Late Summer Kick Off!

Another year has come and gone and somehow it's been almost that amount of time since we've posted an update!! 

It has been a busy year for the Sparks Lab!  We continue to expand - welcoming a new researcher (Dave Griffin), a new postdoc (Jingjing Tong) and a new PhD student (Eva Birtell) to the lab over the last year.  Looking ahead we have two new PhD students starting in the Fall (Joe Cristiano and Bali Singh) and another new researcher (Emily Kennebeck) starting in August!  We are forever grateful to the funding agencies who believe in our work and the collaborators who push the bounds of our research that allow us to reach even great interdisciplinary heights!

With the hellos, we also have our farewells!  Olivia Hazelwood, who has been with the lab since early 2020 pandemic days, graduate with a BS in Plant Science. She received the departmental faculty award for outstanding undergraduate in plant science and we couldn't be more proud of all she has accomplished!  Her first publication was also accepted just a few short weeks ago (Publications)!  We can't wait to follow along and see all of the awesome things that Olivia will accomplish in her career!

In other news, our summer intern numbers have also expanded dramatically!  We have NINE interns joining us this summer.  Four from the engineering side:  Nicky Reigel, Het Patel, Sebastian Torres and Brandon Maravilla Garcia; five from the biology side: Emilia Pierce, Safiyya Haider, Austin Jensen, Taran Kermani and Mariela Alfaro Garcia.  Major shout out to the Sparks Lab members who are spending their time mentoring these interns.  We 💚 our interns!!!!

​Stay tuned for summer fun pictures coming soon!