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UMass Chan research retreat draws nearly 400; Allan Jacobson delivers keynote

By Mark Shelton

November 05, 2014
  • Sijia Wu, a GSBS student in the Brudnick Neuropsychiatric Research Institute, talks about a poster at the 19th Annual Basic Research/GSBS Retreat.
  • Ting-Hao Huang, right, a GSBS student in neurobiology, makes a point to Sean Ryder, PhD, associate professor of biochemistry & molecular pharmacology during the poster session.
  • GSBS student Sarah Lewandowski discusses her poster with Thoru Pederson, PhD, professor of biochemistry & molecular pharmacology and one of the meeting organizers at the 19th Annual Research Retreat.
  • Maire Osborn, a postdoctoral fellow in the RNA Therapeutics Institute, speaks with Dinah Sah, PhD, left, an executive at Voyager Therapeutics, and Christian Mueller, PhD, assistant professor of pediatrics.
  • Tony Carruthers, PhD, dean of the GSBS, speaks with David Weaver, PhD, professor of neurobiology.
  • Winners of the Dan Mullen awards for best posters were, from left, Alison Philbrook, Cheng Chang, Pallavi Lamba and Carrie Kovalak.

Nearly 400 hundred members of the UMass Chan Medical School academic community—faculty, staff, students, postdoctoral fellows and guests—gathered at the Lincoln Conference Center at UMass Amherst for the 19th Annual Basic Research/GSBS Retreat on Nov. 3 and 4. In addition to scientific presentations from more than a dozen UMMS faculty members, including new hires in molecular medicine, biochemistry & molecular pharmacology, medicine, neurobiology and the RNA Therapeutics Institute, conferees heard from graduate students in medicine, BMP, and molecular medicine and, new this year, three postdocs presenting on their current work.

Chancellor Michael F. Collins introduced the keynote speaker, Allan Jacobson, PhD, the Gerald L. Haidak, MD, and Zelda S. Haidak professor in cell biology, chair and professor of microbiology & physiological systems, and the 2014 recipient of the Chancellor’s Medal for Distinguished Research, who delivered the talk “Bench to Bedside and Back to the Bench: Nonsense Mediated Decay, Translation Termination and the Development of Therapeutic Nonsense Suppression.”

As has become a research retreat tradition, awards for best posters were presented to four GSBS students. The following were chosen: Alison Philbrook, who studies in the laboratory of Michael Francis, PhD, associate professor of neurobiology; Cheng Chang, a student in the laboratory of Arthur Mercurio, PhD, professor and interim chair of cancer biology; Pallavi Lamba, a student in the lab of Patrick Emery, PhD, professor of neurobiology; and Carrie Kovalak, a student in the lab of Melissa Moore, PhD, Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, the Eleanor Eustis Farrington Chair in Cancer Research and professor of biochemistry & molecular pharmacology.

The poster awards are named in honor of the late Dan Mullen, a longtime GSBS staffer. There was also a presentation by Dinah Sah, PhD, a senior vice president at Voyager Therapeutics, a venture capital-funded biotech startup supporting gene therapy research and development at UMMS. Dr. Sah announced a pilot grant competition for faculty members with appointments in the UMass Center for Clinical and Translational Science that will support up to four promising research projects in vector research and development.