VILP Mentors
Faculty mentors in the Veterinary Investigation & Leadership Program (VILP) represent a wide range of research areas and come from a number of departments within the College and the University. As an intense summer research experience is the cornerstone of the VILP, it is important that prospective applicants give careful consideration to the faculty mentor with whom they wish to work. Below is a partial list of previous VILP mentors, featuring only those who are currently active faculty members.
Faculty Photo | Faculty Member Department Affiliation | Research Interests |
---|---|---|
![]() | Carrie AdlerMolecular Medicine | Molecular and cellular mechanisms driving organ regeneration; how stem cells produce differentiated cells that coalesce to form functional organs, in an animal where regeneration proceeds without inhibition |
![]() | Craig AltierPopulation Medicine & Diagnostic Sciences | Molecular basis of Salmonella pathogenesis; the genetic and environmental control of epithelial cell invasion |
![]() | Avery AugustMicrobiology & Immunology | Regulation of T-cell activation, development and function; T-cell differentiation; mast cell function and eosinophil function |
![]() | Adam BoykoBiological Sciences | Canine genomics, including understanding the mechanisms and consequences of inbreeding, drift, and adaptation in populations undergoing natural and artificial selection |
Sarah CaddyMicrobiology and Immunology | Viruses, Immunology, Canine, Antibodies | |
![]() | Casey CazerClinical Sciences | Epidemiology of zoonotic diseases, evidence-based medicine, and One-Health; developing methods to improve antimicrobial resistance surveillance and track multidrug resistance |
![]() | Richard CerioneMolecular Medicine | Signal transduction growth factor receptors; protein structure; drug design and chemical biology; signaling cues that direct cell proliferation, differentiation and development |
![]() | Paula CohenBiomedical Sciences | Etiology of spontaneous birth defects in mammals; mechanisms of meiotic recombination; DNA repair proteins in meiosis and recombination; germ cell development; ovarian development |
Aimee ColbathClinical Sciences | Therapeutic interventions for musculoskeletal disease including osteoarthritis, fracture repair and tendon/ligament disease | |
Kevin CummingsPublic & Ecosystem Health | Application of epidemiologic approaches to investigate the ecology and transmission of Salmonella and other foodborne pathogens among a wide variety of hosts | |
![]() | Charles DankoBaker Institute for Animal Health & Dept. of Biomedical Sciences | Medical genetics and genomics and cancer biology research |
![]() | Arunika DasBiomedical Sciences | Genetic and epigenetic mechanisms of chromosome inheritance and aging during meiosis and early development |
Mandi de MestreBiomedical Sciences | Molecular mechanisms at maternal-fetal interface, genetics of miscarriage, immunobiology placentation | |
Diego DielPopulation Medicine & Diagnostic Sciences | Molecular mechanisms underlying virus-host interactions, focusing on the mechanisms underlying viral immune evasion that contribute to virus virulence and disease pathogenesis | |
![]() | Anushka DongreBiomedical Sciences | Understanding mechanisms that can potentiate the efficacy of immune checkpoint blockade therapy in the context of poorly responding tumors |
![]() | Jacquelyn EvansBiomedical Sciences | Hereditary diseases in dogs to identify genetic variants contributing to disease development |
Julia FelippeClinical Sciences | Cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in B cell response; neonatal immunology and response to vaccination; immunomodulation using biologic response modifiers; cancer immunotherapy; characterization of primary and secondary immunodeficiencies | |
![]() | Kathryn FiorellaPublic & Ecosystem Health | Planetary Health/One Health, fisheries, livelihoods, HIV/AIDS, nutrition, environmental change |
Andrew FlyakMicrobiology and Immunology | Antibody response to viral pathogens, vaccine development | |
Deborah FowellMicrobiology and Immunology | Regulation of T cell function in inflammatory and infectious disease | |
Amandine GamblePublic & Ecosystem Health | Ecological drivers of pathogen dynamics, wildlife epidemiology, pathogen dynamics at the wildlife-human interface, quantitative ecology | |
![]() | Laura GoodmanPublic & Ecosystem Health | Pathogen discovery and surveillance, with focus areas on tick-borne disease and antimicrobial resistance; exploring the underlying mechanisms of infectious disease emergence and identifying biomarkers to detect and prevent emerging threats to humans and animals |
![]() | Brandon HedrickBiomedical Sciences | Functional morphology of a wide variety of vertebrate groups, including sensory, musculoskeletal, and reproductive systems, using micro-computed tomographic imaging, contrast-enhanced imaging (e.g., diceCT), evolutionary and biogeographical modeling, and geometric morphometrics |
