Our first in person Departmental Retreat in 3 years took place this past week! On September 21st, many of our talented faculty and trainees presented posters at the David Naylor Student Commons. On September 22nd, members of the department traveled to Centre Island to hear talks from our trainees, faculty, and invited speakers. A Biochemistry Olympics event was also held on the island!
Here are some highlights from the retreat:
Dixon Ng from the Moraes Lab was awarded the Connell Award for Best All-Round Postdoctoral Fellow.
Huazhu (Peter) Liang from the Melnyk Lab was awarded the Pfizer Graduate Scholarship.
Brandon Payliss from the Wyatt Lab was awarded the Centennial Award in honour of Sela Cheifetz.
Kamran Rizzolo and Angela Yu from the Houry Lab were awarded the Connell Award for Top Graduate Student Publication of 2021 for their paper on the functional association between the trigger factor chaperone and ClpXP proteolytic complex .
Elaine Thai from the Julien Lab was awarded the David A. Scott Award for best all-around graduate student.
Dr. Glover was awarded the David Isenman Citizenship Award for service to the Department beyond the call of duty.
Dr. Michael Norris, Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry, presented his work on the structural basis of paramyxovirus budding.
We also heard amazing talks from our two invited keynote speakers, who lead a joint lab at NYU Grossman School of Medicine:
Dr. Damian Ekiert, Associate Professor, Department of Cell Biology & Microbiology, spoke about their lab’s work characterizing MCE proteins that bridge the inner and outer bacterial membrane to mediate lipid transport.
Dr. Gira Bhabha, Associate Professor, Department of Cell Biology, spoke about their lab’s work on characterizing the polar tube, a harpoon-like invasion apparatus of microsporidia.