Welcome!
Thank you for visiting my website. Within this site, you will find information about me, Armin Bayati, my background, skills, and experiences in cell biology, neuroscience, biochemistry, and microscopy!
My Background
I am a scientist with a Ph.D. in Neuroscience and Cell Biology from McGill University. I am currently a Research Fellow at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital. My work centers on modeling neurodegenerative & infectious diseases using iPSC-derived neurons, molecular & cellular techniques, and advanced imaging to uncover disease pathophysiology and test preclinical compounds designed to reverse degeneration. I have led projects that identified how pathogenic proteins enter/infect cells, uncovered mechanisms involved in neuronal degeneration, developed Python-based tools to analyze live-cell imaging, and helped advance novel small-molecule therapeutics targeting mitochondrial health, viral entry, and cellular aging. With more than 20 peer-reviewed publications, including first-author studies in Nature Neuroscience, Cell Reports, and Journal of Biological Chemistry, my research bridges fundamental discovery with translational drug development.
Work Experience and Education
2023-2024
Research Associate
McGill University
Advanced iPSC-based disease modeling to dissect mechanisms of apoptosis, autophagy, and protein aggregation in neurodegeneration. Developed high-resolution electron microscopy workflows to visualize Lewy body–like inclusions, applied CRISPR/siRNA editing to identify therapeutic targets, and co-authored first-author publications in Nature Neuroscience and published multiple review and protocol papers.
2018-2023
Doctoral Research
McGill University
Doctor of Philosophy (Neuroscience, Cell Biology).
PhD research at the Montreal Neurological Institute focused on modeling neurodegenerative and infectious diseases using human cancer cell lines and iPSC-derived neurons. Work uncovered molecular and cellular mechanisms of protein aggregation, mitochondrial dysfunction, and neuronal vulnerability in Parkinson’s disease, Published the first paper on the internalization of SARS-CoV-2 in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.
2018
Undergraduate Researcher
University of Victoria
Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRA) recipient, to continue research in the Nahirney lab, developing expertise in tissue processing, sectioning, and sample preparation for electron microscopy.
2013-2018
Undergraduate Degree
University of Victoria
Bachelor of Science (Honours) with Distinction. Honours work in the Nahirney lab, exploring the neurodegenerative effects of stroke in mice.
2024 - Present
Harvard Medical School & Mass General Brigham
Research Fellow
Led preclinical testing of novel drug candidates for neurodegeneration and cellular aging, developed high-throughput imaging assays for cytotoxicity, mitophagy, and protein aggregation, and established iPSC differentiation protocols for disease modeling and drug discovery. Created Python-based pipelines for automated live-cell imaging analysis and secured over $1M in competitive research funding to advance therapeutic discovery.