Biological Sciences

  • Photo of Marie-Claire Harrison, who is wearing a dark-colored sweater.

    Harrison named Brighter Ventures Student Award recipient

    Marie-Claire Harrison, a graduate student in the Department of Biological Sciences, has been named the 2023 recipient of the Brighter Ventures Student Award. The Brighter Ventures Student Award supports Ph.D. students interested in the application of artificial intelligence in the biomedical research field. This award was established by Laurent Audoly, a graduate… Read More

    May. 25, 2023

  • Headshot of Lauren Jackson.

    Study establishes molecular basis for interaction between an essential protein complex and its regulator

    By Leah Mann The labs of Lauren Jackson, associate professor of biological sciences and biochemistry, and Todd Graham, Stevenson Professor of Biological Sciences at the College of Arts and Science and professor of cell and developmental biology, recently published a study in the Journal of Cell Biology… Read More

    May. 23, 2023

  • Headshot of Anne Hatmaker.

    Diversity in infectious mold species impacts respiratory disease severity in humans

    By Caroline Cencer Anne Hatmaker Fungal diseases caused by pathogenic fungi such as molds affect millions of people worldwide every year. Despite the high prevalence of fungal diseases, the mechanism of infection is not well understood. The laboratory of Professor of Biological Sciences Antonis Rokas, led by graduate student Anne… Read More

    Feb. 3, 2023

  • Vanderbilt University

    Student-led research creates a publicly available mitogenomic data source for a human pathogen

    Publicly available data sources help drive progress in science, especially complete and annotated data sources. As part of a student research project, corresponding author Anne Hatmaker, a Ph.D. student in the lab of Antonis Rokas, professor of biological sciences, and first author Miya Hugaboom, an undergraduate in the Rokas lab,… Read More

    Feb. 21, 2022

  • Vanderbilt University

    Patel Lab earns new grant to study evolutionary trade-offs between reproduction and aging

    Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences Maulik Patel and his lab have received a Pilot Research Grant from the Vanderbilt Evolutionary Studies Initiative to study reproduction and aging. According to one theory in evolution, aging is the price animals pay for reproduction. Research in the Patel lab uses the tiny but… Read More

    Feb. 4, 2022

  • Professor Seth Bordenstein with Students in the Lab. Photos of Seth Bordenstein instructing and interacting with undergraduate students Asia Miller and Mahip Kalra. Admissions materials.

    Darwin’s magnificent mystery and the microbiome

    Vanderbilt researchers are reimagining Charles Darwin’s work by communicating how the origin of species might depend largely on the microbiome—the totality of bacteria, viruses, fungi and other organisms—living in or on a host body. Darwin’s On the Origin of Species put forth a seminal and revolutionary thesis for the life sciences in 1859: Populations with a common… Read More

    Nov. 2, 2021