Thesis Defenses

2024

• Stephanie Azzopardi defended her thesis titled “Role of iRhom2 in Olfaction: Implications for Odorant Receptor Regulation and Activity-Dependent Adaptation.” Stephanie was mentored by Dr. Carl Blobel at the Hospital for Special Surgery.
• Nicky Blobel defended his thesis title "Endogenous Sources of DNA Damage that Drive Human Disease." Nicky was mentored by Dr. Agata Smogorzewska (Tri-I '03) at The Rockefeller University. 
• Kirsten Bredvik defended her thesis titled “Differential Regulation of Mitochondrial Metabolism in Inhibitory and Excitatory Synapses.” Kirsten was mentored by Dr. Timothy Ryan at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Jeremy Chang defended his thesis titled “Revealing Smc5/6's Dynamic Behavior on Diverse DNA Topologies Through Single-Molecule Methods.” Jeremy was mentored by Dr. Shixin Liu at The Rockefeller University.
• Briana Christophers defended her thesis titled “Drosophila Muscle Cofilin Maintains Neuromuscular Junction Structure for Proper Neurotransmission.” Briana was mentored by Dr. Mary Baylies at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Felipe D'Andrea defended his thesis titled “Inquiries into the Mycobacterial Caseinolytic Protease System.” Felipe was mentored by Dr. Jeremy Rock at The Rockefeller University.
• Alisha Dua defended her thesis titled “Whole-Brain Networks Invariant to Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Treatment Support a Trait-Like Representation of Depression.” Alisha was mentored by Conor Liston (Tri-I '08) at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Sarah Hanif defended her thesis titled “The Orphan G Protein-Coupled Receptor GPR52 is a Novel Regulator of Breast Cancer Multicellular Organization.” Sarah was mentored by Dr. Kristy Brown at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Abby Janke defended her thesis titled “A Neuronal Circuit Motif for Leaky Vector Integration.” Abby was mentored by Dr. Gaby Maimon at The Rockefeller University.
• Hyejin Kim defended her thesis titled “Modulation of the CRISPR-Cas9 Immune Response.” Hyejin was mentored by Dr. Luciano Marraffini at The Rockefeller University.
• Yilun Ma defended his thesis titled “In Vivo Characterization of Keratinocytes in the Melanoma Microenvironment.” Yilun was mentored by Dr. Richard White at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Jez Marston defended his thesis titled “Transposable Element Expression in Adaptive and Innate Immune Responses at the Bulk and Single Cell Resolution.” Jez was mentored by Dr. Doug Nixon and Ethel Cesarman at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Jesse Novak defended his thesis titled “Leveraging Cellular Metabolism to Direct Epithelial Tissue Regeneration.” Jesse was mentored by Dr. Elaine Fuchs at The Rockefeller University.
• Preethi Periyakoil defended her thesis titled “Deep Topic Modeling Deconvolves Cell States from Spatial Transcriptomic Profiles of the Rheumatoid Arthritis Synovium.” Preethi was mentored by Dr. Christina Leslie at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Victoria Von Saucken defended her thesis titled “Postsynaptic BMP Signaling Instructs Myonuclear Properties to Support Neuromuscular Junction Activity.” Victoria was mentored by Dr. Mary Baylies at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Connie Zhou defended their thesis titled “Neuroimmune Signaling Promotes Astrocytic Nucleocytoplasmic Disruptions and Stress Granule Formation Associated with TDP-43 Pathology.” Connie was mentored by Dr. Anna Orr at Weill Cornell Medicine.

