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Here are all the research highlights, celebrations, and excitement!
October 2025
Halloween Lab Meeting & Coding breakthroughs
(College Park, MD)
I had the idea for everyone in the lab to do a low-effort Halloween costume: - FLUORESCENT PROTEINS! (Left) We have been doing heavy lifting with getting behavioral experiments to work and I finally sat down and got a bulk set of code to begin working for an undergrad I am working with in the lab (shoutout to Sofia!). Photographic evidence of us cranking on the python code (right).
September 2025
Carinna wins the F31 Fellowship
(College Park, MD)
Standing in line at Panda Express, I recieved an email informing me that I was awarded the prestigious NIH F31 fellowship! WOOHOO!
August 2025
Grad students attend UMD football game
(College Park, MD)
The three grad students got some food and went to their first UMD Football game! GO KERMIT!
June 2025
Catching up with pals before leaving MBL for the summer
(Woods Hole, MA)
Before departing back to MD, I caught up with my friend, Nikki, that I met at the ReBilD workshop from last August (left) and snagged a photo with my favorite microscopist- Abraham (right).
June 2025
End of Cycle Celebration
(Woods Hole, MA)
Majority of the SYNC faculty and students gathered at the Kidd to celebrate final data collection before presentations (left). Before the end of the 2-3 weeks we celebrated with our 2 students over pizza (right).
June 2025
Teaching for the Neurobiology Course (MBL)
Traveled back to Woods Hole, MA to instruct in Synaptic Connectivity section (SYNC) of the Neurobiology course at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL).
(Woods Hole, MA)
May 2025
Piloting behavior on some funky fish (stay tuned for publication)
(College Park, MD)
Autumn testing new behavior chambers. (Autumn Lee)
May 2025
Meghan defends her senior thesis
(College Park, MD)
Meghan Hnilo successfully defended her honors research thesis from the UMD biology honors program. In honor of the lab's first undergraduate senior defense - we created a "lil Meghan".
April 2025
Rising Stars in Cell Biology Symposium
(Washington, DC)
The three graduate students presented posters at the Cell biology symposium hosted by John's Hopkins. Overall good conversations and beautiful posters by yours truly **wink wink**.
April 2025
Printing Posters for Cell Biology Symposium
Carinna showed Iris the process for printing her first poster at UMD for an upcoming Cell Biology symposium. WOOHOO!
(College Park, MD)
April 2025
Updated Angueyra Lab Photo
In preparation for Meghan's undergraduate Biology Honors Thesis defense, we all got together to snap a photo of everyone in the lab - minus Stephen.
(College Park, MD)
April 2025
Annabella and Carinna get bubble tea
(College Park, MD)
Mogee tea is a spot right off of campus where the lab like to grab bubble tea from time to time. They now have a fun little "photo booth" feature inside where you can sanp a photo with friends. (Pictured left to right: Annabella & Carinna)
March 2025
Carinna and Annabella Twinning
(College Park, MD)
Carinna takes on a new mentee in the Angueyra Lab - Annabella! #GreatMindsThinkALike
February 2025
Carinna Presents Development & Genetics 101 to the Lab
(College Park, MD)
After Carinna lectured to the lab about development and genetics, she tested their knowledge on the difference between mutants and transgenics.
(Pictured left to right: Iris and Autumn)
February 2025
Fishy Folk Paint Deep Sea Creatures
(College Park, MD)
Graduate students from the fishy labs decided to get together to paint deep sea creatures to put an art installation into the BioResearch Building.
January 2025
Angueyra lab welcomes a new lab cart (College Park, MD)
In true Angueyra lab nature, another piece of lab equipment was thrifted and put to good use.
(Pictured left to right: Carinna and the fabulous new cart)
December 2024
Fish Labs go Ice Skating
(College Park, MD)
Graduate students in the cichlid and zebrafish labs in the biology department got together to attempt ice skating before break.
December 2024
Angueyra Lab Celebrates Behavior Rig Set up
Juan animated with joy of new experiments he will throw at the behavior rig.
(Pictured left to right: Iris, Autumn, Juan, and Carinna)
(College Park, MD)
December 2024
Angueyra Lab Secret Santa
& Holiday Cookie Exchange
Left: Carinna's present to Iris - A collage of memories from her first semester of graduate school.
Right: Iris and Autumn decorating sugar cookies for the lab meeting.
(College Park, MD)
December 2024
Angueyra lab Graduate Students Visit Old Town Alexandria
(Alexandria, VA)
(Pictured left to right: Carinna, Autumn, and Iris)
November 2024
Carinna gives invited talk at York College
(York, PA)
Carinna's first time being invited to give a research seminar.
October 2024
Angueyra Lab Coat Tie Dye
Lab coats are now as fun as everyone in the Angueyra lab!
(College Park, MD)
September 2024
Decorating the Lab Carts
Metallic markers were made to use to decorate the lab carts
(College Park, MD)
August 2024
Angueyra lab welcomes Autumn and Iris
(College Park, MD)
Two new graduate students joined the lab in the fall of 2024. (Pictured left to right: Iris, Carinna, Autumn, Leah, Juan)
August 2024
Carinna Wins Best Student Talk at MOCB Retreat
(Rockville, MD)
Shortly after returning from the Regenerative Biology Course in Maine, Carinna presented her research at the Molecular and Cellular Biology (MOCB) research retreat and won an award.
August 2024
Carinna attends ReBilD
(Bar Harbor, ME)
To understand more about how development is recapitulated in regenerative models, I attended an intensive 2-week regenerative biology course at the Mount Desert Island - Biological Labratory (MDI-BL).
