Our People

Alia has her BA in Integrative Biology from UC Berkeley, where she graduated in 2021. At Cal, she was involved in various animal behavior labs, as she is interested in veterinary medicine and hopes to go to vet school in a few years. In her lab experience, she has always enjoyed the administrative side of running a lab. In her free time, Alia enjoys volunteering at the Marine Mammal Center, reading, and hiking.

Quinn grew up in Alaska, but has been moving around the United States since undergrad. She did her PhD at University of Wisconsin – Madison researching natural diversity of wild yeast and the evolution of hybrid brewing yeasts. For her postdoc she switched from fungi to animals, using natural hybrids of freshwater tropical fish to study the repeatability of hybrid genome evolution. She’s excited to be stepping into the realm of viral evolution in the Ott lab, where she will be developing computational and machine learning approaches for viral genomes. In her free time she enjoys exploring the microclimates of the bay via hiking and biking and is always on the lookout for a new brewery to try.

Rahul was born in India. After predoctoral research on HIV, Rahul did his Ph.D. in Biotechnology at North Maharashtra University, India. With prior experience on host-virus interaction his focus is to study the in-vivo aspects of coronavirus infection. In the spare time Rahul likes to travel the world and spend time with his family.

Originally a Bay Area native, Maria received her BS in Microbiology from UC San Diego. Previously, she worked making antigenic proteins and aiding in therapeutic antibody discovery and production. In the Ott lab, she is interested in exploring airway organoids and other methods to study SARS-CoV-2 infection and developing therapeutics against viral protein targets. Outside of the lab, Maria enjoys camping, hiking, traveling, and lacrosse.

Originally from a French tropical island called New Caledonia, Ludivine was educationally trained in Paris where she also obtained her PhD in Infectious Diseases at Institut Pasteur. Her doctoral research focused on SARS-CoV-2 and antibodies. More generally, her research interests encompass viruses and their interaction with the immune system. She joined the Ott lab as a postdoc working on the impact of HIV-1 infection on the gut using intestinal organoids. As hobbies, Ludivine enjoys reading, dancing, and traveling.

I am fun-loving guy who does research on viral & host protein-protein interactions. In spare time I do blogging, Karate, Cooking, Gaming(PC), Soccer/PingPong and falling from the scooter regularly!