Fadhl has 10 years of experience in Biomedical Engineering conducting Bioinformatics research. His main research interest is to apply established or innovative computational, bioinformatics or statistical algorithm to find meaningful patterns in data in complex diseases like chronic kidney disease(CKD).

The long-term research goal of Fadhl’s research is to improve outcomes for patients with CKD by developing methods to improve personalized medicine and implementing these methods into clinical practice.

Celine has been working for the last 10 years in the area of systems biology of inflammatory glomerular diseases with a focus on understanding the molecular mechanisms of diabetic nephropathy (DN) first, then IgA nephropathy (IgAN), and lupus nephritis (LN). As the leader of the research projects on systems biology of LN (and IgAN) in our research team, one of her research goals is to develop innovative approaches that will provide new perspectives on our understanding of comprehensive human renal gene expression datasets. This requires novel ideas and sophisticated technical skills to develop and carry out very complex system biology analyses.

As highlighted in her recent publications, systems biology technologies allow the integration of current knowledge with large scale experimental data to generate insight into the regulatory events occurring in LN. One of her current focuses is to use recent systems biology tools to discover new and more specific therapeutic opportunities in human LN, as well as new biomarkers for clinical disease stage or outcome. To this aim, she has analyzed renal macrophage and kidney genome-wide expression profiling data from three different mouse models of LN, as well as from human LN kidney biopsies. This will help the scientific community to select the appropriate mouse model depending on their research topic of interest, as well as to analyze new LN therapeutic targets.

By combining her expertise in molecular and systems biology with her knowledge of renal disease mechanisms, her other research focus is to integrate disease molecular signatures with clinical parameters for LN and IgAN with the hope of shedding some light on any shared pathways in disease pathogenesis. She has thus defined common characteristics among patient groups. These characteristics could be useful for improved classification, outcome prediction, and for defining new therapeutic targets.

In addition, still with the goal of characterizing promising biological targets for the development of new drugs and diagnostics in LN, she has been one active member of one awarded group led by Betty Diamond in the NIH Accelerating Medicines Partnership (AMP) program. She has been optimizing protocols for isolating and storing renal single cell suspensions from human tumor nephrectomy samples as well as biopsies from LN patients and urine samples.

Sean comes to the team with extensive academic and industry experience and a strong track record of genomic biomarker discovery and target validation. His current efforts are focused on understanding molecular mechanisms of human glomerular diseases using a variety of bioinformatics and computational approaches with a goal of identifying mechanistic noninvasive biomarkers linked to intrarenal pathway activation. Mechanistic noninvasive biomarkers may then be used to monitor intrarenal pathway activation in patients with an eye towards precision nephrology.

Specialties: Nephrology, Internal Medicine
Area of Practice: Acute kidney injury and recovery, cystic diseases and all aspects of general adult Nephrology, including chronic kidney disease (CKD).

Research: Epithelial cell polarity and tubulogenesis

Michigan Medicine Profile

Wenjun Ju has Ph.D. in molecular biology with many years’ experience in chronic kidney disease associated research. She previously worked in Division of Nephrology/Department of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City, joined the University of Michigan in 2009.

Her work focuses on using transcriptome approach to identify invasive (tissue) and non-invasive (plasma and urine) biomarkers for disease progression, and more importantly, to investigate the pathological mechanisms underlying the altered gene expression and to determine interventional strategies thereby ameliorating or preventing disease progression.

She is also interested in applying integrative approach (large gene expression datasets and computational methods) to predict human kidney cell lineage-specific genes and using in vivo and in-vitro systems to understand their roles in CKD progression.

Dr. Mariani is a nephrologist and researcher with a focus on glomerular disease progression and novel biomarkers in this complex disease. Dr. Mariani received a BS in Biochemical Sciences from Harvard University and completed her MD at the University of Michigan. She completed her residency, nephrology fellowship, and the MS in Clinical Epidemiology program at the University of Pennsylvania. She currently has a mentored career development award from the NIH-NIDDK. This study aims to identify clinically relevant subgroups of patients with glomerular disease.

My main research is focused on studying alternative splice isoforms/variants that are involved in different types of human cancers. I have developed an approach to integrate transcriptomic data with mass-spectrometric data for the identification of splice isoforms. The functional role of the distinct splice variant of a gene is not well understood. I use different computational tools to understand the potential functions and interactions of these variants. I collaborate with other University of Michigan cancer specialists to experimentally validate our splice variant predictions in human normal and tumor tissue samples.

