Aspen Hirsch, PhD

I am a postdoctoral research fellow in the Tsai lab. I grew up in Colorado and moved to Maui, Hawaii in high school. I then completed my undergraduate degree in Biology with a minor in Classical Civilizations at Gonzaga University in Spokane, WA. As an undergraduate, I worked in the Poxleitner laboratory studying cocaine production in Erythroxylum plants and as an undergraduate research assistant at the Washington State University Sleep and Performance Research Center. I also participated in the H.H.M.I Undergraduate Research Exchange, where I studied type IE CRISPR systems in the Wiedenheft laboratory at Montana State University. I then joined the Haughian laboratory at the University of Northern Colorado, where I completed my M.S. studying the effect of exercise on myeloid-derived suppressor cell populations in a rat model of breast cancer. After working briefly in the Mainou laboratory at Emory University designing novel oncolytic viruses for the treatment of multiple myeloma, I joined the Chernoff laboratory at the Georgia Institute of Technology where I completed my PhD. In the Chernoff laboratory, I designed and validated a novel, protein-based biological indicator with NASA for NASA/ESA’s Mars Sample Return Mission. Cancer research is what I am most interested in - I am very excited to be studying pediatric brain cancer!