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lifETIME CDT

Sugunapriyadharshini Sundararama

Sugunapriyadharshini Sundararama

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Suguna has been awarded a lifETIME CDT fellowship. She has worked as a Junior Research Fellow (JRF) at VIT, Vellore, TN, India, in the field of polymer biodegradable approach to treat diabetic osteomyelitis under the supervision of Dr. Debasish Mishra. She carried out a M.Tech (Biotechnology) project in 2016 under the supervision of Dr. Deepak Pattanayak, Scientist, CSIR-CECRI, TN, India and went on to work on the surface modification of Titanium metals for orthopedic application.

Akash Garhwal

Akash Garhwal

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Akash Garhwal obtained his BS-MS dual degree from IISER TVM (Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Thiruvananthapuram, India with Biology major and Chemistry minor. He has joined CÚRAM as a PhD student in the lifETIME CDT program under the supervision of Dr. Catalina Vallejo Giraldo and Prof. Abhay Pandit. His research project titled " Understanding the Glycan Modulation in Gliosis after Traumatic Brain Injury" will focus on understanding the role of mechanobiology in gliosis after TBI and exploiting this knowledge to design new materials tailored for mitigating gliosis.

Amrutha Varshini Hariharan

Amrutha Varshini Hariharan

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Amrutha completed her bachelor’s in chemistry from Stella Maris College, Chennai, India. She then pursued a Master’s in Polymer Science from CIPET: Institute of Petrochemicals Technology, Chennai, India. During her master's, she worked at the Biomaterial Sciences Laboratory at CSIR – Central Leather Research Institute, India, under the guidance of Dr T. S. Uma. Her project was on Fabricating Thermosensitive Hydrogels for Scarless Treatment of Burn Injuries. She is currently a LifETIME CDT PhD fellow under the supervision of Prof Abhay Pandit. At CÚRAM, Amrutha would be working on Designing Tuneable Glycan Presenting Biomaterials: Next Generation of Biomaterials for the Next Generation of Implants.

Aoibhín Sheedy

Aoibhín Sheedy

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Aoibhín has a B.E. Biomedical Engineering from University of Galway, M.Sc. in Biotechnology from UCC. An early career biomedical engineer who is currently completing a PhD in the development of an advanced immunotherapy to treat ovarian cancer in the Dolan Lab (Eimear Dolan), University of Galway and holds a CÚRAM, lifETIME CDT Fellowship. Founder and auditor (20/21) of University of Galway's WiSTEM (Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Maths) Society.

Bianca Castelli

Bianca Castelli

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Bianca did her B.Sc. in Biotechnology at the University of Milan (Università degli Studi di Milano) and then moved to Galway to do her M.Sc. in Regenerative Medicine. She is currently doing her PhD as part of the lifETIME CDT program, focusing on neurodegeneration (esp. multiple sclerosis) and the development of a point of care (POC) device to detect biomarkers of neurodegeneration. Her supervisor is Dr. Una FitzGerald, and her secondary supervisor is Prof. John Cooper (University of Glasgow).

Brian Harkin

Brian Harkin

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Brian completed his M.E. and B.E. in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Galway. He is currently completing a PhD where his research is focused on uncovering the biophysical processes and mechanical factors governing tumour growth to improve cancer therapy delivery. The project is funded by SFI through the LifETIME CDT Fellowship Program and is supervised by Dr Eoin McEvoy and co-supervised by Prof. Laoise McNamara

Cian Whelan

Cian Whelan

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Cian graduated with a cell and molecular biology degree from University College Dublin. His PhD research is funded under the lifETIME for doctoral training. It focuses on how mechanosensitive ion channels can polarise macrophages and how this affects the wound-healing potency of their extracellular vesicles.

Eileen Reidy

Eileen Reidy

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Eileen graduated with a first class honours Undergraduate degree in Biotechnology from the University of Galway in 2018. She graduated with a M.Sc. in Immunology from Trinity College Dublin in 2019. She is currently carrying out a PhD under the supervision of Dr. Aideen Ryan and Prof. Abhay Pandit. This project is funded by lifETIME CDT and focuses on developing a 3D model of colorectal cancer and it's tumour microenvironment in order to closely mimic different aspects of colorectal cancer in an in-vitro model.

