Student Highlights and Congratulations

August 2022

Congratulations to Anna Gretzinger, who received a Corrine F. Resta Endowed Doctoral Student Award in the amount of $10,000. Well done, Anna!
 

July 2022

Congratulations to Alex Haimbaugh for successfully defending her Ph.D. thesis!
 

May 2022

Congratulations to Pharmacology Ph.D. student, Anna Gretzinger, for being selected as an NIH-funded CBI scholar for 2022-2023. 
 

April 2022

Dr. Carly Martin, who defended her Ph.D. thesis March 3rd, has received the Leonard N. Simons Award for Exemplary Research and Scholarly Achievement. The Leonard N. Simons Award for Exemplary Research and Scholarly Achievement is awarded at the annual event to a Cancer Biology student who has distinguished him- or herself in scholarship and leadership. For more information, please click here.
 

April 2022

Congratulations to incoming Pharmacology Ph.D. student, Mathew Prifti, for being awarded the Dean's Diversity Fellowship!

The Dean's Diversity Fellowship is designed to attract new doctoral students to Wayne State University. The fellowship covers three academic years during which fellows have no service requirements.
 

April 2022

Congratulations to Ph.D student Sean Johnson for successfully completing his Ph.D. defense!
 

January 2022

Favia Nixon was featured in an issue of ACS Student Magazine! Check out the article here! 


December 2021

Congratulations to Favia Nixon for being selected as a recipient of an ABRCMS 2021 Presentation Award at the ABRCMS meeting! Favia is an undergraduate student working in Dr. Ray Mattingly's lab. 
 

November 2021

 

 

 

Congratulations to Pharmacology Ph.D. student, Samantha Heldman for winning best graduate student poster at the October 15th Regional Chapter of the Society of Toxicology Meeting. Her poster was titled: Endocrine Disrupting Activities Associated with Liquid Crystal Monomers and their Mixtures. Samantha is a member of Dr. Chris Kassotis' lab. 

More information about the meeting can be found here.
 

October 2021

Congratulations to Carly Martin, a Cancer Biology Ph.D. student in Dr. Karin List's lab! She won first prize for her talk at The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB) meeting on "Serine Proteases in Pericellular Proteolysis and Signaling ", October 28-30, 2021. More information about the meeting can be found here.


September 2021

Congratulations to Ph.D. student Danielle Meyer for successfully defending her dissertation! 


September 2021

Thank you to Ph.D. Student Laimar Garmo for helping organize the annual Pharmacology/Cancer Biology picnic. 
 

July 2021

Congratulations to the following Pharmacology Ph.D. Students for their participation in the 47th Annual Pharmacology Colloquium!

  • Alex Haimbaugh and mentor, Dr. Tracie Baker: first-place award for oral presentation 
  • Katherine Roth and her mentor, Dr. Mike Petriello: poster presentation

See more information about the 47th Annual Pharmacology Colloquium here!
 

September 2020

Two papers have just been published with three students each trained/training in our department-- Fausto Varela (former Pharmacology student), Andrew Murray (former Cancer Biology student), and Carly Martin (current Cancer Biology student). 


February 2020

 


Ph.D. student Demi Nuga and advisor Dr. Anna deCarvalho's application to the NCI for an F31 fellowship was recommended for funding (and on its first trial)!


January 2020


Danielle Meyer (PHC program) was first author on a paper published in Chemosphere, an international journal designed for the publication of original communications and review articles. Her paper was entitled
"Developmental exposure to Pb2+ induces transgenerational changes to zebrafish brain transcriptome." The paper can be found here

 

 

 

 

 

September 2019


Carly Martin (CB program) won 1st prize for the poster presentation, The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Special Symposium on Serine Proteases in Pericellular Proteolysis and Signaling, Potomac, MD, Sept 12-15, 2019. "Characterization and targeting of TMPRSS13 in breast and colorectal cancer." Mentor: Karin List

 

 

 

June 2019
Carly Martin (CB program) and Danielle Meyer (PHC program) won awards for their presentations at the 46th Annual Pharmacology Research Colloquium at the University of Toledo.

February 2019
Fausto Varela (PHC program) has defended his dissertation entitled "The role of the cell-surface protease TMPRSS13 in colorectal cancer". Dr. Varela has taken a postdoctoral position at Kansas University Medical Center with Dr. Freudenthal.

December 2018
Danielle Meyer (PHC program) has been awarded an individual F31 predoctoral fellowship for her dissertation work in Dr. Tracie Baker's lab.

