The individuals below are the people that make our laboratory rich.
They bring energy, ideas, amazing troubleshooting and fun to our science, every day.
JANICE THOMPSON
Janice earned her bachelor of science in biochemistry from Michigan State University and joined the Watts lab in 2002. She is currently a research assistant II, with over 25 years of experience as a scientist in both academia and industry. In addition to lab managerial responsibilities, she regularly performs protein extractions and quantitation, western analyses, and enzyme activity assays related to all of the projects currently being researched in the lab. She has been called both Queen of the Westerns and All Knowing of Where Everything and Anything Is/Has Been Located.
BETH LOCKWOOD
Beth joins the Watts Lab in July 2023. We welcome her to our group!
Andres Contreras
Andres received his DVM from Universidad Nacional de Colombia. After 3 years of large animal clinical practice in central Colombia, he served as an intern in the Dairy Internship Program at the College of Veterinary Medicine at Michigan State University. He continued his education, receiving a master’s degree in mastitis and a PhD in Comparative Medicine and Integrative Biology. His research background includes expertise in adipocyte and endothelium biology as well as in adipose tissue sympathetic innervation. His research work has focused on the interactions between adipose tissue function and disease. His doctoral studies, evaluated the effects of lipolysis on endothelial cell inflammatory responses. Findings from his dissertation emphasize the role of adipose tissue malfunction in the development of inflammatory based diseases, especially those with a vascular component such as atherosclerosis and hypertension. His postdoctoral research work focused initially on the lipolysis-induced white adipose tissue remodeling process and developed into elucidating the effects of sympathetic innervation on the appearance of thermogenic adipocytes (brown) within subcutaneous adipose. His current work focuses on the role of lipolysis metabolites in adipose tissue function and their link with the development of metabolic diseases.
Emma WAbel
Emma (Miss Emma) joined the Watts lab in 2022. She comes to us from Hope College. Emma is front and center in the chemerin project. She has brought confident use of RNAscope to the laboratory, and is focused on understanding from where the chemerin important to blood pressure comes . Her smile, her fearlessness and organization are amazing.
Caitlin Wilson
Caitlin is a graduate student who joined the Watts Lab in 2022. Caitlin is involved in the PVAT PPG project, where she is focused on understanding the mechanotransduction of PVAT and how its stress-relaxation impacts health. She received her B.S. in Biochemistry from Lake Superior State University in 2020. Caitlin is bringing our lab more into bioinformatics, mechanics and many things we’ve not thought of before. Her intelligence radiates from her, and she’s always willing to learn.
Will Tragge
Will has worked in our lab for a year and a half (dec 2022) and will graduate in the spring! He’s helped bring to life the 5-HT7 receptor antibody testing.
Aya Abu-Zama
Aya joined in 2021 as Professorial Assistant through the MSU Honors College. She is working on the Perivascular Adipose Tissue (PVAT) project, and enjoys every second of being and learning in the lab with her wonderful team!
Elise Yoder
MSU PA, beginning Fal 2022