Students Honored for Research Achievements

At the 2025 Student Research Day on April 2, 65 medical students presented their research to colleagues, fellow students, faculty, and leadership, and 10 were honored with awards. Each student prepared a research poster explaining the methodologies, results, and inspiration for their topic. The event also honored VP&S physician-scientist Steven O. Marx, MD, who was selected as this year’s Scholarly Projects Program Faculty Mentor of the Year. Dr. Marx is the Herbert and Florence Irving Professor of Cardiology (in Medicine) to Honor Dr. Le Roy E. Rabbani (in Molecular Pharmacology and Therapeutics) and director of the cardiovascular fellowship program.

Recipients of Awards in Four Categories: 

Scholarly Project

1st Place:

Chisom Enwere, “A RADical Treatment for Arrhythmias”

2nd Place:

Michelle Shui, “Optimizing Pelvic Exam Training: Insights From Medical Students at Columbia University”

Summer Research

1st Place:

Lauren Burgett, “Stepwise Differentiation of Engineered Human Meniscus Tissues in 3D-Printed Flexible Scaffolds”

2nd Place:

Zachary Levin, “Early Identification of Delayed Cerebral Ischemia and Cerebral Vasospasm After Aneurysmal Subarachnoid Hemorrhage Through a Novel Dynamical Systems Approach”

3rd Place (tie):

Matthew Warren, “Dissecting the Functional Heterogeneity of Tissue-Resident Memory T Cells in Human Tissues”

Gift Owolabi, “Simple Point System for Predicting Bloodless Aortic Aneurysm Repair”

MD/PhD

1st Place:

Noah Chen, “Building a Better Bug—Creating Glucose-Avid Bacteria for Tumor Colonization”

Research Year

1st Place:

Varun Sudunagunta, “Stag2-Cohesin Dependent Chromatin Dynamism Drives Erythroid Fate Acquisition and Execution”

2nd Place:

Ritt Givens, “Do Teams of Strangers Create Health Care Dangers? The Effect of OR Team Consistency on Operative Times in Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis”

3rd Place:

Nathaniel Rolfe, “Convection Enhanced Delivery of Dexamethasone Suppresses Tumor-Associated Inflammation in Glioblastoma and Avoids Systemic Toxicities”