I have the utmost respect for T. S. Eliot, but it seems to me that June, not April, is the cruelest month. With June comes the Gordon Research Conference season, and with it, danger for thousands of u...

Leptin receptor-expressing hypothalamic neurons (LepRHypo) are key regulators of energy balance, yet a comprehensive, cell type-resolved, chromatin accessibility map of these neurons is lacking. We pr...

Our current carbon economy relies on fossil fuels, from which we isolate small organic molecules to produce medicines, plastics, cosmetic, or other chemicals that we use everyday. However, sustainability requires a more biomass-based carbon economy, where we engineer plants to produce precursor molecules, which can then be assembled to desired chemicals that we use daily. Plants have evolved an amazing diversity of metabolites, but these metabolites are not produced in every cell of the plant. Therefore, it is essential to understand how plants can express different metabolic pathways across different organs, tissues, and even cell types. We are interested in the following questions: How are metabolic pathways (especially specialized metabolism) controlled by cell fate? How can we reprogram plant cell fates for biomanufacturing? How can we toggle between differentiated cell states for metabolic engineering and totipotent cell state for genetic engineering?