Medeea P
- Research Program Mentor
PhD candidate at Stanford University
Expertise
Immunology (innate immunity, host-pathogen interaction), virology, microbiology
Bio
Hi! I'm currently a 4th year PhD student at Stanford studying the human immune response to bacteria and viruses. Most people are familiar with the microbiome (all the bacteria that live in your gut and at other sites of colonization in your body, like the skin or airway passages), but my research is in the very new field of host-virome interactions: the study of the viral communities that are literally in every organ, tissue, and fluid in the human body (even the brain). Most of these viruses don't infect eukaryotic cells: the majority of your virome consists of bacteria-infecting viruses, also called bacteriophages. I'm studying how the presence of these bacteriophages impacts the course of bacterial infections and how the immune system responds to them, in primary human cells, mouse models, and at a systems-wide level using single-cell RNAseq. I have a strong background in general virology, microbiology, and human/mammalian immunology. I also have experience with allergy models and lymphocyte immunology (B and T cells). Outside of lab, I love to be outside! I've gotten really into trail running during COVID, and I also hike, backpack, scuba dive, and practice and teach yoga!Project ideas
Viruses on the Brain
In this project, you'll do a deep dive into the emerging field of the brain viromes, and how they connect to homeostasis of the healthy brain, new therapies for glibastoma and other brain cancer, the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's, and other brain disorders. We will pick a disease/condition and develop a proposal for a targeted vaccine or treatment based on brain viral content. This could be targeted to a general audience (i.e. blog post), a funding audience (i.e venture capital board) or a specialized audience (i.e. grant/research proposal).
Big Data, Tiny Cells
In this project, we'll identify a question around immune function, response, or disease progression and find publicly available single-cell datasets that might help us answer this question. We will analyze our integrated dataset using single-cell analysis R packages, and summarize the findings as a research paper. You'll learn basic approaches to scRNAseq analysis, hypothesis-driven project design, principles of scientific writing and data reporting, and hopefully generate some cool findings!