Erin Reardon

Erin Reardon

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Erin did her BSc in Biomedical Science (Pharmacology) at the University of Galway and then went to the University of Edinburgh to study a Master of Research in Integrative Neuroscience. She is currently carrying out a PhD under the supervision of Dr John Mulvihill and Dr Eoghan Cunnane at the University of Limerick. The LifETIME CDT funds this project and focuses on investigating the role of the brain-meninges tissue interface in traumatic brain injury.

Hey Wei Wong

Hey Wei Wong

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Hey Wei Wong has completed his B.Sc.(Honour) in Biotechnology in Taylor's University and obtained his M.Sc. in Stem Cell Engineering for Regenerative Medicine in University of Glasgow in 2022. Currently, He is carrying out a PhD under the supervision of Dr. Andrew Daly. This project is focusing on engineer bio printed cardiac injury models containing functional vascular and immune components to model the inflammatory response following myocardial infarction.

Ibrahim Erbay

Ibrahim Erbay

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Ibrahim holds a double major in Metallurgical and Material Engineering and Bioengineering from Manisa Celal Bayar University and an M.Sc. in Molecular Biology and Genetics from Izmir Biomedicine and Genome Center. He is a lifETIME CDT student, and his research interests include organ-on-a-chip systems and biomaterials. He is working under joint supervision of Dr. Yury Rochev and Prof. Gerard O’Connor focusing on experimental models of inflammatory bowel disease.

Joanne Chang

Joanne Chang

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Joanne obtained a BSc. (Honours) in Anatomy and Development at the University of Edinburgh and studied for an MSc. in Regenerative Medicine and Tissue Repair at the University of Edinburgh. Her PhD research centres on tissue engineering, optimising hydrogels for endothelial cell growth and developing a relevant in vitro model to investigate endothelial-macrophage interactions in an ischaemic environment. Her research is funded by the lifETIME-CÚRAM Centre for Doctoral Training. It is being conducted under the supervision of Dr Shane Browne and Dr Tom Hodgkinson at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (Tissue Engineering Research Group).

Josep Fumadó Navarro

Josep Fumadó Navarro

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Josep graduated in Biochemistry from the Rovira i Virgili University (Spain). He has a Master's in Advanced Biotechnology from the Autonomous University of Barcelona (Spain). During his studies, Josep worked at the Institute of Agrifood Research and Technology (Spain), Hirszfeld Institute of Immunology and Experimental Therapy (Poland), and the start-up ZIP Solutions SL (Spain). After that, he worked for 2 years as a research assistant in the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC). His research project focuses on the development of cell mimics for the delivery of therapeutics in vascularized brain organoids, under the supervision of Dr. Mihai Lomora and Prof. Abhay Pandit.

Kamalnath Selvakumar

Kamalnath Selvakumar

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Kamalnath, a biotechnology master’s graduate from Anna University India, pursuing his PhD (lifETIME CDT) at the University of Limerick with the guidance of Dr Eoghan Cunnane. His doctoral research focuses on developing innovative hydrogel-based preclinical models of urological cancers that accurately reflect the 3D tissue architecture, host-tumour interaction, and molecular diversity of the tumour for targeted therapy optimization. Before joining the PhD, he worked at Pandorum Technologies, an Indian tissue engineering and regenerative medicine company, to develop bio-engineered extracellular matrix mimics in the form of hydrogel fillings and 3D bioprinted scaffolds to cure corneal blindness.

Meenakshi Suku

Meenakshi Suku

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Meenakshi Suku obtained her M.Sc. in Bioengineering (with a specialisation in Tissue Engineering) from Trinity College Dublin and is currently working in cardiac tissue engineering. She is pursuing her PhD (part of lifETIME CDT) in CÚRAM on developing a humanized in-vitro model for myocardial infarction, under the supervision of Dr. Michael Monaghan and is based in Trinity Centre for Biomedical Engineering, Trinity College Dublin.

