Lab Members
Meet the Team
Principal Investigator
Amanda Poholek, PhD
Dr. Amanda Poholek is an Associate Professor in the Department of Immunology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She is the Director of the Health Sciences Sequencing Core at UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and the Director of the Microbiology and Immunology Departments Scholars (MIDS) Program.
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Dr. Poholek grew up in Massachusetts and received her PhD in cell biology at Yale University under the mentorship of Dr. Joe Craft. Dr. Poholek performed her postdoctoral studies at the NIH/NIAMS under the mentorship of Dr. John O'Shea. Dr. Poholek started her lab at the University of Pittsburgh in 2015.
Post-Doctoral Fellow
Shilpi Giri, PhD
Dr. Shilpi Giri is originally from India and obtained her PhD in Immunology from NCCS, Pune University. With 3 years of postdoctoral experience in studying IFNg regulation of tissue-resident macrophage function during bacterial and parasite infection, she joined the Poholek lab in 2024.
Her current focus is on investigating Blimp1 regulation of tissue-specific immune responses, particularly in the development and function of CD4 tissue-resident memory cells. Outside of the lab, Shilpi enjoys spending time with her son, practicing yoga, and watching movies.
PhD Candidate, Program for Microbiology and Immunology
Aaron Yang
Aaron grew up in Andover MA and recieved his B.S. in Biology and Health: Science, Society and Policy at Brandeis University. He worked at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in the lab of Dr. Eric Wong, at the Belfer Center for Applied Cancer Science at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute and at Gritstone Bio prior to becoming a PMI graduate student at Pitt.
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His project is focused on understanding 3D chromatin topology in terminally exhausted T cells from the tumor and applying bioinformatic and systems immunology approaches to understand these changes and how they relate to T cell dysfunction. In his free time, he plays volleyball, runs a lot and playing fetch with his tiny dog.
PhD Candidate, Program for Microbiology and Immunology
Harshita Beeravolu
Harshita was raised in California and lived in Boston, MA for five years before moving to Pittsburgh. While in Boston, she completed an MS in Biomedical Sciences at Tufts University and worked in industry for 3 years.
Currently, she's working on uncovering the role of Prdm1-associated enhancer regions on Blimp-1 expression in T cells. Her hobbies are binge listening to mystery-thriller audiobooks and podcasts, cooking/baking, and shopping at Trader Joe’s
Tsinghua Scholar
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Xingjian Qiu
Xingjian is a visiting student from Tsinghua University majoring in clinical medicine. His research is focused on CD8+ T cell exhaustion in the tumor microenvironment and investigating how epigenetic remodeling influences the progression of T cell exhaustion. Outside the lab Xingjian enjoys playing western flute and writing poetry.
PhD student, Integrative Systems Biology
Yijia Chen
Yijia graduated from Rutgers University-New Brunswick with a degree in Plant Biology. After completing his undergraduate studies, he moved to Columbia University for the MA Biotechnology program. His master's thesis, mentored by Dr. Alex Tsankov, focused on copy number variation and its impact on the tumor microenvironment, utilizing next-generation sequencing (NGS) datasets and computational methods. Yijia is currently a PhD student in the ISB program, co-mentored by Dr. Jishnu Das. His research interests lie in utilizing spatial technology to address key questions in immunology. In his free time, he enjoys playing tennis and engaging in the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game for fun.
PhD student, Program for Microbiology and Immunology
Anya Ranaraja
Anya grew up in Little Rock, Arkansas and received her B.S in Biology at Rhodes College in Memphis Tennessee. She moved back to Arkansas where she worked in the lab of Lu Huang at University of Arkansas studying metabolism and ontogeny of macrophages during Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection. Anya joined the Poholek Lab in 2026, where she is currently investigating the role of Blimp1 in meditating ILC2 plasticity in the lungs. In her free time, she enjoys running, traveling, and spending time exploring new spots in Pittsburgh with friends.
Undergraduate Researcher
Avery Tramontana
Avery is a rising Junior at the University of Pittsburgh majoring in Biological Sciences. She joined the Poholek Lab in 2026 and is working on projects related to epigenetics of T cells.
Undergraduate Researcher
Lacee Adams
Lacee is a senior at the University of Pittsburgh majoring in Biology. She joined the Poholek Lab in 2025 and is working on projects related to Blimp-1 in T cells.
Undergraduate Researcher
Catherine Yang
Catherine is a rising freshman and joined the Poholek Lab for the 2025 and 2026 summers as part of the Hillman Academy Program. She is working on projects related to epigenetics in T cells.
Master's Student Researcher
Melina Xie
Melina is a Master's student in the Computational Biomedicine and Biotechnology Program (CoBB) at the University of Pittsburgh. She joined the Poholek Lab in 2026 and is working on computational approaches for spatial transcriptomics.
Collaborators
The Hand lab hopes to identify the factors derived from host genetics, the environment (diet, infection etc.) and the microbiota that shape host colonization.
Delgoffe Lab
The Delgoffe lab studies the intersection of metabolism and immunity in cancer.
The Ray lab studies protective mechanisms in the lung that prevent acute lung injury specifically during bacterial pneumonia, and immunoregulatory mechanisms in the neonatal lung that defend against infections
The Das lab focuses on the development and use of novel systems approaches to analyze high-dimensional immunological datasets, and elucidate molecular mechanisms of immunological disorders.