Mentor Areas
- Personalized mentorship from Dr. Yuyan Cheng and experienced bioinformaticians.
- Opportunities to develop advanced computational and analytical skills.
- A supportive and collaborative research environment.
- Potential for co-authorship on scientific publications.
- Experience that prepares you for a career in biomedical research or data science.
Description:
The Cheng Lab at Penn Medicine is dedicated to leveraging data science approaches to drive key biological discoveries. Our focus is on utilizing single-cell and spatial genomics data to understand the mechanisms of degenerative eye diseases, with the ultimate goal of developing targeted therapeutics. Our team has previously made significant contributions to understanding transcriptional control of neurodegeneration and neural repair (see the Publication page on our website).
We are seeking talented undergraduate students to join our team and assist in single-cell genomics data analysis. Students will receive hands-on training from our bioinformaticians to process single-cell RNA-seq data generated from neurological tissues sourced from human specimens or animal models. They will also learn complex computational analyses to identify biomarkers for neurodegenerative diseases.
Preferred Qualifications
- Current undergraduate student majoring in Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, Computer Science, Biology, or a related field.
- Proficiency in Python or R, Linux/Unix.
- Enthusiasm for biomedical data and a strong interest in computational biology.
- Prior experience with genomics data is preferred but not required.
- Excellent analytical, problem-solving, and organizational skills.
- Ability to commit a minimum of 8 hours per week during the academic year, and 20 hours per week if enrolled in a summer program.
Project Website
Learn more about the researcher and/or the project here. https://yuyanchenglab.github.io/
Details:
Preferred Student Year
First-year, Second-Year, Junior, Senior
Academic Term
Fall, Spring, Summer
I prefer to have students start during the above term(s).Volunteer
Yes
Yes indicates that faculty are open to volunteers.Paid
Yes
Yes indicates that faculty are open to paying students they engage in their research, regardless of their work-study eligibility.Work Study
Yes
Yes indicates that faculty are open to hiring work-study-eligible students.