CV
EDUCATION
2016–24 MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, Cambridge, MA
PhD in Biology
2011–16 HARVARD UNIVERSITY, Cambridge, MA
B.A. with honours in Chemical and Physical Biology, GPA 3.73/4.00
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
2017– BURGE LAB at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Graduate student
Investigations of the mechanism of intron-mediated enhancement.
2014–16 CHURCH LAB at Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering
Undergraduate student, Research Fellow
Development of novel isolation techniques for extracellular vesicles.
2011–14 SZOSTAK LAB at Massachusetts General Hospital
Undergraduate student
In vitro selection of a ribozyme capable of catalyzing phospholipid maturation.
PUBLICATIONS
2024 Kowal E.J.K., Sakai Y., McGurk M.P., Pasetsky Z.J., Burge C.B. Kowal E.J.K., Sakai Y., McGurk M.P., Pasetsky Z.J., Burge C.B. Sequence determinants of intron-mediated enhancement learned from thousands of random introns. bioRxiv 2024.10.29.620880; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.10.29.620880
2024 Ter-Ovanesyan D., Whiteman S., Gilboa T., Kowal E.J.K. et al. Identification of markers for the isolation of neuron-specific extracellular vesicles. bioRxiv 2024.04.03.587267; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.04.03.587267
2021 Norman M.*, Ter-Ovanesyan D.*, Trieu W., Lazarovits R., Kowal E.J.K. et al. L1CAM is not Associated with Extracellular Vesicles in Human Cerebrospinal Fluid or Plasma. Nat Methods. 2021;18:631–634. PMID: 34092791
2017 Ter-Ovanesyan D. & Kowal E.J.K., et al. Imaging of Isolated Extracellular Vesicles Using Fluorescence Microscopy. Methods Mol Biol. 2017;1660:233-241. PMID: 28828661
2017 Kowal E.J.K. & Ter-Ovanesyan D., et al. Extracellular Vesicle Isolation and Analysis by Western Blotting. Methods Mol Biol. 2017;1660:143-152. PMID: 28828654
2017 Mateescu B. & Kowal E.J.K., et al. Obstacles and opportunities in the functional analysis of extracellular vesicle RNA–an ISEV position paper. J. Extracell. Vesicles. 2017;6:1286095. PMID: 28326170
2016 Chavez A., et al. Comparison of Cas9 activators in multiple species. Nat Methods. 2016;13:563–567. PMID: 27214048
2015 Kiani S., et al. Cas9 gRNA engineering for genome editing, activation and repression. Nat Methods. 2015;12(11):1051–1054. PMID: 26344044
PATENTS
2016 TER-OVANESYAN, Dmitry; KOWAL, Emma, Joanna Katharina; CHURCH, George, M.; REGEV, Aviv; (WO2016172598) EXOSOMES AND USES THEREOF
TALKS & POSTERS
2022 Kowal E.J.K., Pasetsky, Z.J., McGurk, M., Burge, C. B. Investigating the sequence determinants of Intron-Mediated Enhancement (IME). Oral presentation at The RNA society 27th annual meeting; 2022 May 31-June 5; CU Boulder, Boulder, CO
2018 Kowal E.J.K. & Burge, C. B. Different mammalian introns enhance gene expression at different steps. Poster presented at The RNA society 23rd annual meeting; 2018 May 29-June 3; University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA.
2017 Kowal, E.J.K. et al. Isolating neuronal exosomes using cell-type specific protein markers. Oral presentation at International Society for Extracellular Vesicles Annual Meeting; 2017 May 18-21; Toronto, Canada.
2015 Kowal, E.J.K. et al. Distinguishing nucleic acids inside extracellular vesicles from those outside. Oral presentation at ISEV Research Seminar on EV-associated RNA; 2015 Sep 24-25; Utrecht, The Netherlands.
2015 Kowal, E.J.K. et al. Thinking outside the cell: nucleic acid content of exosomes and extracellular fluid. Poster presented at The 2015 National Collegiate Research Conference; 2015 Jan 22-24; Harvard University, Cambridge, MA.
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
2020 Teaching Assistant, Quantitative Biology (7.57), MIT
2017 Teaching Assistant, Introductory Biology (7.012), MIT
AWARDS
2017 Winner of MIT Biology Science Slam
2015 Thomas T. Hoopes Prize for senior thesis, “Thinking outside the cell: nucleic acid content of exosomes and extracellular fluid”
2015 2nd place at Festival of Bad Ad-hoc Hypotheses
2014 Herchel Smith-Harvard Undergraduate Research Fellow
2014 Origins of Life Initiative Undergraduate Research Award (declined)
2013 Origins of Life Initiative Undergraduate Research Award
2013 Harvard College Program for Research in Science and Engineering (declined)
2012 David Rockefeller International Experience Grant
LEADERSHIP & WORK EXPERIENCE
2020– Co-captain of MIT Climbing Team
2014–15 President of the Harvard Community of Humanists, Atheists and Agnostics
2012–14 Head Tutor, Harvard College Writing Centre, Harvard University
2011–13 Bartender at Cambridge Queen’s Head Pub