Lab Members

After graduating from UC San Diego, Derek joined the Salk Institute where he prepared snm3C libraries that captured DNA methylation and chromatin conformation information in single nuclei. Currently, he works on human derived IPSCs and organoids to assist in modeling rare neurodegenerative disorders.

Eric earned his bachelors in molecular, cellular and developmental biology from UC Santa Cruz. While he was at UCSC, he worked with Human Cortical Organoids at the UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute. He is currently working on maintaining human derived IPSCs to study rare neurodegenerative disorders.

Wylie is in his fourth year at UCLA studying biology. Wylie is currently using patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) to generate neurons in order to model rare neurodegenerative disorders such as neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis, type 6. His research also includes using iPSCs from patients with GATAD2B associated neurodevelopmental disorder (GAND) to generate brain organoids in order to understand the disease further.

Molly earned her PhD in biomedical sciences from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she investigated novel pathogenic mechanisms of cystic fibrosis. She is currently working with our team to model rare neurogenetic disorders, such as GATAD2B-associated neurodevelopmental disorder (GAND), using patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells and cerebral organoids to unravel disease mechanisms and explore therapeutic strategies.

Sophia is an undergraduate at UCLA studying neuroscience, with a research focus on rare pediatric neurodegenerative disorders. She is currently assisting with gathering clinical data on GATAD2B-associated Neurodevelopmental Disorder (GAND) in patients to better characterize the phenotypic parameters of the neurodevelopmental syndrome.