Alex Stutzman nominated for HHMI Gilliam Fellowship

Alex successfully competed to be one of the UNC nominees put forward in prestigious national fellowship competition.  Alex is now in the running for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Gilliam Fellowships for Advanced Study.  She is a terrific candidate with a strong background in research and leadership.  We hope HHMI is able to recognize Alex’s accomplishments and provide her future opportunities for continued development by awarding her with his fellowship.

Dowen Lab members win awards for presenting their work at Symposium

Two Dowen Lab members have won competitive awards at the 4th Annual UNC Chromatin and Epigenetics Symposium, held virtually on Dec 3, 2020.

Graduate student Nicole Arruda won an award for her talk.

Graduate student Megan Justice won an award for her poster presentation.

Congratulations on being recognized for your presentation skills and your results. Enjoy the prize money!

Riya Gohil writes NC DNA Day blog post highlighting Alex Stutzman

She is at it again. Riya Gohil has authored another blog post for NC DNA Day, this time shining the spotlight on our very own graduate student Alex Stutzman!  Riya interviews Alex and reveals her path to research, her scientific loves, and other science adjacent interests. In particular, they touch on Black In Genetics (BIG) which Alex founded and is leading in some cool directions. Riya did a great job in this new format (personal interview).

Check out her work here:  http://ncdnaday.org/2020/10/scientist-spotlight-alexis-stutzman/

 

Welcome Fall Rotation Student Riya Gohil

Our lab is excited to welcome a new graduate student for the fall rotation period. Riya Gohil will investigate chromatin structure using advanced molecular biology and genomics techniques.  Riya earned her B.S. in Genetics at the University of Georgia.  Before her first day in the lab, Riya told me she wanted to bring us cheese.  I think this is going to go well! 

Welcome to the Dowen Lab and UNC!  

Megan, Zach and Holden publish in Cell Reports!

Megan Justice, Zach Carico and Holden Stefan have their WIZ study published in Cell Reports. Their work shows that WIZ forms a complex with the architectural proteins Cohesin and CTCF, which are known to organize the genome into DNA loop structures. WIZ is important for proper genome structure, gene expression and control of embryonic stem cell identity. Congratulations on your exciting work!

Welcome Postdoctoral Researcher Audra Bryan

We are excited to share that Audra Bryan has joined the lab as a postdoctoral researcher. She recently earned her PhD from Vanderbilt University where she studied the role of transcription factors in gene regulation in normal cells and cancer cells. We are glad to have her join our team and apply her skills to the area of 3D genome organization and gene control.