Events
CEMINAR
The most important community-oriented activity we sponsor is CEMINAR, formerly MicroMorning, a monthly seminar series where students and postdocs in the CEMI program present their work. Usually 2 individuals present 20-25 min talks (+ 5 min questions) to fill the hour, but on rare occasions we invite an outside speaker. CEMINAR is primarily designed to provide CEMI students and postdocs with an opportunity to practice giving a formal talk to a friendly Caltech audience. Numerous collaborations have been sparked between labs at Caltech thanks to creative connections made during these seminars. View past CEMINARS
CEMINAR
CEMINAR is on the second Wednesday of every month.
UPCOMING
Wednesday, October 8, 2025, 4:00 pm
4:00-5:00pm Chen 130
5:00-5:30pm Socializing (snacks and drinks will be provided)
"From lab to clinic: Development of a fungal sequencing technology to enable next generation vulvovaginal candidiasis diagnostics and treatments"
Reid AkanaIsmagilov Lab
Vulvovaginal candidiasis (VVC) is a widespread and debilitating fungal disease that affects ~75% of women at least once. Despite high prevalence and healthcare burden, there is a lack of understanding VVC disease etiology. Diagnostics and therapeutics are also ineffective and unreliable. One bottleneck is the inability to reliably study fungi in clinical samples, such as from vaginal swabs. To address this need, we are developing technologies to enable reproducible and accurate measurements of fungal gene expression from sequencing of vaginal swabs. In this talk, I will discuss our technology development progress, and preliminary results from our ongoing pilot study.
"Microbial communities: From cell-cell interactions to large-scale dynamics"
Hannah JeckelNewman Lab
Microbial communities are ubiquitous on earth and play critical roles in many ecosystems, influencing the health of humans, animals and plants. They commonly consist of a variety of species, sometimes extending across kingdoms, with complex and context-dependent interactions. Predicting, understanding, or even observing these interactions and how they shape the development of a community can be a major challenge that requires simplified experimental systems and models which nevertheless capture the essential aspects of the system. In this talk, I will discuss different strategies to approach this challenge across examples ranging from the collective swarming of bacterial populations to rhizosphere communities.
Social Events
In addition to CEMINAR, CEMI sponsors social events during the academic year:
Fall Poster Sessions: All CEMI labs present one or more posters on their lab’s research. This helps incoming/current students and postdocs remain up-to-date on that latest research projects going on across the campus. One attractive feature of Caltech is that students admitted in any graduate program are welcome to rotate in any lab (as long as the lab is taking students), so this poster session can open up new interests and areas for exploration. It also can spawn new collaborations between labs.
Spring Lectures and Evening Gala: To celebrate the start of the calendar year, we invite a keynote speaker from outside Caltech to give a seminar, plus a few shorter talks by assistant professors or postdocs at Caltech and other local universities. These “Spring Lectures” are open to anyone interested. As a companion event, we hold a formal gathering for a limited number of CEMI sponsors, faculty, and students and postdocs currently being supported by CEMI grants. The evening’s entertainment is organized by a different CEMI lab each year, and the evening culminates with a presentation of the “CEMI Oscars” (we are close to Hollywood, after all…), roasting CEMI members for notable achievements in the past year, all in good fun. View past lectures
Spring Happy Hour: In recognition of the fact that sometimes the most inspired ideas come when we least expect them, we promote casual conversation between all members of the CEMI community supplemented with drinks and food at the start of the spring term (no posters required!).
CEMI Spring Celebration of Science: This hour-long science program featured short lightning talks from CEMI graduate students and postdocs followed by time to talk with the speakers and socialize with our CEMI colleagues. The inaugural event was held on May 12, 2021.
Workshops
CEMI occasionally supports training courses at Caltech that provide members of the CEMI community with an opportunity for intensive training in a particular area. Any member of the CEMI community is welcome to suggest a topic for a workshop. Please contact the CEMI administrator if you have an idea. View past workshops
