Arunima
Graduate student
Biosketch
I am originally from India, and earned my bachelor’s degree in biotechnology engineering in 2019, where I completed my thesis on the saccharification of pine needle biomass for biofuel production. I went on to receive my Master’s degree in Biological Sciences from Michigan Technological University in 2021, where I investigated the impact of laccase gene overexpression on poplar digestibility for biofuel production. I then joined Invizyne Technologies in California, where I worked on microbial fermentation for squalene biosynthesis, enzyme purification, and cofactor regeneration. In 2023, I became an Associate Researcher at the University of Kansas, studying the impact of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease on drug metabolism. I am now joining Dr. Tara Doucet Hare’s lab at Clemson University to pursue my Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.
Research interest
My Ph.D. research will focus on understanding how transposable elements—particularly LINE1 and HERV-K—shape genome function in neurodevelopment and cancer. I am especially interested in how these mobile genetic elements interact with chromatin remodeling machinery to influence gene regulation, genome stability, and diseases progression.