Latulippe Research Group - Department of Chemical EngineeringMy work centres around developing adenovirus quantification methods. The primary focus is using a live-cell imaging system to reduce the time required to measure infectious titre and increase throughput. I am also developing a qPCR assay to detect the presence of adenovirus and host cell DNA in chromatography fractions.

Mac VIRUS is an organization that serves to encourage undergraduate students at McMaster to explore the vast and important fields of immunology and virology. My role as VP of Research centred around ensuring the scientific relevance and accuracy of the content we produce. I directed the research committee - a group of students with a passion for scientific communication - who are responsible for writing content for social media posts, as well as the scientific content of educational events. I also served as the liaison with other committees in McMaster VIRUS, and acted as a scientific advisor when needed.

Full Cycle is one of Canada's premier bike shops, with multiple locations in the Ottawa area. My role centred around the online operations, where I was responsible for customer communications and orders with a customer satisfaction rating of 4.9/5. Additionally, I was responsible for ensuring proper publication of products on our website, resulting in my designing of several new product page types to streamline their addition to the site.

McMaster SynBio is a undergraduate student-led synthetic biology research team at McMaster University. As Vice President of Logisitics, my role focused on both back-end management and direct leadership responsibilities. I developed and managed all databases and documentation standards including our electronic lab notebook. I was also responsible for inventory tracking and procurement from equipment and reagent suppliers. My role as a wet lab researcher continued as well, where I devised and led the team's 2023 iGEM project to develop a vaccine for both echinococcosis and cysticercosis. I reengineered the phage vectors I developed the previous year, expanding their capabilities to include surface antigen expression, and targeted gene delivery to immune cells in the gut. The updated version of the vectors also incorporated several synthetic biology standards to simplify future modification, as well as unique security features to prevent the vectors from functioning outside controlled environments. I designed and performed the updated protocols for producing the vectors, and was responsible for supervising other lab members on their use.As dry lab lead, I directed a team of students focused on simulation and engineering design. This included vaccine distribution modelling, designing a low-cost bioreactor to produce the phages, and an oral delivery system for them.

My role as a wet lab researcher focused primarily on developing a hybrid filamentous bacteriophage/AAV vector for our 2022 iGEM project on treating B-cell Lymphoma. These phages used a ligated scFv to target cancerous B-cells and deliver an oncolytic gene cassette. I also designed and carried out several protocols involved in producing the phages, with a focus on engineering the phage plasmid. Most of the design work was performed in Benchling, which I also used to analyze sequencing results of the precursour phages and products. I presented the results of this project with the team at the 2022 iGEM Jamboree in Paris, France.