Katia Tarasava
Student Alumni
Materials Science and Engineering

Katia lived in Belarus until she came to the US to attend Colorado College, from where she obtained a BA in Biochemistry in May 2012. After working at Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research and CU Denver for a year, she decided to pursue graduate studies at CU Boulder. She did rotations with Stephanie Bryant (Chemical & Biological Engineering), Robin Dowell (Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology) and Ryan Gill (Chemical & Biological Engineering). She joined the Material Science and Engineering Program and the Gill research lab in 2014. Katia's PhD project focused on developing novel tools for controlling bacterial gene expression and metabolism for production of sustainable materials and chemicals. She was actively engaged in promoting women in STEM through her role of vice president and co-founder of Women in Science and Engineering Group at CU. In her free time Katia enjoys hiking, practicing yoga and playing piano. She graduated in Spring 2019.