My name is Bezawit Danna. I am a sophomore Biochemistry major. I joined the
Divakaruni Lab in Winter 2022. The Divakaruni Lab studies energy metabolism and cellular
substrate preference. The main focus of the Divakaruni Lab is mitochondrial metabolism in cells
and general mechanism of metabolic controls. The lab uses bioenergetics, analytical chemistry,
and live cell imaging to characterize mitochondrial metabolism and develop mitochondrial
pathways as therapeutic drug targets. I am working on brain energy metabolism. We focus on
Mitochondrial Metabolism in brain cells to find potential therapeutic drug targets for
neurodegenerative diseases like Alizihemer and parkinson disease. In Particular, we research on
Mitochondrial Pyruvate Carrier to inhibit pyruvate uptake in mitochondria. Currently, I am
helping with doing BCA assay with BSA standard solution to quantify synaptosomal protein.