We are delighted to welcome Sheena Mali, our new doctoral researcher, to ComeInCell! She will be working in di Michele’s lab in the UK. Her DC17 project will focus on engineering interactions between synthetic RNA condensates and cell membranes to induce controlled deformation, patterning, and division-like behaviors in synthetic cells.
Sheena received her Honours degree in Nanotechnology from the University of Sydney. She was awarded the University Medal for her thesis which explored the influence of DNA nanostructure designs on the morphology of condensate-based synthetic cells. Later, she worked in industry for Sysmex Corporation (Kobe, Japan) where she contributed to the development of a compact microfluidic device for rapid RNA detection using a novel CRISPR-Cas13a mechanism.
Welcome to ComeInCell, Sheena!