Harini grew up in India, and she majored in Microbiology, which led her to her first foray into scientific research at the AstraZeneca Drug Discovery program. Although she joined the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with the intention of pursuing her Ph.D. in Microbiology, she heard Phil Newmark, her graduate advisor, give a talk on planarians and fell in love with these flatworms with their astounding abilities of regeneration. Her graduate thesis defined the functions of multiple genes involved in germline stem cell self-renewal and maintenance in both planarians and their parasitic cousins, schistosomes. Her fascination with regeneration drew Harini to zebrafish, and she joined Will Talbot’s lab at Stanford, initially intending to study the process of remyelination. Fortuitously, however, her experiments led her to appreciate the fascinating biology of microglia and the importance of lysosomal pathways in these critical neuroimmune cells. As she designed her own research program, she delved into the field of neurodegenerative, neurodevelopmental, and neuropsychiatric disorders and the contributions of neuroimmune signaling pathways in these devastating conditions.

Outside of the lab, Harini loves to spend time with her dog, Arya, listen to way too many podcasts, and read fiction.

Emilio was born in Pirayú, a small city in the Paraguayan countryside. He earned his BSc in Biochemistry and MSc in Biological Chemical Sciences at the Facultad de Ciencias Químicas of the Universidad Nacional de Asunción (FCQ-UNA). His master’s research in the Biotechnology Department focused on engineering a recombinant M13 phage to carry an immunogenic peptide from the foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) for vaccine development. He later studied the antiviral activity of natural extracts against HSV-1. Despite his strong interest in phage and virus research, his next goal was to pursue his passion for neuroscience. To achieve this goal, he obtained the Fulbright–CAL scholarship to pursue a PhD in the USA. In 2025, he joined the Iyer Laboratory as a PhD student in the Biochemistry and Cell Biology program within the BioSciences Department at Rice University.

In his free time, he enjoys playing the electric guitar, watching movies, going to concerts, and engaging in sports such as running, soccer, biking, and hiking.

Beatrice is from Boston, MA and attended Northeastern University for her undergraduate degree in Bioengineering. While at Northeastern, she completed two six-month-long co-ops, the first at Dr. Scherzer’s Parkinson’s Neurogenomics laboratory at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the second at Moderna Therapeutics in the Rare Disease group. After graduating from Northeastern in 2022, Beatrice joined Dr. Matthew Disney’s lab at UF Scripps as a research assistant.  There she worked on the design and evaluation of RNA-targeting small molecules as novel therapeutic modalities. In the Fall of 2024, Beatrice began her PhD at Rice University in the Synthetic, Systems, and Physical Biology program and joined the Iyer lab at the end of her first semester. She is excited to continue to enhance her understanding of neuroscience and be able to contribute to rare neurological disease research. In addition, she is keen to work on tool development for in vivo visualization.

In her free time, Beatrice likes to watch indie movies and run with her dog.

Othniel is a sophomore at Rice University majoring in Neuroscience. During his time at Rice, he has become passionate about neurobiological research. His first experience with research began with his involvement in a biostatistics project that sought to elucidate the role of various metabolites in the progression of Alzheimer’s Disease. At the Iyer lab, he is currently focused on exploring the role of microglia in epilepsy.

In his free time, Othniel loves playing basketball, designing sports posters, trying new foods, and listening to music.

Arya was born in St. Louis, Missouri, and adopted in 2014 when she was just a tiny four-month-old puppy. Since then she has listened to her mom give many practice talks, and she snoozes through them all. She thinks everyone she meets is her best friend, and this theory has not been proven false to date.

Outside of the lab, Arya loves to nap, go on long hikes and walks, and thinks playing fetch is lame.