The Bick Lab Team

Principal Investigator; Associate Professor; Director, Division of Genetic Medicine and Clinical Pharmacology

Alex earned his MD and PhD in Genetics at Harvard and completed his medicine residency at Massachusetts General Hospital with a clinical focus on personalized medicine. He joined the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine faculty in the Division of Genetic Medicine  in July 2020. He was named Director of the Division of Genetic Medicine in October 2024. In addition to his research, Alex sees patients in the Vanderbilt Genetics and Therapeutics Clinic.

Postdoc

Kun is a postdoctoral researcher who joined the Bick Lab in July 2024. Kun earned a Ph.D. in epidemiology and biostatistics from Peking Union Medical College in China. His research focuses on using large databases to explore the risk factors and health outcomes of clonal hematopoiesis, like CHIP and mosaic chromosomal alterations. Outside of work, Kun loves watching movies, jogging, and traveling—and he’s on a mission to visit every state in the U.S.!

Postdoctoral Research Fellow Trainee

Naomi is a postdoctoral research fellow trainee who joined the Bick lab in July 2025. Naomi is interested in the relationship between Clonal Hematopoiesis of Indeterminate Potential (CHIP) and the development of cardiovascular disease. She graduated with her PhD in Microbiology and Molecular Biology from Brigham Young University in January 2025. In her free time, Naomi can be found singing, hiking, reading, spending time with her husband, and whistling back at the neighborhood songbirds.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Andrew Kjar completed a PhD in biomedical engineering at Vanderbilt University in 2026, and then joined the Bick Lab as a postdoctoral fellow. Andrew's work focuses on transcriptomic data analysis across scale: from case studies and in vitro experiment interpretation to large patient cohorts, he seeks to understand how genetic variants can influence cell states and disease phenotypes at the single cell level. On the weekends, you might find him playing pipe organ for his local congregation.

MD-PhD Student

Yash is from Phoenix, Arizona and went to undergrad at Stanford where he studied Bioengineering. After undergrad, Yash joined the Vanderbilt MSTP and is now a second-year graduate student in the Bick Lab. When he is not trying to convince other lab members to get coffee, Yash enjoys studying mosaic chromosomal alterations (mCAs), trying to piece together population genetics observations, and applying deep learning to single cell transcriptomics. For fun, Yash likes to run, play and watch basketball, and cook recipes from the NY Times.

PhD Student

Jessica is a Research Assistant for the Bick Lab’s Wet Lab. She recently graduated from Cedarville University in 2020 with a degree in Molecular and Cellular Biology. She is currently working on a project to biobanking PBMC cells from CHIP patients and a project investigating the effects of a NAMPT inhibitor on common CHIP mutations. Outside of work, Jessica enjoys taking her australian cattle dog puppy, Chip, on hikes and long walks!

PhD Student

Joe is from Indianapolis, Indiana and went to Indiana Wesleyan University for undergrad and Lipscomb University for this Master’s. After a year as a research assistant, he joined the Bick lab as a PhD student. He enjoys exploring new technologies in single-cell and methylation and their impacts to understanding hematopoiesis and somatic mosaicism. When not in lab, Joe enjoys the NBA (Pacers), the Premier League (Liverpool) and productions at the Nashville Symphony. 

PhD Student

Erika is a PhD student in the Bick Lab. She went to undergrad at Vanderbilt University studying Molecular and Cellular Biology and Math. She is interested in epigenetic signatures of CHIP on a single cell level, and the mechanism of how CHIP mutations lead to clinical outcomes. When not in lab, Erika enjoys singing, drawing, exploring local cafes, and FaceTiming her dogs from home.

MD-PhD Student

Sara is an MD/PhD student from Saint Louis, Missouri. She completed her undergraduate studies in Biochemistry with an emphasis in Writing at the University of Missouri– Columbia (go Tigers!). After graduating, Sara joined the Vanderbilt MSTP and is now a first-year graduate student in the Human Genetics program. Her science currently focuses on the effect of somatic mutations on cardiovascular disease. Ultimately, Sara plans to become a physician-scientist caring for patients with cardiovascular disease. For fun, Sara enjoys going to the gym, cycling on Nashville’s beautiful greenways, tending to her flower garden, and subjecting anyone who will listen to fun facts about history.

PhD Student

Ariel is a Human Genetics PhD student in the Bick Lab. She holds a M.S. in Bioinformatics from Boston University. Her research focuses on the development of bioinformatics pipelines to identify somatic mosaicism from high-throughput sequencing data. She conducts integrative multi-omics analyses to characterize associations between somatic variation and human disease phenotypes. Outside of the lab, she enjoys spending time with her dog, tending her balcony garden, and relaxing with video games or a good Netflix series.

