Principal Investigator

Postdoctoral Associate

Postdoctoral Associate

PhD Candidate

January 2022-present

Ibrahim is an MCB doctoral student who joined De Nisco lab in January 2022. Ibrahim is working on multiple projects, but his thesis work is primarily focused on the clinical prevalence and comparative genomics of a newly defined Klebsiella species – a collaborative project with Dr. David Greenberg at UTSW Medical that was recently funded by an NIH R21 grant.

Doctoral Student

September 2023-present

PhD Candidate

January 2021-present

Sam began as an MS student and was admitted to the MCB PhD program in May 2021. Sam contributes to multiple projects, but his thesis work uses single cell RNA-seq to define bladder immune populations in collaboration with Dr. Doug Strand at UTSW Medical Center who serves as Sam’s co-mentor. Sam’s abstract was selected as one of the best at the SUFU Winter meeting in 2023; he was invited to give a talk for which he was awarded second place. So far, Sam has earned junior authorship on three publications and completed his qualifying exam in September 2023.

PhD Candidate

June 2022-present

Ujjaini is an MCB doctoral student who joined De Nisco lab in June 2022. Ujjaini’s thesis work primarily focuses on using fluorescence in situ hybridization to visualize and identify bladder-resident bacterial populations through collaborations with clinicians at UTSW Medical Center and Duke University. Ujjaini is co-first author on a manuscript at Life Science Alliance. Outside of lab Ujjaini enjoys anime, art, and hanging out with her lab mates.

Doctoral Student

January 2023-present

Hrishikesh started in De Nisco lab as an MS student and was then admitted to the MCB PhD program in Summer 2023. Hrishikesh’s thesis project investigates the evolution of fatty acid auxotrophy among commensal Lactobacillus species.

Doctoral Student

Spring 2023-present

Doctoral Student

Doctoral Student

Laboratory Technician

Summer 2022-present

Undergraduate Student

Undergraduate Student

Now an Assistant Professor at University of Rochester Medical Center!

Now a Postdoctoral Scholar at UT Southwestern Medical Center!

January 2019-Fall2023

Neha is now a Project Microbiologist at Eagle Analytical in Houston, TX.

Neha was an MCB doctoral student who joined De Nisco lab in January 2019. Neha has contributed to several projects, but her focus was a novel gain of function enterococcal cytotoxin that she discovered in one of our clinical E. faecalis isolates. Neha’s work has resulted in two first author publications in Microbiology Resource Announcements (2022) and ACS Infectious Disease (2023) and 6 junior author publications. Neha also won the Samuel Kaplan Award for best poster at the ASM Texas Branch Meeting in 2019.

Dr. Sawant is a Senior Microbiologist in the California Department of Public Health.

Namrata’s PhD project identified mechanisms of antimicrobial peptide resistance in uropathogenic Escherichia coli. Namrata was selected to give a talk at the Wind River conference on Prokaryotic Biology in 2022. Namrata has one first author manuscript at Microbiology Spectrum and is junior author on two publications.

Brianna completed her PhD in Molecular and Cell Biology in Spring 2026.

Brianna’s thesis work focused on the regulation of glycosaminoglycan utilization by uropathogenic Proteus mirablis. Brianna has one first author publication and two junior author publications. Brianna is also second author on a publication with our collaborator at SUNY Buffalo that has been published in Infection and Immunity.

June 2019-December 2021
Sundharamani was an MCB doctoral student who joined De Nisco lab in Summer 2019. Sundhar’s thesis project centered on virulence mechanisms of a newly defined Klebsiella species. Sundhar successfully defended his doctoral thesis in Fall 2021. Sundhar’s work resulted in two first author publications in Microbiology Resource Announcements (2020) and in Journal of Bacteriology (2022) as well as one junior author publication. Sundhar also won first place in the basic science poster competition at the SUFU Winter Meeting in 2021. After graduating with his PhD, Sundhar went on to pursue a career in industry.

