Lab Members - Graduate Students

Kristy is a PhD student who joined the lab in 2022. She graduated with a BS in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology and a minor in Comparative Literature from the University of Washington in Seattle, WA. Her research is focused on the role of STING activation in autoinflammatory disease. She is a joint student in Fitzgerald and Rothstein labs.

Mingqi is a PhD student who joined the lab in 2019. He received his BSc in Biological Sciences from Peking University, China. He is working on nucleic acid sensing pathways.

Kevin is an MD/PhD student who joined the lab in 2018. He received his BSc in Biochemistry from Tufts University with a minor in Mathematics. He is interested in the connection between innate immune sensing of nucleic acids and the initiation of adaptive autoimmunity. His thesis work focuses on lung autoinflammation resulting from gain-of-function mutations in the cytosolic dsDNA sensing pathway cGAS-STING. 

Xuqiu is a PhD student that joined the lab in 2017. She received her BSc in Biological Sciences from Peking University, China. Her research is focused on the innate immune pathways that regulate tissue homeostasis and inflammation.

Shrutika is a PhD student who joined the lab in 2020. She received her Master's in Pharmacology from Northeastern University, Boston, MA. Her current research is focused on understanding the role of a scavenger protein, MFGE8 in recognizing and phagocytosing debri generated by different modes of cell death and how this plays a role in prevention of autoimmune diseases such as SLE.

Jeff is an MD/PhD student who joined the lab in 2018. He received his BA in Biochemistry from Columbia University, NY, with a concentration in Computer Science. His current research focus is on nucleic acid sensing pathways and inflammasomes in human keratinocytes.