Graduate Students

Hyunji is a Ph.D. student in the BBS program and is co-mentored between Drs. Marcia Haigis and Miao Cui laboratories. Born and raised in South Korea, she completed her BSc and MSc at University of Seoul. She studied plasmonic nanoparticles for bio-sensing and bio-imaging during her master’s under the supervision of Dr. Inhee Choi. After that, she worked as a research trainee in the lab of Dr. Luke P. Lee at Harvard Medical School, where she developed her interest in biomedical research. She is currently interested in exploring heart regeneration from metabolic perspectives.

Yutong (Mary) received her bachelor’s degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She did her undergraduate research in the Johnson Lab, working on antibody-polymer conjugates for cancer treatments. She is currently interested in integrating chemical methods to study metabolite signaling.

Hobbies: traveling, playing board game!

Peter is a PhD student in the HMS Immunology program and is co-mentored between the Haigis and Sharpe laboratories. He is interested in understanding the metabolic determinants of effective anti-tumor immunity and metabolic usage of CD8⁺ T cells in the settings of cancer and aging. Previously Peter worked as an industry scientist at Merck Research Laboratories where he supported the pre-clinical development of several immunotherapeutic agents across the early discovery pipeline.

Roberta was raised in a seaside town in southern Italy, but ended up studying medicine in one of the foggiest cities of northern Italy (Pavia). As an Armenise-Harvard Summer Fellow, she works with Jaime on a project about metabolic rewiring in resistant lung cancer.

“Fun” fact: She lives 1 hour away from the lab because she kept mistaking Harvard Campus with Harvard Medical School while searching for houses on Google Maps

Sheila received her B.S. in Biochemistry from University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her undergraduate research in the lab of Dave Pagliarini was focused on identifying enzymes and precursors involved in coenzyme Q biosynthesis. She is currently interested in exploring how alterations in T cell metabolism improve antitumor immunity. 

Favorite show: Avatar: The Last Airbender

Originally from Mexico, Erick is now a student in the Chemical Biology Ph.D. program at Harvard. Departing from an analytical chemistry background and a broad interest in cellular metabolism and human disease, Erick’s efforts are currently focused in dissecting the biological and chemical features of different oncometabolites. His studies are generously funded by Fundación Mexico en Harvard and Mexico’s National Council for Science and Technology (CONACyT).  

Happy Place: Lamont Library at Harvard Yard. Proudly, a Lamonster.

Oscar hails from Guayaquil, a city on the coast of Ecuador. He pursued his undergraduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where he worked on ways to engineer substrate-specific and potentiated variants of the yeast disaggregase Hsp104 in the lab of James Shorter. In the Haigis Lab, Oscar is interested in understanding how different cellular states lead to metabolic reprogramming as to coordinate lipid homeostasis and how cellular pathologies arise when such processes go awry.

Liam did his undergraduate research in the laboratory of Bryan Ballif at University of Vermont, where he studied blood group systems. He is currently researching the interaction between tumor metabolism and urea cycle dysfunction in the context of hepatocellular carcinoma. In addition, he is interested in studying the contributions of proteomic changes to cancer metabolism.

Hobbies: Editing Wikipedia

Favorite protein: SrcASM

Sam received her BS in biomedical science at Imperial College London, studying infectious diseases. She then worked as a technician for a year in Bruno Reversade's laboratory before ending up at HMS. Her current work examines the enzymology of prolyl hydroxylase 3 and its role in lipid metabolism.

Sarah completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Her undergraduate research in the laboratory of Martin Burke was focused on synthesizing less toxic derivatives of antifungal natural products. She is currently interested in understanding mitochondrial sirtuin activity and substrate specificity in the context of metabolic diseases. Her work is supported by a fellowship from Joslin Diabetes Center.

Favorite alpaca name: Alpacino