Rebecca Lee is a 4th year PhD candidate in the laboratory of Dr. Kaelyn Sumigray, in the Department of Genetics. Using genetic mouse models and in vitro 2D enteroid monolayers, she is investigating the role of the planar cell polarity (PCP) pathway in intestinal patterning and architecture to better understand how a stem cell niche is maintained during intestinal development.
Lo Graduate Fellowship for Excellence in Stem Cell Research
The Fellowship
Yale Stem Cell Center is pleased to announce the 13th year of “The Lo Graduate Fellowship for Excellence in Stem Cell Research” (abbreviated as “The Lo Fellowship”). This one-year fellowship is made possible by a generous gift of endowment from the KS & Feili Lo Foundation. It is Yale Stem Cell Center’s most prestigious graduate award and is designed to recognize and support graduate students with demonstrated passion and achievement in stem cell research. Up to four Lo Fellowship awards will be given to outstanding senior graduate students pursuing stem cell research at Yale University, to partially defray the recipient’s stipend, with funding beginning on September 1, 2024. Each recipient will receive $30,000 in stipend support.
Eligibility
The applicant should be a Ph.D. or M.D./Ph.D. candidate who has successfully passed the Ph.D. qualifying exam and will be in their 4th or 5th year of graduate study by September 1, 2024. The applicant’s thesis research should be in the stem cell field in the laboratory of a Yale Stem Cell Center faculty member. Selection will be limited to one student per lab.
Deadline
Application deadline is May 31, 2024 at 11:59pm.
Application Package
Applications should contain the following four components:
- NIH Biosketch of the applicant.
- Information on the applicant that includes:
- The applicant’s year of study as of the September 1 start date.
- The name, title, and department of the student’s advisor.
- The field of study in which the degree will be granted.
- A brief (two-page maximum) description of the applicant’s thesis project, including a title and a hypothesis, and summarizing past accomplishments (i.e. preliminary data) and future research. Figures are encouraged, but not required. References are not included in the 2- page limit.
- Three letters of reference: one letter from the applicant’s thesis mentor and two letters from other faculty who know the candidate’s research and can fairly evaluate the candidate. One or both of these individuals should be members of the candidate’s thesis committee.
The applicant should send all materials, with the exception of reference letters, as a single PDF file to Valancia Ariyanayagam, Operations Manager at valancia.ariyanayagam@yale.edu. The three reference letters should be sent directly from the faculty members to Valancia Ariyanayagam.
For questions about eligibility for this award, please contact Valancia Ariyanayagam at valancia.ariyanayagam@yale.edu.
Current Fellows
- Bruna Mafra de Faria is a graduate student in the laboratory of Shangqin Guo in the Department of Cell Biology. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Sciences and a Master’s degree in Morphological Sciences from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ-Brazil), where she investigated the effect of small molecules against Glioblastoma. Bruna’s current research in the Guo lab focuses on understanding the biology of Acute Myeloid Leukemia.
- Monique Pedroza (they/them) is a fourth year PhD candidate in the Department of Genetics mentored by Dr. Berna Sözen. Their primary area of research is exploring inaccessible stages of early human embryogenesis using a stem cell-based platform. Prior to starting their PhD, Monique completed their master's degree in Clinical Embryology at the University of Oxford investigating left-right asymmetry in mammalian embryonic heart development with Dr. Shankar Srinivas. They then worked as a postbaccalaureate research fellow at the National Institutes of Health investigating RNA degradation in mouse oocyte development with Dr. Jurrien Dean. Monique earned their bachelor's degree in Biology and Spanish from Florida State University. At Yale, Monique is a recipient of the Lo Graduate Fellowship for Excellence in Stem Cell Research.
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2022 Fellows
Postdoctoral Associate in Cell Biology
Myles Alderman is a postdoctoral associate in Haifan Lin's Lab studying the self-renewal of germline stem cells . He performed his graduate studies at Yale University's Department of Genetics mentored by Dr. Andrew Xiao. His dissertation was focused on understanding the epigenetic regulation of embryogenesis and placentation, with a focus on DNA methylation. Before starting his PhD, he worked in the lab of Dr. Hugh Taylor investigating the pathogenesis of endometriosis, and the impact of Bisphenol-A (BPA) on embryonic development and epigenetic programming. He earned his bachelor's degree in biology in 2014 from Kenyon College. Myles is a recipient of the Gruber Science Fellowship at Yale, the National Science Foundation's Graduate Fellowship Research Fellowships Program (NSF GRFP), and the Lo Graduate Fellowship for Excellence in Stem Cell Research.- Madeline Mayday is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Pathology and is a Medical Research Scholar. Originally from Muskoka, Ontario, she graduated with a B.S. in Cell and Molecular Biology from San Francisco State University. Following her undergraduate career she worked as a Research Associate at UCSF to develop a protocol for detection of pathogens causing respiratory failure in pediatric HSC transplant patients. Madeline started her graduate studies in Yale’s MMPP program in Fall 2019 and joined the Krause Lab in May 2020 with an interest in translational research and malignant hematopoiesis. She is currently working on a project to better understand the development of AMKL, a rare neonatal leukemia. Madeline is a Chief Graduate Student for the Department of Pathology.