The Goods - Tufts Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences newsletter

 

HIGHLIGHTS

Call for Student Videos! GSBS is looking for student contributors to a video introducing the school to prospective applicants. The video will allow prospective students to hear directly from our current students about their research, why they chose GSBS, and other aspects of the student experience. If you’re interested in participating, please record short (one sentence) video responses to any or all of the prompts below. Phone recordings are great! Why did you choose GSBS?  Summarize your research in one sentence.  What is your favorite thing about being a GSBS student?  Once you’ve recorded your video, you can upload it to this Box folder. Email Alex Israel (Alexandra.Israel@tufts.edu) with any questions.

GSBS STUDENT SPOTLIGHTS

Maria Brouard visited her Grandpa (Pappou) in Thessaloniki, Greece! She made sure he didn't walk down the stairs too quickly when leaving church.

After the virtual MSTP retreat, current and incoming MD/PhD students gathered at the Crow's Nest!

Maria Brouard and Liam Harrington just finished their OB/GYN rotation at Newton-Wellesley Hospital! On the left, you can see they are excited to start their PhDs this summer. On the right, they're remembering they still have many years left in their over MD/PhD programs... It's fine. They will support each other through it.

Second-year Immunology students Valentina Studentsova and Mike Rist, along with a non-Tufts friend, took a free outside yoga class in the Seaport through Seaport Sweat.

Jacob Klickstein dedicates this week's spotlight to his parents' massive pothos, which has been growing since he was a kid!

To have your student spotlight included in The Goods, send it to alexandra.israel@tufts.edu by 10am on Friday!

UPCOMING EVENTS

June 29 Dissertation Defense - Rachel Levene 12pm | Jaharis Behrakis Auditorium (Room 130) Zoom link: https://tufts.zoom.us/j/94237502832pwd=eWRReVZqRGhDM3pRbS81Q0x5V3Vkdz09 The Graduate Program in Molecular Microbiology invites you to Rachel Levene's defense of her dissertation, "Regulation of the influenza A virus host shutoff factor PA-X through hijacking host proteins and pathways". For more information, see the flyer. June 30 Performing and understanding ECGs in virtual reality 11am - 12pm Register here. The MIT.nano Immersion Lab is a facility dedicated to AR/VR, immersive technology, and the visualization of complex data sets. This event - part of the IMMERSED IN seminar series - will showcase a new program to replace the need for a live human subject and offer real-time feedback to trainees. This event is free and open to the public. For more information, see the website. Recurring Events Associate Dean Dan Volchok's Zoom Office Hours Every Tuesday and Thursday, 3 - 3:30pm Zoom link: https://tufts.zoom.us/j/92583128894?pwd=NjlCbStnKy9pMXBvb2NwMG14WGFmUT09 In order to keep people informed, Associate Dean Dan Volchok will be holding open Zoom “office hours” focused on student and academic issues. Please feel free to use these sessions to ask questions, make suggestions, or to just touch base and chat. TUSM Run Club Every Thursday The TUSM Run Club is starting up again! Run anytime on Thursdays, then post your runs on Strava (https://www.strava.com/clubs/676763) and pictures on Instagram (@tusm_run_club). See the flyer for more information, and contact Jamie Maguire (Jamie.Maguire@tufts.edu) with questions. Dean Archer's Virtual Office Hours Dean Archer will be offering drop in office hours virtually for all students in June. See below for dates/times and Zoom information. June 30– 3-4pm (EST) | Zoom link Virtual Yoga Classes Restorative Yoga | Tuesdays at 5pm | Zoom link here. Yoga Sculpt | Wednesdays at 5:30pm | Zoom link here. The Student Advisory & Health Administration Office is offering Virtual Yoga classes for all Health Sciences Students on the Boston Campus.  On Tuesdays, Dr. Christina Pastan will offer Restorative Yoga. Please log on 5 minutes before the start of class and get yourself situated for practice. Participants will not to be able to enter the class after 5:10pm. Participants video will not be seen, and no experience is necessary. On Wednesdays, Julia Citron, TUSM 24, offers Yoga Sculpt classes. This yoga flow class incorporates cardio movements, weight training, and upbeat music. All levels are welcome, and weights are optional! Virtual Drop-in meditation Thursdays | 12:30pm Interested in developing a stronger meditation practice? Every Thursday at 12:30pm, Dr. Christina Pastan, Director, Mind-Body Wellness, School of Dental Medicine offers a 20-minute session which begins with a short talk about an aspect of meditation followed by a guided experience. If you would like to be added to the listserv to receive additional information for this session, send an email to christina.pastan@tufts.edu. VIEW THE FULL CALENDAR

