HST Student Research

HST is committed to educating physicians, engineers and scientists who have a deep understanding of the scientific basis of medicine and who are equipped for a career of interdisciplinary research. The Division also seeks to train individuals who will engage in productive independent investigation of important problems at the interface of technology and clinical medicine. The list of academic year 2008 graduates and their thesis titles below demonstrates the breadth of our students' research, spanning engineering/physical sciences, basic biological sciences and clinical subjects.

Academic Year 2008 Theses

Medical Engineering and Medical Physics Program (PhD or ScD)

• Aaron D. Aguirre, MD, PhD

  Advances in optical cohenence tomography and microscopy for endoscopic imaging applications and functional neuroimaging

• Jose O. Aleman, PhD

  Gluconeogenesis as a system: development of in vivo flux analysis of hepatic glucose production in type 2 diabetes

• Pak Wai Au, PhD

  Engineered functional blood vessels in vivo

• Ming-Chieh Ding, PhD

  The electrophysiology of mechanical brain injury in rats

• Georg K. Gerber, PhD

  Computational discovery of gene modules, regulatory networks and expression programs

• Carlos A. Gomez-Uribe, PhD

  Modeling systems of chemical reactions in biology: dynamics, stochasticity, spatial effects and model reduction

• Michael S. Hemond, PhD

  NMR solution structure of the C-terminal domain of the Fas apoptosis inhibitory molecule (FAIM)

• Grace Y. Kim, PhD

  Resevoir-based devices for the monitoring and treatment of disease

• Lily Y. Kim, PhD

  Microfliuidic perfusion culture for controlling the stem cell microenvironment

• Kevin R. King, PhD

  High-throughput microfluidic living cell arrays for spatiotemporal gene expression profiling

• Timothy K. Lu, PhD

  Combating biofilms and antibiotic resistance using synthetic biology

• Sasha A. McGee, PhD

  Non-invasive detection of oral cancer using reflective and fluorescence spectoscopy

• David-Huy N. Nguyen, PhD

  Combinatorial lipid-like materials for intracellular delivery of small RNAs that activate innate antiviral immune responses and adjuvant vaccines

• Biju Parekkadan, PhD

  Cellular and molecular immunotherapeutics derived from the bone marrow stroma

• Erika B. Wagner, PhD

  Musculoskeletal adaptation to partial weight suspension: studies of lunar and Mars loading

• Shannon C. Wieland, PhD

  Computational, statistical and graph-theoretical methods for disease mapping and cluster detection

Speech and Hearing Bioscience and Technology Program (PhD or ScD)

• Roozbeh Ghaffari, PhD

  The functional role of the mammalian tectorial membrane in cochlear mechanics

• Adrian K. Lee, ScD

  Influence of spatial cues on the identification and the localization of objects in the auditory foreground

• Nicolas Malyska, PhD

  Analysis of glottal event patterns with application to automatic speaker recognition

• Emmanuel J. Simons, PhD

  Chemical penetration enhancers and in situ-forming reservoirs for trans-tympanic drug delivery: progress toward improved treatment of otitis media

• Fabio A. Thiers, MD, PhD

  The outer spiral network and its innervation by the olivocochlear system

• Sherry Y. Zhao, PhD

  The stop like modification of /ð/: A Study in the analysis and handling of speech variation

Radiological Sciences Joint Program (PhD or ScD)

• Megan L. Hepler, PhD

  Cell-specific contrast agents for magnetic resonance microscopy

• Christopher S. Melhus, PhD

  Advanced brachytherapy dosimetric considerations

• Peng Yu, PhD

  Statistical shape analysis of neuroanatomical structures based on spherical wavelet transformation

Medical Sciences Program (MD)

• Aaron D. Aguirre, MD, PhD

  Advances in optical coherence tomography and microscopy for endoscopic imaging applications and functional neuroimaging (PhD Thesis)

• Siraj M. Ali, MD, PhD

  A tale of two mTor complexes (PhD Thesis)

• Zarine-Rohinton Balsara, MD, PhD

  Interaction of Chlamydia trachomatis with mammalian host cells (PhD Thesis)

• Patrick J. Codd, MD

  Over-expression of Fezf2 modifies the fate and differentiation of neocortical precursors from early to late development (Honors Thesis)

• Steven M. Corsello, MD

  Identification of AML1-ETO inhibitors by chemical genomics (Honors Thesis)

• Paul B. Dieffenbach, MD

  From yeast to flies: a search for the mechanisms of Tau-induced neurodegeneration (Honors Thesis)

• Frank Fang, MD

  Epithelial to mesenchymal transition and human papillomavirus-induced oncogenesis

• Hiu-fai Fong, MD

  Prevalence and predictors of abnormal liver enzymes in young women with anorexia nervosa

• Paul M. George, MD, PhD

  Novel polypyrrole derivatives to enhance conductive polymer-tissue interactions (PhD Thesis)

• John R. Greenland, MD, PhD

  Vaccine antigen expression and immune responses (PhD Thesis)

• Nathan C. Himes, MD

  Magnetic resonance imaging in murine models of cardiovascular disease

• Nicholas E. Houstis, MD, PhD

  Reactive oxygen species play a causal role in multiple forms of insulin resistance (PhD Thesis)

• Felipe Jain, MD

  Reward prediction and movement encoding in the subthalamic nucleus (Honors Thesis)

• Junne Kamihara, MD, PhD

  Studies at the hemochromatosis (HFE) locus: Gene conversions, haplotypes, and an association analysis (PhD Thesis)

