West Lab Alumni Spotlight

Past West lab members have gone on to prestigous positions, working on neurodegenerative diseases, in both academia and industry. This page spotlights a few of these amazing researchers.

Zhiyong Liu, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Cell Biology

Univ. of Al. Birmingham

West lab post-doctoral fellow 2018-2023

Zhiyong earned a K99/R00 fellowship in the West laboratory for his work on vesicle traffic and LRRK2 function, and now runs an NIH-funded laboratory focused on Alzheimer's disease research at the Univ. of Alabama at Birmingham

Mark Moehle, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Pharmacology

Univ. of Florida

West lab graduate student, 2011-2015

Columbia University School of Medicine

Mark earned a K99/R00 fellowship and runs a laboratory focused on circuit changes that unerlie dystonia, Parkinson's disease, and different dementias

Kaela Kelly, Ph.D., Senior Research Scientist

Arvinas Therapeutics,

West lab graduate student, 2015-2020

Kaela leads a research team focused on the development of PROTAC drugs to degrade proteins related to neurodegenerative diseases.

Nicole Bryant, Ph.D., Principle Scientist

Vividion Therapeutics,

West lab graduate student, 2018-2022

Nicole runs a research team in the Early Discovery Group, using novel chemoproteomic platforms to inform new drug targets for therapeutic interventions.

Kyle Fraser, Ph.D., Principle Scientist

Biogen IDEC

West lab graduate student, 2012-2017

Kyle runs a research team focused on biomarkers and drug responses in neurodegenerative disease.

Hisham Abdelmotilib, MD/PhD, Clinical Fellow of Neurology

Mass Gen. Hospital, Harvard Medical School

West lab graduate student, 2013-2018

Hisham is a practicing neurologist at one of the most prestigous neurology departments in the country and specializes in neurodegenerative disorders.

Ketty Bai

West lab, 2019-2021

Columbia University School of Medicine

Ketty was an undergraduate reseracher in the West lab and is currently pursuing an MD at Columbia University's Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons

Lyndsay Hastings

West lab, 2020-2021

NIH IRTA Fellow

Lyndsay was an undergraduate reseracher in the West lab and is a recipient of the National Institutes of Health's Post-baccalaureate Intramural Research Training Award, and pursuing graduate school

Allison Chang

West lab, 2018-2020

University of Minnesota Graduate School

Allison was a Post-Bac researcher in the West lab and is pursuing a graduate degree in Neuroscience at the University of Minnesota

Shijie Wang, PhD

West lab, 2017-2021

Post-doctoral researcher, UCSF

Shijie graduated with a PhD in the West lab and focuses on biomarkers and pathways in Parkison's disease.

Joshua Li

West Lab, 2018-2022

Medical student at Emory

Josh was a post-bac researcher in the West laboratoroy currently in medical school.

Valentina Krendelshchikova

West lab, 2016-2021

Scientist at Astra Zeneca

Valentina was a West lab manager and now works in Industry for protocol optimization and laboratory operations.

Nicole Malpeli

West Lab, 2018-2022

Meta Platforms, Inc

Nicole was an undergraduate computer science reseracher in the West laboratory and currently works for Meta in Manhattan as an engineer.

Julia Ziaee

West lab, 2019-2022

Salesforce, Inc.

Julia was an undergraduate researcher in the West laboratory and currently is a software engineer at Salesforce in San Franscisco.