Spring 2006 Fellows

ACHAL ACHROL is a fourth-year MD candidate at Stanford University. He graduated from George Washington University in 2003, magna cum laude, with a degree in computer science. As a researcher at University of California at San Francisco he developed a handheld electrocardiogram monitoring system, an NIH-funded bioinformatics database, a portable cerebral perfusion measurement device, and techniques to utilize magnetic resonance imaging to study volume and hemodynamic changes in aneurysms. He has co-authored thirteen journal publications and won funding awards from both University of California at San Francisco and Stanford University. Ultimately, Achal plans to research new diagnostic and information systems to revolutionize medical care, while addressing social and policy issues related to medical research, including protection of research subjects, patient privacy, and the role of government in the patient-physician relationship. Born in 1980 in Jaipur, India, Achal moved to the US in 1981 with his family, who live in Vienna, VA.

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DEEMA ARAFAH is a third year MD candidate at Harvard University. She graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard University in 2005 with a BA in history of science. After college, she worked as an intern and telemedicine coordinator for the World Health Organization in Jerusalem and the Occupied Palestinian Territories; her work was supported by a fellowship from the Harvard Committee for Human Rights. She has also worked as an EMT and public health field researcher in the West Bank and with Physicians for Human Rights-Israel helping to coordinate medical evacuations. She has presented papers on Palestinian health and human rights at international conferences and was recently published in Haaretz, a major Israeli newspaper. Once an accomplished footballer, she now enjoys coaching youth soccer teams in refugee camps and US inner-cities. Deema hopes to pursue a career as a physician-advocate and medical educator. She is especially concerned with improving access to quality health care and education for people rendered socially or politically "invisible." Deema was born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1981 to Palestinian parents who immigrated to the United States in 1978.

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ALICE MICHELLE AUGUSTINE is a third year JD candidate at Loyola University in New Orleans. Last summer, Michelle spent time in Haiti working on a human rights case submitted by the Inter American Court of Human Rights about the right to an education for Haiti's poorest citizens. She also organized a service mission in Haiti raising money to benefit children who were victims of street and gang violence. In her first year at Lehman College, she worked over sixty-eight hours a week, holding two jobs to help support her family while remaining a full-time student. She was then awarded the Jeannette K. Watson Fellowship and a Ronald E. McNair Scholarship. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa. As a Watson Fellow, Michelle has worked at the New York Supreme Court, the New York City Council, and the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice in Accra, Ghana. As a lawyer, Michelle plans to become an activist for the social and economic rights of the world's poorest inhabitants. Born in 1978 in Dominica, Michelle is a green card holder. Alice will be on a Fulbright Scholarship in Turkey researching human trafficking.

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ALVARO BEDOYA is Counsel to Senator Al Franken (D.-Minn.). In 2007 he graduated from Yale Law School. He graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard University with a BA in social studies. As an undergraduate, Alvaro performed outreach for the Migrant Farmworker Justice Project and wrote his senior thesis on the exploitation of foreign sheepherders in the American wool industry. Upon graduation, he worked as a research consultant for the International Labor Organization, co-authoring three studies that exposed the widespread existence of forced labor in Peru, Bolivia and Paraguay. Before his work for Senator Franken, Alvaro was an associate for Wilmer, Cutler, Pickering, Hale and Dorr LLP, where he specialized in litigation and investigations in Latin America. He was born in Lima, Peru in 1982 and raised in Vestal, New York.

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ANNA BERSHTEYN is a fourth-year PhD candidate in materials science and engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, studying regeneration of bone and cartilage tissue. Since entering Massachusetts Institute of Technology as an undergraduate, Anna has helped develop a Solar Water Disinfection Device, interned with a Navajo weaver's cooperative, and conducted research at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and the Argentinean steel company Tenaris Siderca. Anna volunteers as an EMT, as a Boston Red Cross disaster responder, and as the volunteer coordinator for a local homeless shelter. She drums with the sabar drum ensemble "Rambax MIT," which recently toured in Dakar, Senegal. Anna was born in Kiev, Ukraine in 1984 and immigrated with her family to California in 1989.

