Annapurna Kuppa, MS, M.Tech
Annapurna Kuppa, MS, M.Tech
Research Lab Specialist Lead
[email protected]
Annapurna is a Research Lab Specialist Lead in the Abdel-Latif lab. She has two master's degrees in Bioinformatics and Biotechnology from Johns Hopkins University and University of Pune in India. Annapurna is uniquely trained to perform both functional as well as computational research. She began her career at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT-Bombay) and later joined the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as a Bioinformatics Scientist.
Over the years, Anna has enjoyed serving multiple roles, as a project manager, a scientist, and a team lead. She enjoys mentoring new team members and students. At Michigan Medicine, Anna is involved in studying cardiovascular diseases, obesity-related disorders, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease using computational and animal models. Her current project focuses on the novel mechanisms of cardiac tissue repair post-myocardial infarction in Acomys and Mus. Anna also develops computational pipelines to analyze RNA sequencing data, to evaluate clinical biomarkers for disease risk predictions, and to perform genotype-phenotype association studies.
In her free time, Annapurna enjoys dancing, traveling, and exploring new vegetarian spots.
Tahra Kaur Suhan, MS
Research Lab Specialist Senior
[email protected]
Tahra serves as a researcher and support staff in the Abdel-Latif lab. She received her BS in Zoology from Michigan State University, and her MS in Molecular Cellular and Development Biology from the University of Michigan.
Tahra began her career at the University of Michigan in 2007, with the Unit for Laboratory Animal Medicine (ULAM), after which she was recruited to serve as the Assistant Program Manager of Dr. Max Wicha’s cancer stem cell research laboratory. Over the years in her career at Michigan Medicine, she has continued as a lab manager and scientist, studying numerous cancer mechanisms and targeted therapies, including immunotherapy, Ewing sarcoma tumorigenesis and metastasis, and investigating the role of protein phosphatase 2A (PP2A) and small molecule development in difference cancer models, in hopes to determine new targeted therapies.
Tahra has extensive experience with both in vivo and in vitro studies, and a variety of molecular biological assays, as well as lab management. She is excited for the pivot to the cardiology field, where she will help develop unique mouse models, and utilize this along with other methods to study the role of pathological inflammation and immune cell dysfunction, with a focus on T cells, in the development of cardiac fibrosis and diastolic dysfunction in heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF).
When Tahra is not dedicated to finding innovative treatments for human diseases, she enjoys spending time with her two little beautiful sons and husband, reading, and running.