My primary research interests are twofold: 1) To translate basic science findings from animal models to human application in kidney transplantation. 2) Outcomes research in the area of kidney transplantation with a focus on recipient and donor obesity, variation in practice patterns and understanding the clinical impact and economic implications of various post kidney transplant complications.

My current work focuses on understanding changes in glomerular and podocyte parameters early after kidney transplantation and their impact on long term allograft survival. Using a multidimensional approach that involves a combination of clinical, glomerular morphometric, histological and transcriptomic data we are in the process of defining individuals at high risk for post-transplant glomerular disease and obtain mechanistic insights into disease causation and progression. My work is currently funded via intramural grants from the Michigan Nutrition and Obesity Research Center as well as the George O’Brien Kidney Center.

Besides my clinical and research interests, I serve as faculty at the UM-KECC (Kidney Epidemiology and Cost Center) where our multidisciplinary team is working to develop quality metrics for dialysis facilities designed to improve access to kidney transplantation.

Viji is the lead bioinformatician/computational biologist on the MiKTMC team. Her research focus is in identifying non-invasive biomarkers and therapeutic targets predicting disease progression in Diabetic Nephropathy and CKD in general. She has extensive experience in applying several statistical and bioinformatics methods on bulkRNA/single cell transcriptomic/proteomics and longitudinal clinical data along with the structural alterations to identify markers of disease progression.

Viji leads the efforts in multi-omics data integration projects for several of our cohorts such as CProbe, EarlyDKD, and BeatDKD by adapting a wide variety of established and novel computational approaches to understand the underlying mechanisms in the pathogenesis of kidney diseases. She has extensive experience in using transcriptomic data to identify cross-species/tissue mechanisms’ between human and animal models of diabetic nephropathy and other kidney diseases.

She also leads several of our academic and industry collaborative projects nationally and internationally. As part of our ASBC core, she trains biologists and clinicians to use systems biology approaches relevant to their research hypothesis.

My research is focusing on whole exome capture, high-throughput mutation analyses and functional characterization of novel renal disease genes. My expertise is in the field of “Molecular Basis of Genetic Diseases” and major scientific achievements include the identification and functional characterization of more than 30 novel kidney disease genes as e.g. NPHP1, INVS, NPHP3, NPHP4, IQCB1, CEP290, NEK8, SDCCAG8, TMEM67, CEP164, ZNF423, ATXN10, TCTN1, TCTN2, SLC41A1, ANKS6, PLCE1, ARHGDIA, ADCK4, ZMYND10, LRRC6, SPAG1, IFT172, SIX1, SIX5, and FAN1  in patients with Nephronophthisis, Joubert Syndrome, Senior-Loken Syndrome, Nephrotic Syndrome, Primary Ciliary Dyskinesia, Branchio-Oto-Renal Syndrome, and Karyomegalic Interstitial Nephritis.

Bio coming soon

Mathew is passionate about developing efficient bioinformatics pipelines and analytic methods for multi-OMIC data. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry and two master’s degrees in Public Health Biotechnology (University of Ibadan) and Biomedical Engineering (University of South Dakota). His area of competence is in data analysis, Machine Learning, and bioinformatics. He has previously developed a classification model for biofilm stage-specific genes and expression modules based on ICA algorithms to accelerate microbial biofilm biomarker discovery.

He joined MiKTMC in February 2023 and is responsible for multi-OMICS data processing, including quality control, mapping to reference, quantification, and statistical tests using standard approaches.

‍

Gabrielle joined the lab in 2021 and works with the clinical cohorts team as a clinical research coordinator. Currently, she serves as the adult coordinator for CureGN and assists with other projects as they arise. She has a special interest in academic medical centers and seeing how they’re able to provide top of the line care to those who they serve. Gabrielle earned her Masters of Science in Health Psychology in 2021 from the University of Michigan-Dearborn and her undergraduate degree from Alma College in 2019. When she’s not at work, she enjoys spending time with her cat, quilting, and baking delicious treats.

‍

Mike joined MiKTMC in 2023 after stints as a high school math teacher, an actuary, an education policy researcher, and most recently as the lead CureGN programmer at Arbor Research. He received a B.S. in Mathematics from the University of Michigan and a M.S. in Applied Statistics from Penn State University.

