Page 25 - CBAC Newsletter 2017

A conversation with

Jiajing Xu & Smiruthi Ramasubramanian

Ph.D. Candidates

Department of Biomedical Engineering
Yoram Rudy Laboratory

Cardiac Excitation and Arrhythmias

While sitting at the table fiddling around with a deck of cards in Professor Yoram
Rudy’s Laboratory, Jiajing Xu and Smiruthi Ramasubramanian spoke of how they
met:

Smiruthi Ramasubramanian: On my first day, she [Jiajing Xu] was already here,
she had already interned in Dr. Cui’s lab and this was her second internship in
the summer and I came the fall of that year, in 2009.

Jiajing Xu: I remember that in the week that you had decided to start your third
rotation, I was preparing for my qualifying exam. I haven’t formally started but
already decided to stay in the Rudy Lab.

Ramasubramanian: It was my third rotation.

Who did you rotate with before?

Ramasubramanian: I rotated with Dr. [Joseph] O’Sullivan and Dr. [Rohit] Pappu

What made you come here?

Ramasubramanian: I came here to work with Dr. Pappu. I found his work with
disordered proteins very interesting.

So how did you end up in the Rudy Lab then?

L-R: Smiruthi Ramasubramanian, Ramasubramanian: Chuckling. You know destiny? That was what it was! Because
Jiajing Xu during that summer of 2009, Hadas [Dr. Yoram Rudy’s wife] volunteered with
the international students’ organization. She offered to have a cultural exchange
dinner. It was me and another southeast Asian boy. We were invited to her house
and Dr. Rudy came to pick me up. On the way, we started talking, and I said that I
was really interested in proteins and I did not know of any other lab that does

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