Husband-and-wife team exemplify graduate education at College of Medicine
Recent graduates Varun Prabhu and Ushma Doshi are two outstanding alumni of the Graduate School at Penn State. The husband and wife team came to study molecular medicine at Penn State College of Medicine. When their doctoral degree dissertation work came to an end, they chose separate professional paths, firmly rooted in the research enterprise but outside of academia.
Prabhu focused his academic studies on an emerging area of cancer research: the therapeutic targeting of cancer stem cells that are responsible for cancer therapy resistance and disease relapse. Prabhu’s research characterized small molecule therapies that restore tumor suppressive pathways to prevent mechanisms that drive cancer stem cells.
Doshi, meanwhile, focused her work on a sphingolipid known as ceramide that has been shown to selectively kill cancer cells, while sparing normal cells. Since delivery of lipids is difficult, Mark Kester’s lab has created and commercialized ceramide nanoliposomes that deliver ceramide to cells and have the potential to kill cancer cells. For her thesis project, she researched the molecular signaling pathways that are engaged by ceramide to induce cancer cell death. The safety profile of this therapeutic intervention is better than traditional chemotherapies.
Read more of Varun and Ushma’s story at Penn State News.
If you're having trouble accessing this content, or would like it in another format, please email the Penn State College of Medicine web department.