Previous Members
Graduate and Post-Doctoral Students
Daniel Dodd, PhD
Graduate Student (2019 - 2023)
Daniel joined the Gallego-Perez Nanomedicine Lab in 2018 during his undergraduate tenure, then following graduation, transitioned into his PhD in August of 2019. His research focused on the use of myeloid-lineage immune cells as mediators of therapeutic drug delivery. His initial work demonstrated this technique to deliver tumor suppressor genes to mesenchymal breast cancer cells, which were then able to mitigate tumor growth and invasion. In May of 2022, Daniel was awarded the Presidential Fellowship from Ohio State, one of the school’s premier graduate fellowships, to pursue similar research in cerebrovascular disorders. He focused on the use of electroporation-based techniques, combined with a pro-angiogenic cocktail of transcription factor plasmid DNA, to potentiate re-vascularization of ischemic brain tissue. Daniel presented his work at several local and international conferences, including as a featured podium speaker at the 2022 annual Society for Neuroscience meeting in San Diego, CA. Following graduation, Daniel accepted a position as a research scientist at InfinixBio, a contract research organization in Columbus, OH.
Jordan Moore, PhD
Graduate Student (2018 - 2022)
Jordan joined the Gallego-Perez Nanomedicine Lab as a research assistant in 2016, then transitioned into his PhD in 2018. His research focused on using nano-transfection based methods to assist in the repair of peripheral nerves following traumatic injury. Jordan was awarded a F99/K00 Predoctoral to Postdoctoral Fellow Transition Award from the NIH in 2021. He was named as a Purdue Black Trailblazer in Engineering in 2020 and has presented his work at several events throughout his career, including the Society for Neuroscience and the Biomedical Engineering Society. Jordan successfully defended his thesis in the December 2022, which is titled "Nanomedicine-Based Strategies for Peripheral Nerve Injury". Following graduation, Jordan began working as a post-doctoral fellow at Stanford University.
Hatice Halipci Topsakal, PhD
Visiting Scholar and Postdoctoral Researcher (2021 - 2022)
Hatice was a visiting scholar in the Gallego-Perez Nanomedicine Lab located in the Biomedical and Materials Engineering Complex. She was also the winner of the TUBITAK 2219 Scholarship from Türkiye. Additionally, she is an Assistant Professor and Assistant Principal at Istanbul Atlas University, Vocational School, Department of Medical Laboratory Tecniqiues. Her research focuses on microbiological applications in biotechnology and medical science. Her research specializes in bacterial resistance and antimicrobials on pathogen microorganisms. During her tenure in the Gallego-Perez Lab, she worked on tissue nanotransfection to combat biofilm infections in wounds.
Luke Lemmerman, PhD
Graduate Student (2019 - 2022)
Luke joined the Gallego-Perez Nanomedicine Lab as a research assistant in 2018, then transitioned into his PhD in 2019. His research focused on using nano-transfection based methods to reprogram fibroblasts into different cell lineages for therapeutic outcomes in stroke and diabetes. Luke was awarded a distinguished university fellowship during his time as a doctoral candidate and was a finalist for the university's Three Minute Thesis competition in 2021. Luke earned several publications throughout his time in the Nanomedicine Lab, and presented at the Biomedical Engineering Society national conference on stroke therapies. Luke successfully defended his thesis in the summer of 2022, which is titled "Development of Cell-based Therapies for Ischemic Stroke and Type I Diabetes using Nanotechnology-based Cell Reprogramming". Following his tenure, Luke began working with Sarepta Therapeutics.
Silvia Duarte-Sanmiguel, PhD
Graduate Student (2017 - 2020); Post-Doctoral Researcher (2020 - 2021)
Silvia was a PhD student in the Interdisciplinary Program in Nutrition and post-doctoral researcher in the Gallego-Perez Nanomedicine Lab. Her research focused on developing novel nanoscale tools for inflammation and immunomodulation within the context of cancer and diabetes (Thesis title: “Nanotechnology-based approaches towards modulating inflammation”). She was awarded the AHA predoctoral fellowship in 2018, and was one of the finalist for the Millipore Sigma Life Science Award for Tumor Biology. As a finalist, Silvia was invited to go to Germany to present her work on “Nanotechnology-based approaches towards elucidating and modulating the immunology of the tumor niche”. Silvia defended her thesis in the spring of 2021 and began working with Andelyn Biosciences.
Research Staff
Ludmila Diaz-Starokozheva
Lab Manager (2017 - 2020)
Ludmila joined the Gallego-Perez Nanomedicine Lab as the lab manager in 2017. As lab manager, she also performed research that focused on tissue engineering for therapeutics outcomes in ischemic disorders and diabetes. Following her tenure, Ludmila joined Ohio State as a PhD student in the Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology Interdisciplinary Program.
