GROUP
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Melody Swartz
Alexandra Magold
Anish Mukherjee
Lucas Shores
Ruolan Zhou
Rachel Weathered
Gustavo Andrés Vásquez Montoya
Emiliano Medellin
Trevin Kurtanich
Margo MacDonald
Calixto Salles
Trevor Ung
Yue Wang
Kelly Blaine

Stuart and Walt

Melody A. Swartz, PhD
William B. Ogden Professor of Molecular Engineering
Lymphatic Physiology, Cancer Research, Immunotherapy
Postdoctoral scientists and engineers

Alexandra Magold, PhD
Postdoctoral Researcher
Alexandra has discovered the ciliation of lymphatic endothelial cells in vitro and in vivo. Using her inducible murine model of reduced lymphatic endothelial ciliation, she is now targeting lymphatic ciliation for chronic inflammation, atherosclerosis and cancer therapies.
Anish Mukherjee, PhD
Postdoctoral Researcher
Anish is looking to delineate the multifaceted role of lymphatic vessels in cancer. He is specifically looking at how cancer therapies, such as radiotherapy, can affect the structure and function of the local lymphatic vasculature and what it entails for cancer therapy and metastasis.

Lucas Shores, PhD
Postdoctoral Researcher
Lucas’ research interests lie at the intersection of research on lymphatics, diabetes, and immune engineering for regenerative medicine. This interdisciplinary focus leverages techniques from several disciplines to develop novel, translationally-oriented, and disease-targeted therapeutics.
Graduate students

Ruolan Zhou
PhD candidate
In vitro models of the tumor microenvironment.

Rachel Weathered
PhD candidate
In vitro models of the tumor microenvironment.

Gustavo Andrés Vásquez Montoya
PhD candidate
The integration of multi-scale modeling and simulations of in vitro and in vivo experiments for the study of cancer immunobiology and cancer immunotherapy.

Emiliano Gomez Medellin
PhD candidate
Understanding the role of lymphatics in the lung immune microenvironment and its contributions to allergy and chronic airway inflammation.

Trevin Kurtanich
PhD candidate
The role of lymphatics in immunity, specifically in how they may promote an enhanced memory response in both tumor and vaccination contexts.

Margo MacDonald
PhD candidate
My work explores the role of neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs) in the tumor microenvironment and examining how the biomechanical properties of the tumor microenvironment impact immunotherapy response. Recently, I have also been investigating the role NETs and lymphatic clotting play in severe cases of COVID-19

Calixto Mateos Salles
PhD candidate
The role of lymphatics and their microenvironment in the education and priming of T cell memory.
Trevor Ung
PhD candidate
Trevor is currently studying the role of lymphatics in vaccine responses. He is specifically interested in how cell-specific delivery of vaccines to lymph node cell subsets affects immune responses and generation of immune memory.
Staff

Yue Wang
Technician
Kelly Blaine
Research
Lab Manager
Mascots
