People


Principal Investigator

Professor Eric Alani

I am a Professor in the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics (MBG) at Cornell University and am a member of the Graduate Field of Genetics, Genomics and Development and the Graduate Field of Biochemistry, Molecular and Cell Biology.  I completed a Sci. B. in Life Sciences at MIT, a Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Harvard University with Nancy Kleckner, and a post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School with Richard Kolodner. My lab studies roles for DNA mismatch repair proteins in maintaining genome stability.

I care deeply about contributing to the scientific community and have mentored many graduate students, post-doctoral fellows and undergraduate students. I served on the editorial board of GENETICS, co-organized several international chromosome stability research conferences, and recently completed my term on the program committee for the biennial GSA Yeast Genetics Meeting. In my department I taught for many years a course in advanced genetics and am currently teaching a course on DNA biology.  As an NIH Training Grant Director in Genetics and Development I started a graduate student mentoring committee and a summer REU (Research Experience for Undergraduates) program, which I currently participate in.

Email- eea3@cornell.edu

Office 459, Biotechnology Building

 

 

Staff

Premila Edamala

Lab Manager

BSc in Genetics and Medical Biochemistry and MSc in Human Genetics from

the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

 

Email- pe77@cornell.edu

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Students

Beata Mackenroth

Graduate Student

Project: Does the Sir2/3/4 complex play a role in D-loop stability during BIR?

BS in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Oklahoma State University

 

Emailblm262@cornell.edu

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lisette Payero

Graduate Student

Project: Uncovering the Role of Exo1 in Meiotic Recombination

BS in Biology from the University of South Carolina Aiken

 

Email- lisettepayero@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Isaac Chizhik

Graduate Student

Project: Understanding the co-evolution of the MLH1 and PMS1 genes in DNA mismatch repair

BA in Molecular Biology from William Jewell College

 

Email- iwc5@cornell.edu

 

 

Sydney Rosen

Undergraduate Student

Project: Investigating the kinetics of the repair template selection decision during mitotic homologous recombination

 

Email- sir35@cornell.edu

 

 

 

 

 

Alani Lab Alumni