Student News
Congratulations to Anthony Spinella on a successful defense!
Congratulations to Anthony Spinella on successfully defending his PhD dissertation entitled Age-Associated Alterations in Head and Neck Cancer!
Anthony is a member of the Varelas Lab in BU's Department of Biochemistry & Cell Biology. In 2024, he was selected to present a research talk at the FASEB Hippo Pathway in Biology and Diseases Conference in Melbourne, FL, where he discussed his work on YAP-TEAD blockade and its role in restoring age-associated immune evasion in oral squamous cell carcinoma. He also presented a selected research talk at the 2024 Boston University School of Medicine MD-PhD Annual Retreat. Additionally, Spinella was awarded Best Poster Presentation at the Biochemistry & Cell Biology Department Annual Retreat at BUSM. In 2023, he gave a selected research talk at the American Physician Scientist Association Northeast Regional Meeting. In 2022, Spinella was honored with the Best Lightning Talk Award at the Genome Science Institute 2022 Research Symposium and also won Best Poster Presentation at the 2022 Biochemistry Department Annual Retreat at BUSM.
Anthony was awarded an F30 by the National Institute of Aging, focused on defining age-associated alterations in oral squamous cell carcinoma. Anthony was also awarded a Student Seed Grant by the Boston University Center for Multiscale and Translational Mechanobiology to explore the mechanical properties of the oral tumor microenvironment in aged tissues.
Congratulations again, Anthony, and we wish you all the best moving forward. 🎉
Abstract Summary:
Head and neck squamous cell carcinomas (HNSCC) are the seventh most common cancers globally with poor survival rates and largely ineffective pharmacological treatments. Despite older age being associated with worse survival for HNSCC, most preclinical cancer studies focus on outcomes in young animals, potentially contributing to the limited understanding and treatment strategies for these cancers. To test the influence of age on HNSCC, we utilized carcinogen-induced and syngeneic orthotopic isograft models of HNSCC, performing hemi-lingual injections of murine oral squamous cell carcinoma cells that phenocopy tobacco-driven HNSCC in young and old mice. Old animals exhibited more rapid tumor growth, reduced intra-tumoral immune infiltration, and were enriched for transcriptionally-distinct, immune-evasive tumor cell populations. We observed that older age promotes malignant features in oral lesions. Additionally, we identified an enrichment of an age-associated, immune-evasive carcinoma cell population that coincided with reduced immune infiltration in tumors in old mice, molecular features that corresponded to reduced immune infiltration in human HNSCC. We further identified an age-associated, pro-fibrotic fibroblast population in the aged oral microenvironment that corresponded to elevated collagen deposition and elevated yes-associated protein (YAP) and TEA-domain transcription factor family (TEAD) activity in oral carcinoma cells in old mice. We demonstrated that targeting YAP-TEAD activity restored the immunogenicity of oral carcinoma cells, enhancing immune infiltration and tumor clearance in old mice. In additional studies, we demonstrated that correcting absent chemokine signaling in old mice and could restore intra-tumoral immune infiltration to promote tumor clearance and that induction of an age-associated, fibrotic stroma in young mice could recapitulate both the growth dynamics and immune-evasive phenotypes in oral carcinoma cells observed in old mice. Overall, these studies highlight the critical importance that aging plays in directing tumor biology in HNSCC, that YAP-TEAD contribute to mediating these dynamics, and that targeting age-associated alterations in the carcinoma cell, immune, or stromal compartments could serve as viable avenues for therapeutic intervention to improve outcomes for older HNSCC patients.
Congrats to our 2024 graduates!
Congratulations to our 2024 MD-PhD graduates Margaret Minnig, Anthony Yeung, Shen Ning, and David Swain!
- Margaret will begin residency in psychology and research at The University of Washington
- Anthony will begin residency in pediatrics as part of the Molecular Medicine Program at The University of California San Francisco
- Shen will begin residency in Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology at Massachussetts General Hospital
- David will begin residency in opthalmology at Northwestern University
We wish you all the best in your upcoming endeavors!
Congratulations to our MD-PhD Class of 2025 AOA Inductees!
We are proud and honored to announce the following AOA inductees from our MD-PhD Class of 2025.
Annual MD-PhD Program Retreat Brings Students of All Years Together for a Day Full of Science, Medicine, Mentorship, and Fun!
The annual retreat is a student-planned initiative attended by all members of the MD/PhD training program. Students interact and learn from their colleagues in all years during this event. The retreat includes a keynote speaker (usually an alum of the program), several student scientific and clinical presentations, and a poster session where M2s and all students in the graduate phase of the program present research from their labs or rotations.
This year's alumni speaker is Dr. Aly Elezaby. Dr. Elezaby is an advanced heart failure and transplant cardiology at Stanford University School of Medicine and a research scientist in the lab of Dr. Daria Mochly-Rosen. He graduated from the MD-PhD program at Boston University School of Medicine in 2017.
Photos courtesy of Brittny Garcia
Congratulations to Daniel Kirsch on a successful defense!
Congratulations to Daniel Kirsch on successfully defending his PhD dissertation on the pathological contributions to clinical symptoms of CTE!
MD PhD Students Shine at Medical Student Research Symposium!
MD PhD students presented this past Monday at the Medical Student Research Symposium. Rose Zhao was selected as an oral presenter for her research on "Characterization of Whole-genome Double Sequencing Events Across Tissues in vivo." Martin Ma and Kristen Segars both won awards for their poster presentations. A huge congratulations to our students!
Congratulations to Shen Ning on her AOA Induction!
Shen Ning has been elected to have membership to the medical honor society, Alpha Omega Alpha (AOA). Induction into AOA is awarded to medical students who exemplify scholarship, character and have contributed significantly to the medical sciences and practice. On behalf of Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine's MD/PhD program, we would like to extend our warmest congratulations to Shen!
Shen now joins the ranks of the following MD/PhD students:
2022:Aditya Mithal, Kristy Abo, Katelyn Trecartin
2020: Ryan Quinton
2019: Marek Kowalski, Chris Gromisch and Iris Trutzer
2018: Anjali Jacobs
Congrats to our 2023 graduates!
Congratulations to our 2023 MD/PhD graduates Kristy Abo, Katelyn Batterman, Alissa Frame, Xu Ke, Yoonjoo Lee, Will Li, Jane Lock, Aditya Mithal, and Marc Vittoria! We wish you the best in your upcoming endeavors!
Read the Fall 2022 Bench to Bedpost Bulletin Here!
The Fall 2022 edition of the Boston University MD/PhD Bench to Bedpost Bulletin is now live! Some highlights from this semester's Alumni edition include:
- Dr. Borkan's interview with Dr. Ian Francis (MD/PhD '20)
- A recap of the 2022 annual MD/PhD Retreat
- Two award-winning MD/PhD students
- And more!
The Bench to Bedpost Bulletin is brought to you by Aria Pearlman Morales, Morgan Corniquel and Katie Hohl, all chairs of the Alumni Committee Branch of the MD/PhD Student Government.
Conor Shea wins Moorman-Simon Fellowship
Congratulations to Conor for winning the 2022-2023 Moorman-Simon Fellowship! The fellowship is provided to current MD/PhD and PhD students in Computational Biomedicine who are working in the field of cancer research. Conor has been working in Beane and Spira-Lenburg Labs, using single cell RNA transcriptomics to profile premalignant lesions in the lungs and identify their progression to cancer.
Learn more about the fellowship here.