Jennifer D. Lewis

Dr. Jennifer Lewis is an Adjunct Associate Professor and Principal Investigator at the Plant Gene Expression Center, USDA and in the Department of Plant & Microbial Biology, UC Berkeley. She received her Honors Bachelor's in Arts & Science and Biology from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario and her PhD from Cornell University in Ithaca, NY. She carried out postdoctoral training at the University of Toronto in Toronto, Ontario.

As a PhD student, Jennifer became interested in plant-pathogen interactions and identified host proteins that promoted viral cell-to-cell movement. During her post-doctoral training, Jennifer began working on type III effector proteins from the plant pathogen Pseudomonas syringae, which infects a wide range of plant species. Her lab is interested in how bacteria manipulate the host to promote virulence and how hosts can defend themselves against infection.