Name: Somaye Badieyan, Ph.D.

Role: Post-doctoral fellow

Degrees: Virginia Tech - Ph.D. Biological Engineering; University of Tehran - M.S. Biotechnology

Birthplace: Iran

Project: Viral hijacking of microtubule motor proteins

Science haiku: Enter and invade // Riding host motors inside // Stop these viruses!

Favorite bench activity: Clipping grids

Name: Michael Cianfrocco, Ph.D. (Twitter: @mcianfro; Profile at SBGrid)

Role: Head cheerleader

Degrees: University of California Berkeley - Ph.D. Biophysics with Eva Nogales; Providence College - B.S. Biochemistry

Birthplace: USA

Project: A little bit of everything

Science haiku: Kinesin dynein // Bidirectional transport // Cargoes along tracks

Favorite bench activity: Freezing cryoEM grids

Name: Emily L. Eberhardt (Twitter: @NightScientist)

Role: PhD student (Cellular & Molecular Biology)

Degrees: University of Wisconsin Madison - B.S. in Microbiology

Hometown: Alexandria, LA, USA

Project: Regulation of the outer-mitochondrial membrane protein, Miro1.

Science haiku: Miro in membrane // Goal -- solubilization // Structural beauty

Favorite bench activity: Grid screening using electron microscopy

Name: Lily Hahn [Joint with Lois Weisman's lab]

Role: PhD student (Cell & Developmental Biology)

Degrees: University of California , San Diego - B.S. Microbiology

Birthplace: South Korea

Project: Regulation of yeast vacuole inheritance by myosin V transport

Science haiku: Purify proteins // Can’t get the complex to form // Let me graduate

Favorite bench activity: Anything that involves using P200

Name: Sarah Kearns [Joint with Kristen Verhey's lab] (Twitter: @annotated_sci)

Role: PhD student (Program in Chemical Biology)

Degrees: Rochester Institute of Technology - B.S. Biochemistry, minor Mathematics

Birthplace: USA

Project: Cytoskeletal (particularly tubulin) methylation by SETD2

Science haikus: Study SETD2 // tubulin methylation // biochemically

No words describe awe // when tubulin dimers form // microtubules

Favorite bench activity: Making TIRF coverslips and imaging immunofluorescent stained cells

Name: Yilai Li, Ph.D.

Role: Michigan Life Sciences post-doctoral fellow

Degrees: University of Michigan - Ph.D. Biophysics with Julie Biteen; M.A. Statistics; Fudan University - B.S. Biological Sciences

Birthplace: China

Project: Machine learning methods in cryoEM data analysis and implementation into COSMIC2

Science haiku: Processing is hard // AI and automation // Need to be faster

Favorite bench activity: No benchwork! Reading papers : )

Name: Anthony Ludlam, Ph.D.

Role: Staff scientist, lab manager, teller of bad jokes

Degrees: University of Michigan - Ph.D. Biological Chemistry with Zhaohui Xu; Michigan State University - B.S. Biochemistry

Birthplace: USA

Project: Dissection and characterization of the adapter complex linking mitochondria to microtubule motors

Science haiku: COVID won't stop me // I need to make some protein // to beat Parkinson's

Favorite bench activity: Protein purification from native sources

Name: Zhenyu Tan

Role: Ph.D. student (Biophysics Program)

Degrees: Tsinghua University - B.S. Biological Sciences

Birthplace: China

Project: Regulation of motor protein activity by cargo adaptors

Science haiku: Electrons flying // through my frozen specimen // scatter, damage, light

Favorite bench activity: Freezing cryoEM grids