ANNOUNCEMENTS

GSBS Anti-racist Working Group - Open Meetings and Suggestions Document The GSBS Anti-racist Working Group will be opening up its meetings to any member of the community who wishes to attend. Students, faculty, staff, and postdocs are invited to stop by and share their suggestions, comments, and feedback. Watch this space for meeting details.  If you can't attend a meeting, or would prefer to make suggestions in a different format, the group has a Google Doc of proposed topics, initiatives, and action items. Members of the GSBS community members are free to look at the doc and add their own suggestions. Hirsh Challenge for Biomedical Scientists GSBS Board of Advisors member, Jane C.I. Hirsh, J97P, A04P, AG00P and her husband Mark Hirsh, D.D.S., D68, J97P, A04P, AG00P have issued a challenge to our community. If 125 gifts are made, then they will give $25,000 to support the Career Development Fund. You know better than most that one of the top priorities of the school is to give students more and enhanced opportunities to explore the different career paths available to them as well as to teach them the leadership skills they will need outside of the lab. The funds received from this challenge will help us do that. So in the spirit of the collaborative nature of our community, will you join the challenge by making a gift to the Hirsh Challenge?  Here is what you need to know: Visit go.tufts.edu/hirshchallenge to make your gift.  Gifts of any amount, to any GSBS fund will count towards the challenge.  Thank you in advance for your consideration and all you do for Tufts. If you have any questions or would like to make your gift by other means, please contact Kristin Hill (kristin.hill@tufts.edu). Natalie V. Zucker Research Center for Women Scholars Award Winners Several members of the GSBS community are among the recipients of the Natalie V. Zucker Research Center for Women Scholars award for 2021. These awards were established through the incredible generosity of Mrs. Natalie V. Zucker in order to further the research careers of junior women scientists conducting basic and clinical research in the School of Medicine, the School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences, the School of Public Health, the School of Dentistry, the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, or the major Tufts-affiliated hospitals. Awards are made to further specific research projects and to fund travel and training opportunities. This year's recipients include Jennifer Helble, a postdoctoral researcher in the Hu lab; Huiyun Liu, a postdoctoral scholar in the Moore lab; Whitney Perry, a graduate of the CTS Master's program; and Fangfang Qiu, a postdoctoral researcher in the Hamrah lab. For the full list of recipients, see the website. QM&DS Training in Biomedical Data Science summer course: registration open The Center for Quantitative Methods and Data Science (QM&DS), Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI), and Tufts University Data Intensive Studies Center (DISC) are pleased to announce a series of trainings in biomedical data science this summer. Basic statistical knowledge and computational experience will be helpful, but are not required. You may sign up for as many seminars as you would like. Please find the schedule, topics, and iLearn registration links below. The zoom link will be sent to registered participants before the event. Please email Lori Lyn Price at lprice1@tuftsmedicalcenter.org to be added to our mailing list or if you have any questions. June 30: Introduction to Sequence-Based Transcriptomic Analysis July 14: Bioinformatics Analysis of Bulk RNA Sequencing Data July 21: Bioinformatics Analysis of Single-Cell RNA Sequencing Data July 28: Functional and Enrichment Analysis Methods for RNAseq Data Tauber Fitness Center is now open! The Tauber Fitness Center is open to Health Sciences Campus students! Effective June 7th, pre-registration is no longer needed. Students are now able to utilize the center during all open hours and use all available equipment during their visit. Locker rooms are also open, and can be used for short-term storage during your workout. Overnight storage is not allowed. Students must be participating in weekly surveillance testing to work out in the fitness center, and masks must be worn the entire time you are in the Fitness Center. The Fitness Center has returned to regular hours! For the summer, hours will be as follows: M-W-F: 7am - 7pm T-TH: 7am - 8:30pm Weekends: 12 - 5pm For more information, see the website. Research!America Summit June 30 | 11 - 6pm Register here Registration is now open for Reaching the Peak: A Science & Technology Career Summit, Research!America’s summit for early career researchers. During this one-day virtual event, early career researchers will have the opportunity to explore an array of career paths, network with fellow researchers, participate in professional development workshops, and engage in meaningful discussions around issues critical to the success of the R&D ecosystem. Apply for the Rowland Fellowship Deadline: August 20, 2021 The Rowland Institute at Harvard is seeking applications for Rowland Fellowships for the 2022 Academic year. We seek the best young experimentalists in all fields of science and engineering. The Rowland Fellowship provides an opportunity to work in the rich intellectual environment at Harvard and the surrounding area, while establishing an independent program. We welcome applications from candidates with newly awarded doctorates or with up to three years postdoctoral experience. The Fellowship provides laboratory space, funding for equipment, personnel, and general operations. Staff scientists and engineers work with the Rowland Fellows to design and fabricate new experimental set-ups. Additional shared facilities are also available through Harvard. For more information, as well as application instructions, see the website.

