For about 20 years, UC Berkeley bioengineering professor Dan Fletcher has been uplifting the creative side of researchers. Each spring, he hosts an art showcase featuring works from members of his lab as an exercise in creativity, community and fun. This annual showcase inspired a group of Fletcher Lab Ph.D. students and postdocs to establish the Ground State Ensemble in 2018 as a way to create dance theater pieces for the show that are loosely based on their research. This year’s performance was built around the dissertation of recent grad Amanda Meriwether Ph.D. ’24. Titled “miRNA Detection with CRISPR-Cas13a Using a Split Guide RNA” — or “Mirna Goes to the Party” — the piece uses the metaphor of trying to fit in at a party to illustrate the role of the protein Cas13a in detecting microRNA for molecular diagnostics and discovery.  🔗 See the full performance at gobears.me/4dtoHhs or at the link in our bio. #UCBerkeley #Research