Graduate Students Recognized at Convocation

The Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences honored students in the Class of 2022 for their academic achievements during its convocation ceremony on May 18.

The ceremony recognized students who are graduating with their master’s degrees, as well as those who earned special awards and prizes for their accomplishments accomplishments in research, scholarship and service.

In addition to honoring students, the ceremony also recognized the 2022 Weill Cornell Graduate School Alumni Award of Distinction winner Dr. John MacMicking (Ph.D. ’97), as well as graduate school faculty.

The following is a complete list of all of the award winners:

Alumni Award of Distinction

John MacMicking, Ph.D. ’97

Professor of Microbial Pathogenesis and Immunobiology, Yale University School of Medicine  

David P. HajjarExcellence in Teaching and Mentoring Award

Mary Baylies, Ph.D.

BCMB Teaching and Mentoring Award

Kirk Deitsch, Ph.D.

IMP Teaching and Mentoring Award

Joe Sun, Ph.D.

PBSB Teaching and Mentoring Award

Jason Mezey, Ph.D.

Pharmacology Teaching and Mentoring Award

John Blenis, Ph.D.

Julian R. Rachele Prize

• Joshua Weiss, “Anatomic position determines oncogenic specificity in melanoma.” 354 Nature, Vol 604, 14 April 2022 (BCMB Program, Mentor, Dr. Richard White)
• Bianca Diaz, “Base editing sensor libraries for high-throughput engineering andfunctional analysis of cancer-associated single nucleotide variants.” Nature Biotechnology, 14 February 2022  (BCMB Program, Mentor, Dr. Lucas Dow)

Student Service Award

• Ifeh Akano (Pharmacology)for Outstanding Outreach and Service
  • Co-president of the Tri-I Outreach Club; founder of the Tri-I Mentorship Initiative; co-director for the Community Leader Fellowship Program; co-organizer Tri-I Outreach Fair
• Thais Klevorn (IMP) for Outstanding Outreach and Service
  • Community outreach coordinator and co-president of the Tri-Institutional Minority Society (TIMS)

Student Diversity Award

Dianne Lumaquin (BCMB), mentor for the Gateways Program; co-chair of FACES (Female Association for Clinicians, Educators and Scientists; graduate student representative on the Diversity in Science Council

Distinguished Student Commencement Speaker Award

Andrea Neil Forbes  (PBSB Program, Mentor, Dr. Ekta Khurana)

Vincent du Vigneaud Symposium Awards

Vincent du Vigneaud First-Year Poster Presentation Awards

First Place

• Margarida Rosa, “Lipid Scrambling Mechanisms of β1-adrenergic Receptor(β1AR) Revealed by Computational Experiments.” (Dr. George Khelashvili) 

Second Place

• Patrick Wallisch,” Engineering Synthetic Enzyme Armed Killer (SEAKER) Cells for the Treatment of Solid Human Tumors.” (Dr. David Scheinberg) 

Third Place

• Brittney Bobowski, "H1 Involved in Recruitment to ssDNA as a Possible DNA Damage Response." (Dr. Yael David) 

Vincent du Vigneaud Second-Year & Above Poster Awards

First Place

• Thasin Peyear, “Screening for Lipid Bilayer-Modifying Compounds using Gramicidin-based Simulation Assays: A Scaffold Based Approach.” (Dr. Olaf Andersen) 

Second Place

• Annalise Schweickart, “AutoFocus: A Hierarchical Framework to Explore Multi-Omic Disease Associations Spanning Multiple Scales of Biomolecular Interaction.” (Dr. Jan Krumsiek) 

Third Place

• Kate Dunmore, “Elucidating the Role of E2F Transcription Factors in Advanced Prostate Cancer.” (Dr. David Rickman) 

Vincent du Vigneaud Oral Presentation Awards

First Place

• Dianne Lumaquin, “Lipid Droplets are a Metabolic Vulnerability in Melanoma.” (Dr. Richard White) 

Second Place

• Anoushka Joglekar, “A Cell-Type Centric View of Isoform Expression Reveals Combination Patterns of Transcript Elements Across Brain Regions and Development.” (Dr. Hagen Tilgner) 

Third Place  

• Helene Jahn, “Oligomers of the Beta Barrel Protein VDAC Scramble Phospholipids at the Outer Membrane for Efficient Lipid Import into Mitochondria.” (Dr. Anant Menon) 

Physician Assistant Student and Faculty Awards

Outstanding Preclinical Instructor Award
William J. Ameres, M.S., PA-C

Outstanding Clinical Instructor Award
Dino Berruti, PA-C 

Academic Excellence Award Preclinical
Shreena Patel

Academic Excellence Award Clinical
Chace Isabella Carpenter

Peer Award
Kathleen Bidad

Research Excellence Award
Lauren Socia

Dr. Verne E. Chaney Humanitarian Healthcare Award
Kathleen Bidad