People

Rajiv McCoy is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biology. His research program uses computational and statistical approaches to study how germline and somatic evolution shape human genome function, reproduction, and development. Current research themes include using data from prenatal genetic testing to understand the causes of human pregnancy loss, as well as generating and analyzing data from global populations to understand the genetic basis and evolution of human genome function. Before joining Johns Hopkins, Rajiv received his PhD in Biology from Stanford University and conducted postdoctoral work at Princeton University and the University of Washington.

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Michael Tassia is a postdoc in the McCoy lab. He is broadly interested in the evolution of animal genomes and how their structure and function have changed over time. Michael received his PhD at Auburn University, where he worked on the evolution of immune systems. Michael’s current research investigates somatic evolution in the blood by applying methods of phylogenetics over developmental timescales. Michael is supported by a postdoctoral Scholar Award from the American Society of Hematology and an NIH T32 fellowship from the Division of Hematology at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

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Arjun Biddanda is a postdoc in the McCoy lab. His research interests span theoretical and applied population genetics, particularly to understand human disease, evolution, and fertility. Arjun received his PhD in Human Genetics from the University of Chicago and was previously a postdoctoral researcher at Oxford. Arjun is supported by a postdoctoral fellowship from the Lalor Foundation for his work developing new statistical methods to understand diverse types of aneuploidies in early development.

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Margaret Starostik is a postdoc in the McCoy lab. Her research uses new genomic technologies to achieve an accurate view of the extent, distribution, genetic basis of mRNA isoform diversity in humans. Margaret received her PhD at Johns Hopkins, where she worked with John Kim and Mike Schatz to study post-transcriptional regulation of gene expression by small RNAs.

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Andrew Bortvin is a PhD student from the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology & Biophysics PhD Program. He received his BA in Biology from the University of Pennsylvania and subsequently worked as a research technician at Princeton University and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Andrew’s thesis research focuses on developing population genomic methods that do not rely on reference genomes, overcoming their associated technical biases. Andrew is the recipient of a Dean’s Teaching Fellowship from Johns Hopkins.

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Betty Huang is a PhD student from the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology & Biophysics Program. She received her BS in Molecular and Cellular Biology from Johns Hopkins. Betty’s current research focuses on understanding the genetic mechanisms shaping variation in human gene expression and splicing.

Joshua Bauman is a PhD student from the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology & Biophysics Program. He received his BS in Cellular, Molecular, and Developmental Biology from the University of Michigan, where he studied AMPK signaling in the laboratory of Dr. Anuj Kumar. Josh is currently interested in phylogenetics and somatic evolution.

Angela Yang is an undergraduate majoring in Molecular Cellular Biology and Computer Science. She is interested in applying her CS knowledge to genomic analysis. In her current project, she is using simulations to infer rates of meiotic and mitotic chromosome mis-segregation that best explain clinical genetic testing data from embryo biopsies. Angela is the recipient of Provost’s Undergraduate Research Award (PURA) in support of her summer research.

Sukriti Gupta is an undergraduate student majoring in Applied Math & Statistics and Molecular & Cellular Biology. She is interested in developing and applying statistical techniques to analyze genomic data. Her current research focuses on using fine-mapping tools to identify causal variants driving gene expression associations in diverse human samples.

Sara Carioscia was a PhD student from the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology & Biophysics Program from 2020-2025. Prior to her PhD, she worked in science policy in Washington, DC. She received her B.S. in Biology and Classics from Georgetown University. Sara’s thesis research discovered genetic variants in maternal genomes that influence risk of aneuploidy in embryos—the leading cause of pregnancy loss. Sara was supported by a Graduate Research Fellowship from the NSF.

Sara is now a Data Scientist at Valo Health.

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Dylan Taylor was a PhD student in the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology & Biophysics Program from 2019-2024. He received his B.S. in Biological Sciences from the University of Maryland. Prior to his PhD, he conducted post-baccalaureate research at the University of Maryland Center for Bioinformatics and Computational Biology. Dylan’s thesis research focused on developing functional genomic resources and testing hypotheses about gene expression evolution in diverse human populations. Dylan was supported by an NRSA F31 predoctoral fellowship from the NIH (NHGRI).

Dylan is now a Human Geneticist at Arena BioWorks.

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Stephanie Yan was a PhD student from the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology & Biophysics Program from 2019-2024. Prior to joining the Ph.D. program at Hopkins, she received her B.A. in Biological Sciences from Cornell University and was a summer research student at the Moffitt Cancer Center. Stephanie’s thesis research investigated the role of structural variation in human divergence and adaptation. Stephanie was supported by an NRSA F31 predoctoral fellowship from the NIH (NHGRI).

Stephanie is now a Scientist at Genomics, Plc.

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Kate Isaac was a PhD student from the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology & Biophysics Program from 2019–2023. Prior to joining the PhD program at Hopkins, she received her B.S. in Biochemistry & Molecular Biology and her B.S in Mathematics from Bethel University. She was a summer research student at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the University of Notre Dame. Kate’s research involved developing statistical models to test hypotheses about human meiosis, embryo implantation, and hematopoiesis. Kate was the recipient of a Dean’s Teaching Fellowship from Johns Hopkins.

Kate is now a postdoc at the Fred Hutch Cancer Center.

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Daniel Ariad was a postdoc in the McCoy lab from 2020–2022. He is a physicist by training, with research experience in condensed matter and astrophysics. He is interested in adapting theory and analytical approaches from these fields to the study of human genomics and evolution. Daniel received his Ph.D. from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and subsequently worked as postdoctoral fellow at Indiana University Bloomington.

Daniel is now a Senior Data Scientist at PrognomiQ, Inc.

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Arta Seyedian was a research technologist and Master’s student in the Bioinformatics program from 2018-2020. Prior to his work at Hopkins, Arta obtained a B.S. in Neuroscience from George Mason University and was an Intramural Research Training Award Postbaccalaureate with the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Arta is now a Bioinformatician at the Center for Single Cell Biology at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.