People

Rebekah Rogers - PI

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Rebekah Rogers is interested in evolution of genome structure. She studies the ways that complex mutations, like duplications, deletions and chromosomal rearrangements form brand new gene sequences. She also studies how natural selection acts on these new gene sequences to produce evolutionary change. The Rogers lab studies these mutations in a variety of evolutionary systems including Drosophila, mammoths and elephants, and humans. Twitter: @evolscientist Google Scholar





Rhyker Ranallo-Benavidez - Postdoc

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Rhyker Ranallo-Benavidez is interested computational genetics, genome assembly, and sequence quality.  He is an expert on genome qc.  He came to the Rogers Lab from Mike Schatz's group at JHU.  Rhyke  is leading genome structue analyisi  in D. yakuba on Mayotte.  @t_rhyker









James Titus-McQuillan - Postdoc

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James Titus-McQuillan is a postdoc in the Rogers Lab working on evolution of genetic novelty via retrogene formation and novel exon formation. James got a PhD in herpetology and phylogenetics before switching to The Dark Side. He is leading the lab's work on isoform variation using long read PacBio isoseq data. Collaborating with the McIntyre Lab at UFL, James is addressing transcriptome complexity and evolution over time. @Titus_McQuillan









Brandon Turner - PhD Student

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Brandon Turner is interested population genetics and computational biology. He is analyzing population genetics of genome structure variants in D. yakuba and D. santomea. He is a math and statistics major who enjoys Big Data analysis for biological data. Twitter: @Drosophkilla









Taylor Conway - Undergraduate Student

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Taylor Conway is an undergraduate working on tandem duplications and their role in creating genetic novelty. She is a bioinformatics major doing her capstone credit in the Rogers Lab. She is enthusiastic about sequence analysis, evolutionary genetics, and Drosophila. Taylor will be applying to PhD programs for Fall 2022. @_TD_Conway .

















Previous Members

Rittika Mallik - Masters Student

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Rittika Mallik is a computational biologist. She is working on repetitive elements in elephant genomes. She has identified recently proliferating transposable elements in the genomes of Asian and African elephants. Rittika did her Masters work on repetitive elements in elephants. She is a bioinformatician who codes in python, java, and C++.








Theresa Miorin - Honors Thesis Student

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Theresa Miorin is a Biology major at UNCC, doing an Honors Thesis in the Rogers lab. She is working on genetics of meiotic drive in D. americana and D. novomexicana. She is also performing phenotypic assays on D. yakuba and D. santomea. She was the chief fly curator for the Rogers lab. Theresa is a PhD student in Kelly Dyer's lab at UGA, supported on the UGA Genetics Training Grant. Twitter: @theresamiorin









Cathy Moore

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Cathy Moore is the Biosafety Officer at UNCC. Cathy did her undergraduate in Biomedical Engineering at Vanderbilt and her PhD in Biology at UNCC. Cathy led molecular work in the lab. She generated Illumina sequence data for population genomic panels of D. yakuba as well as RNAseq experiments in hybrid Drosophila.







Nick Stewart - Postdoc

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Nick Stewart works on the genetic basis of meiotic drive. Nick did his PhD with Bryant McAllister at the University of Iowa. His thesis showed that chromosomal fusions cause segregation distortion in D. americana and D. novomexicana. This segregation distortion system is associated with a latitudinal cline in North America. Nick is currently using next generation sequencing to study the genetic changes associated with this segregation distortion system in Drosophila.

He is currently an Assistant Professor at Ft. Hays State University in Kansas. He received his first grant from Kansas NSF EPSCoR in 2021.

Stephanie Grizzard - Masters Student

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Stephanie Grizzard is interested in aquatic and marine biology. She has led the bivalve sequencing and annotation project in the Rogers Lab. Stephanie has generated Illumina sequence data for population samples of M. nervosa. She worked on annotation and assembly of the bivalve genome. She is now a PhD student in Bioinformatics at Old Dominion University.









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Anh Moss - Masters Student


Anh Moss is currently a PhD student in the Fodor Lab working on microbiome evolution. Anh completed a summer internship project with the Rogers Lab, during which she worked with Dr. Rogers to find genome structure changes within Drosophila yakuba genomes using bioinformatic pipelines. Anh completed her undergraduate degree in Biology and Studio Art from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Kevin Selles - Undergrad

Kevin Selles is a Bioinformatics concentrator. He led analysis of genome structure variation in freshwater bivalves for the Rogers lab. He is now working in industry.


Steven Kay - Undergrad

Steven Kay is a recent graduate of UNCC with a concentration in Bioinformatics. He is analyzed tandem duplications in Drosophila for the Rogers lab. He is now working in industry.

© 2017 Rebekah Rogers



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