Current StARR Scholars

James “Dustin” Denham, MD MS is a senior resident in the J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Residency Program at Emory University. Dr. Denham is a first-generation college student who grew up in the small town of Dadeville, AL. He first developed an interest in viruses and their biology after his high school anatomy teacher suggested he read The Hot Zone- an interest that led him to pursue a bachelor’s degree in microbiology from Auburn University (where he would also receive his master’s degree in biological science). He received his MD from the University of South Florida Morsani College of Medicine in Tampa, FL. There he met John N. Greene, MD who permanently solidified Dr. Denham’s interest in clinical infectious diseases.

Research Summary

Dr. Denham is working and studying under the supervision of Anne Piantadosi, MD PhD who is a physician-scientist in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Emory University. Within Dr. Piantadosi’s laboratory group, Dr. Denham intends to study the evolution, pathogenesis, and biology of the arboviridae, particularly the Dengue Fever Virus (DENV) using metagenomic techniques such as next-generation sequencing (NGS).

Yetunde Fatade, MD, MPH is a second-year internal medicine resident at Emory who plans to pursue a fellowship in Cardiology. She desires a career in finding solutions to disparities that minorities face in cardiovascular disease management. During medical school, Fatade was focused on being an active learner and an advocate for patients by coordinating student-run outreach clinics for agencies that serve adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and volunteering at clinics that provide medical care in homeless shelters and at settings that serve individuals struggling with drug and alcohol dependence. Through these various experiences, Fatade realized the importance of research. During her MPH program, she was part of the team that provided the first outcomes-based evaluation of the newly implemented “Patient-Centered Medical Home (PCMH)” model of care on the management of hypertension in the Philadelphia Department of Public Health primary care clinic network, finding that African Americans were more likely than other races to have poorer BP control even with implementation of the PCMH.

Research Summary

As a StARR grant recipient, my research focus will be on evaluating the effects of markers of inflammation and coagulation (ie, CRP, D-dimer, IL-6) on cardiovascular complications in the setting of COVID-19, and the role of race and ethnicity in modifying these effects. I am excited to continue the work of finding solutions to health disparities through my StARR program research.

Vanessa Van Doren, MD is a second-year resident physician in the J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Residency Program at Emory. Prior to medical school, she worked in molecular biology and genetics research. She was part of the team that discovered the strongest known genetic risk factor for schizophrenia in 2016, reframing schizophrenia as deriving at least in part from derangements in immune function. During medical school, she became deeply involved in advocacy efforts focusing on expanding Medicaid, moving towards a single payer healthcare system, making medications affordable through global access licensing, and fighting discrimination within both the healthcare and medical education systems. She learned that through a comprehensive focus on HIV – by honing her clinical acumen through internal medicine residency followed by infectious disease fellowship, incorporating translational HIV research as a physician-scientist, and advocating for equal treatment and access to care for HIV-positive patients – she could make a meaningful contribution to a disease that disproportionately affects marginalized people.

Research Summary

She is currently investigating how condomless receptive anal intercourse (CRAI) affects HIV transmission risk in men who have sex with men (MSM) by comparing differences in mucosal healing time, cytokine expression, and rectal microbiome after mucosal injury between MSM who do and do not engage in CRAI.

Elizabeth Iffrig, MD is a second-year resident in the J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Residency program at Emory. She attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 2006-2010, where she received a BS in chemistry and in biology. Following that she joined the Medical Scientist Training Program at the Emory University School of Medicine and the Wallace H Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering and completed a PhD in Biomedical Engineering in 2016 and her MD in 2018, graduating Magna Cum Laude. Her research during her PhD was focused on characterizing the differences in abdominal aortic blood flow profiles and tissue kinematics between men and women using Magnetic Resonance Imaging as a way of understanding why men are predisposed to develop abdominal aortic disease. This work revealed that even in healthy vascular disease-free volunteers, there are significant differences in wall shear stress profiles, peripheral resistance patterns and solid tissue mechanics that may explain why men are more likely to develop abdominal aortic aneurysms. As a StARR recipient, she plans to utilize her expertise in fluid mechanics to study microvascular shock in septic patients.

Research Summary

With the assistance of the StARR grant, I plan to develop an endothelialized microfluidic model to study the pathophysiology of microcirculatory shock in the septic patient. The model will use early septic patient blood samples to identify important circulating inflammatory mediators that contribute to microcirculatory dysfunction. Results from this model will then be compared with capillary hemodynamics data obtained from septic patients in the ICU to determine which of these mediators may be an important biomarker and predictor of sepsis morbidity and mortality.

Nour Beydoun is a second-year internal medicine resident at Emory, who plans to pursue a fellowship in Infectious Diseases. Nour completed her medical school at the American University of Beirut (AUB), Lebanon, after which she moved to Atlanta to join the Hope Clinic, the clinical arm of the Emory Vaccine Center. During her time at the Hope Clinic, she was involved in several NIH-funded Vaccine and Treatment Evaluation Unit (VTEU) studies, as well as Human Immunology Project Consortium (HIPC) and investigator-initiated studies. She was also involved in the protocol development for two projects studying the immune response to vaccination using a systems biology approach.

Research Summary

As a StARR grant recipient, Nour plans to study the role of the microbiome in the immune response to vaccination. The goal of the study is to determine whether alteration of the microbiota by antibiotic exposure can negatively impact the immunogenicity of vaccines, and to assess the innate and adaptive immune mechanisms responsible for that phenomenon using a systems biology approach. Therefore, the study will compare the immune profiling in the blood and lymph node after rabies vaccination, with or without use of antibiotics, and will analyze the microbiome in those two groups.

Nick Scanlan, MD graduated from the StARR program and completed the J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Residency program at Emory in July 2021. As a STARR scholar, Dr. Scanlon’s research characterized responses to the Shingrix vaccine in renal transplant patients given at various time points after transplant. He also studied the role of Shingrix vaccination in the development of HLA antibodies to determine if the vaccine might play a role in rejection based on the development of these antibodies after vaccination.

Dr. Scanlon is currently an Allergy and Immunology Fellow at UC San Diego. He wrote a K38 application during his time a StARR scholar. Dr. Scanlon’s application, “Systems Biology Approach to SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Individuals with known COVID-19," was awarded as he was transitioning to his fellowship program.