Kavya earned her Bachelor's degree in Biotechnology from St. Xavier's College, Ahmedabad,India, followed by Master's in Biotechnology  as a gold medalist from the Institute of Advanced Research (IAR), Gandhinagar, India. Her research journey spanned across tumor immunology, autoimmunity, and infectious immunology.

 

With growing interest in immunology, Kavya went on to complete her Master of Medical Sciences in Immunology at Harvard Medical School, where she joined Dr. Vijay Kuchroo's lab at the Gene Lay Institute for Immunology and Inflammation at Brigham and Women’s Hospital for her thesis research. There, she optimized an in vitro culture-based platform with an aim to build an atlas of enteric neuronal responses to inflammatory cues and became increasingly interested in neuroimmune interactions.

 

Kavya joined the Stevens Lab as a Research Associate II in August 2026. She will be working with Dr. Jordan Doman and Dr. Constanze Depp, contributing to the direction of iPSC-derived microglia, functional genomics, and CRISPR screen-based approaches to understand microglial function in neuropsychiatric disease, neurodegeneration, and aging. Ultimately, she hopes to bridge the gap between the peripheral and central nervous systems through the lens of immune signaling.

 

Outside the lab, Kavya has trekked to Everest Base Camp, practices Indian classical dance (Kathak), enjoys baking and painting (especially glow-in-the-dark paintings), and loves exploring science beyond her own field.