Our retreat in October 2019 at Mohonk Mountain House had the biggest turnout to date, including a number of new participants from Cornell Ithaca! With more than 230 attendees, this Halloween special retreat was filled with apple cider muffins, a luxurious buffet breakfast, and our own homebrewed “spectral overlap” stout. This year also featured our first ever poster blitz, where 8 students shared the highlights of their research. As always, the science presented at the retreat, both during the talks and at the poster session, really highlighted the breadth and depth of work covered by labs in the IMP program, allowing the first years to get a sense of all of the labs in the program. This year, we heard about a wide range of topics from new faculty members Justin Perry and Melody Zeng, ranging from apoptotic cell clearance to fetal-microbiota immune crosstalk. Our students Sarah Schrader, Andrew Scott, Priyanka Chowdhury, and Oyindamola Adefisayo, presented their research on Tuberculosis persistence and DNA damage repair, T cell dysfunction, and B cell class switching. Our Keynote speaker this year was Marc Jenkins, who gave an impressive talk on the surprising features of naïve T helper cells. Afterwards, everyone wound down at the karaoke bar, where we heard a rendition of Britney Spears’ toxic performed by some of our students and faculty, among others. This year was exceptionally special, as we celebrated and thanked Dr. Joseph Sun for his role as chair of the retreat planning committee for the past seven years. We are looking forward to the 2020 retreat, where we will welcome Dr. Greg Sonnenberg and Dr. Andrea Schietinger as co-chairs of the retreat committee. Stay tuned for the next update!
Keynote
Surprising features of the naiive helper T cell repertoire
Marc Jenkins, PhD
Professor, University of Minnesota Medical School
IMP Awardees
Colleen M. Lau, Sun Lab
Saskia Hemmers, Rudensky Lab
Andrew Scott, Schietinger Lab
Elisa Sanchez, Huse Lab
Sanda Mimouna, Rogatsky Lab
Miguel De Jesus, Huse Lab
Cybelle Tabilas, Rudd Lab
Benji John Grigg, Sonnenberg Lab
Maeva Metz, Longman Lab