In 2019 so far, two postdoctoral fellows working with Upender Manne, Ph.D., Professor, UAB Pathology, won awards for presentations on their postdoctoral research.

On Monday, February 18, the UAB Postdoctoral Association, in collaboration with the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs, organized its 16th Annual Postdoctoral Research Day. The event featured six sessions and Dr. Victor Darley-Usmar, Professor, UAB Pathology, was one of the four presenters of the keynote talk, "Twenty Years of Postdoctoral Education at UAB."

The fourth session, sponsored by the O'Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center, featured studies related to cancer research. Sumit Agarwal, postdoctoral fellow of Manne, gave an oral presentation on the topic, "MicroRNA-124 modulated collagen-prolyl hydroxylase P4HA1 expression regulates colon cancer progression." Co-authors include: Balabhadrapatruni V. S. K. Chakravarthi, Michael Behring, Hyung-Gyoon Kim, Kevin Hale, Abduljalil M Alsubaie, Sameer Al Diffalha, Shajan Sugandha, Sooryanarayana Varambally, and Manne. Agarwal won third place overall for the day's events for his presentation.

In January, Michael Behring, postdoctoral fellow of Manne, attended the Second Conference on Bioethics Issues in Minority Health and Health Disparities Research. Behring presented a lab research poster titled, “Ethical Considerations for Observational Cancer Health Disparity Research,” co-authored with Kevin Hale, Bunyamin Ozaydin, and Manne. 

Behring won first place for his presentation. Congratulations to both on these honors! 

On February 19, Mark Pepin, Medical Scientist Training Program (below, left) student mentee of Adam Wende, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Pathology, (below, right) successfully defended his dissertation, "Genetic and Epigenetic Underpinnings of End-Stage Human Heart Failure," to receive his M.D., Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering.