics. With a background in mathematical biology, currently I am doing research in population genetic by using mathematical models to explore the evolutionary process within populations.
Berenice Jimenez-Marin
Postdoctoral Researcher
I am interested in studying major evolutionary transitions, especially multicellularity, but overall aim to harness both experimental and bioinformatic approaches to tackle biological questions integratively. Currently, I am working towards bettering our understanding of the evolution of promoter architectures using a unicellular ciliate model system.
Kunaal Joshi
Postdoctoral Researcher
I have a background in mathematical modeling of stochastic dynamical systems, and am currently investigating the evolution of the scaling patterns of cell size and growth rate across the tree of life.
Scott Menor
Assistant Research Scientist
I'm working on modelling co-evolution theoretically and in simulation and am exploring ways biological and other complex systems self-organize and increase or decrease in complexity.
Paul Schavemaker
Assistant Research Scientist
I have interest in: (1) Determining the cost-benefit relations for cellular features such as flagella, cytoskeleton, mitochondria, and the endomembrane system – examining a diverse set of single-celled species. (2) Combining these relations with evolutionary theory to illuminate the origin of eukaryotes.
Ryan Stikeleather
Postdoctoral Researcher
I’m interested in understanding what factors influence translation error rates and how to systematically quantify those error rates in multiple organisms across the tree of life.
Guangying Wang
Postdoctoral Researcher
I am interested in the genetics, genomics, and evolutionary biology of ciliated protozoa. Currently, I am focusing on the comparative aspects of cell biology among different species, as well as analyzing a large-scale population genomics dataset of ciliates.
Wen Wei
Assistant Research Scientist
I‘m interested in understanding the pattern of genetic and phenotypic evolution across several model species. I currently work with the microcrustacean Daphnia, especially focusing on the effects of Daphnia genome expansion on the diversity of reproduction cycles, and the origin of the male-deficient and the obligate parthenogenesis lineage.
PhD Students
Nikta Jabbarzadeh
I am interested in investigating the hydrodynamic effects on the motility of microorganisms. Currently, I am working on producing volumetric images and extracting flow fields to (1) improve motility cost calculations through enhancements to the Paramecium body model and (2) identify swimming states in three-dimensional space.
Man Lin
My research interest are: (1) molecular coevolution, with specific focus on interaction between the nucleus and organelles; (2) cell-type evolution.
Bogoljub Trickovic
I am interested in understanding the mechanistic causes of various scaling laws in evolutionary cell biology.
Masters Students
Alexander Day
My focus is on the Volvocales clade of algae to study how multicellularity affects the energy budget of cells.
Methila Sarker Pooja
I am currently pursuing a Master's degree in Molecular and Cellular Biology, with a keen interest in population genetics, mutation accumulation, and the biology of aging. My current research revolves around microcrustaceans Daphnia, with a primary focus on identifying the factors that explain the differences in the lifespans of Daphnia pulicaria and Daphnia pulex.
Chetana Vendanaparthy
My research focuses on studying the evolution of E. coli chimeras and wildtypes and estimating their growth and metabolic rates.