Corianne Van den Akker completed her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Twente in the Netherlands. In 2014, she obtained her PhD in biophysics at FOM Institute AMOLF (The Netherlands), where she worked in the lab of prof. Gijsje Koenderink. The aim of her research was to relate the mechanical properties of amyloid fibrils to their underlying structure across multiple length scales, from molecular up to macroscopic.
Erin grew up in East Tennessee. She received her B.S. in chemistry from Furman University, where she conducted undergraduate research with Professor Brian Goess. After graduating in 2011, she moved to New Jersey to pursue her Ph.D.
I am currently a postdoc in the lab of Dr. Sarah Heilshorn in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering and co-advised by Dr. Giles Plant in the Department of Neurosurgery. My current focus is on improving cell transplantation therapies after spinal cord injury using novel biomaterial design approaches in order to improve functional regeneration. Cell transplantation therapies have shown promise in treating the cellular voids that form after spinal cord injury that prevent functional recovery.
Rabindra (Robin) Shivnaraine is a post-doctoral fellow working with Professor Brian K. Kobilka in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Physiology. Professor Kobilka has demonstrated that movements within G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) underlie their function. To directly measure these movements, Robin is collaborating with the laboratory of Professor Steven Chu to bring innovative single-molecule techniques to capture and assess these movements.