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AMIT BOURI is a consultant at the Monitor Institute, a Boston-based strategy consulting organization serving the social sector. He graduated with an MPA/MBA joint-degree at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, where he led global health and corporate social responsibility initiatives. He received his BA in sociology and anthropology from Swarthmore College. While there, he studied traditional Chinese medicine in Shanghai, China, and co-founded a mentoring program for underprivileged immigrant children in Philadelphia's Chinatown. After his graduation, Amit worked first as a consultant for Bain & Company and then for the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, where he contributed to the implementation of international programs to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV. Recently, he helped develop a strategic plan for Johnson & Johnson's HIV/AIDS philanthropic efforts. Amit was born in California in 1978 and raised by a single mother from India. He envisions a career focused on mobilizing private, public, and nonprofit resources to address poverty and inequity.

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GABRIEL BRAT started his residency in surgery at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and graduated from Stanford Medical School. He graduated with a BSE, summa cum laude, in bioengineering from Arizona State University. While at Arizona State University, Gabriel developed a diabetes treatment program for Hispanic and Native American patients from a low-income community. Most recently, he led an HIV prevention program in Central America. After graduating, he won a Marshall Scholarship, which allowed him to earn graduate degrees in Latin American studies at Oxford University and public health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Gabriel, the son of Argentine immigrants, has conducted fieldwork in Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala on a variety of projects since his undergraduate years, all related to health concerns of underserved populations. Gabriel aspires to combine a career in medicine and development. He hopes to lead programs that bring together science, community involvement, and long-term philanthropic and commercial investment to improve the health of marginalized populations.

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TOMAS CARBONELL is an associate at Van Ness Feldman, PC in Washington, D.C where he works on clean energy and climate policy projects. He graduated from Yale Law School in 2008. Raised in North Carolina by Cuban parents, Tomas graduated from North Carolina State University in 2002 with degrees in chemical engineering, economics, and multidisciplinary studies. Pursuing a passion for international environmental law and policy, Tomas went on to earn master's degrees in development economics and environmental management as a Marshall Scholar at Oxford University. He has interned at the Center for International Environmental Law, Environmental Defense Fund, the US Department of Justice, and the World Resources Institute, and has written extensively on the environmental impacts of official export credit agencies. He is committed to a career as a policymaker or litigator in the environmental area, either at an environmental group or a government agency.

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DORA CASTAÑEDA is the daughter of Mexican immigrants who settled in Los Angeles in 1974. Born in 1978, she graduated cum laude from University of California at Irvine in 2001 with a BS in biological sciences. She  received her MD from Stanford University and is doing an anesthesia residency at Stanford University Hospital and Clinic. In pursuit of her medical degree, Dora published three scientific papers on her work in the epilepsy research section at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, MD. Intrigued by the complexities of research, she is devoted to improving medicine through basic science, with emphasis on applying her findings to cerebrovascular disease. Dora aspires to mold a basic science and public health approach to research with direct applications to the health of medically underserved populations, especially in stroke treatment and prevention as an academic neurosurgeon.

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ALBERT CHANG received his BA from Stanford University in political science with honors in international security studies. He was a 2005 Harry S. Truman Scholar and will receive his JD at Harvard University in June 2009. As an undergraduate, Albert served on the Defense Policy Team at the US Department of State, for which he was the recipient of the 2004 Department of State Certificate of Appreciation. Outside of government, Albert has received many research fellowships and worked for two foreign policy think tanks: the Nathan Hale Foreign Policy Society and the Institute for National Policy Research. First published at 19, Albert has since published two papers and was the youngest person selected to present his paper on diffusing the North Korean nuclear crisis at Harvard Unviersity's largest conference in Asia. He wrote a thesis regarding a long-term peace framework between China and Taiwan. Born in Hayward, CA, in 1984 to parents of Taiwanese and Chinese descent, Albert intends a career as a policymaker promoting international security. This fall Albert will be joining the Obama Administration.

