Kozul honored by Washington University

Keri–Lyn Kozul, a postdoctoral research fellow at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, received the 2025 Elliot L. Elson Education and Training Award from the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics. This award supports educational opportunities for outstanding students and postdoctoral trainees in the Department. The award is named for Elliot L. Elson, an emeritus professor at Wash U who developed fluorescence correlation spectroscopy and fluorescence recovery after photobleaching, now standard tools for studying molecular transport and reaction kinetics in cells.

Keri–Lyn Kozul

Kozul joined the lab of Natalie Niemi in 2024 after earning her bachelor’s degree and Ph.D. from the University of Queensland, Australia. She is currently characterizing novel protein phosphatase targeting coenzyme Q7 hydroxylase, or PPTC7, mutations that lead to mitochondrial disease, to design potential therapeutic approaches.

Her doctoral research uncovered molecular mechanisms underlying Mitochondrial DNA Depletion Syndrome 13, a mitochondrial disease caused by mutations in F-Box and leucine-rich repeat protein 4. She showed that the loss-of-function that leads to excessive mitochondrial removal via dysregulated mitophagy receptors. She is currently characterizing novel PPTC7 mutations that lead to mitochondrial disease, with the goal of designing potential therapeutic approaches.

In addition to the Elson Award, Kozul received a W.M. Keck Postdoctoral Fellowship and The United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation UMDF Postdoctoral Fellowship and was inducted into the Edward A. Bouchet Honors Society in 2025.