Caroline Say is an Oklahoma City native and an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Caroline has joined us for the summer to learn about functional genomics and the methodologies used to investigate them. She will be working with Dr. Nair and Dr. Wu to design a CRISPR/Cas9 system to disrupt the enhancer region of TNFAIP3, a SLE risk variant. Welcome Caroline!
Welcome Jaanam!!!
The Gaffney Lab would like to welcome the newest member of our team! Jaanam Gopalakrishnan is a Ph.D. student in the GPiBS program at the University of Oklahoma Health Science. Her dissertation studies will be focused on investigating the molecular and functional role of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus risk haplotypes spanning the UBE2L3 gene. We are delighted to have her!
Welcome our newest tiny members
The Gaffney lab is celebrating the arrival of two of our tiniest members. Congratulations to Graham and Mandi Wiley the birth of their baby girl, and Stuart Glenn for the birth of his baby boy.
Publication Announcement
We are pleased to announce the recent publication of our newest manuscript in Genes & Immunity. Our manuscript, titled “TALEN-mediated enhancer knockout influences TNFAIP3 gene expression and mimics a phenotype associated with systemic lupus erythematosus,” demonstrates our newest technological advances in precision-based genome editing, and demonstrate that the TT>A variants we previously identified are indeed causal variants that function independent of other LD-associated variants to disrupt TNFAIP3 gene expression in SLE patients.
Sequencer Upgrades
Our Genomics Core is upgrading our sequencers to include Hiseq 3000 and NextSeq 500 instruments. These state-of-the-art machines utilize the newest sequencing chemistries available. The Hiseq 3000 will output the same amount of data as two of our old Hiseq 2500 instruments at about half the cost and the Nextseq will replace the Rapid Run modes of our old Hiseq 2500 instruments and provide one third more data at about one third the cost. We are excited about what our new upgrades will mean for enhancing the capabilities of our Genomics Core.
Welcome!!!
Our lab is delighted to welcome three new members, Drs. Satish Pasula, Kandice Tessneer and Ajay Nair.
Dr. Pasula is joining us as a Senior Postdoctoral Fellow and will continue our groundbreaking work focused on understanding the functional genomics of lupus risk loci TNIP1 and UBE2L3.
Dr. Tessneer is joining us as a Postdoctral Fellow with an emphasis in Scientific Writing. Her mission is to increase our publication speed and assist in garnering new grants to fund exciting new projects in our lab.
Dr. Nair recently completed his doctoral research focused on evolutionary developmental biology and genetics at the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. He will be joining our lab in September as a new Postdoctoral Fellow. His research will focus on characterizing the functionality of TNFAIP3, a gene we recently identified as a lupus risk allele, as well as investigating the importance of the microbiome to autoimmune disease susceptibility.
The Fleming Scholars are here!
Our lab is delighted to welcome Laura Jardine as our Summer Fleming Scholar. Laura is from Muskogee, Oklahoma and just finished her Freshman year at Oklahoma City University. Her project will focus on using next generation sequencing to find gene mutations in cancer. Please welcome Laura to the lab!