Program Announced for the 19th Annual NICHD Fellows Retreat

The NICHD Office of Education is pleased to announce the final program
for the 19th Annual Meeting of Postdoctoral, Postbaccalaureate, Clinical Fellows, and Graduate Students, also known as the Fellows’ Retreat, on October 22^nd. This event will bring together NICHD fellows from across the institute to showcase research, foster connections, and engage in professional development.

The retreat features fourteen oral presentations by fellows, split into concurrent and featured sessions throughout the day. These talks will highlight work from NICHD’s basic, clinical, and population health programs. Two mid-day poster sessions will showcase a range of research projects, offering opportunities for scientific exchange, feedback, and networking. The event will also include two career-focused speakers. Bizu Gelaye, Ph.D., M.P.H., the new chief of the Epidemiology Branch, will give the morning keynote, sharing his experience in leading mentoring programs. In the afternoon, science journalist Dr. Sam Jones will discuss how she transitioned from research to writing for leading media outlets and producing podcasts.

This year’s retreat will also bring in representatives from key NIH resources, including the NIH Library, the Foundation for Advanced Education in the Sciences (FAES), and the NICHD Bioinformatics and Scientific Programming Core. Fellows will have a chance to connect with these experts during dedicated networking sessions. Dr. Melissa Delgado from the NICHD Office of Health Equity and Dr. Britney Hardy from the NIH Office of Intramural Training and Education will also offer guidance to fellows on career decision-making.

This retreat promises a day of learning, networking, and career growth for
all attendees. The topics and themes for the event were directed by a retreat planning team composed of fellows across multiple training levels. Members include Manon Baudic, Ph.D., Daniel Cai, Chelsey Fontenot, Ph.D., Leanne Iannucci, Ph.D., Griffin Katz, Asma Sodager, Sanjana Sundararajan, Ph.D., and Prabhani Wijesiriwardhana, Ph.D. The Office of Education thanks them for their ideas and leadership.

Fellows Speaker Line-Up

Concurrent Talks

Mechanisms driving enhancer-promoter rewiring underlying cell-fate decisions in preimplantation mouse embryos
Joyce Thompson, Ph.D., Unit on Genome Structure & Regulation

Class I Phosphatidylinositol Transfer Proteins Are Required to Support Sustained Calcium Signaling
Gergő Gulyás, M.D., Ph.D., Section on Molecular Signal Transduction

Characterizing Neurodegeneration-Linked Protein Stathmin-2 In Response to Injury
Vanya Bhat, B.S., Unit on the Development of Neurodegeneration

Adherence to the Planetary Health Diet Index and fetal body composition based on three-dimensional ultrasonography in the Fetal 3D Study—Singletons
Priscilla Clayton, Ph.D., Epidemiology Branch

Cross-species electrophysiological comparison of fast-spiking inhibitory neurons across multiple brain regions
Lauren Hewitt, Ph.D., Section on Cellular & Synaptic Physiology

Isoform-specific role of mitochondrial outer membrane metabolite channel, VDAC in cancer metabolism
Megha Rajendran, Ph.D., Section on Molecular Transport

Spatial Multi-omics Reveal the Role of Wnt Signaling Modulators in Cleft Palate
Jeremie Oliver Piña, Ph.D., M.S., M.B.A., Section on Craniofacial Genetic Disorders

Postpartum depression and stress are associated with more frequent feeding to soothe in response to infant distress
Allison Choe, B.S., Social & Behavioral Sciences Branch

Elucidating the roles of thyroid hormone signaling in hepatic metamorphosis and erythropoiesis using single-cell RNA sequencing
Paisley Thomson, Ph.D., Section on Molecular Morphogenesis

Deciphering the Role of CTCF-Mediated Loops in Gene Regulation: Insights from CTCF-TRIP
Zhenyu Zuo, Ph.D., Unit on Genome Structure & Regulation

Featured Oral Talks

Role of parity in the association between maternal polygenic score of birthweight and fetal growth: a study in two multi-ancestral pregnancy cohorts.
Prabhavi Wijesiriwardhana, Ph.D., Epidemiology Branch

The zebrafish gills as a model for studying specialized gas-exchange lung endothelial cells
Jong Park, Ph.D., Section on Vertebrate Organogenesis

Using zebrafish to model central conducting lymphatic anomaly driven by pathogenic variants in KRAS
Ben Sempowski, B.S., Unit on Vascular Malformations

Biochemical and mechanistic insights into NRas depalmitoylation by ABHD17
Elvis Ongey, Ph.D., Section on Structural & Chemical Biology