2024 MB&B Retreat Program

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September 20 – 21, 2024

Heritage Hotel, 522 Heritage Rd. Southbury, CT

 Day 1 Friday

Time Event Location
8:00 a.m. Bus Departs Ingalls Ice Rink 73 Sachem St. New Haven
9-00-10 a.m. Check-in/Registration Heritage Hotel downstairs foyer
Bags to be stored in Washington Room

DO NOT BRING INTO CONSTITUTION ROOM

9-10 a.m. Continental Breakfast Constitution Foyer
10:00-10:15 Welcome by Enrique De La Cruz & Carol Martin Constitution Room
10:15-12:10 p.m. Session 1 Moderator- David Flesher Constitution Room

Session 1

10:15-10:31 a.m. | Ron Breaker “Riboswitches in Mammals.”

10:32-10:48 a.m. | Ran Yang and Olivia Hunker (Bleichert Lab)”From Origins to DNA Replication.”

10:49-11:05 a.m. | Allison Didychuk with Sara Gelles-Watnick “We Still Donut Know What ORF68 is Doing”.

11:06-11:22 a.m. |  Yong Xiong with Christian Freniere and Fidel Arizaga “Visualizing host-virus structures at high resolution.”

11:23-11:39 a.m. | Ailong Ke “Leveraging molecular mechanisms to improve genome editing applications”.

11:40-11:56 a.m. | Mark Hochstrasser “A SUMO Tale or Why Have a Tail?”

11:57 a.m.-12:13 p.m. | Brigitte Naughton and Dylan Poch (Schlieker Lab) “From Membranes to Motions: Forces Behind NOMO Functionality in Muscle and Small Molecule Modulation of Neurological Disorders.”

12:15-1:15 p.m. Lunch Timbers Room
1:16 – 2:30 p.m.  Session 2 Moderator – Ryan Stanton Constitution Room

Session 2

1:16-1:32 p.m. | Kate Schilling and Ghazia Abbas-Curriculum Updates for AY 2024-2025

1:32-1:48 p.m. | Julien Berro with Yuan Ren “Fantastic forces and where to find them.”

1:49-2:05 p.m. | Steven Tang with Taylor Gierke “Decoding and Rewiring Cell-Surface Interactomes for Cell-Cell Fusion.”

2:06-2:22 p.m. | Candie Paulsen with Isabel Romov “A TRP down regulatory lane! A guide to channel regulation in the Paulsen Lab.”

2:23-2:39 p.m. | Nikhil Malvankar “How do Microbes Respire without oxygen-like Soluble Electron Acceptors using Protein Nanowires: Structures, Functions, and Electron Transfer mechanisms.”

2:39-4:30 p.m. Free time – Please see list below of possible activities and locations
4:30- 5:15 p.m. Poster Session 1 Lincoln Room
5:16-6:00 p.m. Poster Session 2
6:00-6:45 p.m. Dinner Garden Room and Timbers
6:45 p.m. Macnab Poster Winners Announced
 7:00-10:00 p.m. The Sigler Soiree (Mixer/Social Event) Timbers and Outside Terrace

Day 2 Saturday

8-9:00 a.m Breakfast Garden Room and Timbers
9:05-10:44 a.m. Session 3 Moderator -Greg Quevedo Constitution Room

9:05-9:15 a.m. | Steven Tang and Allison Didychuk “Introduction to Directors of Postdoctoral Affairs.”

9:16-9:32 a.m. | Michael Koelle with Shavanie Prashad “How a neural circuit makes a decisive decision.”

9:33-9:49 a.m. | Amanda Jeng and Yevheniia (Jane) Ishchenko (Koleske Lab) “An autism-associated mutation in TRIO drives deficits in excitatory neurotransmitter release”

9:50-10:06 a.m. | Matt Simon with Isaac Vock “Ensuring your chromatin and RNA biology isn’t half baked.”

10:07-10:23 a.m. | Danni Jin (Gilbert Lab) “Specificity of SARS-CoV-2 non-structural protein 1 (Nsp1) translation inhibition of human 5′ UTRs”

10:24-10:40 a.m. | Marisa Michalchik (De La Cruz Lab) “An example of how textbook biochemistry explains clinical enzyme   replacement therapy outcomes.”

10:41-10:57 a.m. | Karla Neugebauer “Splicing is hot to go.”

10:58-11:10 a.m. Wrap up by Enrique De La Cruz and Carol Martin
11:20-11:40  a.m. Group Photo Stone Garden
11:45 a.m. Bus Departs Front entrance to Heritage Hotel

Faculty Advisor: Enrique De La Cruz

Retreat Coordinator: Carol Martin

Special thanks to the Student Organizers: Aden Alemayhu and Charlotte Godfrey

Student Volunteers: Camila Garcia, Isabel Romov, Yixuan Chen, Ashleigh Smirnov, Changhao Zhu, Bingnan Luo, Taylor Gierke, Pedro Madalozzo, Hyunkyung Lee, Chimere Nnatubeugo, Ryan Stanton, Gregory Quevedo, Marisa Michalchik, and David Flesher.

