About the Authors

Zhenxia Qin

Affiliation Department of Molecular Biology & Biochemistry, University of California Irvine, Irvine, California, United States of America

Rachel S. Kaufman

Affiliation Department of Molecular Biology & Biochemistry, University of California Irvine, Irvine, California, United States of America

Rana N. Khoury

Affiliation Department of Molecular Biology & Biochemistry, University of California Irvine, Irvine, California, United States of America

Mitri K. Khoury

Affiliation Department of Molecular Biology & Biochemistry, University of California Irvine, Irvine, California, United States of America

Dana W. Aswad

dwaswad@uci.edu

Affiliation Department of Molecular Biology & Biochemistry, University of California Irvine, Irvine, California, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: ZQ DWA. Performed the experiments: ZQ RSK RNK MKK. Analyzed the data: ZQ RSK RNK DWA. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: DWA. Wrote the manuscript: ZQ DWA.