Joel Kingsolver’s lab has been featured in a photo essay on UNC’s Endeavors! The essay displays macro-photographic images of the lab’s research and highlights their outreach efforts. Be sure to check it out here.
Congratulations to the following Phi Beta Kappa inductees for the Fall of 2022:
Blair Thomas Blakeney
Christopher Nash Bowman
Meredith Leigh Bowman
Bryn Copenhaver
Eduardo de la Parra Polina
Sharidan Lee Farris
Aakanksha Gundu
Mansi Gupta
Benjamin Andrew Hamer
Meagan Harrington
Gavin Connor Hughes
Luke Yuen Johnson
Sophia Annabelle Johnson
Jennifer Ashton Judd
Paul Christopher Karre
Alexandra Holden Katz
Anirudh Raman Kompella
Michael Chen Li
Brianna Elizabeth Lucero
James Mcguire Metts
Madison Ann Milotte
Dean Avery Pearce
Harrison Nash Philbeck
Cameron Alexander Pinkelton
Shaili Rathod
Ayden L Ring
Evan Drew Rosenberg
Molly Ruebusch
Alyssa Jacqueline Schoff
Simcha Ravi Singh
Alicia Marie Spencer
Litao Tu
Soorya None Vasan
Hayden Vaughn
Nicholas Anthony Yapundich
To learn more about Phi Beta Kappa, visit their website.
Listen as PLOS Climate Editor-in-Chief Emma Archer and Executive Editor Jamie Males discuss climate change research publishing with author John Bruno, marine ecologist and Professor in the Department of Biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in their recorded podcast “Breaking Down Barriers in Climate Change Research Publishing!”
Congratulations to Jill Dowen, Associate Professor in the Biochemistry & Biophysics Department and the Biology Department, who received tenure as a UNC faculty effective January 1, 2023.
Dr. Dowen received her BS from the University of Iowa, her PhD from the University of California San Diego, and she completed her postdoctoral studies at the Whitehead Institute at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Dowen joined UNC in 2016 as a faculty member in the Biochemistry and Biophysics Department and the Biology Department. Dr. Dowen is also a member of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and the Integrative Program for Biological and Genome Sciences.
Research in her lab focuses on the link between genome organization and transcriptional control of cellular identity. Her lab is particularly interested in the proteins, DNA sequences, and molecular processes that link three-dimensional organization of the genome and spatiotemporal gene expression. The Dowen lab applies cutting-edge technologies such as CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing and high throughput sequencing-based chromosome conformation capture assays to interrogate the function of long-range DNA interactions on chromosomes during health and disease.
Since coming to UNC, Dr. Dowen has assembled and trained a very active lab of postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, and undergraduate researchers. She’s received funding from the NIH and a Sidney Kimmel Scholar Award. She is a Reviewing Editor for Frontiers in Molecular Biosciences Genome Organization and Dynamics and is the Well-being Liaison for Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics.
Learn more at: https://jilldowenlab.web.unc.edu/.
The Copenhaver lab has published a collaborative paper in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences entitled “DNA polymerase epsilon interacts with SUVH2/9 to repress the expression of genes associated with meiotic DSB hotspot in Arabidopsis” which shows that genes associated with DNA double strand breaks (DSBs) are silenced during meiosis by a subunit of DNA polymerase epsilon (POL2A) acting together with a SET domain protein (SUVH9). This work advances our understanding of how epigenetic mechanisms influence plant reproductive biology. The first author of the paper, Cong Wang, was co-advised by Drs. Copenhaver and Wang, and the second author, Jiyue Wang joined the Copenhaver lab as a postdoctoral associate.
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2208441119
Congratulations to Emma Rudy Srebnik for being featured on the Center for Galapagos Studies’ website for her impressive undergraduate career. To read more about her academic journey and travels from Japan to the Galapagos, check out the article here.
Congratulations to Dr. Nat Prunet for winning 8th place in the 2022 Photomicrography Competition at Nikon! Be sure to check out the image, “Growing tip of a red algae,” here.
Congratulations to UNC Biology undergraduate student Madison Milotte for being featured on UNC’s website. The article, “UNC junior studies how climate change might disrupt butterfly life cycles,” highlights Milotte’s use of a Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) to complete their research. Read the full article here.
Rebecca Van Hoeck, a Biology graduate student in Joel Fodrie’s lab, has been awarded the NOAA Sea Grant Knauss Marine Policy Fellowship. This fellowship supports graduate students with interests in ocean, coastal and Great Lake resources and in the national policy decisions affecting those resources, and matches them with “hosts” in the legislative and executive branches of government in DC. Congratulations, Becca!
Congratulations to Professor Emeritus Peter White whose new book is just out: The World Atlas of Trees and Forests: Exploring Earth’s Forest Ecosystems by Herman Shugart, Peter White, Sassan Saatchi, Jérôme Chave. It’s a textbook that’s also a work of art, filled with information interspersed with remarkable photographs. Congrats, Dr. White!