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SNEHAL DESAI is currently a freelance director whilst pursuing an MFA in directing at the Yale University. He graduated from Emory University, summa cum laude, with a BA in political science and theater studies. He was born 1980 to Indian parents who immigrated in 1976; his parents reside in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Since beginning his undergraduate degree at Emory University, Snehal has directed or assistant directed over thirty productions. He was awarded Emory University's Benston Award for Excellence in theater studies, was Resident Director for Theater Emory, and is a member of the Lincoln Center Director's Lab. He also interned in the office of US Senator Max Cleland, served as an Emory University Admission Advisor, and worked as Director of Outreach and Marketing for the Princeton Review of Georgia and Alabama. Snehal's ultimate goal is to become the artistic director of a theater that champions bold new minority voices, and which creates socially conscious and politically challenging works that utilizes the transformative power of the theater to produce visions that challenge the way we see the world and live our lives. Snehal has spend the past year touring his solo show "Finding ways to Prove You're NOT an Al-Qaeda Terrorist when You're Brown ( and other stories of the gIndian)." He was also project director for "The Spitting Game," a new play commissioned by Emory Univeristy and recently presented a reading of his new play"Sita/Sati Part I: Apu Asleep in NYC" with Desipina Theater Company. 

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GRIGORY GORYACHEV completed an MM in guitar performance and is a third-year DMA candidate at the New England Conservatory of Music. He is a student of the renowned concert guitarist Eliot Fisk. Born in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1977, Grigory began playing the guitar at the age of seven. Following his debut at age nine, he performed regularly in major cities in Russia, and appeared frequently on television and radio. Grigory has toured North America, France, Spain, Scandinavia and Israel. He views himself as one of the few guitarists in the world who is equally proficient in both flamenco and classical styles. Since immigrating to the United States in 1995, Grigory has continued playing flamenco guitar while deepening his involvement with the classical style.

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SUSIE HUANG completed her BA and MA in chemistry, summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from Harvard University in 2002. She received her PhD in physical chemistry from the University of California at Los Angeles, and is a third-year MD student in the Harvard and MIT HST Program. Susie has conducted extensive research in magnetic resonance spectroscopy and imaging, authored numerous publications, and given talks at international conferences. While completing her PhD on a National Science Foundation graduate fellowship, she taught and mentored undergraduates and volunteered at the University of California at Los Angeles Medical Center. Susie was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1980 (with her twin sister) to parents who emigrated from Taiwan. Susie envisions a career as a physician scientist working to improve cancer detection and therapy through molecular imaging.

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YASHAR KALANI is a resident physician in Neurological Surgery at the Barrow Neurological Institute (BNI) in Phoenix, AZ . Prior to residency training he completed postdoctoral studies at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute/Stanford University and the Lund University Strategic Center for stem cell biology and neuroscience where he studied cell fate decisions of neural stem cells. He completed his MD at Stanford University (2008) where he was a Howard Hughes Fellow. He earned an MS and PhD in chemistry: biochemistry and molecular biophysics from California Institute of Technology in 2003 and 2004, and a combined BS/MS in biochemistry/organic chemistry from the University of California at Los Angeles in 2002. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa. Yashar was born in Tehran, Iran in 1980. His family left there in 1991, immigrated to Canada, and finally settled in the US in 1996. Throughout his years of higher education, Yashar has many institutional and national fellowships to fund his education and research resulting in scientific and clinical publications. He believes that his training as a chemist, coupled with his medical training and residency, will give him the skills necessary to combine and apply the tools of stem cell biology to medicine and to utilize cell-based therapies to regenerate lost or damaged nervous tissue.

 

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Geoffrey Krampitz received his MD from Stanford University. A native of San Jose, Costa Rica, he came to the United States upon the murder of his parents shortly before his eighth birthday. He is a naturalized citizen who grew up in a children's home and with relatives in Texas. Geoff earned a BSE in biomedical engineering from Johns Hopkins University in 1998. After several years helping to launch a couple of start-up software companies in Silicon Valley, he performed stem cell research at the University of California at San Francisco while working toward an MSE in biomedical laboratory science from San Francisco State University. Driven by a vision of equality of opportunity and by gratitude to those who helped him, Geoff founded the Medical Mentorship Program, a program that pairs disadvantaged premed students from community and state colleges in the San Francisco area with current Stanford University medical students and provides guidance on how to improve their medical school applications. In addition, Geoff co-coordinated the 2006 Latino Medical Student Association (LMSA) Regional Conference and raised over $140,000 for LMSA and its mentorship and community outreach programs. He has co-authored several journal articles and is the recipient of the Nelson Fellowship Research Award, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Research Training Fellowship for Medical Students, and the American Medical Association Minority Scholar Award. Determined to prevent others from experiencing the same hardships he endured as a result of losing his parents, Geoff plans a career as a trauma surgeon.

