Jen got her bachelors degree in biology and philosophy from Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia before spending a year teaching science in Philadelphia public schools. She then spent several years studying host-pathogen dynamics of nutrient acquisition at Penn before earning her PhD in Immunology from Weill Cornell Medical School in NYC. After a postdoc at UCLA, where she became a wizard of microscopy, she started her lab jointly with her partner – Alon – at Harvard Medical School in the Department of Systems Biology. Their lab now studies inflammation from two major angles: the biophysics of its spread through dense, 3-D tissues such as lymph nodes and solid tumors; and how it impacts cell fate decisions during viral infection. Jen also co-teaches a course for first year PhD students that focuses on effective science communication and creativity.
Jennifer Oyler-Yaniv Website