July 2024
BISI-GSA Hosts DC Museum Day
(Washington, DC)
As a leader in the biological sciences Graduate Student Association (BISI-GSA) we organized an event for incoming students to UMD to explore the museums food spots local to the area.
June 2024
Carinna Teaches at Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) Neurobiology Course (Woods Hole, MA)
Our team set out to understand how transcription factors are reactivated during photoreceptor regeneration in zebrafish.
May 2024
Visual Systems Development - Gordon Research Conference (GRC)
(Lucca, Italy)
Carinna attended the GRC in Italy and presented her work on the generation of photoreceptor subtypes to an international audience.
(Pictured is Kristen Kwan & Juan Angueyra)
April 2024
Carinna Wins Best Graduate Student Poster Award At MARZ
Angueyra lab attends their second MARZ conference at Rutgers University. Usuy and Carinna both presented posters!
(Brunswick, New Jersey)
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December 2023
Carinna Passes her Qualifying Exam
(College Park, MD)
In celebration of passing her qualifying exam Carinna and Juan posed with their matching Juicy Couture Track Suits
October 2023
Carinna completes her Preliminary Meeting
(College Park, MD)
August 2023
Fish Labs go to the Baltimore Aquarium
(Baltimore, MD)
Fish labs (Juntti, Kocher, Carleton, and Angueyra) head to the Baltimore Aquarium to sport our fishy knowledge.
May 2023
Mid-Atlantic Regional Zebrafish (MARZ) Meeting
(Bethesda, MD)
The Angueyra lab's first ever attendance at a conference. (Pictured left to right: Carinna, Juan, Leah, Meghan).
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April 2023
Reunited with Undergraduate Research Mentor - Dr. Pysh
(Salem, VA)
Attended Alumni weekend at Roanoke College. (Pictured left to right: Carinna, Dr. Pysh, Frankie).
February 2023
2nd Year Research In Progress Talk
(College Park, MD)
I presented the research I had conducted in 2022 at my second year RIP talk for the BISI-MOCB Program!
Title slide of Carinna's first Research In Progress (RIP) talk.
January 2023
Joined Dr. Juan Angueyra
(College Park, MD)
I Met Dr. Juan Angueyra in December of 2022 and began working in the visual system of zebrafish. Juan had just started in January that year so I would be building the lab and aqua facility with him. In the first month of the lab, I learned how to perform retinal dissections and image analysis using CellPose and Napari.
First semester in Juan Angueyra's lab. Featured is Carinna's first ever retinal Dissection.
2022
Working on Heart Development in Astyanax Mexicanus
(College Park, MD)
I continued working on heart development in cavefish and further explored early developmental signaling. To the right is an example of an entry of my lab notebook I kept in the Jeffery lab. I was logging observations on the size of a vesicle that is important for establishing the left-right axis in the body plan.
January-March 2022
Lab Rotation 3: Heart Asymmetry in Cavefish
(College Park, MD)
For my third rotation, I spent 7 weeks exploring whether hypoxia is important for heart asymmetry in cavefish. In Dr. Jeffery's lab, I learned how to perform Immunohistochemistry, sort developing embryos, and work with vertebrates over the course of development.
October-December 2021
Lab Rotation 2: RNAi in c. elegans
(College Park, MD)
For my second rotation, I joined Dr. Antony Jose's Lab. In the Jose lab I worked with C. elegans for the first time and celebrated with the lab at two holiday functions at the end of the fall semester in my first year of graduate school.
August-October 2021
Lab Rotation 1: Cloning in Plants
(College Park, MD)
I began my first lab rotation in the lab of Dr. Yiping Qi where I was able to successfully clone plant genome editing and transcriptional regulation tools.
August 2021
Began Classes at University of Maryland for PhD
(College Park, MD)
Jim Henson is an alumni of the University of Maryland. There are many examples of Kermit throughout campus. Getting a picture with Kermit and JIm is a rite of passage.
Left to right: Carinna, Kermit, Jim Henson
May 2021
Graduated from Roanoke College
(Salem, VA)
Graduated with a Biology degree from Roanoke College, magna cum laude.
Spring 2021
Carinna's Senior Thesis Defense
(Salem, VA)
I investigated how monolignol gene expression changes in dark versus light conditions and controls root cell shape. The work was particularly exciting because it suggested that overexposure to sunlight drives a defense mechanism in root cells and ultimately changes cell shape.
Top: Excerpt of Carinna's Undergraduate Thesis.
Bottom: Carinna after her oral thesis defense.
Left to right: Dr. Pysh, Carinna, Frankie Sefcik.
Fall 2020
Returning to research after the COVID-19 Stay at Home Order
(Salem, VA)
After junior year of research, we were allowed back to campus with restrictions. I was able to return to Roanoke College to conduct my senior research thesis project and lead the Biology Club!
May 2019
Tropical Marine Biology
(Baja, Mexico)
The Intensive Learning Term, also known as May Term, provides students with the opportunity to learn in an immersive environment. We explored the Marine Diversity in the Baja California Sur by conducting field studies and logging journals everyday.
Mexico MayTerm to the California Baja Sur Penninsula.
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Pysh research lab Spring of 2019 with lab T-shirts.
Spring 2019
Pysh Research Lab Expanded
(Salem, VA)
The Pysh research lab expanded welcoming in two more researchers to the group. Here is the group pictured in front of Massengill Auditorium.
Fall 2018
Pysh Research Lab Holiday Card
(Salem, VA)
I began research in Dr. Leonard Pysh's research lab with Frankie Sefcik. We studied how lignin is important for root cell development in the Arabidopsis thaliana.