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PAUL KWAK is currently a fourth-year medical student at Case Western Reserve University. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University in history and science and recently received an MM in collaborative piano at the Juilliard School. He also received an MSc in comparative social policy from Oxford University. Born in Kettering, OH, to parents of Korean descent, Paul is now 27. His parents, both naturalized citizens, live in Beavercreek, OH. Paul plans to pursue otolaryngology in order to combine his fascination with the voice, singing, and music, with his desire to become a physician.

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ELIZABETH KWO is a first-year MBA candidate and completed her third-year as an MD candidate at Harvard University. She completed a BA in human biology from Stanford University in 2004 and received the Lloyd W. Dinkelspiel Award. After graduation, she conducted research on elderly healthcare disability and dependency as a Fulbright Scholar in Taiwan. Elizabeth created the Nepal Clinical Internship, a program that has sent over 140 US students to work in Kanti Children's Hospital in Nepal, allowing them to develop clinical skills and experience international healthcare. She is a published poet and has extensive experience abroad, working in orphanages in Mexico, establishing health clinics in rural Ecuador, building a women's shelter in Guatemala, and researching traditional medicines in Peru. Elizabeth was born in Taipei, Taiwan in 1981, and her family now lives in San Francisco, California. Elizabeth plans to dedicate her career to geriatrics and would like to run a nonprofit organization that improves healthcare for the elderly.

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DARRYL LI is a fifth year PhD candidate at Harvard University in anthropology and Middle Eastern studies and is a third-year JD candidate at Yale University. He earned a BA from Harvard University in 2001 and an MPhil from Cambridge University in 2003. Darryl has conducted academic research in Rwanda, Yemen, and Pakistan, where he was a visiting lecturer in the Law & Policy Department of the Lahore University of Management Sciences. Darryl has worked for the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (Gaza), Human Rights Watch, and was a consultant for B'tselem, a leading Israeli human rights organization. He also interned at the South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre (New Delhi). Darryl hopes to pursue a career alternating between scholarship and activist litigation. He was born in 1979 to Chinese immigrants who are naturalized citizens and currently reside in Canton, MA.

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THEODORE MARENTIS is at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor starting his residency in radiology. He completed his MD at the Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology Health Sciences and Technology program. He received his BS in biomechanical engineering and MS in electrical engineering from Stanford University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi. Born in Athens, Greece, Theodore is 27 years old. His family came to the US for the first time in 1996 and he became a naturalized citizen in 2004. At Stanford University, Theodore was active in community service with such organizations as Habitat for Humanity and the Urban Ministry. He was the chairman of the community service committee for his fraternity. His research on Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) has been published three times. Theodore's immediate goal is to produce an implantable liver dialysis machine. He is the co-inventor on a renal dialysis patent and believes that medicine is the perfect confluence of his passions for science and technological development and his desire to have a positive social impact.

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SUSAN MATHAI will receive her MD from Yale University in May. She will be an resident in internal medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. She graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard University in 2005 with a degree in social studies. She was born in 1983 in Dallas, Texas, to Indian parents who are naturalized citizens, and who immigrated to the US in 1982. While at Harvard University, Susan received grants to support senior thesis research concerning healthcare in Cuba and community health work with Partners in Health. Fluent in Spanish and English, Susan conducted research in Cuba, and has been involved in activities utilizing her language skills, such as clinical research on reproductive health and clinical translating. While at Harvard University, Susan directed the Mission Hill After School Program, a student-run project serving children in Roxbury. Susan uses her domestic and international experiences to inform her education about the structural and social forces that shape the course of diseases disproportionately affecting the poor. Susan plans to dedicate her medical career to reforming healthcare practices through direct service as a physician and through advocacy and research.

