School of Medicine
Showing 1-18 of 18 Results
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Linnea Burke
Postdoctoral Scholar, General Surgery
BioLinnea Burke is a general surgery resident at Loma Linda University Health and a research fellow in the Division of Minimally Invasive and Bariatric Surgery at Stanford University. Her research interests include minimally invasive and bariatric surgery, healthcare disparities and implications on clinical outcomes, health services and policy, quality improvement, and the application of AI to improve surgical care.
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Angela Corvino
Postdoctoral Scholar, General Surgery
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsPostdoctoral researcher pioneering the advancement of novel radiotherapy approaches (FLASH, SFRT) to tackle a critical challenge: minimising damage to healthy tissue surrounding difficult to treat tumors. I'm hands-on in all stages of preclinical experimentation, spanning from Monte Carlo simulations for planning and precise dosimetry, to conducting small animal irradiation, follow-ups, and insightful data analysis.
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Chia-Hsin Hsu
Postdoctoral Scholar, General Surgery
BioDr. Chia-Hsin (Cindy) Hsu is a postdoctoral scholar in Dr. Deshka Foster's laboratory in the Department of General Surgery at Stanford University School of Medicine. She received her Ph.D. in Biomedical and Biological Sciences from Cornell University under Dr. Andrew White, where she studied how extracellular matrix remodeling and innate immune crosstalk shape tumor response to targeted therapy in BRAF-mutant melanoma. She previously earned her D.V.M. and M.S. in Veterinary Medicine from National Taiwan University. Dr. Hsu's current research focuses on two projects: developing a sustained-release hydrogel platform for localized JUN inhibition to prevent postoperative intra-abdominal adhesions, a leading cause of bowel obstruction and reoperative morbidity; and investigating stromal–tertiary lymphoid structure (TLS) crosstalk in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma to define how the tumor microenvironment shapes anti-tumor immunity.
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Adel Mutahar
Postdoctoral Scholar, General and Vascular Surgery
BioDr. Adel Z. I. Mutahar is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Surgery at Stanford University, working under the mentorship of Dr. Frederick M. Dirbas. His research focuses on translational breast cancer biology and emerging radiotherapy technologies, with an emphasis on tumor–microenvironment interactions, immuno-oncology, and preclinical therapeutic development. His academic journey spans three countries—beginning in Yemen, advancing through India, and now progressing at Stanford—reflecting his commitment to impactful cancer research and global scientific advancement.
Dr. Mutahar began his career in Yemen, earning his Bachelor’s degree in Medical Laboratory Sciences before joining Abs Community College as a faculty member. From 2007–2013, he held several academic leadership roles, including Academic Director, Head of Evaluation, and Assistant Dean of Students, where he modernized curriculum, expanded hands-on diagnostic training, and strengthened laboratory education infrastructure in resource-limited settings. His work contributed to building a more skilled medical diagnostics workforce and improving pathways for laboratory science education.
Awarded a prestigious national merit scholarship, Dr. Mutahar continued his graduate and doctoral training in India, completing his M.S. and Ph.D. in Biotechnology with a focus on triple-negative breast cancer. During his doctoral work, he developed 3D tumor spheroid models and combinatorial therapeutic strategies, demonstrating synergy between anti-angiogenic agents and chemotherapy in TNBC. He further advanced this research by creating an orthotopic murine model to investigate metastatic progression and demonstrated that knockdown of the MTA1 gene in mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) significantly suppressed TNBC invasion, angiogenesis, and metastatic spread, introducing a promising stromal-targeted therapeutic concept for aggressive breast cancer. This work earned recognition through travel grants, conference presentations, and a Best Poster Award. His scientific adaptability was further demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic, when he uncovered a novel interaction between SARS-CoV-2 Spike RBD and VEGF signaling.
At Stanford, his work emphases on FLASH radiotherapy, an ultrahigh-dose-rate modality with the potential to widen the therapeutic window by minimizing normal-tissue toxicity while maintaining tumor control. Working within Dr. Dirbas’s translational breast oncology program, Dr. Mutahar employs patient-derived xenografts, orthotopic murine models, spatial transcriptomics, single-cell RNA sequencing, and immune profiling to dissect the biological mechanisms governing treatment response. His research integrates multi-omics analysis to map early and late radiotherapy injury pathways—including senescence, apoptosis and fibrosis. His goal is to develop mechanism-driven radio-immunotherapy strategies and durable FLASH-RT combination regimens that can be translated into clinical trials for breast cancer, improving therapeutic durability, minimizing toxicity, and ultimately enhancing patient outcomes.
Dr. Mutahar’s long-term vision is to establish an independent laboratory at the intersection of radiobiology, immuno-oncology, and translational therapeutics. Guided by Dr. Dirbas’s mentorship and shaped by multidisciplinary experience across three continents, he aims to develop biologically informed treatment strategies that eradicate tumors while preserving normal tissue and immune integrity—ultimately improving quality of life and survival for women with aggressive breast cancers. -
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. -
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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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. -
Lucy Whitmore
Postdoctoral Scholar, General Surgery
BioLucy Whitmore is a radiation physics researcher at Stanford University working on emerging radiotherapy technologies, with a particular focus on ultra-high dose-rate (FLASH) radiation delivery. Her research combines radiation dosimetry, preclinical irradiation, Monte Carlo simulation, accelerator physics, treatment planning, and quantitative analysis of radiation biology studies. She also works on very-high-energy electron beams, detector response, radiochromic film dosimetry, and the development of reproducible experimental and computational workflows for translational radiotherapy research.
