Stefania Kapsetaki

Cancer researcher and pianist

Did you know that the BIGGEST living thing on earth is a fungus? It’s a whopping 4 square miles in size and it’s slimy, a bit gross and a lot amazing! The Humungous Fungus is made up of lots of cells, making it a Multi (many) Cellular (cells) Organism (living thing). Lots of things around you, and in fact you yourself, are a multicellular organism. Have you ever stopped to wonder how something as complex as a human came about?

These sorts of questions have made me very interested in finding out more about multicellular organisms. Like why do they exist and how did they evolve?? So I studied at the University of Oxford, exploring super slimy green algae! I grew lots of single celled green algae and one morning, I decided to add a predator into the mix. The predator started eating the algae, it was like a slimy MASSACRE! But then, the algae started sticking to one another forming gloopy blobs! These multicellular blobs were too big for the predator to eat so the multicellular blobs won! It was a victory for team work and a victory for slime! and got me thinking that surviving a predator might be important for the first step in the evolution of multicellular life!

Now, I’m researching cancer in lots of different animals at Arizona State University. I love playing the piano and have been so lucky to be able to do both science and music in my career. Find out more about both my music and my science by following me on Instagram @kapsetakitwins or Twitter @steffiKapsetaki ! I’ll keep you updated! Farewell and, most importantly, follow your dreams!

Stefania is our Sublime Slime box champion.