Alumni - Voiniciuc Lab

Previous members at UF

If you are looking for current team members: click here.

Ania M. Granadino

🔊 (AHN-yah Gran-ah-dee-noh)

Position: Visiting Scholar (2024.01- 2024.04)

Ania joined us as for a full-time research internship as a fourth year Agricultural Science and Production at Zamorano University. She aimed to broaden her knowledge of genetically modified organisms and plant molecular biology, exploring how this can be a valuable asset in addressing challenges related to agriculture.

Outside the lab: horseback riding and reading.

Yunhan Wang

Position: PMCB program Ph.D. rotation (2023.11 – 2024.02)

Next position: Ph.D. student in the Wang Lab (Plant Pathology)

Yunhan joined us for a 3-month rotation after completing her B.Sc. in Forest Science (University of British Columbia, 2020-2023), following a Bachelor of Agriculture in Forestry (Nanjing Forestry University, 2017-2020). She worked on bioengineering antimicrobial peptides in yeast.

Outside the Lab: watching concerts, detective novels

Ryan Cantrell

Position: B.Sc. Student Internship (2023.10-11)

Ryan completed a 4-week internship as a first-year microbiology and statistics major at the University of Florida. He assisted with molecular biology and yeast genetic engineering experiments.

Outside the lab: Exploring the outdoors and a playing guitar.

Madalen Robert

Position: Ph.D. Student (IPB Halle, Germany) and DAAD Visiting Scholar at UF (2020.02 – 2023.07)

Madalen developed carbohydrate binding modules (CBM) as tools for designer cell walls, and now works in the industry.

Read more about the DAAD: German Academic Exchange Service

Samarth Raipal

Position: OPS Automation Assistant (2023.05- 2023.06)

As a Computer Science master’s student at the University of Florida, Samarth assisted us with the initial setup of the Opentrons OT-2 hardware and protocols.

Elyse Winne

Position: B.Sc. Student Internship and Supervised Research Credits (2022.09 – 2023.05)

Next position: UF/IFAS Summer Research Internship (Eric Triplett lab, UF) and OPS Research Assistant (Andrew Hanson lab, UF)

Elyse joined the lab as a third year B.Sc. in Microbiology student interested in using microorganisms as models for solving relevant issues in society. While working in the Designer Glycans lab, Elyse attended the 2023 NIAMRRE Annual Conference (Addressing the Gaps in Antimicrobial Resistance, AMR) and was awarded a competitive UF/IFAS Summer Research internship. In the future, she plans to pursue graduate studies and biological research in industry.

Read more about the paid UF/IFAS Summer Research program.

Lianna Larson

Position: B.Sc. Student Internship (2022.09 – 2023.05)

Lianna joined the lab as a first-semester B.Sc. Student in Biological Engineering and hopes to contribute to the development of biofuels. She contributed to the discovery and characterization of a new peeling walls mutant in Arabidopsis.

Julia Moncrieff

Position: B.Sc. Research Scholar and Supervised Research Credits (2022.09 – 2023.05)

🏆University Research Scholars Program First Semester Research Award

Julia joined us from the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences at the University of Florida and aims to pursue a future career in biomedical research. She received the highly competitive URSP Research Award for her excellent work.

Alexa Young

Position: B.Sc. Student Internship (2023.01 – 2023.05)

Alexa spent a semester in our lab during the first year of her B.Sc. in Microbiology and Cell Science, minoring in Bioinformatics. She wants to learn more about the field of genetics and genetic engineering.

Dr. Fang Bai

Position: Biologist IV at UF (2022.09 – 2022.12)

Next position: Research Geneticist (USDA ARS)

Fang has been working on the genetic and epigenetic regulation of maize seed development in the Department of Horticultural Science since 2012 and assisted with the Designer Glycans lab start up at UF.

Publications: ResearchGate

Rafena Boyd

Position: B.Sc. Student Internship (2022.09 – 2022.12)

Rafena joined the Designer Glycans as a 4th year Microbiology and Cell Science B.Sc. student with a minor in African American Studies. Rafena gained experience with molecular biology, particularly cloning, and is interested to pursue a future career in medical pathology.

Tanya Lubbe

Position: B.Sc. Student Internship (2022.09 – 2022.10)

Tanya completed a short research internship as part of her third-year undergraduate studies in Microbiology and Cell Science. Tanya is interested in learning more about genetics and biochemistry, aiming to pursue graduate education abroad in the future in one of these fields.