Principal Investigator
Piali Sengupta
A.B. Bryn Mawr College
Ph.D. MIT (Advisor: Brent Cochran)
Postdoc UCSF (Advisor: Cori Bargmann)
Email
CV
I’ve always been fascinated by the complex interactions between animals and their environment. As a grad student, I studied pheromone signaling in S. cerevisiae and then discovered the wonderful C. elegans system as a postdoc in Cori Bargmann's lab then at UCSF. My lab continues to use C. elegans as the primary experimental organism, although we have also started some work in the vertebrate nervous system. A PI's ‘job’ is constantly unpredictable and always interesting, and it is great fun to be able to interact with and learn from so many smart, interesting, and interested lab members and peers. I love to travel (the more remote the better), am a bookaholic and a movie buff, and am actively searching for a hobby that I can stick with.
Research Associates
Anna Raskin
In the Sengupta Lab, I am responsible for preparing media and other consumables. In my past I’ve worked as a research associate in the Agricultural Research Institute. I am a fan of nature, traveling, literature, and art. In my free time, I love watching ice skating and painting.
Revanth Sudhireddy
I graduated with a BA in Biology from Oberlin College in 2024. In the Sengupta lab, I enjoy making sure the lab is running smoothly and learning new skills while exploring my curiosities. In my free time, I enjoy watching movies and playing video games.
Staff Scientists
Stephen Nurrish
Senior Research Scientist
PhD Imperial Cancer Research Fund (Advisor: Richard Treisman)
Postdoc Harvard/UC Berkeley (Advisor: Josh Kaplan)
Stephen Nurrish (Nuz, a school nickname that inexplicably stuck) is from deepest darkest Lincolnshire in the UK. He was an undergraduate at UEA in Norwich which involved a year of study at UCSD. He then did his PhD in transcriptional regulation with Richard Treisman at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund in London. Reading fly and worm papers revealing the Ras/Raf/MAPK pathways he fell in love with genetics and joined Josh Kaplan's lab at Harvard to study neurotransmission in C. elegans. He moved with the Kaplan lab to UC Berkeley and then in 2001 he set up his own lab in the UK at the Laboratory of Molecular Cell Biology at UCL in London. He ran his own lab for 13 years and his major discovery was that he wasn't very good at it, preferring the bench to the office. A conversation with Josh Kaplan resulted in him closing his lab and moving back to Harvard to re-join Josh's lab as a senior scientist in 2014. Then in 2025 he joined the Sengupta and Meisel labs at Brandeis to split his time between worm neurons and mitochondria.
Postdoctoral Fellows
Jamie Jihye Yeon
I’m interested in the mechanisms by which genetic factors contribute to experience-dependent plasticity in thermosensory neuron function. Currently, I am investigating how food deprivation alters thermosensitivity in C. elegans. In my free time, I enjoy taking pictures and watching good movies.
Arindam Dutta
My interest lies in deciphering how gut colonizing bacteria influence the neuronal activity involved in the
chemosensory detection of different kinds of sensory stimuli and downstream processing of the input
stream of sensory information. Currently, I am investigating how gut commensal bacteria influence C.
elegans pheromone production and thus regulate its behavior in an ecologically relevant manner. Apart
from this, I am a soccer lover, so in my free time, I love watching soccer games. Also, I enjoy reading books
on popular science.
Priya Dutta
My interest lies in exploring the role of different ciliary lipids and their modifying enzymes in
regulating the mechanisms required for restricting the ciliary receptor and membrane content to
maintain functionality and the homogeneity of the structural architecture of the cilia. Especially with
different types of sensory cilia displaying different membranous architecture of the outer segment.
The C. elegans thermosensory AFD neuron consists of a cilium which is surrounded by membranous
microvilli, and sensory proteins differentially localize to these individual compartments. Currently, I
am investigating the mechanisms involved in facilitating this differential distribution of sensory
proteins to the AFD cilia versus the microvilli.
In my free time, I enjoy painting, cooking, gardening, and Netflix.
Graduate Students
Anjali Pandey
I am interested in learning how context can modulate behavior on the cellular level. Specifically, I'm looking at how olfactory behavior in the worm can change depending on the context of other odorants. I am currently working to identify what proteins are playing a role in context-dependent changes.
Sam Bates
I am interested in studying the transcriptional regulatory programs that govern experience dependent plasticity. Using C.elegans thermosensory neurons as a model, we hope to uncover how sensory information is communicated to the genome to modulate the temperature activation threshold based on recent temperature experience. In my free time I enjoy watching 80s action movies.
Jamie Stonemetz
I am interested in how sensory stimuli impact gene expression, and how those changes alter behavior. Specifically, I am studying how temperature changes alter gene expression in the thermosensory neurons of C. elegans. When I’m not working, I enjoy playing roller derby, knitting, and live music.
I am interested in understanding the mechanisms required for cilia growth and regeneration. Currently, I am starting a project with the hopes of finding what proteins are responsible for cilia regrowth in different types of dysfunctional IFT mutants. In my free time, I enjoy reading, painting, and staying active.
Laurie Chen
I am interested in studying how an animal changes its behavior in response to its environmental stimuli. More specifically, I am using C. elegans to understand how an increase in temperature alters the gene expression that drives temperature-dependent behavioral plasticity. In my free time, I enjoy knitting, playing ultimate frisbee, and reading.
Sam Leslie
I am interested in studying the mechanisms underlying age-dependent cilia recovery. Specifically, I am looking at the primary cilia found in C. elegans sensory neurons to understand how age can promote cilia growth in IFT mutants. In my free time, I enjoy spending time outside and trying new restaurants.