Home Department: Engineering
Mentor: Wah Chiu (Photon Science Directorate, Bioengineering, and Microbiology & Immunology)

“Atomic Resolution Analysis of the Varicella-Zoster Virus Utilizing Cryo-Electron Microscopy”

Under the direction of Dr. Wah Chiu and Dr. Stefan Oliver with Dr. Ann Arvin’s lab, Ronan is analyzing the subcellular structures in the cryo-electron tomograms of varicella-zoster virus (VZV) infected MeWo cells. These tomograms were created to visualize the infection and assembly processes of VZV, and other structures within the cell. This project will involve data processing and analysis for feature extraction and annotation using neural network-based machine learning (ML). Through this project, Ronan will learn to analyze and visualize tomograms and ML methods. Furthermore, he is learning about the biological processes involved in VZV infection.