January 2019-May 2022
Tahmineh was an MCB doctoral student who joined De Nisco lab in Spring 2019. Her thesis focused on innate immune responses to rUTI and identified prostaglandin E2 as a biomarker for rUTI. Tahmineh successfully defended her doctoral thesis and received her PhD in Spring 2022. Tahmineh’s first author work was published in Life Science Alliance in 2021. For her contributions to an ongoing collaboration with Dr. Shalini Prasad to develop a new point-of-care UTI biosensor, Tahmineh earned junior authorship on three publications. After receiving her PhD, Tahmineh was recruited by the clinical research company ICON plc as clinical trial Site Monitoring Associate.

August 2019-May 2023
Belle joined De Nisco lab in August 2019 with Dr. Kelli Palmer acting as co-mentor. Belle successfully defended her PhD thesis in Spring 2023. Belle’s thesis work resulted in three first author publications in Microbiology Resource Announcements (2020), Journal of Visualized Experiments (2021), and Access Microbiology (2023). Belle’s latest first-author manuscript is deposited on bioRxiv and is currently in revision at mBio. In addition, Belle contributed to five publications in De Nisco lab as co-author. After graduating with her PhD in May 2023, Belle has been enjoying motherhood while considering a career in industry.

October 2018-June 2021
Vivian was an undergraduate in Biology who joined De Nisco lab in October 2018. Vivian helped to create our urinary microbiome strain collection and set the foundation for our lab’s current advanced culture methods for fastidious species. In November 2019, she presented her work on culturing the urinary microbiota at the ASM Texas Branch Meeting and won the Joan Abramowitz 1st Place Poster Award. Vivian was also awarded “Best Undergraduate Research Presentation” in Microbiology at the UT Austin Fall Undergraduate Research Symposium (FURS) in 2019 and the UTD Undergraduate Research Scholar Award during the Spring 2020 semester. As a post-baccalaureate student in De Nisco lab Vivian developed a novel semi-quantitative glycosaminoglycan degradation assay. Her first author manuscript describing this work was published in Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology in 2022. Her contributions have also resulted in four junior author publications. Vivian was admitted to the highly selective MD/PhD program at the University of Wisconsin Madison and started training to become a physician-scientist in Fall 2021.

Serena is now an MD/PhD student at Washington University at St. Louis.

Serena joined my lab as a Clark Scholar in Summer 2022. Serena worked on multiple wet lab and dry lab projects in the lab due to her considerable skills in programming. Serena worked with former PhD student Brianna Shipman and our collaborators at SUNY Buffalo to characterize two enterococcal hyaluronidases. For her work on this project, Serena is junior author on a manuscript that was submitted to Infection and Immunity in September 2023.

Fall 2018-Spring 2019

Spring 2019-2020

Fall 2019-2021

Spring-Fall 2020

Fall 2020-Spring 2021

Spring 2020-2021

Former Lab Technician

October 2018-June 2021
Amber joined the lab as an undergraduate student in Fall 2018. She primarily worked on E. faecalis genomics and antimicrobial resistance. She competed in the UT Dallas Undergraduate Research Symposium (URSA) and was a Top 10 semi- finalist. Amber wrote her Major Honors thesis on the research she performed in De Nisco lab and was junior author on three publications from my lab. Amber graduated in May 2020 with her B.S. in Molecular Biology, and I hired her as a post-baccalaureate technician in July 2020 while she applied to PhD programs. Amber began her PhD at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus in Fall 2021.

October 2018-May 2022
Sam started as an undergraduate student in my lab in Fall 2018. Sam primarily investigated antimicrobial peptide resistance among uropathogenic Escherichia coli isolates. In Spring 2019, Sam’s project was selected for the URSA and he was a semi-finalist in the annual URSA poster competition. Sam’s contributions have earned him junior authorship on one publication in The Annals of Pharmacotherapy and on another manuscript that is currently under review. Sam started medical school at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Fall 2022.