• Brittany L. Lee, MD

  The role of host cell endoplasmic reticulum recruitment in Trypanosoma cruzi invasion and vacuole maturation

• Yao Liu, MD

  Expression and statin-dependent regulation of the transcription factor Kruppel-like Factor 2 (KLF2) in mouse vascular endothelium

• Theodore C. Marentis, MD

  Alignment and manufacturing techniques for three-dimensional tissue engineering scaffolds (Honors Thesis)

• Mark L. Miller, MD

  A novel in vitro liver assay based on a polarized hepatic monolayer

• Christina E. Mills, MD, ScD

  Transmission and control of pandemic influenza (PhD Thesis)

• Sonali Mukherjee, MD

  Rapid analysis of the DNA binding specificities of transcription factors with DNA microarrays (Honors Thesis)

• Robert S. Ohgami, MD, PhD

  A proteomic screen identifies a novel player in the transferrin cycle: Flotillin-2 (Honors Thesis)

• Navid Redjal, MD

  Combinatorial therapies for malignant gliomas: cytotoxic synergy of CXCR4 inhibition with chemotherapy (Honors Thesis)

• Mohammed Saeed, MD, PhD

  Temporal pattern recognition in multiparameter ICU data (PhD Thesis)

• Jonathan D. Schoenfeld, MD

  Cancer patients treated with an autologous tumor cell vaccine develop antibodies to angiogenic cytokines (Honors Thesis)

• Monica Sircar, MD

  Investigation of the role of endothelial JAM-C in neutrophil transmigration under shear stress (Honors Thesis)

• Anna L. Stevens, MD, PhD

  Mechanical injury and inflammatory cytokines affect cartilage matrix integrity and tissue homeostatis: a mass spectrometric analysis of proteins with relevance to arthritis (PhD Thesis)

• Yee-Ping Sun, MD

  Identification of novel lipid mediators that regulate the resolution of acute inflammation (Honors Thesis)

• Leo L. Tsai, MD, PhD

  Development of a low-field ³He MRI system to study posture-dependence of pulmonary function (PhD Thesis)

• Yifan Yang, MD

  Investigation into the heterotypic cell fusion between muscle and hematopoietic cells

• Ellen Yeh, MD, PhD

  Enzymatic halogenation during natural product biosynthesis (PhD Thesis)

• Glenn C. Yiu, MD, PhD

  Activin/TGFb signaling suppresses axonal growth ability in sensory neurons (Honors Thesis)

• Martin Zalesak, MD, PhD

  Transitive inference in healthy humans and implications for schizophrenia (PhD Thesis)

• Suzana M. Zorca, MD

  The role of N-linked carbohydrates in von Willebrand factor receptor function (Honors Thesis)

Biomedical Enterprise Program (SM)

• Amir Goren, MBA

  Assessing the economic case for stratified medicine

• Amanda S. Jenkins, MBA

  Characterizing monitoring for the diagnosis and resuscitation of shock patients

• Rehan A. Khan, MBA

  What future physicians want: a comparative analysis of the perception of medical students and pharmaceutical industry executives regarding future of pharmaceutical sales

• Daniel S. Rippy, MBA

  Assessing decision inputs in drug development between small, early stage companies and big pharma: is there a difference?

• Inder Singh, MBA

  Factors influencing the time for FDA review of medical devices

• Lizhe Sun, MBA

  Value creation through modernizing traditional Chinese medicine

Biomedical Informatics Master's Program (SM)

• Julia Braverman, PhD

  Testimonials versus informational persuasive messages: the moderating effect of delivery mode and personal involvement

• David A. Harmin, PhD

  Genomic studies of motif enrichment and conservation in the regulation of gene expression in the brain

• Ivar S. Helgason, MD

  Predicting prescription patterns

• Pankaj Sarin, MD

  Development and evaluation of an electronic feedback system to improve physician compliance with evidence-based practices

Clinical Investigator Training Program (MMSc)

• Jeremy S. Abramson, MD

  Novel target identification in diffuse large B-cell Lymphoma

• Miguel Alonso Alonso, MD

  The role of the right prefrontal cortex in obesity

• Rajendra D. Badgaiyan, MD

  Dopaminergic neruotransmission and human cognition

• Rupal S. Bhatt, MD, PhD

  Mechanisms of resistance to antiangiogenic therapy

• Allison L. Cohen, MD

  A prospective study measuing serological markers for preeclampsia in women with preexisting diabetes at several time points during pregnancy.

• Aaron M. Cypess, MD, PhD

  Human brown adipose tissue and its impact on metabolism

• Ogo I. Egbuna, MD

  Hyperparathyroidism: a plausible role for polycystin-1

• Elizabeth A. Hoge, MD

  MBSR and anxiety: therapeutic and neuroendrocine effects

• SiHong Huang, MD

  Functional characteristics of HIV-specific T cell responses in infants and children

• Steven J. Isakoff, MD, PhD

  Evaluation of p63/p73 as a biomarker to predict response to platinum in metastatic triple negative breast cancer

• Katherine A. Janeway, MD

  Biology and treatment of pediatric gastrointestinal stromal tumor

• Nira Pollock, MD, PhD

  Development and evaluation of novel diagnostic tests for tuberculosis

Master's of Engineering in Biomedical Engineering (MEng)

• Vivian V. Li, MEng

  Design of a thermal diffusion sensor for noninvasive assessment of skin surace perfusion and endothelial dysfunction

• Dewang V. Shavdia, MEng

  Septic shock: early warning using common clinical variables

• Giovanni Talei Franzesi, MEng

  A novel polymeric microelectrode array for highly parallel, long-term neuronal culture and stimulation