Lab Manager

Ningning is the Lab Manager of the Bick Lab. She earned her medical degree from the Capital Medical University in China and her masters in molecular biology in the USA. She has worked at Vanderbilt University Medical Center for over 20 years. Before joining the Bick Lab team, she worked in a cardiovascular lab and within the neurology department studying genetic epilepsy.

Cloud Application Developer

Brian is a seasoned cloud computing developer leading the technical lab operations. He specializes in launching genome analysis pipelines at scale across extensive data cohorts, including AllOfUs, UKBioBank, BioVU, and TopMED, on AWS and GCP, leveraging Docker containers for enhanced efficiency. He is also our AWS and GCP administrator, handling everything from security to user account management to storage. He went to MTSU for his undergrad in Mathematics and Computer Science and to Vanderbilt University for his Master’s in Computer Science. Outside of the lab, Brian is an intense bodybuilding enthusiast, with the gym as his second home.

Clinical Research Coordinator

April is a clinical research coordinator in the Bick Lab. She received her BS in Biology from the University of Georgia (go dawgs!), and continued her education by obtaining a Masters degree in Health Science from Meharry Medical College. In her free time, April enjoys playing tennis, listening to music, going to the gym, and learning different languages!

Research Assistant

Micayla is originally from Maryland and earned her BS in Genetics from University of Georgia. She works in the Bick Lab as a research assistant and helps recruit patients for two clinical trials. She hopes to pursue a masters in Genetic Counseling. In her free time, she likes to play pickleball, enjoy live music and jigsaw puzzles!

Research Assistant

Elizabeth is a research assistant in the Bick Lab. She is from Virginia and earned her BS in Health Promotion with a Behavioral Medicine Emphasis from University of Georgia! She contributes to the Bick Lab by recruiting patients and collecting samples for two research studies. She hopes to attend medical school. In her free time, she likes to take yoga classes, try new recipes, and read! 

Research Assistant

Program Manager

Don came to the Bick Lab in the fall of 2024 with many years of experience as a VUMC staff member. He holds a master's degree in biology from the University of Texas at Arlington, where he studied molecular evolution in mammalian transposons.

Assistant Professor, Hematology/Oncology

Ashwin completed medical school training at Kasturba Medical College (KMC), Manipal University in India, and residency training in internal medicine at Icahn School Medicine at Mount Sinai, NYC. He went on to finish a hematology and oncology fellowship at the Cleveland Clinic. He joined Vanderbilt as an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the division of Hematology and Oncology in April 2021. He is passionate about clonal hematopoiesis. For fun, Ashwin enjoys running, 3D printing, collecting fountain pens, and cooking. 

Assistant Professor, Radiation Oncology

Leo is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology at VUMC. He treats pediatric patients and adult patients with CNS tumors with personalized radiation therapy. He is interested in studying clonal hematopoiesis in patients after cancer therapy such as radiation therapy. He is currently a K12 scholar through the Vanderbilt Clinical Oncology Research Career Development Program. He received his medical degree at Harvard Medical School and completed his clinical residency at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City.

Assistant Professor, Cardiovascular Medicine

Brett is originally from Atlanta, Georgia and completed his undergraduate studies in Biology at the University of Georgia. He went on to earn his MD and PhD from the Medical College of Georgia before starting internal medicine residency at Vanderbilt. He completed his clinical cardiology fellowship in July of 2021. He has been an Assistant Professor since 2025. Brett is currently working to understand the mechanisms of cardiovascular injury associated with CHIP using a single cell multiomics approach.

Instructor, Rheumatology

Robert completed his MD and PhD in computational biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He completed residency in Internal Medicine at VUMC and is now an Instructor in Rheumatology at VUMC where he takes care of patients with auto-immune disease. His research focuses on the role of somatic mutations in auto-immune diseases such as VEXAS, vasculitis, and inflammatory arthritis. Outside of the lab, he enjoys biking and jogging in Nashville’s beautiful parks.

Hannah was a Human Genetics PhD student in the Bick lab. She completed her PhD in 2026. Her research in the Bick Lab focused on the genetic architecture of genetically derived immune cell proportions and the genetic outcomes for individuals with inherited variants in tumor suppressors.

Alyssa was a Human Genetics PhD student in the Bick Lab. She completed her PhD in 2025. Her research n the Bick Lab focused on multiomic methods to study cell-type-specific variation in clonal hematopoiesis.

Tara was a Human Genetics PhD student co-mentored between the Bick Lab and the Davis Lab. She completed her PhD in 2024. Her main project in the lab involved uncovering genetic and environmental factors that influence CHIP growth rate.

Internal Medicine Resident

Research Assistant

Undergraduate

Research Assistant

Research Analyst 1, Bick Lab All of Us Coordinator

Clinical Coordinator

Clinical Coordinator

Cloud Application Developer

Rotation Student