Tim wins the Asrican Sophie & Jack Award

We are thrilled to announce that our PhD candidate, Tim, has been selected as a recipient of the Asrican Sophie & Jack Award from the UCLA Graduate Programs in Bioscience! This prestigious award supports PhD students conducting innovative research in cardiovascular science, spanning basic discovery to translational clinical applications, and recognizes dedication, creativity, and impactful contributions to the field.

Tim’s accomplishment not only reflects his outstanding scientific work, but also highlights the excellence of the research taking place in the Pernas Lab. Please join us in congratulating Tim on this well-deserved honor — we can’t wait to see where his work leads next!

Hannah and Sam got into the MIMG Path2 program!

We’re excited to announce that two of our undergraduate students, Hanna Riel and Sam Leistiko, have been accepted into UCLA’s MIMG Path-2 Program — a prestigious track that allows qualified undergraduates to carry out independent research under faculty mentorship while fulfilling their major’s research requirement.

Having two students join Path-2 is a win for our lab as well as for them. It means having dedicated, motivated undergraduates working more intensively and independently on meaningful projects, contribution to long-term research goals, with potential for poster presentations or co-authorship and of course extra hands for more continuity and focus on ongoing or new investigations.

Please join us in congratulating them on this achievement! We look forward to their growth and contributions in the lab under the Path-2 program.

Chahat’s PhD work got published in Nature Microbiology!

We are thrilled to announce that the amazong work of Chahat Mehra, a PhD student in the Pernas Lab, has just published in Nature Microbiology: “Toxoplasma effector TgROP1 establishes membrane contact sites with the endoplasmic reticulum during infection.”

Using a clever combination of a fluorescence-based membrane-contact reporter, CRISPR loss-of-function screening, imaging and proteomics, Chahat and her coauthors discovered that the parasite effector TgROP1 acts as a molecular tether — connecting the host endoplasmic reticulum (ER) to the intracellular vacuole that contains Toxoplasma gondii.
This ER–parasite membrane contact site (MCS) provides a novel insight into how pathogens hijack host organelle interactions, and opens new avenues to understand infection biology — and potentially design therapies targeting these contact-site tethers.
Getting published in Nature Microbiology is a major milestone and reflects the rigor, creativity, and persistence behind the work.

Please join me in congratulating Chahat for this outstanding achievement! We look forward to seeing where this work leads and celebrating many more milestones together.

Sebastian Presents at SCEP 2025

We’re excited to share that Sebastian gave an excellent talk about how “Molecular mimicry enables mitochondria-Toxoplasma contact sites (MiToCs)” at the 2025 SCEP Symposium! The SCEP Symposium (Southern California Eukaryotic Pathogen Symposium) brings together scientists, trainees, and students from across the field to share cutting-edge research, build collaborations, and explore the latest advances in pathogen biology and host–pathogen interactions.

Congratulations to Sebastian for representing the Pernas Lab and for presenting his work at this important scientific meeting — we’re proud of your achievement and look forward to what’s next!

Congratulations to Sarah — Poster Award Winner at ABRCMS 2025!

We’re thrilled to announce that Sarah received a Poster Award at ABRCMS 2025 (Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students) that took place on November 19-22, 2025 in San Antonio, TEXAS. ABRCMS is one of the nation’s largest multidisciplinary undergraduate and graduate research conferences, dedicated to promoting diversity and excellence in the biomedical sciences. Learn more about the conference here: https://abrcms.org/

Sarah’s poster stood out among a competitive field of young scientists, showcasing her dedication, rigor, and creativity. This recognition reflects both her hard work and the strength of the research happening in the Pernas Lab.

Please join us in congratulating Sarah on this well-deserved honor — we couldn’t be more proud!

Welcome aboard the lab (Summer 2025), Alen Poehlman!

Alen Poehlman
I am from the University of Washington in Seattle, where I am entering my third year majoring in Biochemistry. This summer, I am a part of the Amgen Scholars program, consisting of a 10-week mentorship, conferences, and workshopping events to prepare students for graduate school and their careers in research. This summer, I will be working with Amy Prichard studying dual infection with obligate intracellular pathogens, where we're looking to gain a better understanding of how pathogens interact with each other and their host in a shared cell.

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