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Bootcamp is led by current BISB/BMI PhD students with help from many others!

Table of contents

  1. Bootcamp Instructors
  2. Program Chairs and Administration
  3. Guest Instructors
  4. Fellowships Panelists
  5. Internships Panelists
  6. Questions?
  7. Credits

Bootcamp Instructors

Bootcamp instructors curate Bootcamp’s content and teach the majority of modules.

David Laub he/him

Email: dlaub at ucsd.edu

3rd year DBMI PhD student

Advisor: Hannah Carter

Hratch Baghdassarian he/him

Email: hmbaghdassarian at ucsd.edu

5th year BISB PhD student

Advisor: Nathan Lewis

Juan Tibocha-Bonilla he/him

Email: j1tiboch at eng.ucsd.edu

5th year BISB PhD student

Advisor: Karsten Zengler

Kiki Spaulding she/her

Email: kspaulding at ucsd.edu

3rd year BISB PhD student

Advisor: Graham McVicker

Program Chairs and Administration

Program chairs and administrators present information about program operations.

Amy Sitapati, PhD

Email: asitapati at ucsd.edu

Clinical Professor, Medicine

DBMI Director

Terry Gaasterland, PhD

Email: tgaasterland at ucsd.edu

Professor of Computational Biology and Genomics, Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO)

BISB Graduate Program Chair

Guest Instructors

Guest instructors lead modules on specialized topics.

Alex Wenzel he/him

Email: atwenzel at ucsd.edu

4th year BMI PhD student

Advisor: Jill Mesirov

Sessions:

  • Breakout: Choosing a PhD Advisor
  • Arya Massarat he/him

    Email: amassara at ucsd.edu

    4th year BISB PhD student

    Advisor: Melissa Gymrek

    Sessions:

  • Preview: Genome-Wide Association Studies (GWAS)
  • Module 7: Software Engineering on a Team
  • Module 8: Reproducible Bioinformatics
  • Jessica Au she/her

    Email: jeau at ucsd.edu

    3rd year BISB PhD student

    Advisor: Ludmil Alexandrov

    Sessions:

  • Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in the BISB program and at UCSD
  • Kathleen Dorrestein she/her

    Email: kdorrestein at health.ucsd.edu

    Staff Research Associate, Dorrestein Lab

    Sessions:

  • PhD-Level Scientific Communication
  • Mike Cuoco he/him

    Email: mcuoco at ucsd.edu

    4th year BISB PhD student

    Advisors: Rusty Gage and Eran Mukamel

    Nathan Lewis, PhD

    Email: n4lewis at ucsd.edu

    Professor, Pediatrics and Bioengineering

    Sessions:

  • Getting Paid 1: Predoctoral Fellowships
  • Fellowships Panelists

    These students will sit on a panel for Q&A during the Fellowships session

    Arya Massarat he/him

    Email: amassara at ucsd.edu

    4th year BISB PhD student

    Advisor: Melissa Gymrek

    Fellowship: NSF-GRFP

    Carlos Guzman he/him

    Email: cag104 at ucsd.edu

    BISB Alumnus, Graduated 2023

    Advisors: Sven Heinz and Chris Benner

    Fellowships: NSF-GRFP, Ford Fellowship, and NIH F31

    Mike Cuoco he/him

    Email: mcuoco at ucsd.edu

    4th year BISB PhD student

    Advisors: Rusty Gage and Eran Mukamel

    Fellowship: NSF-GRFP

    Internships Panelists

    These students will sit on a panel for Q&A during the Internships session

    Aaron Boussina he/him

    Email: aeboussina at ucsd.edu

    3rd year BMI PhD student

    Advisor: Shamim Nemati

    Internships: Genentech and Illumina

    Eric Kofman he/him

    Email: ekofman at ucsd.edu

    5th year BISB PhD student

    Advisor: Gene Yeo

    Internship: Element Biosciences

    George Armstrong he/him

    Email: garmstro at eng.ucsd.edu

    BISB Alumnus, Graduated 2022

    Advisor: Rob Knight

    Internships: NVIDIA and Thermo Fisher Scientific

    TJ Sears he/him

    Email: tsears at ucsd.edu

    3rd year BISB PhD student

    Advisor: Hannah Carter

    Internship: Genentech

    Xingzhao Wen she/her

    Email: xzwen at ucsd.edu

    5th year BISB PhD student

    Advisor: Sheng Zhong

    Internship: Vertex pharmaceuticals

    Questions?

    For questions about bootcamp, please contact the bootcamp instructors!

    For questions about student life feel free to message to the BISB Student Discord. You should have received an invite link via email. Our discord server is entirely student-run, and you can find people from different labs, years, and program tracks. It is a great informal resource to chat with fellow students.

    Since the BISB Student Discord is completely student-run, we ask that you do not share the invite link with faculty or staff members.

    For questions about specifics of the program and program requirements, please contact our wonderful program coordinator, Fran Perez Estrada! Another helpful contact, especially for financial matters, is Elizabeth Soos, the Student Affairs Manager for our program and the Department of Bioengineering.

    Credits

    Bootcamp content is either newly generated or adapted from previous years’ work. We would like to credit past bootcamp instructors for their contributions, much of which the current content is based on.

    • Mike Cuoco, 2021-2022
    • Michelle Ragsac, 2020-2021
    • Cameron Martino, 2020-2021
    • Owen Chapman, 2019-2020
    • Jessica Zhou, 2018-2019