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Principal Investigator |
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Ana obtained her B.S. in Biology in 1996 at the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá, Colombia. She left the lofty peaks of the Andes for the (flatter) environment of the Midwest U.S. to attend graduate school at Washington University in St. Louis; there she studied the population genetics of disease resistance genes in wild tomatoes and received her Ph.D. in 2003. During a postdoc at NC State, she carried out research on the evolutionary genomics of rice domestication and the population genetics of floral timing genes in Arabidopsis thaliana. Ana joined the UMass Biology faculty in 2006. Her current research interests include the genetic basis of adaptation, the genomics of plant domestication, and the population genetics of diversification within and between species (CV). |
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Postdoctoral Researchers |
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Mike received a B.S. in Biology from Antioch College (be ashamed to let it die!) in 1995 and worked in the exciting field of hazardous waste removal for several years before returning to graduate school. He received his Ph.D. from Ohio State University in 2006 where he studied evolutionary consequences of crop–wild hybridization in sunflowers and rice. Specifically, Mike was interested in how selection, migration and metapopulation dynamics interact to influence introgression of crop alleles. Mike is currently a postdoc in Ana Caicedo’s lab and is working on a project investigating the evolution of adaptation using weedy rice as a model system. |
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Graduate Students |
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Carrie Thurber
Carrie received her B.S. in biology from Framingham State College in 2005 and her M.S. in biology from SUNY Buffalo in 2007. Her master’s thesis was based on the molecular genetics of Rubisco small subunit genes in Flaveria bidentis. Now a member of the PB Graduate Program at UMass, Carrie is carrying out her first rotation in the lab, focusing on the evolution of weedy rice. Carrie's interests include crop genetics and genomics, especially grass species used as forage for horses.
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Undergraduates |
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Neal Kalra
Neal is a senior undergraduate majoring in Biology and Anthropology at UMass. He spent a little over a year studying the effects of dam removal at various sites in New England at the "Northeast Instream Habitat Program" under Piotr Parasiewicz. He is now investigating tomato fruit evolution in the Caicedo lab and hopes to enter medical school in the near future. |
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Mona Salameh
Mona is a junior Biology major and is also completing pre-dental pre-requisites. She plays in the concert band at UMass and is a member of the university ski club. Mona recently received an HHMI Academic Year internship to carry out research on rice evolution in the lab. Within Biology, Mona is most interested in evolution and genetics. |
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Technician |
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Sherin Kanthi P. Jayasundaramudalige
Sherin received her B.S. in Biology in 1987 at the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. She has a Post Graduate Diploma in education too. For many years Sherin was a high school biology teacher. Since immigrating to the U.S., Sherin has been searching to expand her biology research experience. During the summer of 2007, Sherin volunteered in the lab and got some hands on experience in rice phenotyping, DNA extraction, and challenging PCRs.She has now started working in the lab as a techinician. Sherin's knowledge of rice growth and agriculture has proved to be a great resource for all.
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Past Members |
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Claudia Rullman
Claudia obtained her B.S. in Natural Resources in 1986 from the School of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell University. Following extensive research-related and work experience in plant biology, organic agriculture, integrated pest management, marine ecology and aquaponics, she completed an M.S. in Plant Stress Physiology at the University of Vermont in 2003. Claudia worked as a technician in the Caicedo lab during much of 2007. Her career interests include phytoremediation, effects of anthropogenic pollutants on habitat quality, environmental restoration, marine and estuarine ecology. |
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Daniela Schmieder
Daniela is a native of Germany, who spent a chock-full year as an exchange student at UMass. Her research experience has ranged from subjects such as plant physiology to animal behavior, and organisms such as rats and A. thaliana , to turtles and (virtually) rice. During her stint in the lab, Daniela aligned and edited sequences of rice resistance genes. Now back in Germany, Daniela hopes to carry out molecular and ecological studies on bats.
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