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ISIS SARATIAL MISDARY is pursuing an MFA in directing at the University of California at San Diego. She earned her BA from Villanova University in 1999 and trained as an actor at Middlesex University in London. Since graduating, Isis has worked as a Van Lier Resident Director at Second Stage Theatre and as a Directing Associate at the Lark Play Development Center. Studying indigenous Egyptian puppetry as a Fulbright grantee, she co-founded WAMDA Group, effectively reviving the art from near extinction. WAMDA's shows attempt to disrupt the present from the past, to tackle contemporary social and political issues. WAMDA collaborated with Egypt's Ministry of Culture and UNESCO to create a Center for Folkloric Performance. Isis is a recipient of the prestigious National Endowment for the Arts/Theatre Communications Group Career Development Program for Directors. Ultimately, she hopes to run a US-based international production company where art collides with activism, focusing on Middle Eastern and other marginalized voices. Born in 1977 to parents who emigrated from Egypt, Isis lives in Brooklyn, NY. This spring, Isis will be directing for the Arab American Comedy Festival in New York City and Los Angeles.

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VIPIN NARANG is a fifth-year PhD student in government at Harvard University, where he focuses on international security studies. He received a BS and MS in chemical engineering from Stanford University in 2002, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa as a junior and graduated with academic distinction. Vipin transitioned to international politics at Oxford University, earning an MPhil in international relations with distinction in 2004 as a Marshall Scholar. Vipin has held research positions at Merck & Co., the UN in Geneva, and the RAND Corporation where he was a graduate fellow. He has authored or coauthored four publications. Vipin hopes to apply his training in chemical engineering and international politics to a career dedicated to addressing modern threats to international security, either as an academic or in government service. He was born in the Bay Area in 1979 to parents of Indian descent. His family currently lives in Saratoga, California. In the Fall 2010 he will be an assistant professor in the political science department of MIT.

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SZE-LING NG is a fourth-year PhD candidate at Harvard University in molecular and cellular biology. In 2005, she graduated from the Honors College at Michigan State University with a 4.0 GPA and a dual BS in biochemistry and physiology. As an undergraduate, she tutored fellow students, led several student organizations, and performed service work in Mexico, Puerto Rico and the US. Sze-Ling has conducted research since the summer after her freshman year and has published in Nature Biotechnology. She is the recipient of the Featherstone Prize and Michigan State University Board of Trustees Award. Sze-Ling aspires to work in academia as a principal investigator, professor and mentor. As a future educator, she hopes to facilitate programs that encourage teenagers to pursue a higher education and science-related careers. She was born in China in 1983 and naturalized in 2003.

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SHANTANU NUNDY is at the University of Chicago Medical Center doing his residency in internal medicine. He received his MD from Johns Hopkins University. He graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2004 with a BS in management science. Shantanu was born in 1982 in Toronto, Canada, to parents of Indian descent. His family immigrated to the US in 1986 and settled in Northern Virginia. While at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Shantanu worked part-time at various financial institutions and as a researcher at the Harvard Business School, Brigham & Women's Hospital, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Economics Department. He spent his winter sessions in rural India developing a sustainable healthcare program for an underserved village. Since matriculating at Johns Hopkins University, Shantanu has conducted research in the Division of Cardiology and published a paper on medical malpractice in Health Affairs. He founded the East Baltimore Community Talent Show to strengthen ties with the local community and serves on the Board of Governors for a university-wide community service organization. He plans a career in academic medicine, combining his interests in basic research, policy, and service. Shantanu currently writes about preventive health on his blog Beyond Apples (to read his blog visit www.beyondapples.org).

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ANTONIO PEREZ is in the final year of his MD/MBA program at Harvard University. He earned a BA in history and science from Harvard University, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and received the Detur Prize and John Harvard Scholarship. A research fellow of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Antonio helped develop stem cell therapies for muscular dystrophy. His findings have been featured in numerous national conference presentations and scientific publications, including Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Gellis and Kagan's Current Pediatric Therapy. Antonio also co-founded PABSELA, Harvard University's first program aiming to advance biomedicine in Latin America through partnerships with Latin American universities. He directed Harvard ExperiMentors, a science education program in elementary schools. Antonio hopes to become a cardiologist and healthcare executive. He was born in North Bergen, NJ, in 1984 to Cuban parents.

