Poholek Lab Alumni
Dr. Yibo Zheng
Tsinghua Scholar
Yibo joined the lab in 2022 as a Tsinghua scholar. His PhD thesis in the Poholek Lab uncovered a role for Blimp-1 in ILC2 cells in the setting of allergic asthma.
He returned to China and Tsinghua University in 2025 to complete his medical training.
Jiaqi (Jack) Lu
Research Technician
Jack joined the lab in 2021 as a research technician.
He left in 2023 to pursue new job opportunites.
Dr. Kun He
Research Scientist
Kun joined the lab in 2018 as a post-doctoral fellow and studied the role of Blimp-1 in controlling Th2 cell development in allergic asthma.
He left the Poholek lab in 2024 and is currently working at NIAID/NIH as a Scientist at the Research Technologies Branch and Center for Human Immunology focues on spatial transcriptomic technologies.
Dr. Rhodes Ford
PhD Student
Dr. Rhodes Ford joined the Poholek lab in 2018. Her PhD these, in collaboration with the Delgoffe lab, investigated the epigenetic landscape of exhausted CD8+ T cells from tumors.
After graduating, Rhodes completed a postdoc at UCSF. She is currently a computational biologist at a stealth biotechnology company.
Abby Berrios
Undergraduate Researcher
Abby joined the lab 2019 and graduated from Pitt in 2022. Her project focused on identifying cell type specific enhancers of Blimp-1 in T cells. She is currently a research technician at Abound Bio in Pittsburgh.
Jinyi Zhang
Tsinghua Scholar
Jinyi joined the lab in 2019. Her project aimed to determine the expression of Blimp-1 in ILC2 cells in allergic asthma.
She returned to Tsinghua University in 2021 to continue her medical studies and is currently a physician.
Angela Hettinga
Research Technician
Angela graduated from Carnegie Mellon University and joined the Poholek lab as a research technician in 2015. She left the lab in 2020 to pursue a nursing degree from the University of Pittsburgh and currently works as an ICU nurse.
Natalie Rittenhouse
Undergraduate/Post-Bac Researcher
Natalie joined the lab as a undergraduate bioinformatics student in 2016 and transitioned to a post-bac scholar after her graduation from the University of Pittsburgh in 2017.
She left the lab in 2019 to pursue her PhD in genetics at UNC Chapel hill under the mentorship of Dr. Jill Dowen. She is currently a postdoc at UNC Chapel Hill.
Elizabeth Schmitz
Undergraduate Researcher
Elizabeth joined the lab as an undergraduate bioinformatics student in 2017 and graduated in 2020.
After a 2 yr postbac at the NIH/NIAMS under the mentorship of Dr. Michael Ombrello, she is now a MSTP MD/PhD student at Washington University in St. Louis in Dr. Megan Cooper's lab.
Shivani Pandya
Undergraduate Researcher
Shivani joined the lab as an undergraduate bioinformatics student in 2017 and graduated from University of Pittsburgh in 2020.
She is currently an analyst at Cigna.
Dave Tempestini
Undergraduate Researcher
Dave joined the lab as an undergraduate bioinformatics student in 2019 and graduated in 2020 .
He is currently a data engineer at CapTech and pursuing a Masters of Analytics at Georgia Tech.
Samantha Grimes
Undergraduate Researcher
Sam joined the lab in 2016 as an undergraduate researcher and graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a B.S. in microbiology.
After graduation, she received her PhD from Vanderbuilt under the mentorship of Dr. Mark Dennison and is currently a post-doc at the University of Michigan.