Bio

My research program focuses on using engineering and systems approaches to understand fundamental biological processes in living organisms, particularly the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans. We apply tools that enable the acquisition of biological data in a high-throughput, quantitative fashion. With these high-content engineering approaches, we aim to understand topics such as neuronal aging, synaptic plasticity, noise and stochasticity, genetic networks and buffering, among others. We incorporate tools that enable large-scale high-content quantitative characterization of phenotypes at various scales: from the subcellular level all the way to whole-organism behavioral outputs. We use custom-built platforms for our experimental studies, which typically incorporate microfluidics, computer vision, statistical data analysis, and integrative automation and control. In addition, we apply genetic and molecular biology tools that enable performing genome-wide systematic studies. Current active areas of research include aging of neuronal connections, genetic screens for late-onset phenotypes, quantitative behavioral assays, and the spatio-temporal role of age-associated proteins at the whole organism level.