Lab News
2024
12/12/24
Congratulations to Amanda and co-authors on the publication of her thesis work in eLife! This paper was a long time in the making, so it’s extra special to have it out!
12/11/24
Lab lunch to send off Dr. Amanda Mixon Blackwell, who rides off into the Plasmodium sunset to start new postdoc adventures studying human neurogenetic disease. Good luck, Amanda!
11/5/2024
Congratulations to Kade Loveridge! His paper unveiling a key iron-acquisition mechanism in Plasmodium falciparum was published in PNAS, accompanied by a press release by University of Utah Health.
10/31/2024
Congratulations to Aldo García-Guerrero and co-authors, whose paper on cytochrome c maturation in the electron transport chain of malaria parasites was published in ACS Infectious Diseases!
10/8/24
Congratulations to Kade Loveridge, who was awarded the Deepak Gaur Memorial Award for Best Talk, and to Radek Omelianczyk, who received an Honorable Mention Poster Award at the 2024 Molecular Parasitology Meeting in Woods Hole, MA!
7/30/24
It was a pleasure to host undergraduate GSRM and NARI students Rafael Dovarganes and Sierra Montoya, who spent the summer in our lab under the dedicated mentorship of Radek Omelianczyk and Kade Loveridge.
6/28/2024
Congratulations to Shai-anne Nalder, who was recognized with a Native Excellence at the U Award! This award "celebrates changemakers and leaders who are making a positive impact on behalf of the Indigenous community and honor individuals who exemplify Indigenous excellence. “
5/28/2024
Lab lunch to celebrate the successes of the past year, especially the graduations of Tanya Espino-Sanchez and Amanda Mixon Blackwell, who will move on from the lab soon. Lab alumnus, Seyi Falekun made a guest appearance!
5/27/2024
Congratulations to Jessica Pita Aquino and the other recipients of the John Weis Memorial Graduate Student Travel Award!
5/14/2024
Congratulations to Amanda Mixon Blackwell on her successful thesis defense!
3/11/2024
Congratulations to MD/PhD student Kade Loveridge, who was selected to participate in the Utah Center for Iron & Heme Disorders Rising Stars Symposium. He gave an outstanding talk on his work to unravel iron acquisition in malaria parasites
2/29/2024
Congratulations to Tanya Espino-Sanchez on the successful defense of her PhD thesis!
1/5/2024
Congratulations to grad students Kade Loveridge and Jessica Pita-Aquino and postdoc Radek Omelianczyk who were awarded fellowships from the American Heart Association!
2023
11/3/2023
Congratulations to Erica Hastings for her “best talk” award at the 2023 Dept. of Biochemistry retreat- 2 days of great sciences and engaging colleagues!
9/5/2023
Very proud of PhD student Tanya Espino-Sanchez, whose essay on her grad school journey, "Sparks of Change," is published in eLife . Looking forward to her graduation later this year!
6/21/2023
Congratulations to Erica Hastings, Shai-Anne Nalder, and other recipients of the John Weis Memorial Graduate Student Award. I never had the honor of meeting John but believe he would be quite proud of these awardees.
5/3/2023
Now published at PNAS. Thanks to our collaborators Chris Hill, James Wohlschlegel, Matt Kieber-Emmons and to NIGMS, BWFund, UofUCIHD and UofUBiochem for supporting this work.
4/1/2023
Happy to share that our paper dissecting cyt c/c1 function in the Plasmodium ETC is accepted at PNAS. Congratulations to Tanya Espino-Sanchez and Henry Wienkers for their grit and effort to get this work across the finish line.
3/1/2023
Very proud of Megan Okada and her selection as a 2023 recipient of the WeintraubAward from Fred Hutch. In her PhD thesis, Megan discovered a new pathway critical for organelle biogenesis in malaria parasites.
1/24/2023
Happy to announce a new preprint reporting our collaborative work to unravel functions for the unusually divergent cytochrome c homologs in malaria parasites. Special congratulations to the first authors Tanya Espino-Sanchez and Henry Wienkers for their resilience and determination to finish this project despite many pandemic challenges and difficulties. Very inspiring.
