We started with 4 people in September and now at Christmas time we are 8 who are going every week into the lake … and yes we are enjoying it :o)

The “givrées du Génopode” wish you a Happy Holiday Season !

Noémie was born in a small town close to Paris. She fell in love with genetics in her first science classes in middle school. After high school, she studied medicine in Paris and received her Bachelor’s in medical sciences. Then, she switched from medicine to research and graduated from the Magistère Européen de génétique in Paris Diderot University. During her Master’s, she had the opportunity to work on the HOX gene evolution in plankton (Oikopleura dioica) in the Chourrout group, Center for Marine Biology in Bergen, Norway. Afterwards, she had a great experience studying the effects of compressive stresses on C. albicans in the Holt group, NYU, New York. Finally, she did her Master’s thesis with Dr Escude’s group at the Natural History Museum of Paris, where she worked on the evolution of alpha-satellite sequences in Cercopithecini. Now, she begins a new chapter in the Vastenhouw lab. She will be focusing on understanding early gene transcription in zebrafish and the biophysical mechanisms involved in that process. Exciting!

​During her free time, she likes to play the violin (be careful of your ears), travel, and build her family tree.

Edlyn Wu. Canadian. Molecular biologist and biochemist. Edlyn completed her MSc and PhD in the lab of Dr. Thomas Duchaine (McGill University, Montreal), where she investigated the mechanism of microRNA-mediated gene silencing, using C. elegans as a model organism. With a passion for traveling and a long standing interest in zebrafish and early developmental biology, she moved to Dresden and joined the Vastenhouw group for her postdoc in January 2017. In Lausanne, Edlyn will continue to investigate the molecular events that regulate the timing of zygotic genome activation and is looking forward to take part in science communication activities.

Hann comes originally from the state of Johor in Malaysia. For his higher education, he left sunny Malaysia and moved to Leeds, UK where he completed his Bachelors and Masters degree. It was then that he was recruited to Dresden, Germany by the Vastenhouw lab to do his PhD where he is working to understand the genetic features that kickstart early transcription during zygotic genome activation. Having just moved with the lab to Lausanne, he will continue this research but now in an exciting new environment!

Martino has studied Molecular and Cellular Biology at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa. For his Master Thesis he studied how the synaptic transcriptome changes over time in the mouse cortex. He then joined the Vastenhouw Laboratory for his PhD at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) in Dresden. He has studied the spatial organization of transcription in the nucleus using the early development of the zebrafish as a model, and will continue doing so here at CIG.