Dynamic Nucleic Acid Systems Lab
Elisa Franco, Professor
Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, Bioengineering, and the Molecular Biology Institute (2018–present)
2011–2018 — Assistant Professor, UC Riverside
2012 Ph.D., Caltech · 2008 Ph.D., University of Trieste · 2002 Laurea (Power Systems Engineering), University of Trieste
Email: efranco at seas dot ucla dot edu
Office: Engineering IV, 38-137P
Positions: We are always looking for motivated UCLA undergraduate and
graduate students with a background in engineering, biology, biochemistry, or chemistry.
Current lab members
Postdoctoral scholars & research scientists
Dr. Dino Osmanovic
Dr. Pavel Afrose
Dr. Zhaolin Xue
Tyler Ross
Graduate students
Eiji Nakamura
Heather Romero Mercieca
Mahdi Dizani
Ziqi Ding
Kevin Wang
Undergraduate students & junior staff
Diana McGrory
Madison Yang
Diego Dilao
Eve Sprute
Alumni
With their position after leaving the lab.
Dr. Shiyi Li
Dr. Diana Tanase
Yuna Kim
Dr. Anli Tang
Dr. Siddharth Agarwal
Dr. Jenny Vi Le
Dr. Raffaele Baggi
Dr. Xun Tang
Dr. Hari K. K. Subramanian
Dr. Jaimie M. Stewart
Dr. Vahid Mardanlou
Dr. Christian Cuba Samaniego
Dr. Leopold N. Green
- Brian Perlstein — Molecular, Cell & Developmental Biology, UCLA → Ph.D. student, UT Austin
- Taneeka Anand — undergraduate, UCLA and PCC
- Britney Castaneda Camacho — undergraduate, UCLA and PCC
- Celina Yu — undergraduate, UCLA and PCC → Medical Laboratory Science program at Vanderbilt
- Eric Payson — Bioengineering, UCLA
- Yucheng Sheng — M.S. student, UCLA MAE
- Tonie Butler — M.S. student, UCLA MAE
- Passa Pungchai — undergraduate, UCLA BE → Ph.D. student, Rice University
- Judith Landau — undergraduate, Cal State LA → Ph.D. student, USC
- Melissa A. Klocke — Ph.D. student and postdoctoral scholar
- Kristen Froehlich — M.S. student, UCLA BE
- Vivienne Gunadhi — M.S. student, UCLA BE
- Sydelle Davis — undergraduate, Howard University, Chemical Engineering
- Saron Yoseph — undergraduate, Howard University, Chemical Engineering
- Aria Harris — undergraduate, Howard University, Chemical Engineering
- Katelyn Carleton — undergraduate, UCLA MAE
- Sonia Gomez — undergraduate, UCR BIEN
- Krishen Wadhwani — undergraduate and M.S. student, UCR BIEN
- Kimia Yaghoubi — undergraduate, UCR Neuroscience → M.S. student, UCR Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
- Jonathan N. Lloyd — undergraduate and M.S. student, UCR BIEN → Celgene, San Diego
- Claire H. Tran — undergraduate, UCR BIEN → Biomolecular Science Ph.D. program, UCSB
- John Reed — undergraduate and M.S. student, UCR ME → Epic Systems Corporation
- Andrew Reimer — M.S. student, UCR BIEN → Roche Molecular Systems
- Stewart Contreras — M.S. student, UCR ME → Systems engineer, Northrop Grumman
- Rex Lu — undergraduate, UCR ME → MAE M.S. program, UCLA
- Manuel Bedrossian — undergraduate, UCR ME → Research engineer, Caltech
- Danyia Ashhad — undergraduate and M.S. student, UCR BIEN
- Sho Kitada — undergraduate, UCR Biochemistry
- Christopher Galley — undergraduate, UCR Biology
Former visitors
- Martin Gobry — Ph.D. student, iNANO, Aarhus University, Denmark (2023)
- Daniela Sorrentino — Postdoc (2024–2025) and Ph.D. student, University of Rome Tor Vergata, Italy (2021)
- Chiara Favaretto — Ph.D. student, University of Padua, Italy
- Andrea Carron — M.S. student, University of Padua
- Maximilian Weitz — Ph.D. student, Technical University of Munich
"Honorary" lab members
- Franco Blanchini — Professor, University of Udine, Italy
- Giulia Giordano — Assistant Professor, University of Trento, Italy
Collaborators (former and current)
- Lorenzo Di Michele — Cambridge
- Jillian Blatti — Pasadena City College
- Deborah Fygenson — UCSB
- Paul Rothemund — Caltech
- Preethi Chandran — Howard University
- Douglas Black — UCLA
- Kathrin Plath — UCLA
- Francesca Ceroni — Imperial College London
- Rebecca Schulman — Johns Hopkins University
- Ebbe Andersen — Aarhus University
- Kirill Afonin — University of North Carolina at Charlotte
- Francesco Ricci — University of Rome Tor Vergata
- Rizal Hariadi — Arizona State University
- Vincent Noireaux — University of Minnesota
- Chase Beisel — North Carolina State University
- Mary Dunlop — Boston University
- Julius Lucks — Northwestern University
- Andrea Serrani — Ohio State University