AADOCR NSRG - Secretary Candidate
Reasons For Running
I am a 5th-year DMD/PhD dual-degree candidate at the University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine. My aspiration is to become a next-generation clinician-scientist in dental academia. Through my involvement in various leadership roles, including the position of NSRG Ohio Valley Regional Representative, I have consistently worked to promote dental research among my fellow students through networking, collaboration, and providing resources for opportunities.
During the 2023 AADOCR conference in Portland, I actively networked with NSRG student members and dual-degree students to gain insights into research opportunities in dental schools, dentist-scientist career options, and dual-degree programs at other institutions. These experiences allowed me to promote academic and research career pathways to other students while strengthening my commitment to an independent clinician-scientist career path.
My goal is to advocate for and promote NSRG activities not only at the regional level but also at the national level. I strongly believe that dental students should be further encouraged and actively involved in dental research, leveraging their unique knowledge to contribute to the advancement of oral health. Therefore, within the AADOCR NSRG, I aspire to serve as a secretary, working towards the growth of our networking, collaboration, membership, and research interests.
Student activities
As an event coordinator and previous secretary of Pitt SRG, I have been heavily involved in SRG activities. This year, I have coordinated and organized monthly SRG events for dental and graduate students. The topics included mentoring, networking, getting involved in dental research, etc. Importantly, I should note that we grew our SRG membership significantly and reached the highest number of student participants on the 2024 school research day.
Research conducted
Following my significant research interest in the pathogenesis of peri-implantitis, my PhD dissertation research is about the application of immunomodulatory therapy for achieving immune and microbiome homeostasis in the presence of peri-implantitis. As a leading PhD student, I have been involved in a project showing that local delivery of CCL2 can prevent peri-implant bone loss in peri-implantitis via M2 macrophage polarization and recruitment. I presented our experimental results at the 2020 Pitt Dental Annual Research Competition and received a SCADA award and a Hinman student research award. Also, my research allowed me to obtain a 2021 AADOCR Student Research Fellowship and a T90 training grant. This year, we submitted a manuscript including our recent data to JCI which is currently under review.
