Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences

Dean's Message - June 3, 2024

Congratulations to our awardees
Jaharis Building in the spring

Dear GSBS Community,

For those of you who missed it, the GSBS Awards Ceremony was held on May 16. We had many winners for a variety of student awards given earlier in the academic year. The winners are recognized below.

For those of you who missed it, the GSBS Awards Ceremony was held on May 16. We had many winners for a variety of student awards given earlier in the academic year. The winners are recognized below.

Charlton Poster Awards

  • Chantal Aaron – Neuroscience
  • Hanan Bloomer – GMCB-MD/PHD
  • Samantha Bottom-Tanzer - Neuroscience-MD/PHD
  • Maria Brouard - CMDB-MD/PHD
  • Kimberly Carroll – Immunology
  • Xinru (Regina) Chen – GMCB
  • Jacqueline Garcia – CMDB
  • Doris Ji – Neuroscience
  • Jamie Leiriao – Immunology
  • Samantha Moores – GMCB
  • Mei-An Nolan – Immunology
  • Meadow Parrish – CMDB-MD/PHD
  • Natalia Quirk – Microbiology
  • Nicole Traugh – CMDB
  • Colin Trepicchio – CMDB
  • Frank Zamudio – Neuroscience

Dean’s Fellowship for outstanding research in the first two years

  • Maria Krasilnikov – Microbiology
  • Abigail Lemons – Neuroscience-MD/PHD.

Cosman Fellowship to support an international student pursing a PhD degree in Molecular Microbiology

  • Tien Huynh. - Microbiology

Dean’s Recognition Award for Successful External Fellowship, recognizing students who successfully competed for an external fellowship grant.

  • Xinru (Regina) Chen – GMCB
  • Jacqueline Garcia- CMDB
  • Maria Krasilnikov – Microbiology
  • Erin Sanders – GMCB
  • Garrett Scarpa - Neuroscience 
  • Alec Stepanian - CMDB-MD/PHD
  • Frank Zamudio- Neuroscience

Lalor-Rozan Fellowship for a PhD student in interested in immunology

  • Elyse Blank - Immunology

Provost Fellowship, used to recognize and recruit the best doctoral applicants

  • Gabriella Hinojosa - Neuroscience
  • Hunter Russell - GMCB.

Rosenberg fellowship, established through a very generous gift from our previous Dean, Naomi Rosenberg, and her husband, recognizes outstanding achievement in research and scholarship after a student's first two years at the GSBS.

  • Morgan McNellis - Microbiology
  • Niketa Nerurkar - Gene-JAX

Scheer-Tomasso Fellowship for students with a demonstrated interest in in pediatric hematology

  • Wendelin Marmol – CMDB
  • Crystal Zhang – CMDB

Student Enrichment Awards to fund travel to scientific meetings

  • Warda Arman – Microbiology
  • Kimberly Carroll - Immunology
  • Tyler Colson – Immunology
  • Bing Dai – CMDB
  • Jacqueline Garcia – CMDB
  • Alexis Garretson – Gene-JAX
  • Iris Montes – GMCB
  • Natalie Sontag – Microbiology
  • Alec Stepanian - CMDB-MD/PHD
  • Patricia Synnott – CTS
  • Alexandra Werner - Immunology
  • Frank Zamudio - Neuroscience

Schimmel Fellowship to support PHD students who aspire to augment their scientific training with general business management competences

  • Chantal Aaron – Neuroscience
  • Sydney Grob – CTS-MD/PhD
  • Liam Power – CMDB-MD/PhD

We awarded three special end of year awards at the ceremony.

Norman I and Susan G Krinsky Excellence in Basic Science Teaching Award

  • Angel Leus – Microbiology
  • Natalia Quirk – Microbiology
  • Andrea Rebolledo Viveros – Microbiology
  • Katherine Sulka – Immunology

Lasagna Award for Translational Research, established to honor Louis Lasagna, MD, a former dean of the GSBS, for the strongest paper in translational research in the previous 12 month period

  • Jacob Klickstein - Neuroscience-MD/PhD

Dean’s Award, presented by GSBS to a degree candidate who has exhibited distinction in research as demonstrated by submission of an outstanding PhD thesis

  • Christian Rosa Birriel, a CMDB graduate and former PREP scholar

We also presented a new award this year, the Faculty Award for Student Advocacy. This new award is given to the faculty member, chosen by the students, who has proven to be a consistent advocate and source of support. The awardee is also asked to read the names of the students as they receive their diplomas at Commencement. The inaugural award was presented to Aimee Shen, and she performed flawlessly in reading names at Commencement.

I also had the pleasure of addressing the graduates for the first time in my role as Dean ad interim, and I was happy to praise their achievements, welcome them to the Tufts alumni family, and encourage them to be ambassadors for science to the public and to promote the use of science for the public good.

I would like to take a moment to thank all the hard-working students, faculty and staff for making GSBS successful this past year. I know you are all very busy trying to advance your projects, write your papers, read the literature and serve the community. I look forward to working with all of you and the new incoming students in the coming year as we strive to succeed.

Michael Chin, MD, PhD, Dean ad interim