Fourth Annual CTSI Translational Science Symposium: Speakers, Poster Session Winners and more!
Fourth Annual CTSI Translational Science Symposium
“Research on Disparities in Health Care”
October 1, 2014
Hiebert Lounge
14th Floor-L Building
72 East Concord Street, Boston
BUSM
Sponsored by: The CTSI, as well as The Shamim and Ashraf Dahod Breast Cancer Research Center at BU & The Carter Disparities Fund at BMC
Agenda
Speaker Biographies
Speaker and Panelist biographies can be found here.
Poster Session Abstract Listing
A listing of the abstracts presented in the symposium’s poster session can be found here.
Please note that abstract presenters were given the option to opt-out of listing on our website; abstracts submitted but not presented are also not listed.
Poster Session Winners
First Prize Winner: Steven M. Scherr, PhD
Recent Ebola outbreaks in Western Africa have drawn world-wide attention. There is an urgent need for an early detection of Ebola virus at the point of care in order to contain this epidemic. Using a digital optical detection technique developed in Professor Ünlü’s laboratory, Dr. Scherr and colleagues were able to detect Ebola virus in serum in less than 10 minutes with high sensitivity and accuracy. Certainly, this important work will have great implications in the prevention of Ebola epidemic now and in the future.
Second Prize Winner: Trevor Packer, MS
Due to lack of effective therapeutic regimen, the rise of oral squamous cell carcinoma has become a public health issue. Aiming to develop a more efficient targeted therapy for this disease, Trevor Packer et al. in Dr. Kukuruzinska’s group have performed basic bench research and demonstrated that by specifically inhibiting a gene involved in N-glycosylation, the growth of squamous cancer cells and their metastatic potential can be greatly reduced. Therefore, their discovery will greatly facilitate the development of new and effective drugs for the treatment of this malignancy.
Third Prize Winner: Megan Hempstead, MPH
African-American women have an infant mortality rate much higher than that of non-Hispanic white women. To eliminate this disparity, preconception care before pregnancy could provide an important tool to educate women about the risk factors for negative birth outcomes for both the mother and the baby. In a randomized-control clinical trial, Ms. Megan Hempstead and Dr. Brian Jack’s group, Project Preconception Care has utilized an innovative communication program called “Gabby” to address this issue. Their trial with 100 mostly college-educated young African-American women indicates that the online Gabby system can identify preconception risks leading to actions that can reduce the number of preconception risks.
Attendee Listing
Symposium attendee information can be found here.