Abigail Rodriguez Morales

Education/degrees:

BA, Biology and Sociology, New York University
PhD, Immunology, Washington University in St. Louis

Previous positions held: 

• Postdoctoral researcher, Weill Cornell Medicine
• Adjunct Assistant Professor, CUNY Lehman College
• Assistant Professor, CUNY Hunter College

Current position or career path:

I am an Assistant Professor and “teacher scholar” at Cal State East Bay, which is part of the nation’s largest four-year public university system. Formerly, I had a similar position at Hunter College, which is part of the City University of New York; both institutions strive to provide affordable, high-quality education for an extremely diverse population of students in metropolitan areas of the United States. I teach coursework related to the host-pathogen interface (Parasitology, Immunology, and Hematology) and run a research laboratory that is driven by undergraduate and master’s students. Broadly, my laboratory studies the intersection between DNA damage and innate immune signaling in the context of bacterial infection.

Advice for current graduate students and postdocs:

To be open to distinct training experiences that can help you pivot within your field of interest.