People

 Principal Investigator:

Jayakrishnan Nandakumar

Professor, Department of MCDB

Co-Director, Program in Chemical Biology

Affiliate Faculty, Department of Biological Chemistry

Ph.D. programs associated with: MCDB, PIBS, Biological Chemistry (within PIBS), Cell and Molecular Biology (CMB; within PIBS), and Program in Chemical Biology (PCB), Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP)

NIH T32 programs in which the lab participates: Career Training in the Biology of Aging (CTBA), Genetics Training Program (GTP), Cell and Molecular Biology (CMB), Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP)

Pronouns: He/Him/His

Education: B.Sc., University of Calcutta, India

M.S., Indian Institute of Science, India

Ph. D., Memorial Sloan-KetteringInstitute / Cornell University

Postdoc: University of Colorado at Boulder

Research interests: Interested in telomeres, meiosis, and more. Intrigued by protein-nucleic acid interactions and interfaces. Enamored by protein-protein interactions and higher-order structure of protein complexes that make the sum greater than the (protein) parts! Interested in chemistry and biology and everything in between!

Postdoctoral fellows:
Valerie Tesmer (Senior Scientist) Interested in the structural biology and biochemical mechanisms of telomerase and telomeres.
Kirsten Brenner (postdoctoral fellow) Kirsten did her Ph.D. research in Luis Batista’s lab at WUSTL on human telomerase RNA. Kirsten is generally interested in mammalian telomerase and telomere function in stem cells and specifically interested in DNA damage signaling both at dysfunctional telomeres and in other physiologically relevant contexts.
Ph.D. students:
Sruti Pandey (MCDB Program).  Pronouns: She/Her/Hers. Research interests: Sruti is interested in understanding how chromosome ends are protected by telomere-binding proteins in different species of yeast.
Katherine Wentworth (MCDB Program) Katherine’s is interested in understanding at a molecular level how mouse chromosome ends are protected and replicated.
Anupama Babulal (Program in Chemical Biology)
Anupama wants to apply chemical biology principles to chromosome end protection.
Jeannine Tran (MCDB Program; previously MS Pathways) Research interests: Jeannine is interested in understanding how C. elegans protects and replicates its chromosome ends.
Shibo Hou (MCDB Program) Research interests: Shibo is interested in using Xenopus laevis as a model system to understand the role of shelterin proteins in early embryogenesis and development.
Master’s students:
Ph.D. rotation students:
Undergraduate students:

Shamsalduha Sami Research interests: Shams is interested in using a wide array of techniques in the lab to tease apart the functions of the mouse POT1 proteins.

A woman with long braided hair and glasses smiles at the camera. She is wearing a patterned top and a necklace, with a light-colored background behind her.

Maiya Pickett Research interests: Maiya is interested in using protein biochemistry to understand how the LINC protein complex SUN1-KASH5 influences dynein motility.

A man with short black hair and a trimmed beard is wearing a blue shirt and dark blazer, standing outdoors with buildings and banners in the background.

Jignesh Sadipirala Research interests: Jignesh is interested in using C. elegans as a model system to understand how telomeric proteins facilitate chromosome end protection and end replication.

Skylar Grossberg Research interests: Skylar is interested in studying the molecular mechanisms of telomere biology diseases.

Alumni:

Previous Ph.D. students in the lab:
Jonathan Williams (CDB/MSTP). Jonathan studied a protein complex that spans the nuclear envelope (known as the LINC complex) and its crucial role in mammalian meiosis. Jonathan returned to the MD part of his dual degree after defending his Ph.D. thesis.
Cassie Zuckerman (MCDB Program) Cassie’s project explored an interaction between a centrosome associated protein (centrin) and its novel meiosis-specific partner (MC1) that is essential for mouse fertility. Using x-ray crystallography and biochemical techniques, she is evaluating the molecular mechanism by which the centrin-MC1 interaction facilitates meiosis and downstream steps of spermatogenesis. She also worked on C. elegans telomeric protein structure and function. Cassie is currently in Dr. Liz Pollina’s lab in WUSTL for postdoctoral studies
Shilpa Padmanaban (MCDB Program) Shilpa recently graduated with a Ph.D. in the lab and is currently in Dr. Liz Pollina’s lab in WUSTL for postdoctoral studies. Shilpa’s initial work in the lab revealed structural elements in telomerase and telomeres that are critical for telomerase recruitment to telomeres and catalytic function. Her recent works shifts focus and model organisms. She is studying how chromosome ends are protected in the popular model organism C. elegans.
Ritvija Agrawal (MCDB Program). Ritvija’s work revealed the outer nuclear membrane-spanning KASH5 protein as an activator of dynein responsible for meiotic chromosomal movements. She worked under the joint mentorship of Dr. JK Nandakumar and Dr. Morgan DeSantis and is currently a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Sue Hammoud’s lab (U. Michigan).
Jacqueline Graniel (CDB): Jackie completed her Ph.D. in the lab. Jackie’s research revealed how a mutation that results in a bone marrow failure-associated telomere biology disease in humans results in infertility in mice. Her studies reveal the differential vulnerabilities of humans and mice to telomere shortening.
Devon Pendlebury (Program in Chemical Biology) graduated from the Chemical Biology Ph.D. program in 2020. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow in Leslie Thompson‘s group at UC Irvine. Devon introduced the lab to a whole new field, namely, mammalian meiosis. Devon made seminal contributions to the structural biology of meiosis by revealing protein-protein interfaces involved in processes such as meiotic telomere tethering to the nuclear envelope and meiotic homologous recombination.
Sherilyn Grill (MCDB) is currently a postdoctoral fellow in Ruth Lehmann’s lab at the Whitehead Institute of MIT. In her Ph.D. in the lab, Sheri made major discoveries related to the mammalian shelterin protein TPP1. Sheri revealed a new region called NOB on TPP1 that is critical for telomerase recruitment to telomeres. Sheri also revealed the existence and separation of function of two isoforms of human TPP1.
Eric Smith (Program in Chemical Biology) is currently a postdoc in Dr. Iain Cheeseman’s lab at the Whitehead Insitute of MIT. Before that he was a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Alfonso Mondragon’s lab at Northwestern University. Eric’s thesis work in the lab revealed critical regions in TPP1 and telomerase that are invovled in telomerase recruitment to telomeres.
Hande Kocak (Human Genetics) completed her Ph.D. with Dr. Nandakumar (collaborator/co-mentor) and Dr. Catherine Keegan (primary mentor) in and is now a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Berriel Diaz’s lab in Helmholtz Munich. Hande’s Ph.D. research provided mechanistic insights into how a naturally occurring mutation in the gene encoding human TPP1 results in a telomere biology disease.