Available Activities

  • Outside of Garden Room-Giant Jenga, Ladder ball, Corn Hole
  • Tennis Courts- Pickelball (Games provided by the Sigler Fund)
  • Pumpkin painting and crafts
  • Swimming Pool, Fitness Center, Ping Pong, Game Room

Poster Sessions Titles and Locations

Name First Name Last Title Session Poster #
Wendy Zhang GS “Identification of coilin interactors reveals new regulators of Cajal body number and substructure”. 1 1
Isabel Romov GS Elucidating the molecular and structural mechanisms of a TRPA1 channelopathy 2 1
Camila Garcia GS  “When and Where: Forward trafficking and turnover of a critical pain receptor” 1 2
Sara Gelles-Watnick GS “Mapping the location and interactome of essential herpesvirus packaging factor ORF68”. 2 2
Jackson Gordon GS  “Co-transcriptional microexon definition in neuronal alternative splicing programs” 1 3
Brigitte Naughton GS Nodal Modulator (NOMO) is a force-bearing transmembrane protein required for muscle differentiation 2 3
Chris King GS “Bacterial OmcS-type cytochrome nanowires evolved for versatile extracellular and interspecies electron transfer”. 1 4
Dylan Poch GS  “Neurological Disorders and Phase Separation – a High-throughput Small Molecule Approach” 2 4
Elizabeth Black GS “Chk2 sustains mitotic PLK1 activity to promote proper chromosome segregation” 1 5
Ran Yang GS “Structural basis for MCMBP chaperoning MCM2-7 during human DNA Replication.” 2 5
Yara Mustafa GS Elucidating which “flavors” of FG-repeat nucleoporins bind HIV-1 Capsid 1 6
Max Paul GS “The C2 domain augments Ras GTPase Activating Protein catalytic activity.” 2 6
Chrishan Fernando GS  “Bioinformatic prediction of proteins relevant to functions of the bacterial OLE ribonucleoprotein complex”. 1 7
Bingnan Luo GS De novo Discovery of Functional RNAs 2 7
Jiaqi Li GS “Exploring the potential
roles of acetyl-methyllysine (Kacme) in spermatogenesis”.
1 8
Olivia Hunker GS “Phylogenetic analysis reveals a surprising loss of ORC’s ORC6 subunit in diverse metazoan taxonomic groups”. 2 8
Klarissa Hollander GS “A Dual-Pronged Approach to Attacking HIV Infections.” 1 9
Gregory Quevedo GS Elucidating the mechanism of calcium desensitization of a critical pain receptor 2 9
Zion Perry GS  “Structure of the long noncoding RNA HOTAIR in breast cancer.” 1 10
Sabrina Grunseich GS “High-Throughput Mutational Analysis of Translation Initiation by an IGR IRES” 2 10
Kimberly Vish GS Investigating the role of MEKK2’s αG helix in kinase activity 1 11
Joey Erwin GS “Metabolic trade-offs using a widespread porin-cytochrome complex Om(abc)B kickstarting microbial respiration and nanowire formation” 2 11
Nicholas Doak GS “A Deep Mutational Scanning Approach to Characterizing the Gammaherpesvirus vPIC”. 1 12
Christian Fagre GS “Identification of pseudouridine in mammalian microRNA” 2 12
Ryan Stanton GS  “Regulation of protein synthesis by PUS1-mediated mRNA modification.” 1 13
Kyrillos Abdallah GS “Massively parallel assay for non-canonical translation initiation by human 5′ UTRs reveal global effects of N6-methyladenosine”. 2 13
Amanda Jeng GS Heterozygosity for neurodevelopmental disorder-associated TRIO variants yields distinct deficits in behavior, neuronal development, and synaptic transmission in mice 1 14
Dave Hiller PD “Encouraging curiosity with hands-on explorations of scientific concepts” 2 15
Chengtao Xu PD Less is More: Structure-guided engineering converts IscB into a versatile RNA-guided RNA-editor 1 15
Yuan Ren PD Genetically encoded in vivo force sensors with versatile readouts and compact size. 2 16
Pankaj Madheshiya PD “Viral recruitment of RNA Polymerase II” 1 16
Sunanda Mallik PD “Protein folding and quality control during nuclear transport” 2 17
Cong Shen PD “Bacterial OmcS-type cytochrome nanowires evolved for versatile extracellular and interspecies electron transfer” 1 17
Chandrayee Mukherjee PD “Unravelling molecular mechanisms underlying DYT1 dystonia: insights from a genome-wide CRISPR screening study” 2 18
Nooshin Shatery Nejad PD ” Mechanism of Arp2/3 complex regulation by Coronin-7 “ 1 18
Aldo Salazar Morales PD Electron imaging & cryo-tomography reveal bacteria respire via cytochrome nanowires secreted by type IV-II pili 2 19
Chetna Dhembla PD “Insights into the interaction interface of 26S proteasome with nuclear importins and Sts1 adaptor protein in S. cerevisiae.” 1 19
Sayed Iman Mousavi PD Role of Fimbrin’s domains in crosslinking actin filaments 2 20
Yuekang Zhang Presenting for Wei Zhang PD Visualizing the Translation Landscape in Human Cells at High Resolution. 1 20