Symposium

Click here to read about our most recent symposium held on Wednesday, April 23, 2025.

Check out the photos from this event.

On April 25, 2025, we held our annual research symposium to give us the opportunity to showcase our research, network, and build our community. This year we identified the field of artificial intelligence (AI) and its fast spreading to our daily life as a major and imminent groundbreaking changing game for humanity. We have been given the privilege to host Dr. Nawar Shara as our official 2024 GU Postdoctoral research symposium keynote speaker, who will talk more about this specific topic and its impact in research and our career.

The Oral Presentations featured the following 6 speakers:

• • Dr. Shuaijun Li , Department of Physics

  • Dr. Maria Snegovaya, CERES

  • Dr. Barwendé Sané, Environmental Justice Program/The Earth Commons

  • Dr. Jiaxiang Tao, Oncology

  • Dr. Willian Lazarini Lopes, Department of Pharmacology & Physiology

  • Dr. Veerupaxagouda Patil, Department of biochemistry and Molecular biology and Cellular Biology

Our Keynote Speaker :

Dr Nawar Shara

Associate Professor of Medicine, Georgetown University Director of the Center of Biostatistics, Informatics, Data Science, MedStar Health Research Institute

Founding director of AI CoLab

The afternoon session presented 12 posters from the following fellows:

• • Katarina E AuBuchon, Department of Oncology

  • Justin Demmerle, Department of Oncology

  • Nithya Gajendran, Department of Oncology

  • Sadaf Haderzdeh, GUMC

  • Maisha Huq, Department of Oncology

  • Meghali Joshi, Department of Oncology

  • Juntae Kwon, Department of Oncology

  • Rahul Patil, Department of biochemistry and Molecular biology and Cellular Biology

  • Danyel Smith, Department of Oncology, Cancer Prevention and Control

  • Manasa Suresh, Department of Oncology

  • Oswaldo Villena, Earth Commons Institute

  • Jordan Walter, Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center

For more details, read out Abstract Handbook. 

Our Annual Postdoc Symposium was held on April 27th with curated sessions of oral and poster presentations from postdoctoral fellow. This year our Keynote Speaker was Dr. Jeanine Turner, author of 'Being Present' and Professor at Georgetown University. 

ORAL PRESENTATIONS OVERVIEW

Simon Kaeppeli, PhD

In silico drug discovery reveals novel therapy for glioblastoma combining Casein Kinase 2 inhibitor CX-4945 and Exportin-1 inhibitor Selinexor

Jiaxiang Tao, PhD

Genomic Studies of Estrone and Estradiol Activated ERα/NFκB Shows Estrone Preferentially Activates Immune and Cancer Stem Cell Gene Targets

Chandra Char, PhD, MPH

Hearing loss & Cancer: Assessing the moderation of racial identity using the National Institutes of Health All of Us Dataset

Ayelet Gordon-Tapiero, PhD

Fact and Friction: Mandating Friction to Fight False News

Caroline R. Efird, PhD, MPH

“We Grew Up in the Church”: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Black and White Rural Residents’ Perceptions of Mental Health

Oswaldo Villena, PhD

How environmental, geographic, and socio-demographic indicators influence malaria prevalence

POSTER PRESENTATIONS OVERVIEW

Tyler Walter, MD, PhD

A CRISPR Screen for Epigenetic Genes to Enhance CAR-T Cell Activity in Glioblastoma

Irene Sanchez Brualla, PhD

Phenobarbital does not worsen the effect of neonatal hypoxia on hippocampal LTP in rats

Manasa Suresh, PhD

Inhibition of HDAC6 and HDAC11 has opposite effects on inflammation and the modulation of the functional phenotype of macrophages in the tumor microenvironment

Nithya Gajendran, PhD

Targeting HDAC6 improves innate antitumor immunity by modulating the CD47/SIRPα phagocytic pathway in macrophages

Tsui Pifen, PhD

Novel roles of non-coding RNAs as transcription co-factors

Kristin Paterson, PharmD

The Evaluation of Social Determinant of Health Screening Practices in Medstar Health Primary Care Facilities in DC, Maryland and Virginia

Anna Jermakowicz, PhD

Pharmacotranscriptomics predict medulloblastoma subgroup-specific therapeutics

Kelly Martin, PhD

Rapid auditory and linguistic processing requires the left planum temporale

Read the abstract book for complete list of abstracts.