Graduate News

IPID welcomes new Graduate Students, 2024

From left: Matthew White, Rachel Soukup, Jason Franklin, Kamryn Reynolds, Natalia Zepeda Espinoza, Jessica Ware (IGPBS) and Clinton Osei.

Congratulations to Pathology and Microbiology award winners 2022 - 2023!

Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology Outstanding Graduate Student Educator Award, 2022-2023
Amanda Brinkworth, PhD

Best presentation at the Graduate Student Research Seminar
1st Place: Ryan Singh, 2^nd Place: Natalie Sturd

Outstanding Performance in PAMM 992 - Advanced Topics
Monisha Alla and Itidal Reslane

“Pathology and Microbiology Cash Award for Excellence” demonstrated at the Midwest Student Biomedical Research Forum (MSBRF)
The Best Oral Presentation: Dylan George
The Best Poster Presentation: Gabrielle Watson

Congratulations to Pathology and Microbiology award winners 2020 - 2021!

Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology Outstanding Graduate Student Educator Award, 2020-2021
McKenzie Lehman, PhD

  
(McKenzie Lehman, PhD and Ope Oyewole, IPID graduate student representative)

1st Place – Best presentation at the Graduate Student Research Seminar  
Nicholas Wood

2nd Place – Best presentation at the Graduate Student Research Seminar 
Matthew Romero

Outstanding Performance in PAMM 992 - Advanced Topics

Fall 2020 Ray Widner

Spring 2021 Catherine Vornholt

“Pathology and Microbiology Cash Award for Excellence” demonstrated at the Midwest Student Biomedical Research Forum (MSBRF) 

The Best Oral Presentation: Itidal Reslane

The Best Poster Presentation: Enakshi Roy

Congratulations to Abdul, Raina, Matthew, Insha, Austin and Yongji for successfully completing the Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology and Immunology, Pathology and Infectious Disease (IPID) Graduate Program. We are so very proud of you all!

Grad students spend Saturday Volunteering

From left to right: Aaron Jensen (Oulette Lab grad student), Nick Wood (Oulette Lab grad student), Ryan Singh (Thomas Lab grad student), Blake Bertrand (Kielian Lab grad student), Matt Romero (Carabeo Lab grad student), Ray Widner (Rucks Lab grad student), Camille Riffaud (Rucks Lab post-doc), Jane Morwitzer (Reid Lab grad student), Enakshi Roy (Reid Lab grad student), Abenaya Muralidharan (Reid Lab post-doc).

Students in the Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology and IPID Graduate Program volunteered their time Saturday April 24, 2021 helping the City Sprouts North, a community garden non-profit organization focused on sustainable and equitable food systems.  The group also involved a couple Postdoctoral Trainees from our department.  Nice job people!   

Congratulations to Blake Bertrand!

Blake Bertrand, is a third year PhD student has been awarded the American Heart Association Predoctoral Fellowship Training grant for his proposal entitled "Elucidating myeloid-derived suppressor cell fate during S. aureus biofilm infection".  Blake is a student in the Kielian Laboratory. His work is focused on studying the S. aureus metabolic changes during chronic orthopedic biofilm infections, and how this influences the host immune response.

Congratulations to Pathology and Microbiology award winners 2019-2020! 

Pathology and Microbiology Outstanding Graduate Student Educator Award, 2019-2020
Geoffrey M. Thiele, PhD

1st Place – Best presentation at the Graduate Student Research Seminar
Matthew Martens

Dr. Rakesh Singh presenting award to Matthew Martens

2nd Place - Best presentation at the Graduate Student Research Seminar
Nicholas Wood (presented via Zoom)

“Pathology and Microbiology Cash Award for Excellence” demonstrated at the Midwest Student Biomedical Research Forum (MSBRF)
Insha Mushtaq

Dr. Rakesh Singh presenting award to Insha Mushtaq

Incoming Graduate Students, 2019

Welcome the new IPID graduate students!

(From left): Ray Widner, Kabita Pandey, Kathleen Hecker, Enakshi Roy, Catherine Vornholt, Caitlin Molczyk, Connor Rose, Paran Goel, Valerie Fousek and Srijanee Das.  Not in picture: Sunil Palani and Matthew Romero

Congratulations to Pathology and Microbiology award winners!

(from left):  Dr. Rakesh Singh (Program Chair), Dr. R. Lee Mosley (Program Co-Chair), Stephen Luebker, Dr. Thomas McDonald, Logan Bulock, Tuire Cechin (Program Coordinator) and Macy Olson. Not in picture: Maggie Bartlett and Tayla Heavican.

Pathology and Microbiology
Outstanding Graduate Student Educator Award, 2018-2019

Thomas L. McDonald, PhD

Dr. Thomas McDonald (middle) receiving award presented by student representatives Lisa Jorgenson (left) and Macy Olson (right)

1st Place – Best presentation at the Graduate Student Research Seminar 2018-2019

Maggie Bartlett.    

(Maggie accepted her award via video conference.)