2023

• Dalton Banh defended his thesis titled “Sensing and Synergy by Anti-Bacteriophage Immune Systems in Staphylococcus.” Dalton was mentored by Dr. Luciano Marraffini at The Rockefeller University.
• Alex Barbulescu defended his thesis titled “Investigating the Effect of Antibody-Mediated Feedback on Ongoing Germinal Center Responses.” Alexandru was mentored by Dr. Gabriel Victora at The Rockefeller University.
• Zi-Ning Choo defended her thesis titled “Loose Ends in Cancer Genome Structure.” Zi-Ning was mentored by Dr. Marcin Imielinski at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Deeksha Deep defended her thesis titled “Regulation of Polytypic T Cell Responses in Infection.” Deeksha was mentored by Dr. Alexander Rudensky at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Ben Jackson defended his thesis titled “Metabolic Control of Naïve Pluripotency.” Benjamin was mentored by Dr. Lydia Finley at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Yaniv Kazanksy defended his thesis titled “Towards Targeted Therapy for Pediatric Sarcomas.” Yaniv was mentored by Dr. Alex Kentsis at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Claire Kenney defended her thesis titled “Atypical CRISPR-Cas9 Targets Mediate Efficient Immunity Against Bacterial Viruses.” Claire was mentored by Dr. Luciano Marraffini at The Rockefeller University.
• Ariana Rabinowitsch defended her thesis titled “Effect of iRhom2 Cytotail Mutations on ADAM17 Function In Vivo: Implications for Tylosis with Oesophageal Cancer.” Ariana was mentored by Dr. Carl Blobel at the Hospital for Special Surgery.
• Chris Saffran defended his thesis titled “FAN1: Protecting DNA Through Competition and Teamwork.” Christian was mentored by Dr. Agata Smogorzewska (Tri-I '03) at The Rockefeller University.
• Daniel Stor defended his thesis titled “Antimicrobial Peptides and Bilayer Dependent Defense.” Daniel was mentored by Dr. Olaf Andersen at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Stefan Torborg defended his thesis titled “An Equilibrium of Malignant Cell States Controlled by WNT and Notch Drives Pancreas Cancer Growth.” Stefan was mentored by Dr. Tuomas Tammela at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Camila Villasante defended her thesis titled “The Nanomechanics of Protocadherin 15, a Protein Essential for Human Hearing.” Camila was mentored by Dr. A. James Hudspeth at The Rockefeller University.
• Sam Williams defended their thesis titled “Microbiology and Immunopathogenesis of Hidradenitis Suppurativa.” Sam was mentored by Dr. James Krueger at The Rockefeller University.

