Tessa House, BS

Research Specialist

I am currently a Research Specialist in the Tsai Lab at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. I am originally from San Francisco, and I recently received my BS in Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology with a minor in Bioinformatics from the University of California, Los Angeles. At UCLA I worked in the lab of Dr. Jeffrey Long and conducted multiple independent research projects, including my most recent project on using CRISPR-Cas9 knockout and over-expression to investigate redundancy in SCPL22-29 in Arabidopsis thaliana. During the summer in 2023, I worked at Sandia National Laboratories as a Research and Development Intern executing a new high-throughput technique for isolating bacteriophages. I also continued my work during my final school year by utilizing bioinformatics to analyze the results we obtained. My work in the Tsai lab so far has focused on identifying the nuclear export protein exportin-1 as a genetic dependency and therapeutic target in atypical teratoid rhabdoid tumor.

Research interests: I previously mostly have experience working with genes in Arabidopsin thaliana and bacteria/bacteriophages, but I have always been very interested in studying cancer and pediatric cancer. I also think utilizing bioinformatics to study problems in molecular biology is intriguing as well!

Favorite food: Sushi, probably spicy tuna if I had to choose one roll.

Beverage of choice and protocol for preparation: Most likely an iced chai or some type of iced tea.

Favorite lab technique: I would have to say CRISPR as I have had to do a lot of it for my most recent project and it is interesting to see what phenotypes result.

Hobbies: Hiking, skiing, running, backpacking, going to the beach or to coffee shops.