Lab Alums

Aaron Clarke, PhD 2023

Aaron studied how proton pump inhibitors affect H. pylori in vivo, finding surprising effects on bacterial populations. Look for his work to be published soon. Aaron started postdoc work at the University of Minnesota, Duluth. 

Shuai Hu, PhD 2022. Postdoc 2022-23

Shuai studied how lactate benefits H. pylori, making the exciting discovery that it promotes H. pylori to adopt a new physiological state. Shuai published part of this thesis work in Hu and Ottemann, 2023 (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-37160-1). Shuai started postdoc work at the Dana Farber Cancer  with Jean Zhao. 

Arturo Valdez, BS 2022

Arturo did undergraduate research for almost two years, as part of the UCSC STEM Div program. He worked with Raymond Lopez Magaña on TlpD. Check out his current position at Linked In.

Oscar Lopez Figueroa, BS 2022

Oscar completed his BS in Science Education, working in the Ottemann lab  doing excellent lab support. He completed his MS in Education from Stanford University in June 2023. 


Frida Salgado, MS 2021

Frida completed her MS at UCSC in the METX department, studying a putative AI-2 transporter. After working in public health in the San Diego area, she's off to get another MS in Publich Health! 

Cande Bernal, MS 2021

Cande completed his MS in May 2021, with a thesis entitled "Analysis of the roles of Helicobacter pylori lactate utilization genes in lactate-supplemented growth and bacterial pathogenesis". 

Kevin Johnson, Ph.D.  2021

Kevin completed his Ph.D. dissertation titled "Characterizing the function of the Helicobacter pylori chemoreceptor TlpA and its role in regulating biogeography and inflammation in vivo". The work is described in Johnson et al. 2021. He now works as a Scientist at Sciolta Therapeutics in San Carlos CA. Follow Kevin at Linked In. 

Skander Hathroubi, Ph.D.  Postdoc 2016-2019. 

Skander brought the love of H. pylori biofilms to the Ottemann lab. You can read about his findings in his four publications so far. He's now leading anti-biofilm efforts at Spartha Medical in Strasbourg, France. Follow Skander at his Web Page or Linked In. 

Francesca Batac, M.S. 2018

Francesca completed her MS in collaboration with Melissa Miller, DVM, and returned to her work for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife as a Environmental Scientist/Sea Otter Biologist.  You can read Francesca's work in Frontiers in Marine Science here, and follow her at Linked In 

Jashwin Sagoo, BS. 2019

Jashwin worked initially on the chemotaxis protein stoichiometry project and then transition to a leadership role analyzing H. pylori chemotaxis suppressor mutants through whole genome sequencing. He is currently a Microbiologist/RAII at Resilience. Follow Jashwin at Linked In. 

Julia Zerebinski, B.S. 2018

Julia carried out undergraduate research on H. pylori biofilms. Part of her project was publshed in Hathroubi, Zerebinski, and Ottemann, Mbio 2018. She is currently a PhD student at the Karolinska Institute, Sweden, studying malaria genomics and immunology.

Daniela Keilberg, Ph.D. Postodoctoral Scholar 2013-2017.

Daniela brought her love of bacterial signaling from Lotte Sogaard-Andersen's lab at the Max Planck, Germany. She developed the super cool gland bacterial population quantification technique amongst other work in her four publications. She's now a Scientist at Genentech in South San Francisco, CA. 

Kieran Collins, Ph.D. 2017.

Kieran completed his PhD in 2017, and then headed off to a postdoc work at Stanford University. Follow Kieran at Linked In. 

PhD, MS and Junior Specialist Alums before 2017