For about 20 years, UC Berkeley bioengineering professor Dan Fletcher has hosted a spring art show featuring works from members of his lab - an exercise in creativity as much as it is an escape from the demands of research. Since 2018, the Ground State Ensemble (GSE), a group of Fletcher Lab Ph.D. students and postdocs, has created silly dance theater pieces for the show that are loosely based on their research.
The 2024 GSE performance was built around the dissertation of Amanda Meriwether, a longtime ensemble member who graduated with a Ph.D. in bioengineering in 2024. Titled miRNA Detection with CRISPR-Cas13a Using a Split Guide RNA - AKA Mirna Goes to the Party - the piece used the metaphor of trying to fit in at a party to depict the use of the protein Cas13a in detecting microRNA for molecular diagnostics and discovery. In the prologue, the cast summarizes Meriwether’s research in a snappy chorus-like song. Scene 1 introduces the main characters, the Cas13a proteins and the RNA, via a 1980s aerobics-style dance party. One of the RNA, Mirna (short for microRNA), doesn’t fit in. Scene 2 shows the cast, now dressed up as “The Scientists,” building a lab machine, then engineering an RNA to seek out Mirna and unite her with a Cas13a protein. In Scene 4, a raucous congo line ensues.
Dissertation by Amanda Meriwether. Directed by Amy Cranch. Ensemble: Joana Cabrera, Aymeric Chorlay, Caitlin Cornell, Andres Dextre, María Díaz de León Derby, Jared Huzar, Deepak Krishnamurthy (on drums), Amanda Meriwether, Zaina Moussa, Carlos Ng, and Rosalind Phelps. Video by Sepe Rafiei.