The School of Graduate Studies

Annual Research Day 2012 - April 4, 2012

The School of Graduate Studies is pleased to announce the results of the ANNUAL RESEARCH DAY Platform and Poster Presentations on Wednesday, 4 April, 2012:

Annual Research Day 2011 Results
Last	First	Title	Program or School	Sponsor	Sponsor's Department
Platform Presentation First Prize: May Kin Ho and Daniel Dean Travel Fellowship - up to $1,500
Soh	James	MicroRNA-30c Reduces Hyperlipidemia and Atherosclerosis by Decreasing Lipid Synthesis and Lipoprotein Secretion	School of Graduate Studies - Molecular & Cellular Biology	M. Mahmood Hussain	Cell Biology
First Prize for Poster Presentation in the Afternoon Sessions: $1,500
Shteyn	Elina	Establishing the Role of p27 Y88 Phosphorylation as a Marker in Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma Responsiveness to cdk4 Inhibition.	School of Graduate Studies - Molecular & Cellular Biology	Stacy Blain	Dept of Pediatrics and Cell Biology
McDougal	Robert	Reaction-Diffusion Modeling in the NEURON Simulator	Biomedical Engineering	William Lytton	Physiology and Pharmacology
Second Prizes for Poster Presentations in the Afternoon Sessions: $750
Marsh	Brandi	Reinforcement Learning Brain Machine Interface in Macaques	School of Graduate Studies - Biomedical Engineering	Joseph Francis	Physiology and Pharmacology
Naggar	Isaac	Autonomic Boundary Conditions for Ventricular Fibrillation	School of Graduate Studies - Neural & Behavioral Science	Mark Stewart	Physiology and Pharmacology
Haber	Margalit	Minocycline and N-acetylcysteine modulates microglia while preventing cognitive deficits in a model of mild traumatic brain injury	School of Graduate Studies - Neural & Behavioral Science	Peter Bergold	Physiology and Pharmacology
Zolkind	Paul	Neuroprotective Effect of Leupeptin in Zebrafish Hair Cells	College of Medicine	Richard Kollmar	Otolaryngology
Chadderdon	George	Dopamine-based Reinforcement Learning of Virtual Arm Reaching Task in a Spiking Model of Cortex	Neural & Behavioral Science	William Lytton	Physiology and Pharmacology
Pfeil	Douglas	Blood Pressure Related Hemodynamic Shifts in the Cerebral Cortex During Cardiac Surgery	School of Graduate Studies - Biomedical Engineering	Randall Barbour and Daniel Lee	Pathology/Surgery
Naidoo	Shivana	Exploring the Relationship between Chronic Kidney Disease Depressive Symptoms and Psychosocial Stressors	Psychiatry, PGY2	Daniel Cukor	Psychiatry/Psychology
Bettinger	Patricia	The Role of TFE3 And TFEb in the Onset and Maintenance of Autoimmunity	School of Graduate Studies - Molecular & Cellular Biology	Christopher Roman	Cell Biology
Bazzi	Lama	Capacity building in Alzheimer's Disease (AD): lessons learned from a pilot study in 6 distinct areas of Lebanon	Psychiatry, PGY3	Chemali, Zeina	Harvard University- Department of Psychiatry
Iordanou	Jordan	Examining The Effects of ZIP on Somatosensory Cortex	School of Graduate Studies - Biomedical Engineering	Joseph Francis	Physiology and Pharmacology

Annual Research Day provides an excellent occasion for the entire Downstate community to share the results of their research efforts. Presentations were from students in the School of Graduate Studies, the College of Medicine, the School of Public Health, the School of Nursing, and the College of Health Related Professions, medical residents, postdoctoral fellows, and undergraduate students conducting research with Downstate faculty.

The limited number of travel fellowships are to be used to cover costs for the student or resident to present their work at a scientific meeting.

Dr. James Ecklund, MD, Medical Director of Neurosciences for Inova Health System and Chairman of the Department of Neurosciences at Inova Fairfax Hospital was this year's keynote speaker.  He spoke on “Neurotrauma: A Military Neurosurgeon's Perspective.”

Dr. Ecklund is an internationally renowned neurosurgeon and a recently retired U.S. Army Colonel who spent a distinguished military career as Chairman of Neurosurgery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. In addition to running their neurosurgery training program, and having a clinical practice, he was involved in groundbreaking medical innovations and research, and deployed as a neurosurgeon to Afghanistan and Iraq.

He has held numerous leadership positions within neurosurgical and national organizations including Chairman of the Membership Committee for the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, and President of the Washington Academy of Neurosurgery. He serves on multiple oversight and advisory boards including the Veterans Administration, Department of Defense, International Neurotrauma Foundation, Brain Trauma Foundation and the NFL Player’s Association Mackey-White Traumatic Brain Injury Committee.

Dr. Ecklund is the recipient of numerous awards, including the General George Hayes Award for the Outstanding Neurosurgery Faculty Member, and he received the “A” Designator by the Surgeon General of the Army for excellence in neurosurgery. He is board-certified by the American Board of Neurosurgeons, Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, and a member of the prestigious Society of Neurological Surgeons.

Mark Stewart, MD, PhD