January 2019-Spring 2020
Krutika was a Biology major who joined the lab in January 2019. Krutika was mentored by Namrata Sawant and worked on determining the susceptibilities of clinically isolated uropathogenic E. coli strains to the detergent cetylpyridinium chloride. Krutika gave an oral presentation at FURS in UT Austin in October 2019 and won Best Presentation in her category. An abstract of her work was accepted to the 35th Annual European Association of Urology Conference. Krutika’s contributions earned her junior authorship on a manuscript that is currently under review at Microbiology Spectrum. In Spring 2020, Krutika completed her Honors thesis in Biology describing the research she completed in De Nisco lab. After graduating with her Bachelor’s degree in Fall 2020, Krutika went on to start a Masters program in Biomedical Informatics at NYU in 2021.

March 2019-May 2022
Fatima Khan was a Neuroscience undergraduate who joined the lab in March 2019. She investigated the adaptive immune microenvironment of the bladders of postmenopausal women with rUTI using patient bladder biopsies. Her contributions have earned her co-authorship on three publications in the lab. Fatima was admitted to Dell Medical School at UT Austin and started medical school there in Fall 2022.

January 2019-Spring 2021
Nitya joined De Nisco lab in January 2019 and worked with Vivian Nguyen on our urinary microbiome project helping to cultivate many of the isolates in our urinary microbiome collection. Her contribution to this project earned her junior authorship on our publication in Cell Reports Medicine in 2022. Nitya completed her Bachelor’s degree in Spring 2022 and is planning on attending medical school.

Fall 2020-Spring 2023
Jessica started as an undergraduate researcher in De Nisco lab in Fall 2020 and then I hired her as a PostBac technician during her gap year. Jessica worked on two main projects in the lab – characterization of the innate immune response to UTI and investigation of fatty acid metabolism by commensal lactobacilli. Jessica was awarded the Patti Henry Pinch Scholarship to present her work at the AUA Annual Meeting in New Orleans, LA in Spring 2022. Jessica so far has earned junior authorship on one publication in Bioengineering and Translational Medicine and junior authorship on another manuscript that is currently under review at Life Science Alliance. Jessica was accepted to medical school at UT Southwestern Medical Center and started medical school there in Fall 2023.

June 2021-Fall 2022
Irene joined my lab in Summer 2021 and investigated the activity of a novel enterococcal cytolysin on the urinary microbiota. She was awarded the Patti Henry Pinch Scholarship to present her work at the ASM Texas Branch meeting in Houston, TX in Fall 2022. Irene was accepted to the Green Fellows program for the Spring 2023 semester and worked in Dr. Tiffany Reese’s lab at UTSW Medical Center where she gained employment as a full-time research technician after graduating from UTD with her Bachelor’s degree in Spring 2023. After her gap year, Irene plans to pursue a PhD in the biological sciences.

Summer 2021- Spring 2024

Natalie joined my lab in Summer 2021 and has since worked on our glycosaminoglycan degradation and urinary microbiome projects. Natalie’s contributions have so far earned her junior authorship on a manuscript published in Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology in 2022. Natalie has been accepted to the Green Fellows program for spring 2024 and plans to apply to MD/PhD programs. Outside of lab, Natalie serves as a supervisor with University Emergency Medical Response and is the captain of the UTD Gymnastics team.

Summer 2022-Spring 2024

Eesha Desai was an undergraduate student working on a major in Biology and a minor in Exercise Science and has been in the De Nisco lab since the summer of 2023. She is currently working alongside graduate student Namrata Sawant studying Uropathogenic E.coli (UPEC) and its resistance against the LL-37 peptide located in the urinary bladder. In her free time, she enjoys playing badminton, basketball, and other sports with her friends. She is currently a TA for the course “Introduction to Modern Biology” and hopes to pursue a career in medicine

Spring 2023-Spring 2024

Mark joined the De Nisco Lab in the Spring of 2023 and has been working under the mentorship of Ujjaini, a 3rd-year PHD student. He has been helping Ujjaini on using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) to detect the bladder microbiome in women with urge urinary incontinence and insulin-resistance. He is currently a senior studying Biology and plans on applying to medical school.

Spring 2023-Spring 2024

Nigel was a fourth year undergraduate researcher who will graduate spring 2024 with a B.S. in Biology and a minor in Spanish. He works with Sam on creating a cellular atlas of the female bladder. Nigel enjoys biking and photography in his spare time.

Spring 2022-Sprng 2024