HIRSH LIBRARY NEWS

Hirsh Library Hours The library will be closed from July 3 - July 5 for the July 4th weekend! For updated hours, please see this link.

Hirsh Library Office Hours for GSBS Students Mondays 11am - 12pm Wednesdays 1pm - 2pm Office hours will be happening remotely via Zoom. Those who wish to attend can find information at this link.

CAREER NEWS

Postdoctoral or Research Associate positions to work on proteostasis, aging, microbiome, lens development and aging in the Lab for Nutrition and Vision Research (Allen Taylor) at HNRCA The Lab for Nutrition and Vision Research at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging (JM-USDA HNRCA) at Tufts University, Boston, is seeking outstanding candidates with a recent PhD in Biochemistry or a related discipline to work on one of the following funded projects: Discovering novel stress-induced ubiquitin and autophagy enzyme interactions in response to glycative stress.   Regulatory mechanisms of eye lens differentiation,    Elucidate interactions between dietary glycemia, metabolomics, microbiome, AMD, cataract, aging in animal studies and/or human populations, including planning randomized intervention studies.  Click here for additional information, including application instructions. For specific position descriptions, see the flyers. Postdoctoral Positions Available in the Chen Lab We are seeking 1- 2 postdoctoral fellows in the field of translational medicine using cell and molecular biological approaches. They should have profound experience in one or two of the following research areas: non-coding RNA including lncRNA and microRNA; signal transduction pathway; epigenetic regulation on gene expression; mechanisms of diabetes, osteoporosis/arthritis, Alzheimer's disease and squamous cell carcinoma; regenerative medicine in tissue engineering and wound repair; nanomaterials for in vivo therapeutic molecule delivery; application of over 10 transgenic and gene knockout mouse lines in the Lab. The postdoctoral fellow will be working under the supervision of Dr. Jake Chen and supported by his current NIH grants. A successful postdoc may have the opportunity to be promoted to junior faculty positions. Salary will be from $53,600 to $70,000/year. Dr. Chen’s Lab is conveniently located in downtown Boston, Massachusetts. This is an entry level position but individuals who have been a postdoc for not more than 2 years are eligible to apply. Interested candidates should send a curriculum vitae and a brief description of research interests to Dr. Chen at jk.chen@tufts.edu or via Interfolio.

Imposter Syndrome? Sounds Like a "You" Problem. Have you ever self-diagnosed or been told you have imposter syndrome? A recent article in the Harvard Business review examines the origins of imposter syndrome and why it exists in the workplace. The authors describe a framework of racism and implicit bias that exacerbate feelings of inadequacy in women and people of color (POC). They argue we should stop telling women and POC they have imposter syndrome.

STUDENT HEALTH AND WELLNESS

Wellness Advising Office Mon | 9:30am - 5:00pm Tue | 11:00am - 7:00pm Wed/Thurs/Fri | 9:30am - 5:00pm   Email Sharon.Snaggs@tufts.edu to set up a meeting. Check out the Week in Wellness Newsletter! This week's issue includes photos from the Plantapalooza event and a recipe for marinated grilled chicken. Contact Catherine Choi, catherine.y_choi@tufts.edu, the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences' representative for the Student Wellness Advisory Committee, with questions, concerns, or suggestions regarding student health and wellness.

Talk One2One - 1.800.756.3124 Free and Confidential counseling service available 24/7 In-person counselors are available on the Boston Campus and can be arranged at off-site locations. Make an appointment through the secure group email account Tuftscounseling@allonehealth.com. You can also call the 1-800 number for immediate ”in the moment” mental health support, and/or if you prefer speaking with a person to assist in getting connected.

Want your event or announcement in The Goods? Email alexandra.israel@tufts.edu by 10am on Friday.