Gunther HollopeterMolecular Medicine | Cell biology, identifying additional mediators of endocytosis and determining their function at the molecular, cellular, and organismal levels, with long-term goal to understand how the endocytic machinery influences the form and function of multicellular systems, and structural biology | |
![]() | Renata IvanekPopulation Medicine and Diagnostic Sciences | Epidemiology and ecology of infectious and foodborne diseases; mathematical modeling; spatial epidemiology; risk assessment; public health |
Mason JagerPopulation Medicine and Diagnostic Sciences | Viral pathogenesis, hepatopathology, viral discovery, hepatitis | |
Toshi KawateMolecular Medicine | Membrane proteins, Chronic pain, Cell biology, Biochemistry, Biophysics | |
![]() | Natasza KurpiosMolecular Medicine | Tissue morphogenesis; cell shape and architecture; organ development; gut morphogenesis; mammary gland biology; breast cancer |
Colleen LauMicrobiology & Immunology | Immune memory, natural killer cells, cytokine signaling, epigenetics | |
![]() | Dave LinBiomedical Sciences | Axon guidance; neurodevelopment; epilepsy; autism; genomics |
![]() | Sabine MannPopulation Medicine & Diagnostic Sciences | Metabolic diseases and insulin signaling; nutrition; epidemiology; metabolic and nutritional immunology |
![]() | Jessica McArtPopulation Medicine & Diagnostic Sciences | Epidemiology of periparturient diseases in dairy cattle; disease economics; on-farm methods for accurate disease diagnosis |
Mandy McGeachyMicrobiology and Immunology | Th17 cell regulation and functions during infection and autoimmune disease | |
![]() | Andrew MillerBiomedical Sciences | Studying the mechanisms underlying neurologic disease in animals utilizing both spontaneously arising disease and experimental models in a variety of laboratory animal species |
Raina PlowrightPublic and Ecosystem Health | Transmission of pathogens between species, links between land-use change and pathogen spillover, dynamics and drivers of viral pathogens in reservoir host populations, and Implementation of science for the protection of ecosystem and human health | |
![]() | Brian RuddMicrobiology & Immunology | Developmental immunology; host response to infection |
Richa SardanaMolecular Medicine | Protein quality control, membrane trafficking | |
![]() | Praveen SethupathyBiomedical Sciences | Functional genomics; gene regulation; molecular genetics; gastrointestinal physiology; stem cell biology; metabolic disease |
Carolyn SevierMolecular Medicine | Signaling of cellular oxidative stress; molecular mechanisms used by cellular pathways that sense and signal redox imbalances within the cell | |
Glenn SimmonsBiomedical Sciences | Cancer Biology, role of lipids in the regulation of inflammatory and other immunological processes in tumor microenvironment, in vitro tumor models for testing various therapeutic approaches in non-small cell lung carcinoma | |
Kenneth SimpsonClinical Sciences | Gastrointestinal and pancreatic physiology and pathophysiology across species, interactions between the enteric microenvironment (microbial, dietary, and chemical) and the GI tract in health and disease (inflammation and IBD), and the application of culture-independent methods to detect bacteria in clinical samples | |
![]() | Tracy StokolPopulation Medicine & Diagnostic Sciences | The role of tissue factor (coagulation factor III) in hemostasis (particularly thrombotic disorders) and cancer metastasis |
![]() | Alexander TravisBaker Institute for Animal Health & Dept. Biomedical Sciences | Animal health and fertility as well as efforts to help alleviate poverty and hunger in developing countries, work that indirectly benefits local wildlife |
Brian VanderVenMicrobiology and Immunology | Mycobacterial diseases, understanding how M. tuberculosis acquires and utilizes nutrients during acute and chronic phases of disease and applying this understanding to discover new anti-TB drugs, using chemical-genetics, genomics, and biochemical approaches to discover and characterize the novel M. tuberculosis proteins and pathways required during infection. | |
![]() | Bettina WagnerPopulation Medicine & Diagnostic Sciences | Immunity/host; antibody mediated immune mechanisms in infectious disease and vaccination; allergic diseases; neonatal tolerance and allergy predisposition; strategies to develop allergy treatments |
![]() | Robert WeissBiomedical Sciences | Genome maintenance mechanisms and metabolic pathways in cancer and other diseases |
![]() | Andrew WhiteBiomedical Sciences | Cancer biology; stem cell biology; biochemistry and cell biology |
![]() | Gary WhittakerMicrobiology & Immunology | Pathogenesis of influenza viruses, corona viruses and arena viruses; host range and receptors; activation of membrane fusion; macrophage- and neurotropism; anti-viral therapeutics; diagnostic tests; virus-bacteria co-infections |
Matthias WielandPopulation Medicine & Diagnostic Sciences | Udder health, calf management |