Dr. Arjun Raj Uses Single-Cell Systems Approaches to Understand Melanoma

Arjun Raj, Ph.D., a CSBC investigator at the University of Pennsylvania, uses systems biology approaches to study therapeutic resistance in melanoma. With a background in mathematics and physics, he pursued a Ph.D. focused on mathematical biology at the Courant Institute of New York University. After his first year as a graduate student, Arjun told his advisor, Charlie Peskin, that he wanted to see what it was really like in a molecular biology lab. Charlie introduced him to Sanjay Tyagi (via Fred Kramer), who was developing molecular beacons for RNA detection at the Public Health Research Institute. Arjun worked in Sanjay’s laboratory every day that summer which ignited his interest in biological research.