School of Medicine
Showing 21-30 of 34 Results
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Alejandra Ruiz
Postdoctoral Scholar, General Surgery
BioDr. Alejandra Ruiz is a physician-scientist working at the intersection of clinical medicine, health services research, and community-engaged intervention design. Based on her clinical experience in high-complexity settings, she works to optimize integrative care models that address both physical and mental health needs.
She is currently a postdoctoral researcher in the Departments of Emergency Medicine and General Surgery, where she examines structural barriers to care among underserved populations and develops pathways to improve access and care delivery. Her work is grounded in community-based participatory research, through which she designs, implements, and evaluates culturally responsive interventions. Dr. Ruiz is committed to advancing equitable, sustainable models of care that improve access, engagement, and patient outcomes. -
Mattias Rydberg
Postdoctoral Scholar, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
BioMattias Rydberg, MD, PhD, is a hand surgeon and postdoctoral scholar in the Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at Stanford University School of Medicine. His research focuses on epidemiology, machine learning, and digital health technologies in hand surgery and musculoskeletal disease. Dr. Rydberg completed his medical and doctoral training at Lund University in Sweden, where his PhD work focused on diabetic hand disorders and large-scale register-based research.
At Stanford, he works in the laboratory of Dr. Paige Fox, studying peripheral nerve disorders, fibroproliferative diseases, and AI-based motion tracking technologies for upper extremity assessment. His current projects include national database studies on diabetes and entrapment neuropathies, frozen shoulder and Dupuytren’s disease, and the development of camera-based hand motion analysis tools using machine learning and computer vision. -
Yann Sakref
Postdoctoral Scholar, General Surgery
BioYann Sakref is a Postdoctoral Scholar in General Surgery at Stanford University, working within the Knowlton Lab. With a passion for interdisciplinary sciences and advancing medical biotechnology and patient care, Yann is developing clinical and AI solutions as part of an ARPA-H-funded project under Dr. Knowlton's supervision. His work focuses on creating computer vision models for surgical assistance and contributing to the collaborative development of innovative tools by working closely with clinical, engineering, and AI teams. He also works closely with collaborators at the S-SPIRE Center.
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Saurabh Sharma
Postdoctoral Scholar, General and Vascular Surgery
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsWe develop strategies to transport immunotherapeutic molecules across the blood-brain barrier for imaging and treating brain metastatic cancer. Currently, under the mentorship of Dr. Amanda Kirane, I have continued my work in cancer-targeted nanotechnology for the treatment of melanoma brain metastases. Immunotherapy of small peptides, small molecules.
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Palca Shibale
Postdoctoral Scholar, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
BioShibale, Palca is a post-doctoral fellow in the Hagey Laboratory under mentorship of Dr. Derrick Wan and Michael Longaker. She earned her BS in Molecular and Cellular Biology at the University of Washington (UW), her MS in Medical Physiology and Biophysics at Case Western University and her MD from UW. She has previously conducted translational research on drug efficacy and clinical research in trauma and vascular surgery. Her current works focus on understanding the mechanisms of tissue regeneration and fibrosis with nano materials and as well, the roles of fibroblast subpopulations in the foreign body response model
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Antonio Tomasso
Postdoctoral Scholar, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
BioAntonio Tomasso is an NWO Rubicon Postdoctoral Scholar. As part of his MSc in Medical Molecular and Cellular Biotechnology at Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, he explored the immunomodulatory and neurotrophic roles of neural stem cells (NSCs) following spinal cord injury. As a Research Assistant at Karolinska Institute, he delved into the signaling pathways required for NSC activation and migration after spinal cord injury, and the limited regenerative abilities of mouse and human heart.
During his PhD, he investigated the molecular mechanisms of tissue regeneration in planarians, axolotls and spiny mice. He conducted research as a Visiting Fellow at the University of Kentucky and the Hubrecht Institute.
His research demonstrated that MAPK/ERK signaling acts as a molecular switch between regeneration and fibrosis in adult mammals and can be activated to stimulate a regenerative response, including new hair follicle formation, in scarring wounds.
He contributed to a pioneering study showing that spiny mice can recover heart function after infarct through enhanced angiogenesis, ECM remodeling and epicardium regeneration. He also played a key role in spatial transcriptomic studies that defined regenerative and fibrotic gene signatures in spiny mice, laboratory mice and gerbils.
He earned a PhD cum laude in Molecular and Cellular Life Sciences at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine.
He has been awarded an NWO Dutch Research Council Rubicon Postdoctoral grant to conduct research on the molecular drivers of fibroblast activation in wound healing and organ fibrosis.
His ultimate research aim is to crack the code of tissue regeneration and rejuvenation, reversing organ scarring and preventing fibrosis in injuries and pathological conditions, through the identification of therapeutic targets for enhanced tissue repair and functional recovery.
Driven by his innate curiosity and passion for science, he loves tackling new challenges, thinking outside the box, and building interdisciplinary collaborations to push forward the boundaries of knowledge.
His career goal is to serve as a group leader, fostering a collaborative environment where everyone can thrive, achieve their goals and leave a lasting impact through community-building and scientific discoveries for the benefit of humankind. -
Banita Verma
Postdoctoral Scholar, General and Vascular Surgery
BioI am Banita Verma, a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University, currently working with Dr. Fredrick M. Dirbas at the Department of Surgery. Our research focus is to understand the type of cell death and the nature of immune responses triggered by FLASH versus conventional radiotherapy in various murine breast cancer models. Additionally, we aim to explore the role of DAMPs released by dying cells in generating immune responses after both FLASH and conventional radiotherapy. Furthermore, we are interested in studying the mechanism behind the low toxicity of the FLASH compared to conventional radiotherapy to the adjacent non-cancerous tissue. To accomplish this goal, our laboratory is actively collaborating with Dr. Bill Loo, who holds great expertise in the field of radiation oncology.
Before joining Stanford University, I served as a postdoctoral researcher at Karolinska Institutet, Sweden from 2021-2023. My research aimed to study the activation mechanism of Cholineacetyltransferase (ChAT), a pivotal enzyme in acetylcholine synthesis. This enzyme is known to be hypoactive in neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. Our group successfully synthesized novel compounds capable of enhancing ChAT activity.
I completed my doctoral research in cancer biology at the Department of Experimental Medicine and Biotechnology, PGIMER Chandigarh, India, in 2021. My work was the evaluation of role of TNF-α mediated Necroptosis in breast cancer cells. My primary research interests are cancer biology and cell death pathways.
