Ankit is a first-year graduate student in the Chemistry department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is interested in applying single cell genomics technologies to understand the role of mechanical and biochemical pathways associated with human pluripotent stem cell differentiation and cancer plasticity. Ankit grew up in Kolkata (City of Joy) in West Bengal, India. He graduated from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata with a dual B.S. – M.S. degree in Chemistry in 2021. During his education, he worked with Prof. Lucio Frydman at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel for a couple of years on computational methods in NMR and MRI method development. Fascinated by the intricacies of nanotechnology, he worked on single-molecule spectroscopy of perovskite nanowires for his masters’ dissertation. With a drive to apply chemical methods to understand biological systems, Ankit decided to move to the (significantly) colder climate of Boston to pursue a PhD in Chemistry at MIT. Interested in single-cell genomics and molecular biology, Ankit joined the Shalek and Kiessling labs to investigate the role of mechanical and chemical stimuli on human pluripotent stem cell differentiation and cancer plasticity. Outside research, Ankit is deeply interested in art forms that involve storytelling. Currently, he is trying his hand in photography and occasional story writing.