Undergraduate Students
Gillian Turnbull
2021 - 2022
Gillian was a BME undergraduate student. She was working in the Gallego-Perez Lab on novel nanotechnologies for research in neurodegenerative conditions, specifically Alzheimer's Disease.
Jamilah Henry
2020 - 2022
Jamilah was a BME undergraduate student. She was working in the Gallego-Perez Lab on novel nanotechnologies for research in neurodegenerative conditions and traumatic nerve injuries.
Olivia Seline
2022 - 2022
Olivia was a BME undergraduate from Bates College. She was working in the Gallego-Perez Lab in the summer of 2022 on novel nanotechnologies for research in neurodegenerative conditions.
Roxanne Vermette
2022 - 2022
Roxanne was a student in the Gallego-Perez Lab during the summer of 2022 that performed research on novel therapies in neurofibromatosis.
Alex Poh
2021 - 2022
Alex was a BME student. He was working on novel nanotechnologies for research in neurodegenerative conditions.
Nikita Zuber
2021 - 2022
Nikita was a Biology student. She was working on novel nanotechnologies for research in neurodegenerative conditions.
William McCoy
2021 - 2022
William was a BME student. He was working on novel nanotechnologies for cancer research.
Rithvik Turaga
2021 - 2022
Rithvik was a BME student who graduated in 2022. He was working on novel nanotechnologies for research in cancer, stroke, metabolic disorders and cerebral small vessel disease.
Erin Goebel
2021 - 2022
Erin was a BME student who graduated in 2022. She was working on her senior thesis focused on the development of non-viral nanotransfection platforms for metabolic disorders.
Jordan Deguzman
2021 - 2022
Jordan was a Biology student working on novel nanotechnologies for diabetes therapies.
Natalie Zachariah
2021
Natalie was a BME student. She was working on novel nanotechnologies for cancer research and metabolic disorders.
Marie Tawfik
2020 - 2022
Marie was a BME student. She worked on novel nanotechnologies for neuromuscular degeneration research.
Andrea Tran
2019 - 2022
Andrea is a Biology student. She works on nanotechnology applications for neurodegenerative conditions.
Alex Valentine
2019 - 2022
Alex is an undergraduate student in the Health Science program. He works on nanotechnology applications for neurodegenerative conditions.
Aidan Maxwell
2019 - 2021
Aidan was a Biology student working on the implementation of nanotechnology tools for stroke therapy.
Nick Seneczko
2019 - 2021
Nick was a Biological Engineering student working on nanotechnologies for composite tissue allotransplantation.
Ian Risser
2019 - 2020
Ian was a Biomedical Engineering student who conducting his senior honors thesis on the cell reprogramming applications for stroke therapy.
Marilynn Ng
2019 - 2020
Marilynn was a Biochemistry major working on cell reprogramming applications for neurodegenerative conditions and metabolic disorders.
Carlie Francis
2019 - 2020
Carlie was a Biology student working on cancer nanotechnology.
Shipeng Wang
2019 - 2020
Shipeng was Biomedical Engineering student conducting his senior honors thesis on cancer nanotechnology applications.
Michael Kaltman
2019 - 2020
Michael was a Biomedical Engineering student working on novel nanotechnologies for neurodegenerative conditions.
Lauren Wilch
2019
Lauren was a Biomedical Engineering student from Georgia Tech who worked on cell reprogramming and stroke therapies.
David Guzior
2018 - 2019
David was a Biomedical Engineering working on nanotechnology approaches for nerve injury.
Nicholas Idzkowski
2017 - 2019
Nick was a Corporate Finance student. He worked on migration assays for cancer nanotechnology.
Jesse Fine
2017 - 2018
Jesse was a Biomedical Engineering student. He conducted his Senior Honors Thesis on Lab-on-a-Chip platforms for cancer research. Jesse placed third in the Denman Undergraduate Research forum in the category “Towards Precision Cancer Medicine”.
Caroline Miller
2017 - 2018
Caroline was a Biomedical Engineering student. She conducted her Senior Honors Thesis on the use of micropatterned hydrogels for cancer cell migration studies.
Abi Senthilvelan
2017 - 2018
Abi was a Computer Science and Engineering student. She worked on developing engineering tools for cancer-related research.
Arline Joachim
2016 - 2018
Arline was a Psychology student with a pre-med focus. She worked on nanotechnology approaches for diabetes-related research.
Alec Sunyecz
2015 - 2017
Alec was a Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering student with a pre-med focus. He worked on developing nanotechnology-based approaches to cell and tissue reprogramming. Alec was the recipient of the Outstanding Research Achievement Award in the Davis Heart and Lung Research Day 2016.
Santiago Mendoza
2015 - 2016
Santiago was a Biochemistry with a pre-med focus. He was working on developing novel cell therapies based on reprogramming.
Alyse Krausz
2015 - 2016
Alyse was a Biomedical Engineering student. She conducted her Senior Honors Thesis on microfabricated platforms for the study of the influence of substrate stiffness on topographically guided cancer cell migration.