Ben Walker

Ph.D. Graduate Student, Cochran Lab/Walczak Lab

• benjwalk@indiana.edu

I am in my seventh year of graduate school. I received a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from Purdue University. I currently work in Dr. Cochran’s lab on the biophysics of kinesin and myosin motor proteins. My project focuses on the human and Drosophila chromokinesins KID and NOD, respectively. We are trying to understand how these motors produce force to achieve their intracellular function. We use structural (crystallography, Cryo-EM), kinetic (steady state and pre-steady state), and microscopy methods to understand the basic properties of these motors.

In my experience students here are not limited by the expertise and equipment of their particular lab to design and complete experiments. This is due to the outstanding instrumentation facilities run by knowledgeable staff and a collaborative environment among labs. I also love living in Bloomington. The surrounding hills, forests, and lakes make for beautiful and fun hikes and bike rides. There are also lots of opportunities to see and listen great music and theater performances at affordable prices for students. The local farmer’s market, fair grounds, restaurants, and festivals keeps you well fed and entertained. There is something for everybody here.

Walczak Lab

Jennifer Wong

Ph.D. Graduate Student, Dann Lab

• jewong@indiana.edu

Hello! My name is Jennifer Wong, and I am a fifth year in Charles Dann’s lab. I received my bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from Loyola University Chicago in 2014. I then worked as a research technologist at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine before attending IU in the Fall of 2015. My project focuses characterizing the effect of targeted cytotoxic therapeutics (TCTs), named AGFs, on folate-utilizing enzymes in de novo purine synthesis. Our lab uses X-Ray crystallography, Mass Spectrometry, and other biochemical and biophysical techniques to understand our proteins of interest.

Bloomington has a lot to offer as a small town: delicious foods, great entertainment, and all the parks in the surrounding area. Best of all, I am close to home (Chicago)!

Allissa Haney

Ph.D. Graduate Student

• amhaney@iu.edu

I am in my fifth year of graduate study in the Biochemistry program. I received my bachelor’s degree in Forensic Chemistry from Lake Superior State University in 2014. Here at IU I have studied the effects and response of light on cyanobacteria. My projects have ranged from studying light-dependent repair of DNA damage to developing methods to study light induced DNA regulation in a marine Synechococcus strain. During this research I have used a variety of genetic and biochemical approaches to answer many different questions regarding lights affect on cyanobacteria.

IU-Biochemistry department excels at being supportive of their graduate students through amazing facilities that are staffed with highly knowledgeable researchers who are always willing to train and collaborate with students, and faculty/staff being dedicated to student welfare. The faculty and upper level graduate students here are always enthusiastic to chat with students about an idea for your research, the best restaurants in town, or just how to survive in graduate school. Contact me if you have any questions!

Perla Peña Palomino

Ph.D. Graduate Student, Ressl Lab

• peapenap@indiana.edu

My name is Perla A. Peña Palomino and I am a fourth-year graduate student. I am from San Diego, CA, but I was raised on the other side of the U.S. border, in B.C.N, Mexico. I came back to the US at age 15 and attended Southwestern Community College, and later transferred to San Diego State University (SDSU), where I received my B.S. in biochemistry with a secondary major in Spanish. Once at SDSU, I joined a collaboration between the structural biochemist Dr. Tom Huxford and molecular biologist Dr. Sanford Bernstein. My experience and interest in interdisciplinary research brought me to Indiana University Bloomington to pursue a PhD, with a particular interest in combining structure biology and biochemical approaches to neuroscience. Here at IU, the work of Dr. Susanne Ressl on structure biology of synapse organizers associated with cognitive brain disorders was very appealing to me and I joined her lab in October 2016. My project focuses on the synapse organizing protein C1QL3, which mediates the binding of membrane tethered synaptic proteins regulating synapse plasticity. My major project aims at understanding on an atomic and molecular level how C1QL3 and its binding partners influence synapse plasticity and ultimately neuronal networks.

Our campus has a wide range of student lead organizations and resources available for us graduate students to build/enhance strong support systems. I am particularly involved in our Society for the Advancement of Chicanos/Hispanics and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) chapter, I CAN Persist in STEM Initiative for Women of Color, and the Latino Graduate Student Association: in these communities I have served as a member, President, Vice-President, Scholar and as part of a Leadership Team (LT). It is through these communities that I have enjoyed outreach to inform other students from minority and non-minority backgrounds of the resources available in our campus and to provide insight on the options for navigating certain situations – we – as graduate students can encounter. Outside of research and academics I enjoy outdoor activities and Latin social dance.

Ressl Lab

Haley Harrington

Ph.D. Graduate Student, Schlebach Lab

• hrharrin@indiana.edu

I am a third year graduate student in Jonathan Schlebach’s Lab. I am from just outside of Nashville, TN. I received my bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology with a second major in Spanish from Harding University in Searcy, Arkansas. I spent most of my summer doing research at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN in Charles Sander’s lab where I learned that I loved learning all about membrane proteins. My research internship prompted me to apply for graduate programs. After graduating from Harding in May 2017, I began planning my move to Bloomington, IN to start my graduate career in Fall of 2017. In the Schlebach lab we study membrane protein folding and trafficking in the cell. After I did my rotations I knew that I wanted to join Jon’s lab but I also had a great interest in viruses during my second rotation in Tuli’s lab. Luckily for me they had just started a collaboration project that I took over when I joined the lab. That being said my work focused on the alphavirus structural polyprotein, more specifically evaluating the role of cotranslational folding in -1 Programmed Ribosomal Frameshifting.

I feel lucky to be in an environment where collaborations are so easy to obtain and everyone genuinely wants you to succeed. Bloomington is a very nice place to live, coming from a small town background I thought it would be overwhelming to live in a big college town, but the pace is still steady enough that I feel right at home.

Mingzhe Pan

Ph.D. Graduate Student, Ziarek Lab

• mingpan@indiana.edu

Hello, I am Mingzhe Pan, a second-year graduate student in Ziarek Lab. I graduated from Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China in 2018 with a Bachelor’s Degree and then came here. My lab focuses on G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), neurotensin receptor 1 (NTS1) in particular. We mainly use NMR to probe structure and dynamics of the receptor in solution, but we also use some cellular methods. Now I work on the Na+ binding site of engineered NTS1 (enNTS1) to find out which amino acid residues are at the Na+ binding site.

Bloomington is a quiet, safe small town with distinct seasons, green in spring and summer, red and yellow in fall and white in winter. The campus of IU Bloomington is one of the most beautiful ones among America. It is also said that B-town is a good place for people love tasty foods. You can enjoy food from all over the world here!

Ziarek Lab