Jan Carette

Principal Investigator

Jan E. Carette is Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Stanford University. Jan received his doctorate from Wageningen University, The Netherlands, and did his postdoctoral training at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands, and at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts. His laboratory uses genetic approaches to understand the molecular mechanisms of virus–host interactions, ranging from pathogenic viruses to viruses used in gene therapy.

Pingping Cao

Postdoctoral Fellow

Pingping is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. Pingping's research focuses on the development of direct-acting antivirals and targeted protein degradation targeting the picornavirus 2A and the high-throughput screen to identify the disruptors of the newly identified 2A-SETD3 interaction which is crucial for enteroviruses genome replication. Pingping received her PhD from Tsinghua University, where she studied the working mechanisms of membrane protein complexes involved in sterol homeostasis regulation by cryo-EM single particle analysis in Dr. Nieng Yan's group.

Allison Dupzyk

Postdoctoral Fellow

Allison is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. Allie is studying adeno-associated virus (AAV) entry, and is interested in AAV viral trafficking throughout the host cell. She received her PhD from the University of Michigan in the lab of Professor Billy Tsai, where she studied nonenveloped virus entry and cell membrane penetration.

Emma Esterman

Graduate Student

Emma is a graduate student in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. She is characterizing how several host factors affect enterovirus infection. Emma received her bachelor's degree from Dartmouth College, where she studied gene transfer agent evolution in the lab of Dr. Olga Zhaxybayeva. After her undergraduate studies, she worked for two years at Adimab, where she engineered antibodies to have improved binding to viral glycoproteins.

Christine Peters

Postdoctoral Fellow

Christine is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, where she studies host factors important for picornavirus infection using genome wide screens. She obtained her PhD from Stanford. Christine received her bachelor’s degree from the University of California, San Diego, where she worked with Dr. Joe and Kit Pogliano using a microscopy approach to uncover new antibiotics and understand how they work.

Wenjie Qiao

Basic Life Research Scientist

Wenjie is a former Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. Wenjie continues to study host factors crucial for virus infection and trying to understand the molecular mechanisms. She received her PhD from the University of California, Davis, where she studied plant virus-host interactions.

Nicole Tanenbaum

Nicole is a graduate student in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. She is interested in identifying enterovirus host factors and characterizing the mechanism by which they promote infection. Nicole received her bachelor's degree from the University of Pennsylvania, where she studied influenza vaccine effectiveness in the lab of Dr. Scott Hensley.

Lauren Varanese

Graduate Student

Lauren is a graduate student in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. She studies important host factors involved in reovirus and RSV infections, and she is interested in using prime editing to make clinically relevant mutations to host proteins and determining the effect on viral infections. Lauren obtained her bachelor's degree from Tufts University, where she worked with Joshua Kritzer to design and synthesize peptide inhibitors.

Ben Waldman

A.P. Giannini Postdoctoral Fellow

Ben is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. Ben's research focuses on host-pathogen interactions, with a particular focus on species-specific defense systems and viral antagonism of those systems. Ben received his PhD from MIT, where he studied the regulation of chronic infection by the parasite Toxoplasma gondii in Sebastian Lourido's group at the Whitehead Institute.

Lily Xu

Graduate Student

Lily is a graduate student in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, where she is co-advised by Dr. Jan Carette and Dr. Wah Chiu. She is interested in the intersection of virology and structural biology, using single-particle cryo-EM to investigate viral processes in flaviviruses. Lily obtained her bachelor's degree from Washington University in St. Louis, where she worked with Dr. Daved Fremont to study flavivirus envelope proteins and their interactions with neutralizing antibodies.