Raj Govindarajan presented a seminar on “An alum’s reflections on the academic journey” at the University of Nebraska Medical Center Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology annual symposia in August 2021.
Raj Govindarajan presented a seminar on “An alum’s reflections on the academic journey” at the University of Nebraska Medical Center Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology annual symposia in August 2021.
Jane Protos received the university’s Cancer Research Experience in the Advanced and Training of Emerging Scientists (CREATES) scholarship. She will contribute 400 hours in the Raj lab to work on pancreatic cancer and other career/professional development opportunities. Congratulations!
Avinash Persaud and colleagues have published their work ‘Facilitative lysosomal transport of bile acids alleviates ER stress in mouse hematopoietic precursors’ in Nature Communications. Congratulations!
Brenna Weadick received the Pelotonia Predoctoral Fellowship for the proposal ‘Understanding the role of CNT3 in adenosine compartmentalization and pancreatic tumor growth’ in January 2021. Congratulations, Brenna!
Hanbum Kim and Mike Massey received CREATE scholarships in the summer of 2020.
The CREATES Research Fellowship Program is a partnership between The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – James and the College of Pharmacy. The program supports undergraduate students to conduct cancer research with $4,000 stipends as well as research/career mentoring
Avinash Persaud received a Pelotonia Fellowship in fall 2019 for studying the role of CNTs in nucleoside analog drug disposition in mice.
Persaud’s research is focused on determining how concentrative nucleoside transporters impact the disposition and efficacy of anticancer drugs used in the treatment of pancreatic cancer.
“The concentration of transporters on the surface of tumors and healthy tissues influence drug efficacy and toxicity,” Persaud said. “Our goal is to characterize the transporters responsible for the delivery of frontline pancreatic cancer drugs and devise novel treatment strategies to improve the delivery of these drugs to cancer cells through modulating transporter function and expression. In doing so, we hope to improve both drug efficacy and safety in pancreatic cancer treatments.”
Rajgopal Govindarajan, DVM, PhD, professor of Pharmaceutics and Pharmacology at the college, oversees Persaud’s research. Persaud has also collaborated with Drs. Craig McElroy and Mitch Phelps.
Persaud has been able to take his cancer research to the next level and explore areas of research that he loves through this fellowship.
“I am passionate about cancer research because I have witnessed firsthand the detrimental impact cancer has had on my loved ones, and I have made it my mission to use my skills as a scientist to develop safer and more effective cancer treatments,” Persaud said.
Brenna Weadick received the best poster award at the 3rd Annual Division Scientific Retreat for presenting a projecttitled ‘EMT-induced gemcitabine resistance involves the functional loss of hENT1’ in October 2019. Congratulations, Brenna!
Debasis Nayak, PhD received a Pelotonia Postdoctoral Fellowship for the proposal ‘Targeting solute carrier transporters to prevent pancreatic cancer progression’ in June 2019. Congratulations, Debasis!