Spotlights
Students, Faculty & Alumni
GMS Students & Postdocs Attend 2025 STEMPeers Conference in Boston
Four PhD students and two postdoctoral candidates from Graduate Medical Sciences attended the 2025 STEMPeers Conference, hosted October 4 at the Boston University Metcalf Trustees Center. STEMPeers is a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting and mentoring STEM PhDs throughout their career exploration and transition efforts. The conference was sponsored in part by GMS and the Angle Professional and Career Development Program fund from GMS PhD alum Erika Ebbel Angle. The annual conference brought early- and mid-career STEM... More
Congratulations to Our GMS Distinguished Alumni Award Winner, Dr. Vladimir Kefalov (GMS ’99)!
Vladimir Kefalov, PhD (GMS ’99), currently serves as a professor of ophthalmology, and of physiology & biophysics, at the University of California Irvine, holding the Allergan Endowed Chair in Ophthalmology and serving as Vice Chair for Research in Ophthalmology. He is recognized worldwide as one of the top electrophysiologists in vision research and has received awards from Research to Prevent Blindness, the Alcon Research Institute. Most recently, he was selected as the recipient of the... More
BU’s Cryogenic Electron Microscopy (CryoEM) Core Facility: Understanding the structures of life at a near-atomic scale
Studying the biological structures of viruses, proteins and other tiny macromolecules is key to understanding how life systems function and what happens when disease or injury cause these systems to break down. These macromolecules are so small that traditional microscopes can’t see them very well. Instead, it takes a special kind of microscope to view these samples at the scale needed to fully understand them. The more powerful the microscope, the better researchers are able to... More
GMS MS in Oral Health Sciences (OHS) Welcomes 50 New Students – Its Largest Cohort in Program History
The Master of Science in Oral Health Sciences (OHS) program welcomed 50 students to its Class of 2026, comprising the program’s largest cohort since it was founded in 2005. This year’s new students attended an Orientation event on Thursday, July 31. The incoming Fall 2025 cohort is represented by students from 14 different states and four international countries. Forty-seven percent of students joining the class graduated with an undergraduate degree in biology or microbiology, with the... More
Vickery Trinkaus-Randall, PhD, and Steven Borkan, MD, Receive $1.6M Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) Award to Train MD/PhD Students
Read full article Congratulations to Vickery Trinkaus-Randall, PhD, professor of biochemistry & cell biology, and ophthalmology, and Steven Borkan, MD, associate professor of medicine, who have received a multi-PI Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The $1.6 million award is the first received by BU for the MD/PhD program. It will contribute to the training of at least four MD/PhD students per year to become clinician scientists through research and clinical... More
Congratulations to Our 2025 GMS Educator and Mentor Awardees!
Each year, the Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine honors Graduate Medical Sciences faculty who deliver exceptional education and mentorship to graduate students in masters and doctoral programs. The awards are granted based on recommendations from across GMS programs. This year, GMS is pleased to share that Elizabeth Duffy, MA, and Barbara Schreiber, PhD, have been awarded the 2024 Educator of the Year awards, and that Neil Ganem, PhD, has been awarded the Excellence... More
GMS Spotlight: Kanishka Mehra (MHCBM ’25)
Kanishka Mehra is a May 2025 graduate of the Master of Arts in Mental Health Counseling & Behavioral Medicine at Graduate Medical Sciences. In her work as a therapist, Kanishka aims to work with adolescents, young adults, and midlife adults through transitional periods that can hold the potential for transformation. Throughout the last two years, Kanishka has also worked as the Marketing & Communications student intern for GMS, where she created content for social media, More
Congratulations to Our 2025 Outstanding Student Achievement Award Winners!
Graduate Medical Sciences has awarded three high-achieving, graduating students with Outstanding Student Achievement Awards in the categories of “Community Service” and “Outstanding Research.” The “Outstanding Research” Award recognizes achievement related to scientific impact, breakthroughs and intellectual contributions during a student’s time at GMS. The “Community Service” Award recognizes initiative and leadership related to service either in fulfillment of graduate school requirements or extracurricular efforts. Each student who won an award has made exceptional contributions to... More
2025 Outstanding Student Achievement Award: Master’s Community Service Category
Marine Chido Nimblette Master of Science in Medical Sciences (MAMS) Program Nimblette is a member of the MS in Medical Sciences graduating class of 2025. Since 2024, she has served as one of 38 mayor-appointed members of the SPARK Boston Council, where she advises Boston Mayor Michelle Wu on programs and policies that affect 20- to 35-year-olds across the city. As council members, Nimblette and her cohort each represent a Boston neighborhood. Nimblette represents the Fenway/Kenmore area, More
2025 Outstanding Student Achievement Award: Master’s Research Category
Gloria Urrutia '25 Master of Science in Medical Sciences (MAMS) Program Urrutia matriculated into the MS in Medical Sciences (MAMS) Program in 2023 and is preparing to graduate in May 2025. During her thesis year, Urrutia has worked on several projects addressing overlooked educational and healthcare barriers that disproportionately affect underrepresented communities. For her thesis alongside Assistant Professor of Pharmacology, Physiology & Biophysics Marisol Lopez, PhD, Urrutia investigated how technical flaws in physiology multiple-choice question (MCQ) assessments... More