 

Previous postdoctoral fellows in the lab:
Intekhab Alam was a postdoc in the lab and is currently at Generate Biomedicines. Alam was involved in the dissecting a protein-protein interaction for the meiosis-specific homologous recombination function of BRCA2.

Intekhab Alam was a postdoc in the lab from 2017-19 and is currently in Dr. Sudha Chakrapani’s lab at Case Western Reserve University.

Kamlesh Bisht was a postdoctoral fellow from 2014-16. He is currently employed as a Senior Scientist, in Translational Development and Diagnostics at Celgene Corp. Kamlesh’s postdoctoral work provided seminal insights into the mechanism of telomerase recruitment to telomeres and how it is disrupted in the presence of a TPP1 disease mutation. Kamlesh pioneered CRISPR knockin in the lab and responsible for developing many other assays in the lab.
Previous Master’s students in the lab:

Sagarika Kannoly (MCDB Master’s Program) worked on C. elegans telomeric proteins.

John Ochieng was a Cancer Chemical Biology Master’s student in the lab.

Andrew Polzin (M.S.) completed his Master’s in the lab and went to Epic in Verona, Wisconsin.

Previous Undergraduate students in the lab:

Jonathan Williams conducted his undergraduate honors thesis in the lab and then continued for one more year in the lab doing research. He is enrolled in the MSTP program at UM starting his MD-PhD in the fall of 2018. And guess what, he is back in the lab to do the Ph.D. phase of his MTSP degree! Welcome back, Jonathan!

Oana Danciu conducted undergraduate honors thesis research in the lab and graduated in 2019. She is pursuing her MD in the OSU in fall of 2019.

Nathan Fischer conducted undergraduate research in the lab.

Mayuresh Iyer conducted undergraduate research in the lab.

Jeff Kuhary conducted undergraduate research in the lab.

Benjamin Moy conducted undergraduate research in the lab.

Joanna Bird graduated in 2022.

Sydney Richardson graduated in 2026

Omar Ortiz graduated in 2026

Skylar Grossberg graduated in 2026

Previous rotation students:

Andrew Luo (MCDB Program)

Joshua Eduful (MCDB Program)

Najia Elkahlah (MCDB Program)

Siara Sandwith (CMB Program)

Shadae Sutherland (MCDB Program)

Guanwei Zhou (Program in Chemical Biology PhD program)

Varsha Venkatarangan (MCDB Program)

Monika Franco (Chemical Biology Program)

Yongtong (Shero) Lao (Chemical Biology Program)

Lauren Koch (PIBS program)

Damian Gatica (MCDB program)

Jennifer Chik (PIBS program)

Shyama Nandakumar (MCDB program)

Janet Price (MCDB program)

Jacqueline Graniel (PIBS program)

Roop Jaffri (MCDB program)

Taylor Nye (PIBS program)

Group photographs

Torch Lake Lab Trip – Fall 2021
Last lab party before COVID shutdown -January 2020
Jackie’s PhD defense party – 2021
Jackie’s PhD defense party – 2021
Lab party at JK’s place – 2018
Lab party at Valerie’s place – 2018
Telomere and Telomerase Cold Spring Harbor Meeting (with Jens Schmidt’s lab) – 2019
Lab party to celebrate Hande’s defense – 2014