Biomedical Sciences Graduate Program - Graduates Since 2011

Graduated PhD Students

2011

Ming-Jin Chang
“Characterization of specific roles for AF4 and Dot1 in transformation mediated by MLL-AF9 leukemic oncoprotein”
March 29^th, Blake, Diane

Aram Krauson
“Mechanisms of Pore Formation in Membranes”
March 31^st, Wimley, William

2012

Marcia Henry
“Probing the Structural and Molecular Basis for Binding in a Monoclonal Antibody”
March 20^th, Blake, Diane

Rebecca Fisher
“Brevetoxin as a Model Analyte for Aquatic Immunosensor Applications”
June 7^th, Blake, Diane

Dorothy Lo
“Characterizing the Regulation of Nucleostemin and Its Interaction with the ARF Tumor Suppressor”
November 1^st, Lu, Hua

2013

Jessica Marks
“The rational combinatorial design of cell-penetrating peptides”
August 15th, Wimley, William

2014

Tysheena Charles
“Identification of B and T cell epitopes Using recombinant proteins”
May 30^th, Landry, Samuel

Hussain Badani
“Understanding the mechanism of action of Flufirvitide-3, a peptide based inhibitor of influenza virus”
July 17^th, Wimley, William

Hong-Nam Nguyen
“Modulation of disulfide-stabilized structure affects the helper T-cell response to HIV gp120”
July 22^nd, Landry, Samuel

2015

Erin Henninger
“Understanding Human DNA Polymerase Epsilon Functions: Cancer- Associated Mutator Variants, Proofreading Defects and Post-Translational Modifications”
March 9^th, Pursell, Zachary

Yue Sun 
“Methylated phenanthrene as a petrogenic marker: toxicology assessment and engineering antibody reagents for environmental detection”
October 27^th, Blake, Diane

2016

Blake Rust
“Ectopic CD4+ T Cell Epitopes in Variant Proteins: Structural Influences on Immunodominance and Phenotype”
January 4^th, Landry, Samuel

Alexandra Goksenin*
“Contributions of Proofreading Deficiencies in Human DNA Polymerase epsilon to Genomic Instability”
March 15^th, Pursell, Zachary

Courtney Standlee
“Gas6 Alters Mammary Gland Development And Breast Cancer Progression”
July 21^st, Machado, Heather

Wenjuan Liao
“CCDC3: A new p63 target gene involved in regulation of liver lipid metabolism”
November 9^th, Lu, Hua

2017

Emily Carron
“Macrophages in Breast Cancer Progression”
March 17^th, Machado, Heather

Taylor Fuselier
“Spontaneous membrane translocating peptides: Characterization of common motifs and design of novel screens for delivery of bioactive cargoes”
September 20^th, Wimley, William

William (Berkeley) Kauffman
“Synthetic molecular evolution of hybrid cell penetrating peptides that efficiently deliver peptide and peptide nucleic acid cargoes to cells”
October 25^th, Wimley, William

Charles Starr
“Development of novel antimicrobial peptides with improved hemocompatibility through combinatorial library screening and rational sequence engineering”
October 26^th, Wimley, William

2018

Daniel Nguyen*
“Novel Regulation of Tumor Suppressor p73 by Nerve Growth Factor Receptor
April 3^rd, Lu, Hua

Karl Hodel
“Investigation of human DNA polymerase epsilon mutants in cancer: Mutagenic capacity, mutation spectrum and influence of mismatch repair correction”
May 31^st, Pursell, Zachary

Grace Jairo
“Engineering Recombinant Antibodies for Immunosensors: Incorporating Peptide Tags for Gold Nanoparticle Binding and Incorporating the 12F6 Antibody in a Lateral Flow Device for Detection of Uranium in Groundwater”
November 7^th, Blake, Diane

2019

Sonia Rao
“BH3 Mimetics Induce Chemotherapyinduced Cancer Cells and Improve Response”
August 12^th, Jackson, James

2020

Shantanu Guha
“The Ebola virus delta-peptides are enterotoxic viroporins in vivo and potentially druggable targets”
March 25^th, Wimley, William

Daniel Moss
“Antigen Stability Influences Processing Efficiency and Immunogenicity of Pseudomonas Exotoxin Domain III and Ovalbumin”
March 26^th, Landry, Samuel

2021

J.O. (Joie) Olayiwola
“Adult mice lacking Brca1 are normal and viable but have hypersensitivity to DNA interstrand crosslinks”
March 29^th, Jackson, James

Yujue Chen
“Investigate the Mechanisms in the regulation of centromere-kinetochore network”
April 1^st, Liu, Hong

Jenisha Ghimire
“Use of rational engineering and combinatorial library screening to enhance synthetically evolved antimicrobial peptides” 
April 9^th, Wimley, William

Qian Zhang
“Investigate the mechanism of how sister-chromatid separation is regulated in mitosis”
April 13^th, Liu, Hong

Vivian Park
“Mouse models of DNA polymerase epsilon hypermutant tumor development”
April 14^th, Pursell, Zachary

Deeptiman Chatterjee
“Characterization of Epithelial Dysplasia at Single-cell Resolution in The Drosophila Ovarian Model” 
December 2^nd, Deng, Wu-Min

Nini Zhou
“The Conserved Effects of ESCRT on Mammalian Retrotransposition”
December 20^th, Han, Jeffrey

2022

Eric Wu
“Macromolecular cargo delivery into the cytosol of live cells using pH-triggered pore-forming peptides”
May 13^th, Wimley, William

Meijuan “Selina” Sun
“The Genome Remembers: Using Mutation Studies to Understand DNA Polymerase and APOBEC Functions” 
June 2^nd, Pursell, Zachary

Lauren Swientoniewski
“The Effects of Aluminosilicate Microstructures on Crude Oil Biodegradation Using Model Marine Organisms”
June 30^th, Machado, Heather

Lu Yang
“Regulation of Centromere Function”
July 6^th, Liu, Hong

Caitlin Burke
“Tumor-derived C/EBPb is essential for mammary tumorigenesis”
October 18^th, Machado, Heather

Leisheng Sun
“Triggered cargo release from liposomes using membrane-selective nano pore-forming peptides”
November 22^nd, Wimley William

2023

Michelle Rojo
“C/EBPβ deletion in macrophages alters signaling to mammary epithelial cells during development and tumor progression”
January 11^th, Machado, Heather

Ashkan Shahbandi*
“Breast cancer cells survive chemotherapy by activating robust, parallel programs of immune checkpoint expression that can be targeted with immunotherapy”
March 8^th, Jackson, James

Ryan Ferrie*
“Rapid delivery of bioactive, membrane-impermeable peptides into cancer cells by synthetically evolved membrane active peptides”
April 3^rd, Wimley, William

Xuanming (Troy) Zhang
“L1 Retrotransposon Insertion Profiling in Mice”
April 25^th, Han, Jeffrey

2024

Rajitha Udakara Sampath Hemba-Waduge
“Interplay between Wnt Signaling and the Bithorax Complex in Drosophila”
April 10^th, Ji, Jun-yuan

Alex Mrozek
“Evaluating the Unfolded Protein Response Regulator GRP78 as a Therapeutic Target in Disease”
September 5^th, Lu, Hua/Park, Hee-Won

Femke Aan
“Elucidating a Novel Mechanism of R-Ras Activation in Response to Fluid Shear Stress to Regulate Endothelial Permeability in Health and Disease”
December 4^th, Matter, Michelle

2025

Juliet Strauss*
“Going Greek: Which TLS polymerase is the most “high value”?”
April 22^nd, Pursell, Zachary

*MD-PhD Student
Italics - Mentor