2016-17 CERSI Scholars

Photo	Who	Bio
	Emily Mallory Ph.D. Candidate, Biomedical Informatics Training Program, Stanford	Emily Mallory is a PhD candidate in the Biomedical Informatics training program at Stanford University. She completed a B.S. in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology from the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) in 2011. Emily worked in Dr. Maricel Kann’s lab for three years on extracting disease mutations from text, as well as predicting protein-protein interactions using coevolution-based methods. She started her PhD program at Stanford in 2012 and currently works in Dr. Russ Altman’s lab on text extraction applications. Emily is interested in the combination of text-derived information from literature articles, drug labels, patents, and advisory notes with database and experimental data to predict and monitor drug response and safety.
	Kathryn Ross Postdoc, Center for Tobacco Control, Research, and Education, UCSF	Kathryn Ross received her Ph.D. in Behavior, Cognition, and Neuroscience from American University. She is currently a second-year Postdoctoral Fellow at UCSF’s Center for Tobacco Control, Research, and Education and an active member of UCSF’s Tobacco Center of Regulatory Science. With her mentor, Dr. Neal Benowitz, Kathryn is interested in investigating the cognitive, behavioral, and physiological factors that drive nicotine and tobacco use. Currently, she is interested in using these skills to assess the abuse liability of electronic cigarettes.
	Lichy Han Ph.D. Candidate, Biomedical Informatics Program, Stanford	Lichy Han is a 4th year MD/PhD student at Stanford University. She is currently in her second year of graduate training in the Biomedical Informatics PhD program. Prior to Stanford, she double majored in biomedical engineering and applied math at Johns Hopkins University, where she did research in cardiac signals processing. At Stanford, she works in Russ Altman’s lab, where she studies drug adverse events and drug-drug interactions. As a CERSI scholar, she is working on building a machine learning model that assigns probability scores to FDA adverse event reports. With success, this would allow the FDA to concentrate their efforts on high probability reports, thereby increasing the efficiency of identifying and disseminating novel drug interactions and adverse events.
	Ling Zou Postdoc, Department of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Science, UCSF	Ling Zou, a postdoc scholar in Dr. Kathleen Giacomini’s lab at University of California San Francisco, is interested in regulatory science in translating scientific advances into drug products. As the director of a project funded by the FDA Office of Generic Drugs, “Interactions of Excipients with Intestinal Transporters” at UCSF, she is dedicated to the study that will provide scientific rational for regulatory policy and decision making about inclusion or exclusion of certain excipients in particular drugs. As a member of American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics, she is also interested in bridging the gaps in our understanding of the relationship between preclinical animal studies and clinical trials and providing evidence for physiologically based pharmacokinetic modeling. She believes that the integration of regulatory science and scientific innovation can benefit patients by addressing issues of critical importance in the approval of drug products
	Priya Jayachandran PharmD Candidate, Pharmacy, UCSF	Priya Jayachandran is a third year doctoral student in the PharmD program at the University of California San Francisco. She received a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and a Master of Science in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. She conducts research in clinical pharmacology and bioequivalence in the Pharmaceutical Sciences Pathway of the PharmD program under the direction of Leslie Benet, PhD. At the UCSF-Stanford Center of Excellence in Regulatory Science and Innovation Priya conducts research in regulatory sciences under the direction of Natalia Khuri, PhD and Kathy Giacomini, PhD. In addition to her interests in clinical pharmacology and regulatory sciences, Priya is a founding member of the Precision Medicine Student Alliance dedicated to educating the UCSF community about advances in precision medicine and pharmacogenomics. She also delivers lectures on Medicare Part D as part of the Peer-to-Peer Educator Program.
	Rachel Goldfeder Ph.D. Candidate, Biomedical Informatics, Stanford	Rachel Goldfeder is a graduate student in the Biomedical Informatics PhD Program at Stanford University who is interested in regulatory science affairs surrounding clinical applications of next-generation DNA sequencing. She graduated from Washington University in St. Louis in 2011, majoring in Biomedical Engineering and Psychology. After graduating, she continued her training at the National Human Genome Research Institute at the NIH as a Post-Baccalaureate Fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Francis Collins. During this time, her research focused on identifying disease-causing genetic variants from analyses of exome sequencing data. Currently, as an NSF fellow in Dr. Euan Ashley’s lab, Rachel focuses on developing novel methods for medical-grade variant detection. Her long-term career goal is to enable the effective use of genomic information in patient care.
	Rui Zhang Postdoc, Center for Cerebrovascular Research, UCSF	Rui Zhang is a postdoctoral scholar in the Center for Cerebrovascular Research at University of California, San Francisco. Her research focuses on studying pathogenesis of brain arteriovenous malformation and discovering innovative treatment methods under Dr. Hua Su’s supervision. Holding a bachelor’s degree in basic pharmacy and a PhD degree in pharmaceutical sciences, she has solid understandings of the drug development processes. Rui has long been interested in regulatory sciences. She is a member of the Regulatory Affairs Professionals Society, and is attending regulatory mini-courses held by UCSF-Stanford CERSI. She also volunteers in database researches for lung cancer drug clinical trials and writing clinical research document. She is excited to explore further in regulatory sciences and to start new research with the awarded scholarship.