CURRENT TEAM

DR. DANIEL KOPINKE

Assistant Professor

DEPARTMENT OF PHARMACOLOGY & THERAPEUTICS; MYOLOGY INSTITUTE

Daniel received his BS in Biology and MS in Cell Biology from the University of Kiel in Germany. His master thesis on pharyngeal arch development in zebrafish was a collaborative effort between the labs of Dr. Thomas CG Bosch at the University of Kiel and Dr. Tatjana Piotrowski at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. For his Ph.D. studies, Daniel worked with Dr. L. Charles Murtaugh at the University of Utah investigating whether the pancreas contains an adult stem cell population capable of replacing beta-cells selectively lost in type I diabetes. After finishing his PhD in 2011, he moved to the University of California, San Francisco where he joined the lab of Dr. Jeremy Reiter working on primary cilia, Hedgehog signaling and muscle regeneration. Daniel started his Assistant Professor position at the University of Florida in fall 2018. Daniel received several awards including a Muscular Dystrophy Association Development Grant during his postdoc and a Boehringer Ingelheim Fonds Ph.D. Fellowship during his PhD.

ALESSANDRA NORRIS

Graduate Student

PHARMACOLOGY AND THERAPEUTICS CONCENTRATION

Alessandra (Ale) received her Undergraduate degree from the Universidad de Belgrano (UB), Buenos Aires, Argentina. For her Undergraduate Thesis, Ale worked on the exosomal response to genomic damage induced by UV-C radiation in mesenchymal stem cells derived from induced pluripotent stem cells. She joined the Kopinke lab in fall 2018. You can contact her at alessandranorris[@]ufl[dot]edu.

Ambili A.

Lab Manager

Ambili received her Master of Science in Biotechnology from St Berchman's College, Kerala, India and her Bachelor of Science with a focus on Biotechnology, Zoology and Chemistry from Sanathana Dharma College, India. Ambili joined the laboratory in spring of 2019.

Connor Johnson

Laboratory Technician

Connor received his Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry from the University of Florida. Connor joined the laboratory in the spring of 2020.

UNDERGRADUATES

Lylybell Zhou

Freshman

Lylybell started in the lab in 2020. She is exploring possible avenues in research, as well as in medicine. Lylybell recently got accepted into the prestigious University Scholars Program!

Sarah Breske

Sophomore

Sarah started in the lab in January 2020. She is a microbiology and journalism major and hopes to pursue a career in research and reporting.

ALUMNI

Mikayla Quigley (Summer 2019)

SURF student

Mikayla was an American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics Summer Undergraduate Research Fellow in the lab for the summer of 2019. Her project was to investigate the interaction between intramuscular fat, which infiltrates and replaces healthy muscle tissue during chronic injuries and with aging, and muscle repair. Mikayla is planning to present her work at the 2020 Experimental Biology Conference in San Diego. She is currently a Biology and Marine Science double major with a minor in Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Miami, and will graduate in May 2021. She plans to pursue a Ph.D in biomedical science after completing undergraduate school. Mikayla did a fantastic job and was a joy to have in lab. We wish her all the best in her future endeavors.

Lorin Martin (2018-2019)

Lab technician

Lorin helped to set up the lab and to keep things running smoothly. We are grateful for all the things she has done.

Undergraduates

Alejandro Gonzalez (2020)