Tatiana Kuzmenko
Laboratory Support Associate, Biology Department
310.338.5776
tkuzmenk@lmu.edu
Life Sciences 216
Tatiana Kuzmenko works closely with the General Biology lab instructor contributing to the practical side of the experiments and exercises Freshmen perform in BIOL111 and BIOL112. She helps to write manuals and design other supporting materials; provide training, guidance and feedback for the Teaching Assistants who are running the labs. Tatiana oversees the whole course, collecting and implementing feedback, introducing and troubleshooting new technology and educational approaches aimed to improve the student experience. She is interested in collecting and analyzing scientific and educational research data that is generated in the labs. Tatiana enjoys mentoring student workers as they master their skills in preparing the materials and setting up the labs. She admits it takes a team of laboratory technicians, teaching assistants and instructors to run a course like this successfully and she is excited to be a part of this group.
Tatiana has two Master’s degrees, one is in Evolutionary Biology from Moscow State University, Russia where she studied differences in social structure and individual behavior preferences of ants in a colony; and the second - in Molecular Biology from University of Southern California where she studied molecular mechanisms of recognition behavior and aggression in ants. She is interested in neuroscience and molecular basics of behavior, learning and memory in animals and humans.
In her free time Tatiana enjoys green tea, reading, doing yoga, dancing, surfing, going on adventures and camping with her friends and family. Also, in order to confuse people, she often introduces herself as Tanya because in Russia it’s the same name as Tatiana.