Meet the team

I obtained my Ph.D. in Molecular Plant Pathology from the University of Exeter, UK, under the supervision of Nick Talbot, before undertaking postdoctoral training in Sam Reck-Peterson’s group at Harvard Medical School. I joined the University of Arkansas as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Plant pathology in July 2016, where my research focus is on the cell biology of plant and human pathogenic fungi

Email: me021@uark.edu

Audra, a Fayetteville, Arkansas native, holds a Bachelor of Science in Biological Sciences, a Master of Science in Plant Pathology from the University of Arkansas, and a Doctorate from Martin Egan’s lab. She has studied several disciplines, including plant molecular biology, virology, and fungal cell biology.  In December of 2023, she completed her Doctoral dissertation titled:

Cellular Control of Proteostasis, Cytoskeleton Organization, and Polarity Remodeling During Infection-Related Development by the Rice Blast Fungus

Email: amh011@uark.edu 

I am from Bogotá, Colombia, one of the most biodiverse countries in the world. I obtained my Bachelor of Science in Biology from Pontificia Universidad Javeriana. Then I moved to the University of Arkansas where I completed a Master of Science in plant pathology. Currently, I am working on my PhD, studying the redox regulation of a complex of NADPH enzymes in the blast fungus, and its relationship with pathogenicity.

Baronger completed his Doctoral dissertation titled:

Investigating Dynein Localization, Endosomal Trafficking, and the Clearance of Protein Aggregates in Aspergillus 

Rinalda completed her Doctoral dissertation titled:

Investigating and Characterizing Septin Cellular Regulators During Infection Related Development in M. oryzae

Kathryn completed her Doctoral Dissertation titled:

Rice from paddy to pantry to plate: mitigating rice blast disease with saponins of Medicago, improving shelf life with CRISPR, and exploring global cuisine through text analysis

Nawaraj Dulal completed his Masters Thesis entitled: 

Dissecting the Cellular Control of Septin Organization in a Global Cereal Killer

Austin Sharpe is an undergraduate biology student working on a project for his honor’s thesis. He is studying the model filamentous fungus Aspergillus nidulans.    

Zoe Ching is an undergraduate with an interest in conservation ecology. She is studying the model filamentous fungus Aspergillus nidulans    

Ayanna completed an Adair/Bollenbacher summer internship, and worked on the antifungal mechanisms of silver nanoparticles against rice blast disease.

Fernanda completed the Adair/Bollenbacher summer internship and scholarship for summer 2017 and worked the the role of the microtubule cytoskeleton in appressorium morphogenesis.