Nour-SaÏda Harzallah ‘21 is a triple major in CIS, Physics, and Molecular Biology and Biochemistry. She grew up in the coastal city of Monastir in Tunisia and came to Wesleyan after graduating from Pioneer High School of Monastir. She works as a Research Assistant in Professor Francis Starr’s lab. Never having felt like her interests fit within a single discipline, Nour-SaÏda appreciated the CIS major’s emphasis on conducting scientific research informed by different fields of knowledge.
Nour-SaÏda’s work in the Starr lab lies at the interface of Physics and Molecular Biology, a project that involves studying the bacteriophage phi29. The virus uses different methods of DNA packaging and ejection to store DNA within the viral shell, and to infect host cells. Nour-SaÏda uses molecular dynamics simulations to study the mechanisms of those packaging and ejection processes. After graduating from Wesleyan, Nour-SaÏda will spend two years working as a Research Assistant in the Bhatia lab at MIT while deciding which bioengineering subfield she would like to specialize in.