Plopper Lab Personnel

Principle Investigator

Dr. PlopperGeorge E. Plopper, Ph.D. Harvard University, 1993
Most commonly heard to say: "Do me a favor: email me, to remind me."

I came to RPI in 2001, after spending four years as an Assistant Professor at The University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in both the Biology Department as well as in the Department of Biomedical Engineering in 2006. I currently teach Introductory Cell and Developmental Biology, and Cell-Extracellular Matrix Interactions. Students in the lab take research credits or reading courses as appropriate.

Research techniques that we use regularly in this lab include mammalian and bacterial cell culture, cell adhesion and migration assays, immunofluorecence microscopy, immunoprecipitation, western blotting, protein kinase assays, standard recombinant DNA techniques, qRT-PCR, and cell transfection. Students who work in the lab spend at least one year here, and are exposed to most of these techniques. Our goal is to produce critical thinkers broadly trained in cell and molecular biology techniques.

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Graduate Student


Amanda LundAmanda Lund, RPI class of '06.

Amanda is one of the first two students admitted into RPI's combined B.S./Ph.D. program in Biology. She formally entered the Ph.D. program in Spring 2006. Her project is focused on encapsulating mesenchymal stem cells in three-dimensional "beads" of extracellular matrix proteins and then inducing these "beads" to differentiate into osteoblasts. She is working closely with Dr. Jan Stegemann at the University of Michigan, who developed the bead coating method. She is also a top-notch athelete, having served as goalie of the RPI Women's field hockey team during her undergraduate years here. Now she is an Assistant Coach for the team.





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Graduate Student


Tiffany MillerTiffany Bradke, M.S., Medical College of Ohio, 2006.

Tiffany entered the Ph.D. program at RPI with considerable experience, having earned her Masters degree in Ohio,
and is pursuing a project in identifying and characterizing anti-cancer compounds that target tumor cell migration. She is supported by an NIH Training Grant in Biotechnology, awarded to RPI and directed by Dr. Jon Dordick.












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Graduate Student

Lindsey McKeenLindsey McKeen, RPI Class of '07.

Lindsey joined the Biology Ph.D. program afgter graduating with a BS in Biomedical Engineering. She is the lead investigator on our tissue structure/function collaboration project with Dr. Yener's group. Her primary focus is on how healthy and cancerous breast epithelial cells model their ECM in 3D culture, and she is seeking to identify characteristic traits of this remodeling that can help in the diagnosis of disease and assist in wound healing. She is also a mentor for her sorority.














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Undergraduate Student



Kira Henderson, RPI class of 2010

Kira was admitted into the combined B.S./Ph.D. program in 2008 and joined the lab that summer. Her research project is concerned with the mechanisms of neural tissue formation and how brain cancer diverges from these mechanisms. She is also an active student-athlete and plays club volleyball.











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Undergraduate Student



Anne Sailer, RPI class of 2011

Anne is pursuing a double major in Biology and Computer Science, and is playing an important role in forming the necessary links between our wet-bench work and the image analysis taking place in Dr. Yener's group. Her project is concerned with how human osteoblasts form healthy bone in 3D cultures, how stem cells participate in this development, and how bone cancers disrupt the developmental program in wounded bones.














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Visiting Student



Megan Scott

Megan is a local high school student interested in getting a jump on her research experiences. She is currently assisting Kira and Anne with their projects and will eventually develop her own project. She is also a three-season athlete,













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Last updated: Wednesday, August 20, 2008