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ABBAS RAVJANI received his JD at Yale University. He received his BA, summa cum laude, in political science and Middle East studies from Austin College in Sherman, Texas. As an undergraduate, Abbas remained committed to increasing awareness of Muslim culture and to be himself a Muslim role model in the greater campus community. He served as Student Body President, was President and Co-Founder of the Muslim Students Association, and volunteered as a basketball coach at the local Boys and Girls Club. Additionally, Abbas has worked for the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Department of Navy in Washington, DC. In 2003, he was awarded a Truman Scholarship. As an American Muslim, Abbas wants to pursue a career in government and policy-making in order to represent the voice of his community. He plans to study international law, with the hope of influencing policy and providing new perspectives in government. Abbas was born in 1982 in Gainesville, Texas, to parents who emigrated from Pakistan in the 1970's and are now naturalized citizens. His is currently working as Counsel for Congressman Silvestre Reyes of Texas in the US House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on a Heyman Fellowship.

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YULIA RYZHIK is a fourth-year PhD student in comparative English literature at Harvard University where she currently holds a Mellon Fellowship in humanistic studies. Yulia is a teaching fellow for an Enlightenment course run by the Harvard Summer program in conjunction with Ca'Foscari University in Venice. She received her BA, summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard University in 2005. Born in 1983, Yulia emigrated, with her family, from Moscow in 1995. They are now naturalized citizens, living in South Salem, NY. As an undergraduate, Yulia was awarded various institutional prizes and travel grants. In 2004, she served as an interpreter between Harvard University's Lowell House and the Danilov Monastery near Moscow in negotiations over the Monastery's bells, which were acquired by Lowell House during Stalin's regime. Yulia pursues intensive language study in her summers and participates in poetry and elocution competitions. Yulia intends a career as a professor of English literature specializing in Renaissance poetry.

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COLETTE SHEN is pursuing an MD/PhD in bioengineering at the University of Pennsylvania. She graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard University in 2004 with a BA in engineering sciences. Colette has conducted lab research on tissue engineering and stem cells at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Massachusetts General Hospital. Her research has led to several journal publications and was honored by the National Inventors Hall of Fame. She served as an undergraduate representative on the Harvard University Curricular Review, was director of the Harvard University-Massachusetts Institute of Technology Hippocratic Society promoting issues in healthcare, and was vice-president of Women in Science at Harvard-Radcliffe. Currently at the University of Pennsylvania, Colette is conducting angiogenesis research and serves on the medical school's admissions committee. She looks forward to a career as a physician-scientist-educator, pursuing research that bridges engineering tools with problems in medicine, while also making science accessible to the general public. Colette was born in 1982 to parents from Taiwan who now live in Houston, TX.

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Amandeep Singh is in his final year as a joint M.D. and Ph.D. candidate at the Tri-Institutional Medical Scientist Training Program at Cornell, Rockefeller University and Sloan Kettering Institute. In July 2009, he will begin a short-track residency and fellowship into gastroenterology at the University of Pennsylvania. Amandeep earned a B.A. in Biology, summa cum laude, from Cornell in 2002. He was elected Vice-President of the Cornell Student Assembly and was the Co-Founder and President of the Cornell Bhangra Club, devoted to traditional Indian dance. As a professional choreographer, he has staged dances for the Bollywood Music Awards, NYC Summer Stage, and for many music videos and concerts of world-renowned artists, which have aired on BBC and MTV Desi. Amandeep founded and directs the Surat Sikh Conference, a federally recognized 501(c)3 non-profit organization in its fourth year. He has also published two scientific papers and a chapter of a medical licensing exam review guide. Amandeep plans to use his training as a physician and a scientist to bridge the gap between the scientific, clinical, and social aspects of obesity.

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CORINNA ZYGOURAKIS is a third-year MD candidate at Harvard University as part of the Harvard and MIT HST Program. A graduate of the California Institute of Technology, she holds degrees in biology and literature. She was born in 1984 in Houston, TX, to parents who emigrated from Greece. Pursuing independent neuroscience-related research since age 16, Corinna has published two scientific papers, given presentations at several national conferences, and received the Neuroscience Research Prize of the American Academy of Neurology. At California Institute of Technology, she served in elected positions of the student government and volunteered in the neurosurgery department of a nearby hospital. She also plays the violin in chamber music ensembles and is a long-distance runner. Corinna plans to pursue a career in academic medicine that combines clinical care, research, and teaching in neurology or neurosurgery.

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