November 2018
Sarah Dubaisi (PHC Program) has defended her dissertation entitled "Cytosolic Sulfotransferase Expression and Regulation in Developing Human Liver"

April 2018
Ethan Brock (CB program) won the first-place award for his oral presentation at the Cancer Biology Graduate Program's annual research symposium

Read more: https://www.med.wayne.edu/news/2018/04/10/cancer-biology-graduate-programs-annual-research-symposium-showcases-student-research-leonard-n-simons-award-winner/

February 2018
Joanna Sutton (PHC program) has defended her dissertation entitled "The Influence of Protein Context on Polyglutamine Toxicity in Spinocerebellar Ataxia Type 3"

December 2017
Fausto Varela (PHC program) has been awarded an individual F31 predoctoral fellowship for his work Dr. Karin List's lab.

https://www.med.wayne.edu/news/2017/12/08/graduate-student-studying-cell-surface-protease-in-cancer-wins-two-year-nih-fellowship/

September 2017
Ethan Brock (CB program) has been awarded an F31 individual predoctoral fellowship to pursue his dissertation research in Ray Mattingly's lab.

https://www.med.wayne.edu/news/2017/09/12/national-institutes-of-health-awards-doctoral-students-brock-guastella-and-shaik-competitive-f31-fellowships/

July 2017
Johnathan Diedrich (
CB program) has defended his dissertation and accepted a postdoctoral position with Dr. Daniel Savic at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital

Gorica Ristic (PHC program) has defended her dissertation and accepted a postdoctoral position with Dr. Andrew Lieberman at University of Michigan.

June 2017
Ethan Brock (CB program) won an award for his presentation at the Karmanos Cancer Institute's Molecular Therapeutics annual research symposium.  

https://www.med.wayne.edu/news/2017/06/30/symposium-showcases-cancer-biology-programs-student-projects-celebrates-advances-in-molecular-therapeutics/

Daniel Huereca (PHC program) has defended his dissertation "Activity Dependent Changes in Functional and Morphological Characteristics Among Presympathetic Neurons of the RVLM"

April 2017
Jonathan Diedrich (CB program) was spotlighted at the Cancer Biology research symposium student-led discoveries and innovations.  https://www.med.wayne.edu/news/2017/04/13/cancer-biology-research-symposium-spotlights-student-led-discoveries-and-innovations/

Wen Qu, PhD alumna of the PHC program, has published a portion of her dissertation work in Frontiers in Genetics

February 2017
Joanna Miller (PHC program) has published a first-author paper entitle "Interaction of the polyglutamine protein ataxin-3 with Rad23 regulates toxicity in Drosophila models of Spinocerebellar Ataxia Type 3".  Human Molecular Genetics.  A link to the publication is provided  https://academic.oup.com/hmg/article/26/8/1419/2965932

Richard Arkwight (CB program) has published a first-author review article in Expert Opinion on Drug Discovery.

January 2017

Jonathan Diedrich (CB program) has been awarded an F31 individual predoctoral fellowship to pursue his dissertation research in Izabela Podgorski's lab. Read more.
 

 

 

 

December 2016

Seema Shah (CB program) has defended her doctoral dissertation under the mentorship of Ray Mattingly. 
 

 

 

 

 

October 2016

Seema Shah (CB program) has been recognized for her internship work in an academic-industrial partnership with a small biotechnology firm, Life Magnetics, Inc.

 

 


 

Andrew Murray (CB program) and Fausto Varela (PHC program) have jointly published a review in Biological Chemistry with their mentor, Karin List.

September 2016

Joanna Miller (PHC program) has received a travel award to the American Society for Cell Biology Meeting. She has received a second year of funding for her individual Predoctoral Fellowship (F31) from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

 

 

 

Arko Sen (PHC program) has defended his doctoral dissertation under the mentorship of Doug Ruden. He has begun a fellowship at Salk Institute of Biological Sciences, La Jolla, California, in the Integrative Biosciences laboratory with Graham McVicker.

 

 

 

Wen Qu (PHC program) has defended her doctoral dissertation under the mentorship of Doug Ruden.

Gina Zoratti, PhD alumna of the CB program and individual predoctoral F31 fellowship awardee who completed her dissertation in Karin List's lab, has recently published a portion of that work in Oncotarget.

Andrew Murray (CB program) has had a first-author review published in Biological Chemistry

August 2016

Ryan Jackson (undergraduate student, IMSD program) has won his third award in three years at the 5th Annual Wayne State University Summer Undergraduate Research Symposium.

 

 

 

Sarah Dubaisi (PHC program) has had a first-author paper published in Molecular Pharmacology.

 

 

 

 

Jonathan Diedrich (CB program) has had a first-author paper published in Oncotarget.

 

 

 


Thank you to Joanna Miller for co-organizing the great picnic to welcome the new students to the PHC and CB programs.

July 2016
Daniel Huereca (PHC program) has received a second year of funding for his individual Predoctoral Fellowship from the American Heart Association, Midwest Affiliate

June 2016

Joanna Miller (PHC program) and Gorica Ristic (PHC program) both won first prizes for their presentations at the 42nd Annual Pharmacology Colloquium for Michigan State University, University of Michigan, University of Toledo, and Wayne State University that was held this year in Ann Arbor.

 

 

 

Ethan Brock (CB program) and Jonathan Diedrich (CB program) have successfully competed for reappointment to the T32 training program in cancer biology.

 

 


 

May 2016

Rebecca Farr (PHC program) has had a first-author review published in Biochimica Biophysica Acta.

 

 

 

 

April 2016
Gorica Ristic (PHC program) has had a first-author paper published in Journal of Biological Chemistry.

Jonathan Diedrich (CB program) and Andrew Murray (CB program) won first place and second place, respectively, oral presentations awards at the 6th Annual Cancer Biology Research Symposium.