{"id":146524,"date":"2026-09-17T09:49:23","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T13:49:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/?post_type=bu-article&p=146524"},"modified":"2026-09-17T09:49:24","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T13:49:24","slug":"symposium-showcases-variety-depth-of-gms-student-postdoctoral-research","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/medicine\/articles\/2026\/symposium-showcases-variety-depth-of-gms-student-postdoctoral-research\/","title":{"rendered":"Symposium Showcases Variety, Depth of GMS Student & Postdoctoral Research"},"content":{"rendered":"\t
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A full house at the GMS Research Symposium, including Associate Dean C. James McKnight, PhD, MA, center, hears award winners present their research.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSymposium Showcases Variety, Depth of GMS Student & Postdoctoral Research\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\n\t<\/div>\n\n\t\n
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September 17, 2026<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
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Now in her fourth year as an MD\/PhD student, Texas native Brittny Garcia thought she\u2019d made her peace with New England winters. Despite the snowstorms and bitter cold, which sometimes made her long for warmer places, she didn\u2019t second-guess her decision to choose Boston University\u2019s combined program\u2014four years toward a medical degree sandwiching four years of PhD research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI really fell in love with the mission of the Medical Campus, the research being done here, and the mentors,\u201d said Garcia, one of six students and postdoctoral researchers selected as Research Talk Awards winners at the second Annual Graduate Medical Sciences Research Symposium held April 9 in Hiebert Lounge. An estimated 200 students, faculty, and staff in attendance heard presentations by the Research Talk Awards winners and viewed nearly 100 poster displays showcasing the wide range of work being done by postdoctoral fellows and MD\/PhD, PhD, and MS students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The symposium helps students become better communicators and gives faculty the opportunity to learn about the research and methods at various labs on the Medical and Charles River Campuses, VA Boston Healthcare, and Boston Medical Center. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis event gives you an idea of the breadth and depth of the research on the Medical Campus and the strength of the programs in general,\u201d said Thomas Clarke, PhD, an assistant professor of pathology & laboratory medicine and one of the volunteer judges of the poster presentations.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Research Talk Awards winner and fourth-year PhD student Andre Krunic.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou can see techniques that you\u2019re maybe thinking about incorporating into your research that other labs are already doing, and it can spur collaborations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fourth-year biomolecular pharmacology PhD student Andre Krunic honed his Research Talk Awards presentation at department seminars and the Society for Neuroscience annual meeting last year. His research exploring the use of microRNAs for early diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer\u2019s disease was published recently in the journal Alzheimer\u2019s & Dementia<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Students spend the first year of a PhD program in the classroom, rotating into various labs to find a good match for their research interests. Though he was interested in neuroscience, Krunic was undecided at first as to which research specialty he would choose. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reputation of the Alzheimer\u2019s Disease Research Center and BU\u2019s affiliation with the famed Framingham Heart Study (FHS), the longest-running longitudinal study in the US, attracted Krunic to the school.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen I first came here, I wasn\u2019t set on Alzheimer\u2019s disease. However, when I joined the lab and learned about the novel approaches we were researching to prevent it, such as using microRNAs, I started to become really invested in the field,\u201d said Krunic. \u201cBU is really an excellent place to do Alzheimer\u2019s and dementia research.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The FHS also was a big draw for Bahar Bakhshi, MS. Originally from Iran, Bakhshi is a third-year PhD candidate in molecular & translational medicine. Her research investigates how to better utilize data from continuous glucose monitoring to predict diabetes and cardiovascular disease risk. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m really interested in diet and other lifestyle interventions. I\u2019m hoping to build a career that leverages these different tools to come up with better ways of self-monitoring for individuals who are at risk for chronic diseases like diabetes and cardiovascular disease,\u201d said Bakhshi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Third-year PhD student Bahar Bakhshi, MS, right, explains her research on continuous glucose monitoring.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Now in her fourth year as an MD\/PhD student, Texas native Brittny Garcia thought she\u2019d made her peace with New England winters. Despite the snowstorms and bitter cold, which sometimes made her long for warmer places, she didn\u2019t second-guess her decision to choose Boston University\u2019s combined program\u2014four years toward a medical degree sandwiching four years […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19603,"featured_media":146526,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"bu_prepress_billboard":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term_manual":""},"tags":[],"bu-publication":[366],"medicine-article-category":[],"medicine-topic":[],"news-article-category":[],"news-topic":[],"bu_edition":[570],"media_type":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/146524"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/bu-article"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19603"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146524"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/146524\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":146531,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/146524\/revisions\/146531"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/146526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146524"},{"taxonomy":"bu-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-publication?post=146524"},{"taxonomy":"medicine-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/medicine-article-category?post=146524"},{"taxonomy":"medicine-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/medicine-topic?post=146524"},{"taxonomy":"news-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-article-category?post=146524"},{"taxonomy":"news-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-topic?post=146524"},{"taxonomy":"bu_edition","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu_edition?post=146524"},{"taxonomy":"media_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media_type?post=146524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}