2022

• Abood Abuhashem defended his thesis titled “Dissecting the Role of RNA POL II Pausing in Early Mammalian Development.” Abood was mentored by Dr. Kat Hadjantonakis at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Nneoma Adaku defended her thesis titled “A Gain-of-function Role of Apolipoprotein E2 in Melanoma Progression.” Nneoma was mentored by Dr. Sohail Tavazoie at The Rockefeller University.
• Rhiannon Aguilar defended her thesis titled “Two Novel Insights Into Chromatin Biology Using the Model Organism Saccharomyces cerevisiae.” Rhiannon was mentored by Dr. Jessica Tyler at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Renan Aparicio defended his thesis titled “The Search For Regulatory Mutations in Gitelman Syndrome.” Renan was mentored by Dr. Richard Lifton at The Rockefeller University.
• Neville Dusaj defended his thesis titled “Single-cell Multi-omics of Human Clonal Hematopoiesis Reveals that DNMT3A R882 Mutations Perturb Early Progenitor States Through Selective Hypomethylation.” Neville was mentored by Dr. Dan Landau at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Aaron Gupta defended his thesis titled “Interrogation and Manipulation of the IgG Fc Glycan.” Aaron was mentored by Dr. Jeffrey Ravetch (Tri-I '79) at The Rockefeller University.
• Geena Ianni defended her thesis titled “Cortical Control of Naturalistic Facial Expression In Primates.” Geena was mentored by Dr. Winrich Freiwald at The Rockefeller University.
• Andrew Iannone defended his thesis titled “The Role of Layer I Interneurons in the Assembly of Somatosensory Circuits.” Andrew was mentored by Dr. Natalia De Marco Garcia at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Kevin Kao defended his thesis titled “Antibody-effector Functions in Antiviral Response.” Kevin was mentored by Dr. Jeffrey Ravetch (Tri-I '79) at The Rockefeller University.
• Charlie Kinzig defended his thesis titled “Neotelomere Formation by Telomerase in Human Cells.” Charles was mentored by Dr. Titia De Lange at The Rockefeller University.
• Dianne Lumaquin defended her thesis titled “Lipid Droplets are a Metabolic Vulnerability in Melanoma.” Dianne was mentored by Dr. Richard White at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Alex Miller defended her thesis titled “A Recombination-based Genetic Technology Identifies Regulators of Iron Uptake Genes in Mycobacterium smegmatis.” Alex was mentored by Dr. Sabine Ehrt at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Robbie Myers defended his thesis titled “Development and Application of Single-Cell Technologies to Study Clonal Evolution in Human Hematopoiesis.” Robbie was mentored by Dr. Dan Landau at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Tuan Nguyen defended his thesis titled “Mechanical Manipulation of Eukaryotic Chromatin by DNA-Binding Proteins.” Tuan was mentored by Dr. Shixin Liu at The Rockefeller University.
• Sam Phillips defended her thesis titled “Increased Speed and Purity of Oligodendrocyte Differentiation from Human Pluripotent Stem Cells Allows for Study of Lineage Progression.” Sam was mentored by Dr. Lorenz Studer at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Harlan Pietz defended his thesis titled “Structural and Functional Analysis of Substrate Recognition and Inhibition of the Multidrug Transporters MRP1 and MRP2.” Harlan was mentored by Dr. Jue Chen at The Rockefeller University.
• Daniel Poston defended his thesis titled “Dissecting Host-Viral Interactions through Focused or Unbiased High-throughput Genetic Approaches.” Daniel was mentored by Dr. Paul Bieniasz at The Rockefeller University.
• Devin Ray defended her thesis titled “Development of Chemical Tools to Investigate and Manipulate Cellular Processes.” Devin was mentored by Dr. Yael David at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Andy Siliciano defended his thesis titled “Life on the Edge: Exploring the Neural and Behavioral Algorithms of Plume Tracking.” Andy was mentored by Dr. Vanessa Ruta at The Rockefeller University.
• Andrew Toader defended his thesis titled “Anteromedial Thalamus Gates the Selection & Stabilization of Long-Term Memories.” Andrew was mentored by Dr. Priya Rajasethupathy at The Rockefeller University.
• Matt Wickersham defended his thesis titled “The Use of Machine Learning Methods on Real World Data to Better Inform Clinical Decisions.” Matthew was mentored by Dr. Olivier Elemento at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Eric Zheng defended his thesis titled “On the Origins of Genetic Novelty in Drosophila.” Eric was mentored by Dr. Li Zhao at The Rockefeller University.