2022
11/12/2022
Fun day at the Microbial Pathogenesis Symposium yesterday with outstanding talks by T32 trainees, Megan Okada and keynote speakers.
9/20/2022
Extremely proud of Tanya Espino-Sanchez who just gave a spectacular talk at mpm2022 on her work on Plasmodium cytochromes! Well done, Tanya!
6/6/2022
First lab dinner for the Sigala lab since 2019- celebrating graduations, successes, and much resilience over the past two years!
6/3/2022
Congratulations to Megan Okada for winning the 2022 Marge Gunn Award for Excellence in Biochemistry by a graduate student! Very highly deserved and a fitting bookend to her graduate career.
4/15/22
Proud moment for the lab as Megan Okada successfully defended her PhD thesis today. Congratulations, Megan!
4/4/22
Congratulations to PhD student Shai-Anne Nalder who has been award the prestigious NSF GRFP Predoctoral Fellowship!
3/6/22
Megan Okada
Very happy for Megan Okada, whose paper identifying a key role for isoprenoid synthesis in biogenesis of the apicoplast organelle in malaria parasites was accepted at eLife!
2/2/22
Congratulations to Seyi Falekun, who successfully defended his PhD thesis and is the first student to graduate from the lab!
2021
Seyi Falekun
12/15/21
Congratulations to Seyi Falekun, who was offered and has accepted a clinical chemistry fellowship at ARUP to start next summer after he defends his PhD!
12/1/21
Sage Geher
Congratulations to Sage Geher on his acceptance to medical school at the University of Utah! We’ll be sad to see Sage move on but very happy he will still be around to squeeze in some research during med school breaks.
11/1/21
Erica, Megan, and others in the lab put together this video on our lab’s research, which was debuted at our fall Biochemistry retreat.
10/27/ 21
GSRM summer intern, Alejandro Pereira, received a research presentation award at the 2021 national SACNAS meeting for his poster entitled "Investigating the Role of a Divergent Acyl Carrier Protein in Mitochondrial Genome Dynamics in Malaria Parasites”. Congratulations, Alejandro!
10/6/21
Seyi Falekun's paper on mitochondrial ACP is accepted at eLife. Congratulations, Seyi!
10/6/21
Sage Geher presents a talk on the apicoplast ACP at the hybrid Molecular Parasitology Meeting. Great work, Sage!
Kade Loveridge
7/1/21
Kade Loveridge joins our lab as an MD/PhD student. Welcome, Kade!
6/1/21
Univ. of Florida undergraduate Alejandro Pereira joins us for the summer as a GSRM intern. Welcome to Utah, Alejandro!
Shai-anne Nalder
6/1/21
Shai-anne Nalder returns to the lab as a new PhD student. Welcome back, Shai-anne!
5/10/21
Celine Slam
Congratulations to undergraduate Celine Slam who was awarded a 2021 U.S. Fulbright Scholarship to study malaria transmission at the Centre Pasteur in Cameroon!
4/30/21
Congratulations to Megan Okada, who won first place in the Immunology, Inflammation, & Infectious Disease (3i) Initiative's Annual Symposium Art Contest.
Her 'Braided Helix' (pictured below) won both the popular vote and 1st place in the Art of Science category!
2020
12/8/20
Paul gives a Vitae 2020 talk to the university community on his pathway in science.
11/1/20
Our paper on faster antimalarial activity by doxycycline is accepted at eLife!
10/21/20
Megan, Amanda, and Aldo win a lightning talk award for their witty and creative video clip on the apicoplast!
9/21/20
Megan presents a talk on her work at the virtual Molecular Parasitology Meeting. Well done, Megan!
8/18/20
Seyi is accepted into the African American Doctoral Scholars Initiative program at Utah. Congratulations, Seyi!
7/10/20
Erica is selected for fellowship funding by the Microbial Pathogenesis Training Grant. Congratulations, Erica!
5/1/20
We welcome Erica Hastings to the lab as a new graduate student!
2/1/20
Aldo Garcia Guerrero joins the lab as a new postdoctoral fellow. Welcome, Aldo!
2019
11/5/19
Undergraduate student Celine Slam presents her summer project as a poster at the national SACNAS meeting in Honolulu.
11/1/19
Our 1-year pilot grant to study iron trafficking in blood-stage Plasmodium is selected for funding by the Center for Iron & Heme Disorders.
10/15/19
Jaime Sepulveda joins our lab as a PhD student. Welcome, Jaime!
10/1/19
Jan Warncke joins the lab as a new postdoc. Welcome, Jan!
9/15/19
Megan and Seyi present a poster and talk at the Molecular Parasitology Meeting in Woods Hole, MA.
8/30/19
Lab dinner to welcome new additions
8/15/19
Tanya Espino was awarded fellowship support by the Hematology T32 Training Grant. Congratulations, Tanya!
8/2/19
Ping Guo has joined our lab as a research technician. Welcome, Ping!
8/1/19
We have been awarded a 5-year R35 MIRA by NIGMS entitled, “Comparative Heme Metabolism in Divergent Eukaryotes”. Full steam ahead!
7/17/19
Tanya presents a poster at the Cell Biology of Metals Gordon Research Conference in Castelldefels, Spain.
7/8/19
Sage Geher joins the lab as a new research technician. Welcome, Sage!
6/1/19
University of Utah undergraduate Celine Slam joins the lab as an intern with the Genomics Summer Research for Minorities (GSRM) program. Welcome, Celine!
4/16/19
Seyi Falekun has been awarded the John Weis Memorial Graduate Student Travel Award as well as the Dickman Travel Award to attend the Molecular Parasitology Meeting in Woods Hole, MA, in September. Congratulations, Seyi!
2018
9/12/18
Tanya and Amanda present posters at the Molecular Parasitology Meeting in Woods Hole, MA.
Tanya Espino
Amanda Mixon
Amanda Mixon
7/19/18
Amanda presents her work at the Tetrapyrroles Gordon Research Conference in Newport, RI.
6/24/18
Lab dinner to send off Becky, who is moving on to new adventures.
6/14/18
Our work is graciously recognized by a Pew Biomedical Scholarship.
Malaria-Fighting Biochemist Paul Sigala Named Pew Scholar
Pew Biomedical Scholar Directory (Sigala)
5/2/18
Tanya Espino joins the lab as a graduate student. Welcome, Tanya!
2017
12/22/17
Our DOD Discovery Award to study parasite carotenoid biosynthesis is selected for funding.
10/21/17
Shai-anne wins a poster award for her presentation at the SACNAS Conference in Salt Lake City.
Congratulations, Shai-anne!
9/28/17
Our commentary on Plasmodium Heme Biosynthesis is published in PLoS Pathogens.
9/10/17
Becky Marvin
Becky and Megan present their work as posters at the Molecular Parasitology Meeting in Woods Hole, MA.
6/1/17
Amanda Mixon was selected for support by the Hematology T32 Training Grant. Congratulations, Amanda!
5/31/17
Shai-anne Nalder joins us as part of the Native American Research Internship summer program. Welcome, Shai-anne!
5/30/17
We received a University Seed Grant to study heme utilization by blood-stage parasites.
5/20/17
Amanda Mixon and Seyi Falekun join the lab as graduate students. Welcome, Amanda and Seyi!
10/17/16
Our pilot grant to study iron metabolism in the apicoplast is selected for funding by the Center for Iron and Heme Disorders at the University of Utah.
9/12/16
Megan Okada selected for funding by the Hematology Training Grant. Congratulations, Megan!
6/1/16
Megan Okada joins as first graduate student. Welcome, Megan!
4/1/16
Parasite cultures and transfections boot up. Dd2 loves fresh blood and 5000 feet.
3/1/16
Becky Marvin joins as first post-doc. Welcome, Becky!
1/1/16
Sigala lab opens for operations.