Dr. Joy Xiang is an assistant professor in the Biomedical Sciences Division of the School of Medicine at UC Riverside. She is a member of the RNA Center at UCR, and a cooperating faculty in several Graduate Programs including Genomes Genetics and Bioinformatics (GGB), Cellular, Molecular and Development Biology (CMDB), Bioengineering (BIG). She is passionate about all things RNA, RNA viruses and synthetic biology. In her free time, she likes to play racket sports and watch women soccer.

Karen is a PhD student in the Biomedical Sciences graduate program ('28). She is passionate about RNA molecular biology and its potential for development into personalized medicine. Her achievements include the Mary Galvin Burden Pre-Doctoral Fellowship in Biomedical Sciences, and a Best Pizza Friday presentation award. In her free time, she likes to build computers, win plushies at the arcade, and force herself to go to haunted houses and watch horror movies. 

Laliv is a Junior Specialist and recent graduate from UCR (BS, '24). She is our guardian of cells and aspires to take her academic career further with PhD studies soon. She likes M&Ms and has 3 amazing puppies. 

Alejandra is a Medical student who is our firefly and renilla guru. She aspires to uncover secrets of SARS-CoV-2 proteins in virus host interactions. 

Carlos is a second-year medical student and an aspiring physician-scientist. His clinical interests revolve around perioperative care (anesthesia), hemodynamics, and military medicine. His research interests are in molecular biology, he is specifically interested in the signaling pathways involved in hypoxia. He is a sojourner in the Dr. Joy Xiang and Dr. Erica Heinrich labs, where he studies RNA binding protein interactions in the HIF signaling pathway. What is “free time”? –Carlos 

Natalie Monroy is a Master’s student in Biomedical Sciences at the University of California, Riverside School of Medicine. With a passion for molecular biology and virology, their current research focuses on the SARS-CoV-2 accessory protein ORF8 and its molecular interactions. Natalie is particularly interested in understanding proteins in virus-host interactions and their implications for viral pathogenesis.