Stanford University
Showing 201-250 of 524 Results
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Derick Okwan
Assistant Professor of Pathology
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsBroadly, the Okwan lab’s primary interest is to understand how and why the immune system contributes to nearly all chronic diseases. The immune system of the modern human has evolved from a history of stress to the species: famines, continual bouts of lethal pandemics, as well as major climate/environmental and migratory changes that exposed the immune system to novel threats. At the forefront of these challenges are innate immune cells, particularly neutrophils, the most abundant leukocytes. For the first time in human history – at least in the western world- we live in an era of abundance. The Okwan lab is interested in understanding how this traumatic history creates a functional mismatch for the neutrophil, which we believe underpins their roles in chronic diseases of the modern era: cancer, cardiovascular disease, neurodegeneration, and autoimmune disorders. Rather than wholesale depletion of neutrophils and innate immune cells, we seek to identify novel approaches to leverage these cells to combat various diseases.
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Okikiola Morenike Olajide
Postdoctoral Scholar, Biology
BioOkikiola M. Olajide, PhD is a molecular virologist and emerging structural biologist specializing in HIV-1 vaccine research. Currently a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Barnes Lab at Stanford University, Dr. Olajide focuses on designing HIV-1 immunogens that elicit silent face-targeting broadly neutralizing antibodies (bNAbs) and developing innovative HIV infection models using human spleen organoids. Her research aims to bridge the gap between promising preclinical immunogens and their effectiveness in human clinical trials, advancing the path toward more effective HIV vaccines. Dr. Olajide earned her PhD in Biology from Albert Ludwigs University, Freiburg, where she investigated protein-protein interactions crucial for viral entry in bat influenza A viruses, pioneering approaches such as photo-affinity protein crosslinking and genetic code expansion. She also holds an MSc in Medical Virology from the University of Ilorin, Nigeria, where she studied the role of cockroaches in the dissemination and sustained transmission of live-attenuated oral polio vaccine virus. During her BSc in Microbiology at Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) Zaria, she uncovered an ongoing rubella outbreak among at-risk, unvaccinated pregnant women. A strong advocate for advancing research in developing regions, Dr. Olajide actively supports training initiatives for scientists in Sub-Saharan Africa. Her commitment to mentorship, shaped by her experiences as an international scholar, drives her to guide the next generation of researchers in making meaningful scientific contributions.
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Clayton Olash
Affiliate, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
BioClayton Olash, MD is a psychiatry resident at the Medical University of South Carolina and an affiliate researcher with Stanford University. His work bridges psychiatry, neuroscience, and contemplative traditions, with a focus on how altered states of consciousness can catalyze lasting psychological change.
Clayton's current research spans multiple projects, including studies on ibogaine and its impact on the default mode network, rapid-acting neuromodulation techniques such as SAINT TMS combined with meditation, and a novel high-dose electrotherapy device for home-based treatment of depression. His broader aim is to understand how psychedelics, brain stimulation, and meditative practices can modulate self-related processing and promote enduring well-being.
With backgrounds in philosophy, psychology, and medicine, Clayton's work emphasizes integration: uniting ancient contemplative wisdom with modern neuroscience and emerging technologies. His long-term goal is to develop translational models of care that transform transient altered states into sustainable therapeutic traits. -
Eric Olcott
Professor of Radiology (Veterans Affairs), Emeritus
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsBody imaging utilizing CT, ultrasound and MRI. Imaging of appendicitis. Imaging of pancreatic and biliary malignancies. Imaging of trauma. Magnetic resonance angiography.
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Carolina Olguin Jacobson
Postdoctoral Scholar, Oceans
BioMy research focuses on socio-ecological systems within fishery cooperatives in Baja California, Mexico, exploring their resilience and adaptation strategies to climate change and COVID-19 impacts through oceanographic and ecological monitoring. Working with marine protected areas and climate refugia areas.
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Kathryn Meyer Olivarius
Associate Professor of History
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsI am an historian of nineteenth-century America, interested primarily in the antebellum South, Greater Caribbean, slavery, and disease. My research seeks to understand how epidemic yellow fever disrupted Deep Southern society. Nearly every summer, this mosquito-borne virus killed up to ten percent of the urban population. But it also generated culture and social norms in its fatal wake. Beyond the rigid structures of race and unfreedom in Deep Southern society, I argue there was alternate, if invisible, hierarchy at work, with “acclimated” (immune) people at the top and a great mass of “unacclimated” (non-immune) people awaiting their brush with yellow fever languishing in social and professional purgatory. About half of all people died in the acclimating process.
In New Orleans, alleged-imperviousness or vulnerability to epidemic disease evolved into an explanatory tool for success or failure in commodity capitalism, and a justification for a race- and ethnicity-based social hierarchy where certain people were decidedly less equal than others. Disease justified highly asymmetrical social and labor relations, produced politicians apathetic about the welfare of their poor or recently-immigrated constituents, and accentuated the population’s xenophobic, racist, pro-slavery, and individualist proclivities. Alongside skin color, acclimation-status, I argue, played a major role in determining a person’s position, success, and sense of belonging in antebellum New Orleans.
Most of all, disease provided the tacit justification for who did what work during cotton and sugar production, becoming the essence of an increasingly elaborate and tortuous justification for widespread and permanent black slavery. In the Deep Southern view, only enslaved black people could survive work like cane cutting, swamp clearing, and cotton picking. In fact, proslavery theorists argued, black slavery was positively natural, even humanitarian, for it protected the health of whites—and thus the nation writ large—insulating them from diseased-labor and spaces that would kill them.
By fusing health with capitalism in my forthcoming book Necropolis, I will present a new model—beyond the toxic fusion of white supremacy with the flows of global capitalism—for how power operated in Atlantic society.
I am also interested in historical notions of consent (sexual or otherwise); slave revolts in the United States and the Caribbean; anti- and pro-slavery thought; class and ethnicity in antebellum America; the history of life insurance and environmental risk; comparative slave systems; technology and slavery; the Haitian Revolution; and boosterism in the American West. -
Stefan L. Oliver
Lead Staff Scientist, Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource
BioStefan Oliver is a creative senior scientist and educator with a special interest in the membrane fusion mechanisms of viral pathogens. Stefan uses and develops multidisciplinary approaches to delineate the molecular functions that underpin the mechanics of herpesvirus fusion. Recently he has been focused on solving near atomic resolution structures of antibody-bound glycoproteins using contemporary cryo-EM technologies. One of his overarching goals is to understand the complex interplay of the herpesvirus fusion complex with cellular factors at the atomic level using state-of-the-art structural biology tools.
In addition to his dedication to lab-based science, Stefan is involved in community outreach supporting scientists of the future. He participates as a judge for science competitions and also lectures to high school students about STEM. He is a strong advocate for the scientific method and seeks to get the best out of his mentees at all stages of their careers, guiding high school students and postdocs through their research projects.
Stefan’s educational background includes a B.Sc. in Immunology and a Ph.D. in Veterinary Virology. He has spent more than 25 years in academic and biotechnology research laboratories in fields spanning immunology, pharmaceuticals, infectious diseases and structural biology. Special interests outside of his primary field of research are evolution and motorcycles. Stefan was the recipient of an American Motorcycling Association (AMA) Service award for providing information related to COVID-19.