Mirella Ejiugwo

Mirella Ejiugwo

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Mirella completed B.Sc. (Honours) Applied Biology and Biopharmaceutical Science from Galway-Mayo IT and a M.Sc. Clinical Research degree from University of Galway. Her PhD research is focused on developing physiologically relevant models of diabetic foot ulcer for pathophysiological studies and drug testing (especially using microfluidics) - as part of the lifETIME Centre for Doctoral Training group. Her supervisors are Prof. Gerard O’Connor, Dr. Yury Rochev and Prof. Timothy O’Brien.

Mohamed EL-Melegy

Mohamed EL-Melegy

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Mohamed graduated with a B.Sc. in Pharmaceutical Sciences from Alexandria University (Egypt), where he ranked in his class's Top 1% with Distinction Honours (A+). In 2021, he obtained his M.Sc. in Pharmaceutics ‘Drug Delivery’ from Alexandria University, where he successfully developed novel lipid-based nanosystems loaded with different drug classes for cancer therapy. Since then, he has worked as an assistant lecturer at the Department of Pharmaceutics, Faculty of Pharmacy, Alexandria University. His lifETIME CDT CÚRAM research project, under the supervision of Prof. Abhay Pandit, focuses on "Developing glycome-characterised in-vitro models as a platform to test glycosylated biomaterials."

Narjes Meselmani

Narjes Meselmani

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Narjes A. Meselmani's research interest lies in the development of an electrochemical device to detect tissue perfusion through the electrical characteristics of tissues, under the supervision of Dr. Manus Biggs. Narjes earned her M.Sc. and B.Sc. degrees in electronic engineering, with an emphasis on biomedical engineering, from the Lebanese International University in Lebanon before beginning the PhD program. Her earlier research included studies on endoscopic linear cutter staplers and pattern recognition of EMG data for prosthetic limb adaptive control.

Paola Serrano

Paola Serrano

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Paola had a degree in Mathematics from the Autonomous National University of Mexico (UNAM) and an MSc in Science Communication from Dublin City University. Her doctoral project is under the supervision of Dr. Jessamyn Fairfield and Dr. Una FitzGerald, titled "Sustainability, Public Engagement, and Advocacy within Cell and Tissue Engineering".

Patrick C Hurley

Patrick C Hurley

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Patrick has a B.Sc. in Biomedical Science and an M.Sc. in Regenerative Medicine both awarded in University of Galway. Patrick is carrying out his PhD under the joint supervision of Dr. Una Fitzgerald and Prof. Gerard O'Connor. This project is funded under the lifETIME Center for Doctoral Training and is focused on the development of a microfluidic model of Multiple Sclerosis to discover novel therapeutics.

Sorour Nemati

Sorour Nemati

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Sorour obtained M.Sc. and B.Sc. in chemical engineering from Sahand University of Technology, Iran. Her research interests include stem cells, biomaterials and tissue engineering. She is now pursuing a PhD as a part of the LifETIME CDT program with the main focus on fibrotic glial scar formation and modulation in-vitro under the supervision of Dr. Siobhan McMahon, Prof. Dimitrios Zeugolis and Dr. Michelle Kilcoyne.

Viswanath Vittaladevaram

Viswanath Vittaladevaram

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Viswanath Vittaladevaram obtained his M.Sc. in Biotechnology (with a specialisation in Bioinformatics) from Bangalore University, India and gained research experience in Drug discovery technology (Molecular modelling`& Simulation procedures) at University of Bonn, Germany. He is currently working as a PhD Researcher funded by SFI as a part of lifETIME CDT Programme in collaboration with CÚRAM. His research project focuses on "Multiscale characterisation of synthetic blood brain barrier models" using computational and experimental procedures, under supervision of Dr. David Cheung (University of Galway) and Prof. Manuel Salmeron-Sanchez (University of Glasgow, UK).

Yashna Chabria

Yashna Chabria

DOCTORAL CANDIDATE

Yashna completed a B.Sc.in Biotechnology from Stella Maris College, India and then a M.Sc. in Tissue Engineering and Regenerative medicine in Chettinad University, India. She's currently a lifETIME CDT PhD student in CÚRAM, based at the Lambe Institute for Translational Research at University of Galway. Her research focuses on development of a 3D in-vitro model of Metastatic Breast Cancer to study modification of Extracellular Vesicles (EVs) for therapy under the supervision of Dr. Róisín Dwyer and Prof. Garry Duffy.