Swathi Balaji

• Biomolecular Engineering
• Bioinformatics minor
• College Nine (UCSC)
• 4th Year
• Grant & Web Team
• From: Pleasanton, CA

"Being a part of the UCSC iGEM team this summer has provided me with a valuble life experience to say the vey least. Not only was I able to refine my existing lab techniques and develop new ones, but I was also able to learn how to efficienty work and communicate with my own team to assure maximum success. Over the course of the summer I can say that I have grown both as a person and as a researcher. I am truly glad to have taken on such an opportunity and to have been able to contribute to the scientific community in some way. The amount of experiences and knowledge that I was able to obtain in the past couple of months is definitely something that will remain with me far beyond my undergraduate years."

Anissa Benabbas

• Biology
• Bioinformatics minor
• Crown College (UCSC)
• Graduate (Post Bac)
• Video Team
• From: Sunnyvale, CA

Cristian Camacho

• Biomolecular Engineering
  Bioinformatics minor
  Crown College (UCSC)
  4th Year
  Grant & Video Team
  From: La Mirada, CA

"In my opinion, the greatest part of the iGEM experience was being able to witness and take part in the unimaginable amount of success that a random group could produce in such a short period of time. Being able to operate efficiently as a team on a multi-layered project, raising over $24,000, making new discoveries, and establishing an image for our team and project that we can be proud of. I’ve learned so much because of iGEM, and along the way I’ve been blessed to become friends with a remarkable group of individuals that have helped me become a better leader and a better person."

Jairo Navarro

• Biomolecular Engineering
  Bioinformatics minor
  College Nine (UCSC)
  4th Year
  Grant, Programming, Video, &
  Web Team
  From: Watsonville, CA

"My name is Jairo Navarro and I am currently 22 years old, the youngest in my family. I was born in Santa Clara, and lived in San Jose until my father when to prison when I was about 8 years old. Since then, I have been living in Watsonville with my mother, brother and sister. I am the first in my family to go to college and I could not have picked a better school than UC Santa Cruz to study Biomolecular Engineering and Bioinformatics. Being a part of this year's iGEM team has been the most rewarding and challenging experience during my undergraduate career. Because of iGEM, I have learned how to fund-raise for a research project, conduct my own research experiments, explain my research in layman's terms and has solidified my decision on going to graduate school. "

John Poncini

• Biomolecular Engineering
  Bioinformatics minor
  College 8 (UCSC)
  4th Year
  Grant & Video Team
  From: Stockton, CA 

"I started on the Field Team with an interest in finding and identifying Haloferax species that contain cellulases, enzymes that break down cellulose. The process of screening archaea for cellulases took the majority of the summer so I promptly switched towards developing a synthetic halophilic cellulase. Using a vast array of computational tools, I developed a pipeline for determining a model cellulase which we will test for expression in Haloferax volcanii. My computational work culminated in the discovery of conserved rare codons in specific gene regions across domains of life, leading towards the development of F.O.C.U.S, our computational strategy for determining rare codons in gene sequences. I hope to soon publish my work as well as continue developing useful computational tools for researchers and future iGEM teams."

Tanvir Saini

• Molecular, Cell, &
  Developmental Biology
  Bioinformatics minor
  Oakes College (UCSC)
  5th Year
  Webmaster, Graphic Design, Grant,
  Social Media & Video Team
  From: Simi Valley, CA

Roger Volden

• Biomolecular Engineering
  Bioinformatics minor
  College Eight (UCSC)
  3rd Year
  From: San Jose, CA

"I would undoubtedly say that I have gotten much more comfortable with the people I work with in lab, and it has definitely made me more productive and contribute more to everything that happens. I have definitely grown as a person because of iGEM, and I feel like I have become a better researcher, teammate, and friend because of it. Between all of the lunches, coffee runs, socials, and lab time, I would say that the UCSC iGEM team is like a second family to me. I know I'll always cherish the work that we've been doing and that I'll look back and know how it influenced me as a person."