Lab Members
Hee Won Yang, PhD (Principal Investigator)
- Lab Director; Assistant Professor of Pathology and Cell Biology
Sungsoo Kim
- Postdoctoral Fellow
Dr. Sungsoo Kim is a postdoctoral research scientist in the laboratory of Dr. Hee Won Yang at Columbia University Irving Medical Center. Dr. Kim received his PhD from the KAIST. During his PhD, he had investigated the development of optogenetic tools which can modulate diverse cellular signaling, especially intracellular Ca2+ signaling in vivo mice brain. As a postdoctoral research scientist, he mainly focuses on the underlying molecular mechanism of drug-resistance in tumors by utilizing diverse biological techniques.
Jessica Armand
- PhD Student
Jessica is a graduate of Binghamton University with a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry. Following graduation, she conducted two years of postgraduate research at the University of Rochester Medical Center where she investigated pharmacological and stem cell therapeutics for acute spinal cord injury. Jessica joins the Yang lab in April 2021 as a PhD candidate in the Integrated Program in Cellular, Molecular and Biomedical Sciences. As a graduate researcher, she studies basic cell cycle proliferation and mechanisms of drug resistance in breast cancer models.
Mimi Zhang
- Postgraduate Researcher
Mimi receives her BS in neuroscience and cognitive studies from Vanderbilt University, where she worked in Dr. Lisa Fazio' s lab to examine contextual memory and Dr. David Sweatt' s lab to examine transgenerational effects of long-term use of oral contraceptives. She receives her MA from Columbia University, where she worked in Dr. Alejandro Chavez's lab to screen drugs for neurodegenerative diseases. She is now a postgraduate researcher in the Yang lab and is excited to explore mechanisms underlying cancer drug resistance.
Kaitlin Abrantes
- Undergraduate Researcher
Kaitlin is an undergraduate student at Columbia University studying Biomedical Engineering. In the Yang lab, she is excited to learn more about the relationship between cell signaling and cell growth. Her goal is to apply her engineering background to better understand and map out the inner workings of cell proliferation.
