People

Peggy Cotter, Ph.D. — Principal Investigator

Peggy is a gold-star Bruin, as she earned her B.S. and Ph.D. and conducted postdoctoral research at UCLA. Her graduate work in Robert Gunsalus’ lab focused on bacterial respiration in E. coli, and then she spiced things up a bit by researching Bordetella pathogenesis as a postdoc in Jeff Miller’s lab.

Richard M. Johnson, Ph.D. — Research Associate

Richard earned his bachelor’s degree at James Madison University and conducted his doctoral research in Kathleen McDonough’s lab at SUNY Albany, where he studied second messenger signaling in Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In the Cotter Lab, he’s studying FHA maturation and interaction with ACT in Bordetella spp..

Zachary M. Nash, M.Sc. — Research Specialist

Zach earned his B.S. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (and he once worked in a sewage treatment plant!). His research in the Cotter Lab centers on the processing of FHA, a large protein virulence factor in Bordetella.

Liliana S. McKay — Graduate Student

Lillian C. Lowrey — Graduate Student

Alexa R. Spandrio — Graduate Student

Alexa earned her B.S. from Westmont College in Santa Barbara, CA where she studied Bordetella gene regulation with Steve Julio. She joined the Cotter lab to continue her research on Bordetella pathogenesis, and her current project is focused on understanding the structural requirements and role of ACT during infection.