2021

• Farid Aboharb defended his thesis titled “Mixed Coding in the Dorsomedial Frontal Cortex.” Farid was mentored by Dr. Winrich Freiwald at The Rockefeller University.
• Debby Abramov defended her thesis titled “Disease Mechanisms and Therapeutic Strategies in Munc18-1 Encephalopathies.” Debby was mentored by Dr. Jacqueline Burre at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Kevin Boehm defended his thesis titled “Multimodal Models to Stratify Ovarian Cancer Patients.” Kevin was mentored by Dr. Sohrab Shah at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Du Cheng defended his thesis titled “Non-canonical Axonal Insulin Receptor Signaling Drives Aversive Olfactory Learning.” Du was mentored by Dr. Cori Bargmann at The Rockefeller University.
• Chan Hee Choi defended his thesis titled “Uncovering Regulators of Whole-body Metabolism by Chemoproteomic Profiling of the Adipocyte Secretome.” Chan Hee was mentored by Dr. Paul Cohen (Tri-I '04) at The Rockefeller University.
• Rob Fetcho defended his thesis titled “hPSC-derived Microglia to Study Complement-mediated Synaptic Pruning In Vitro.” Robert was mentored by Dr. Conor Liston (Tri-I '08) at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Sofia Gearty defended her thesis titled “Autoimmune CD8 T Cell Differentiation and Fate Diversification in Type 1 Diabetes.” Sofia was mentored by Dr. Andrea Schietinger at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Andrew Griswold defended his thesis titled “Characterization of the DPP8/9 Pyroptotic Checkpoints.” Andrew was mentored by Dr. Daniel Bachovchin at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Margo Herre defended her thesis titled “Principles of Olfactory Coding in Aedes aegypti Mosquitoes.” Margo was mentored by Dr. Leslie Vosshall at The Rockefeller University.
• Brian Hurwitz defended his thesis titled “New Roles for the Integrated Stress Response in Cancer and Proteostasis.” Brian was mentored by Dr. Elaine Fuchs at The Rockefeller University.
• Iryna Ivasyk defended her thesis titled “DNA Methylation and DNA Methyltransferases in the Clonal Raider Ant.” Iryna was mentored by Dr. Daniel Kronauer at The Rockefeller University.
• Ally Moyer defended her thesis titled “Tumor-immune Crosstalk in a Recently Characterized Form of BAX/BAK-dependent Cell Death.” Ally was mentored by Dr. Emily Cheng at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Kristina Navrazhina defended her thesis titled “Characterizing Inflammatory Mechanisms in Hidradenitis Suppurativa.” Kristina was mentored by Dr. James Krueger at The Rockefeller University.
• Maria Passarelli defended her thesis titled “Tumor Suppression by a tRNA Synthetase.” Maria was mentored by Dr. Sohail Tavazoie at The Rockefeller University.
• Bobbie Pelham-Webb defended her thesis titled “The Molecular Resetting of Pluripotent Stem Cell Identity During Mitotic Exit.” Bobbie was mentored by Dr. Effie Apostolou at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Jake Reed defended his thesis titled “Telomere Length Dynamics and Genome Stability in Response to DNA Damage in Plasmodium falciparum.” Jake was mentored by Dr. Kirk Deitsch and Christopher Mason at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Sarah Schraeder defended her thesis titled “Perturbation of Arginine Biosynthesis in Mycobacteria Elicits Multiple Forms of Resistance to Antibiotics with Other Targets.” Sarah was mentored by Dr. Carl Nathan at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Alex Talishinsky defended his thesis titled “Distinct Transcriptomic Signatures Support Sex-Specific Circuit Changes in Major Depression.” Alex was mentored by Dr. Conor Liston (Tri-I '08) at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Sam Taylor defended his thesis titled “Dietary Fructose Improves Intestinal Cell Survival and Nutrient Absorption.” Samuel was mentored by Dr. Marcus Goncalves at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Josh Weiss defended his thesis titled “Anatomic Position Determines Oncogenic Specificity in Melanoma.” Josh was mentored by Dr. Richard White at the Sloan Kettering Institute.