2nd  Place – Best presentation at the Graduate Student Research Seminar 2018-2019

Logan Bulock

(Dr. Rakesh Singh, Logan Bulock and Dr. Steven Hinrichs)

“Pathology and Microbiology Cash Award for Excellence” demonstrated at the Midwest Student Biomedical Research Forum (MSBRF) 2019

Tayla Heavican

(Tayla Heavican and Dr. Rakesh Singh)

Outstanding Performance in PAMM 992 - Advanced Topics in Immunology, Pathology & Infectious Disease

Journal Club
Fall 2018:  Macy Olson

Spring 2019:  Stephen Luebker

(Dr. Rakesh Singh, Stephen Luebker, Macy Olson, Dr. Steven Hinrichs) 

2018-2019 Student Awards

2018-2019 Student Publications

Welcome new IPID graduate students, 2018!

From left: Nicholas Wood, Amanda Stastny, Melissa Rosenthal, Itidal Reslane, Benjamin Girardo and Blake Bertrand

Maggie Bartlett awarded with NSF fellowship 

The National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) awards fellowships based on a student's demonstrated potential to contribute to strengthening the vitality of the US science and engineering enterprise. Maggie Bartlett was awarded an NSF Fellowship (2018-2023) for her project entitled "The Egyptian fruit bat’s immunoglobulin repertoire." Her research will utilize novel methodology to extract Variable (V), Diversity (D), and Joining (J) regions of the Egyptian Rousette Bat's (ERB) B cell repertoire, as well as generate a bioinformatic pipeline to analyze ERB's B cell repertoire composition,  functionality, and diversity mechanism. 

Additionally,  Maggie received poster and oral presentation awards at The Spring Research Festival in 2018. Maggie presented on “The Egyptian Rousette Bat’s immunoglobulin heavy chain locus characterization and B-cell repertoire analysis.” The Spring Research Festival is an annual event for students, scientists, and the community to collaborate and to learn about research at Fort Detrick and the National Cancer Institute at Frederick.

Maggie Bartlett (left) with her advisor, Mariano Sanchez-Lockhart, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, UNMC. 

Congratulations to Pathology and Microbiology Award Winners

Pathology and Microbiology and Immunology, Pathology & Infectious Disease Graduate Program awarded outstanding graduate students and educators in the annual awards ceremony on May 8, 2018.

(From left) Mohammad Awaji - Outstanding Performance in PAMM 992 – Advanced Topics
Macy Olson – 1st Place Graduate Student Research Seminar Award and Outstanding Performance in PAMM 992 – Advanced Topics
Lisa Jorgenson – 2nd Place Graduate Student Research Seminar Award
Paul Fey - Outstanding Graduate Student Educator Award, with Rakesh Singh

Thandiwe Jere (with Drs. Rakesh Singh and Steven Hinrichs) - Pathology and Microbiology Cash Award for Excellence, Midwest Student Biomedical Research Forum (MSBRF)

 
Kelsey Yamada (with Drs. Rakesh Singh and Steven Hinrichs) – Outstanding Performance in PAMM 992 – Advanced Topics

Martens' research experience at USAMRIID
Matthew Martens, IPID graduate student, and Chancellor Gold discuss research opportunities at the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) in this video.

Woods discusses the founding of GRADS
Kathryn Woods, IPID graduate student, talks to Chancellor Gold about the establishment of Graduates & Professionals Representing Achievement, Diversity and Service (GRADS) on the UNMC campus in this video and in this UNMC Today article.

Incoming Graduate Students, 2017

Welcome the new Pathology and Microbiology & IPID graduate students!


From left: Kathryn Cole, Jonathan (Yoni) Herskovitz, Jian Li, Matthew Martens, Raina Barnes, Lisa Jorgenson, Jane Morwitzer, Macy Olson and Nowayer Alkhaldi

Our SURP students for the summer of 2017

Dylan George, Peru State College  (left)
Dylan George, Dianne Wellems MS, St. Patrick Reid PhD
“The Lipid Sphingosine Kinases are associating with Stress Granules”

Gunnar Orcutt, Peru State College (right)
Gunnar J. Orcutt, Pooja Roy, Fareha Razvi, and Paul D. Fey
“Catabolism Of Glucogenic Amino Acids In Staphylococcus aureus “

Don Nguyen, Michigan State University (MD/PhD SURP program)
Don Nguyen, McKenzie Lehman, PhD, and Paul Fey, PhD
“The Functional Importance of Proline Transporters in Staphylococcus
aureus”

Congratulations to Pathology and Microbiology award Winners

from left):  Dr. Steven Hinrichs with Jiuli Shou – 1st Place Graduate Student Research Seminar Award; Julia Sommer – 2nd Place Graduate Student Research Seminar Award; Chunyi Zhou – Pathology and Microbiology Cash Award for Excellence, Midwest Student Biomedical Research Forum (MSBRF); Dr. Vinai Chittezham Thomas – Outstanding Graduate Student Educator Award and Dr. Rakesh Singh

2016-2017 Student Awards

2016-2017 Student Publications

Maggie Bartlett UNMC PhD student & Madalyn McFarland present - TedxUNO
Parasitic Mind Control: Who's Really in Command? 

To find out who is really in control click the photo to watch the You tube video.

Incoming Graduate Students, 2016

Welcome the new Pathology and Microbiology & IPID graduate students!

From left: Anna Staudacher, Omalla (Allan) Olwenyi, Thandiwe Jere, Elizabeth Hutfless, Kholud Alharthi, Maggie Bartlett, Kathryn Woods and Stephen Luebker  Not pictures: Kelsey Yamada, Jennifer Endres

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