Pooled optical CRISPR screens. The large majority of human genes do not have an impact on cell proliferation. Yet, high-throughput functional studies of genetic elements have largely focused on cell viability due to the technological challenges in large-scale measurements of more complex phenotypes, e.g., subcellular structures and localization of proteins/RNAs. If we could characterize the phenotypic impacts of perturbing all human genes, it could help us identify new therapies for genetic diseases. During my postdoctoral work, I have led the development of a cost-effective technology that scales up protein barcodes for the purpose of pooled optical CRISPR screens of mammalian cell cultures in multi-well plates. Currently, I am applying this technology to study the genetic networks that link the nucleolus and cell cycle.

Single-cell profiling. The technological advances of the recent decades have laid bare the immense heterogeneity that exists in molecular compositions of single cells within and between tissues. At the Gladstone Institute of Data Science and Biotechnology, San Francisco, I powered diverse single-cell studies of cardiovascular, neurological, and infectious disease models. On the basic science side, I developed a novel stochastic modeling framework for the probability distributions of single-cell mRNA and protein counts. In my current postdoctoral work, I am developing harmonized experimental and computational frameworks to acquire and analyze image-based single-cell profiling data. In the future, I aim to integrate data from diverse high-throughput technologies to unravel the mechanisms underlying single-cell heterogeneity.