2020

• Rachel Babij defended her thesis titled “Determinants of Local and Long-Range Connectivity in the Developing Somatosensory Cortex.” Rachel was mentored by Dr. Natalia De Marco Garcia at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Sanjee Baksh defended his thesis titled “You Are What You Eat: Metabolic Coordination of Stem Cell Fate in Tumor Initiation and Tissue Repair.” Sanjee was mentored by Dr. Elaine Fuchs at The Rockefeller University.
• Kelly Banks defended her thesis titled “Epigenetic Regulation of Neutrophil Development and Function by Tet Enzymes.” Kelly was mentored by Dr. Todd Evans at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Steve Cajamarca defended his thesis titled “Studies on Familial Amyloid-Driven Cerebral Hemorrhage.” Steve was mentored by Dr. Sid Strickland at The Rockefeller University.
• Susan Duan defended her thesis titled “GABAergic Restriction of Neuronal Network Activity Regulates Postnatal Interneuron Apoptosis.” Susan was mentored by Dr. Natalia De Marco Garcia at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Meg Fabiszak defended her thesis titled “Finding Common Ground: The Common Marmoset as a Model to Accessing and Providing Insight into the Social Brain.” Meg was mentored by Dr. Winrich Freiwald at The Rockefeller University.
• Roy Guarecuco defended his thesis titled “The Role of Nutrient Availability in Therapeutic Response of Leukemia.” Roy was mentored by Dr. Kivanc Birsoy at The Rockefeller University.
• Sudha Guttikonda defended her thesis titled “Modeling Neuroinflammation Using hPSC-derived Microglia in an I Tri-culture System.” Sudha was mentored by Dr. Lorenz Studer at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Nathaniel Kastan defended his thesis titled “Small-Molecule Activation of Yap for Inner-Ear Regeneration – and Beyond.” Nathaniel was mentored by Dr. A. James Hudspeth at The Rockefeller University.
• Solomon Levin defended his thesis titled “Fibrolamellar Hepatocellular Carcinoma: Proteomic Characterization and Therapeutic Development.” Solomon was mentored by Dr. Sandy Simon at The Rockefeller University.
• Olivia Maguire defended her thesis titled “A Role for Acsbg1 in Obesity Accelerated Breast Cancer.” Olivia was mentored by Dr. Paul Cohen (Tri-I '04) at The Rockefeller University.
• Phil Nussenzweig defended his thesis titled “Cas9 Cleavage of Viral Genomes Generates Immunological Memories.” Phil was mentored by Dr. Luciano Marraffini in The Rockefeller University.
• Jay Shi defended his thesis titled “The Regulators of Cell Architecture in Remodeling Tissues.” Jay was mentored by Dr. Jennifer Zallen at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Michelle Siao defended her thesis titled “Evolution of Multigene Families and The Regulatory Carboxy-Terminal Domain of RNA Polymerase II in Malaria Parasites.” Michelle was mentored by Dr. Kirk Deitsch at Weill Cornell Medicine.
• Rohan Soman defended his thesis titled “There and Back Again: A Translational Approach to Modeling Unique Aspects of Germ Cell Development During Self-Organization of the Primate Embryo.” Rohan was mentored by Dr. Ali Brivanlou at The Rockefeller University.
• Tony Sun defended his thesis titled “ADAR1 Isoform-Selective A-to-I RNA Editing.” Tony was mentored by Dr. Charlie Rice at The Rockefeller University.
• Ross Weber defended his thesis titled “The Role of Compartmentalized Metabolism on Cellular Metal Homeostasis.” Ross was mentored by Dr. Kivanc Birsoy at The Rockefeller University.
• Dan Weinberg defended his thesis titled “Histone Tails Lead the Way: DNMT3A and DNA Methylation in Developmental Overgrowth, Undergrowth, and Cancer.” Dan was mentored by Dr. C. David Allis at The Rockefeller University.
• Robbie Williams defended his thesis titled “Transcriptional Regulation of the Metabolic Response to Therapy in Leukemia.” Robbie was mentored by Dr. Kivanc Birsoy at The Rockefeller University.
• Jenny Xue defended her thesis titled “Tumor Adaptation to Novel Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase (MAPK) Signaling Inhibitors at Single Cell Resolution.” Jenny was mentored by Dr. Piro Lito at the Sloan Kettering Institute.
• Dalee Zhou defended her thesis titled “Soluble Adenylyl Cyclase as a Missing Regulatory Link Between Pigmentation and the Microenvironment and Metabolism.” Dalee was mentored by Dr. Jonathan Zippin (Tri-I '06) at Weill Cornell Medicine.