Dr. Cara Haney
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR – MICROBIOLOGY & IMMUNOLOGY
Dr. Haney received her PhD in Molecular/Cell Biology from Stanford, and then completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard. She started her lab at UBC in 2016.
Dr. Quentin Geissmann
HUMAN FRONTIERS SCIENCE PROGRAM POSTDOCTORAL FELLOW (Co-supervised with Dr. Juli Carrillo)
Quentin received his PhD from Imperial College, London in 2018 working on behavior in Drosophila. He is applying his background in machine learning and insect behavior to tackle questions related to plant-microbiome-insect interactions.
Dr. Melissa Chen
POSTDOCTORAL FELLOW
Melissa received her PhD in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2021. Her research focuses on identifying the ecological principals that drive microbial community assembly and pathogen establishment.
Siyu Song
PhD CANDIDATE – MICROBIOLOGY & IMMUNOLOGY
Siyu received her Bachelor’s degree from Northwest Agriculture & Forestry University in China. She is interested in identifying plant genes that affect the rhizosphere microbiome.
Kitoosepe (Kitty) Martens
UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT – MICROBIOLOGY & IMMUNOLOGY
Kitty is a 4th year student in the Microbiology/Immunology program. She started at the Haney Lab in January 2021 and is working on a method for shaping plant root morphology with root colonizing Magnetospirillum species
Sarzana Hossain
TECHNICIAN
After receiving her MSc from the University of Toronto, Sarzana Hossain returned to the Haney Lab as Lab Manager.
Dr. David Thoms
NSF POSTDOCTORAL FELLOW
Dr. Thoms received his PhD in Molecular, Cellular, & Developmental Biology from Indiana University. He is interested in how plants can discriminate beneficial from pathogenic bacteria and developing cell biology approaches for the plant microbiome.
Christina Wiesmann
PhD CANDIDATE – MICROBIOLOGY & IMMUNOLOGY
Christina received her MSc from the Microbiology & Immunology department at UBC, and joined the Haney lab in January 2017.
Nicole Wang
MSc STUDENT – MICROBIOLOGY & IMMUNOLOGY
Nicole received her BSc in Biology from the University of Waterloo. She is interested in using beneficial microbes to protect against pathogens and climate change-related agricultural issues.
Maya Tselios
UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT – BIOLOGY
Maya is a 5th year student in the Biology program at UBC. An intrigue in the plant microbiome led her to joining the Haney lab in September 2021. Her interests lie in the field of neurobiology and hopes to pursue a graduate degree in Neuroscience in the future
Annika Briggs
LAB MANAGER/TECHNICIAN
Annika is finishing up her BSc in Biology and joined the Haney lab in May 2021 in collaboration with the Brar lab. She is interested in how plants can shape the rhizosphere microbiome.
Dr. Zayda Morales Moreira
POSTDOCTORAL FELLOW
Zayda received her PhD in Applied Microbiology from University of Saskatchewan in 2021 working on wheat, canola, and lentil microbiomes. She is interested in how plant microbiomes are assembled, transmitted, and preserved in response to specific biotic and abiotic stresses.
Yang Liu
PhD CANDIDATE – MICROBIOLOGY & IMMUNOLOGY
Yang received her MSc degree in Agronomy from Northwest A&F University in Yangling, China. Her work focuses on how beneficial microbes can modulate local and systemic immunity in plants.
Daniela Yanez
MSc STUDENT – MICROBIOLOGY & IMMUNOLOGY
Daniela is a recent UBC graduate who has transitioned from an undergraduate to a MSc student in the Haney Lab. She is currently studying the genomic distribution of insecticidal and antifungal genes across Pseudomonas.
Jayni Chang
UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT – BIOLOGY
Jayni is a 2nd-year student in the Biology program at UBC, and an interest in botany led her to join the Haney lab in December 2021 as an Undergraduate Academic Assistant.
The Haney Lab 