Lab Members
Jay R. Silveira
Assistant Professor
Dr. Silveira received his Ph.D. in 2001 from the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Vermont. His graduate work with Dr. Paula Tracy involved assessing the effects of post-translational modifications on the function of factor V, a critical component of the coagulation cascade. After completing his graduate work, Dr. Silveira obtained a postdoctoral fellowship and worked with Dr. Byron Caughey's prion research group at the National Institutes of Health's Rocky Mountain Laboratory facility in Hamilton, Montana. Dr. Silveira's research on prions established a relationship between prion infectivity and the size of prion protein aggregates, revealing that smaller aggregates are inherently more infectious than larger ones. In 2006, Dr. Silveira returned to Vermont and joined the faculty of the Biochemistry department as a lecturer and a member of Dr. Paula Tracy's research group. In 2011 he was promoted to Assistant Professor.
Francis Ayombil
Graduate Student
Francis Ayombil earned a B.S. degree in Biochemistry from the University of Ghana, West Africa in 2007. He proceeded to earn his M.S. degree in Biochemistry from the same university with the research component of his Master's degree done here at the University of Vermont from August 2009 to May 2010. Francis subsequently joined the Doctorate Biochemistry Graduate program in August 2010 and is currently a graduate student in the department.
Laura M. Haynes
Postdoctoral Fellow
Brittany Todd
Graduate Student
Jeremy Wood