Grace Jefferies - research assistant

Grace has an MSc in Drosophila genetics (University of Melbourne) and works on the terminal patterning and embryo imaging projects in collaboration with Prof. James Whisstock.

Dr Monica PIA Caggiano

Monica completed her MSc in Functional Genomics (University of Trieste, Italy) in 2008 and her PhD in Biology in 2013 (EMBL and Heidelberg University). Monica has worked on a variety of organisms including plants and mice and has a strong interest in developmental biology. Monica is currently working on the terminal patterning and embryo imaging projects in collaboration with Prof. James Whisstock.

DR FELIPE MARTELLI SOARES DE SILVA

Felipe completed a MSc from Universidade de São Paulo (Brazil, 2015) investigating the relationship between nutrition and aging. In 2020 he completed a PhD in Science from University of Melbourne investigating how contaminating insecticide doses could contribute to the worldwide demise of insect populations. He spent 6 months of his PhD research at the Baylor College of Medicine (Houston, USA). His current research investigates inborn errors of amino acid metabolism, a group of 150 metabolic disorders that affect 1 in 6,500 live births, and aims to understand their genetic, metabolic, and biochemical basis to develop new dietary-based therapies which can then be trialled in the clinic.

SARAH MELE

Sarah’s PhD project is using Drosophila melanogaster to study inborn errors of branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) metabolism. Sarah is interested in how mutations BCAA genes alter the physiology and metabolome of Drosophila. The goal of Sarah’s work is to correct disease phenotypes can dietary alteration. This project is in collaboration with Dr Matthew Piper (Monash).

JIAYI LIN

Jiayi’s PhD project is focusing on inborn errors of sulfur-containing amino acid metabolism, which is a group of rare genetic disorders that results in childhood mortality. She is using Drosophila melanogaster as the disease model. She is interested in how mutations in the disease-causing genes alter the phenotypes in Drosophila and how disease phenotypes can be altered by diet. This project is in collaboration with Dr Mattew Piper (Monash).

Sam cheers

Sam’s PhD investigates the genetic basis of male infertility using human genome sequencing data, and functional studies in the mouse and Drosophila. This project is in collaboration with Prof Moira O’Bryan (University of Melbourne).

SABAH JBARA

Sabah’s PhD project focuses on understanding how the macrophage-like cell population is controlled. Her work follows on from her Honours year in which she conducted a screen to identify novel receptors required in blood cells. Sabah is fascinated by genetics and biology in general, and hopes to one day win a Nobel Prize.