Graduate STUDENT

Fatemeh Alimohammadi

Fatemeh is from Babol, located in the north of Iran. She received her undergraduate degree in Biology from the University of Mazandaran in 2015, and her Masters in Genetics from the University of Isfahan in 2018. Previously, she was studying the roles of interferon beta in autoimmune diseases.

Technical Associate/lab manager

Emily Tuttle

Emily a lifelong Western New Yorker and currently lives in Geneseo. Emily graduated from MCC with an AAS in Biotechnology in 2008 and have worked here at UR since then. She lives with her husband and 2 kids. They have 2 cats named Butters and Stewie. 

Graduate STUDENT

Marco Zocchi

Marco was born in Rochester, NY, but grew up in Colorado. He studied biology at the University of Colorado Denver. Previously, he examined maternal effect genes in Xenopus embryos in the lab of Dr. Amanda Charlesworth.

POstdoctoral felllow

Fabio Hecht

Born in Rio de Janeiro, Fabio received his undergraduate and Master’s degrees from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He then obtained his Ph.D. under the joint supervision of Dr. Corinne Dupuy (Université Paris Saclay) and Dr. Denise Pires de Carvalho (Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, UFRJ) working on thyroid cancer and reactive oxygen species. Afterward, he became a lecturer of Molecular Biology at UFRJ and is currently a postdoctoral fellow working on the impact of extracellular GSH on cancer.

Graduate STUDENT

TashJaé Scales

TashJaé is from Dallas, Texas, and obtained her undergraduate degree in Biology and Master’s in Chemistry from the University of Texas at Arlington. Her background has focused on both clinical and research-orientated questions, including high-throughput technologies.

postdoctoral fellow

Sara Blick-Nitko

Sara Blick-Nitko, Ph.D., is a postdoctoral associate in the laboratory of Dr. Isaac Harris in the Department of Biomedical Genetics and in the Rochester Postdoc Partnership program. She will utilize the Multifunctional Approach to Pharmacologic Screening (MAPS) to study novel vulnerabilities in cancer cells. Blick-Nitko earned her Ph.D. in the Department of Pathology at the University of Rochester Medical Center. Her doctoral research focused on the role of platelet Ido1 in Plasmodium yoelii uncomplicated malaria infection. Beyond the laboratory, Blick-Nitko’s passion is in advocacy towards enhancing the environment for the deaf community, advocating for language equity, and ensuring accessibility for all. She is committed to breaking barriers and fostering an inclusive society where the deaf can thrive without limitations, where their language is respected, and where accessibility is not an afterthought but a fundamental right.

UNDergraduate student

Merlin (Zhuoran) Zhou

Zhuoran is from Beijing, China. He is taking his undergraduate degree at University of Rochester. He is majoring in Biology.

Fun Facts

• He is losing weight for one year but he can’t stop eating.

• He made his own English name as Merlin.

• He loves singing although he is bad at it.

ALUMNI

We are actively recruiting research technicians, graduate students and postdoctoral researchers. To apply, please email a cover letter and CV to isaac_harris@urmc.rochester.edu.