‍

Heather joined the Michigan Kidney Translational Medicine Core (MiKTMC) during Spring of 2014.  She has a diverse business background, including many years with GlaxoSmithKline and, most recently, with a small, bioinformatics startup company. Heather held a number of business development, international marketing and account management positions in the automotive, biotech and pharmaceutical industries. She received her undergraduate degree at the University of Michigan, an M.B.A. in International Business from Pepperdine University, and completed her PhD work at Eastern Michigan University (EMU) in Technology Studies, focusing on Bioethics.  Heather enjoyed teaching International Business at EMU and loves her current role in managing the development of public-private partnerships between academia and the private sector, as well as steering a number of strategic, financial, and operational aspects of MiKTMC.

‍

Nikki manages our software development and data management team responsible for MiKTMC data mining tools. She comes to us from the private sector, having worked for Thermo Fisher Scientific for the past ten years. Much like her work with MiKTMC, Nikki was the project manager of initiatives that required bioinformatics, software, and translation science teams to communicate and work together. As a senior data scientist, she was responsible for the curation of actionable data from clinical trial criteria, FDA and EMA drug labels, as well as NCCN and ESMO guidelines. 

Nikki started her data management career in the customer satisfaction industry at Claes Fornell Initiative (CFI) Group managing teams for various projects during her tenure there. 

‍

‍

Ruth Ann received her undergraduate degree in Business Administration from Ferris State University and an MBA with a concentration in CIS from Western Michigan University. Ruth Ann joined the MiKTMC Team in November 2019. She provides a broad spectrum of executive, administrative, and program support to Dr. Matthias Kretzler and other faculty members.

Before joining MiKTMC, Ruth Ann worked in higher education student success programming as a program manager and in international development as a donor and community cultivation strategist in 23 emerging economies.

Outside of work, Ruth Ann enjoys reading, writing, playing volleyball, traveling and spending time with her family.

Rachel received an MSI from the School of Information at the University of Michigan. Her studies focused on Library and Information Science, with an interest in cataloging.

Rachel joined the MiKTMC team in 2015. She develops standards and processes for data curation, as well as collects, standardizes, and releases data to several research study software tools such as tranSMART, Nephroseq, and the KPMP Kidney Tissue Atlas.

Prior to MiKTMC, Rachel worked at the University of Michigan Library as a Cataloger, and at Compendia Bioscience as a Data Manager responsible for curating data for the Oncomine and Nephromine applications.

Felix began his studies in bioinformatics in Munich, Germany. Searching for a part-time job to finance it, he met Matthias Kretzler in 2004. Soon after, he started working in Matthias’ group at the Department of ”Klinische Biochemie” (Medizinische Poliklinik, Head of Department: Prof. D. Schlöndorff). Under the eyes of Dr. Anissa Boucherot, he was introduced to  working with and processing Affymetrix microarray data.

After finishing his studies, Felix emigrated from Germany to join Matthias’ team in Ann Arbor, Michigan in September 2006. He is currently responsible for the microarray data processing, starting from normalization to significance analysis and clustering. Selected subsets of data are then passed to pathway mapping and transcription factor analysis. Felix is also involved in correlating gene expression data to clinical values for biomarker selection and prediction of future outcomes.

Outside the lab, he enjoys camping, fishing, biking, good food and playing squash.

Prior to joining MiKTMC, I received my MSc. degree in 2011 from the department of Anatomy, Cell Biology and Physiological Sciences at the American University of Beirut. I worked there as a Senior Research Assistant for 12 years where I evolved as a Researcher and a Lab Manager. I was interested in studying the role of microenvironment in modulating normal and/or cancer cell properties in favor of cancer cell progression with a special focus on gap junctions and exosomes as major players in intercellular communication.

I hope to implement my knowledge, explore new venues and positively contribute to the advancement of research on the diagnosis and treatment of kidney diseases which will ultimately lead to improved patient outcomes.

Damian migrated to the MiKTMC team from the Sampson lab. Prior to that he worked as a bioinformatics scientist for Steve Kleinstein at Yale University.
He received his Ph.D. in Bioinformatics at the University of Michigan for his work on alternative splicing using high-throughput proteomics.

Damian has worked in a variety of bioinformatics positions including as the chief bioinformatics scientist for the Proteomics Core at the University of Michigan under Dr. Alexey Nesviskii. His current work in the MiKTMC lab focuses on whole genome sequence analysis for our NEPTUNE patient cohort.

‍Website: http://dfermin.com/

Matthew received his undergraduate degree in Cell and Molecular Biology from the University of Michigan. He joined MiKTMC in April 2021 as a Research Lab Specialist. He works in the Wet Bench group, under Dr. Jennifer Harder, culturing kidney organoids for the study of various kidney diseases. He has previous research experience at the Pathology Department studying mixed-lineage leukemia and directing the Michigan Synthetic Biology Team on various research projects.
Prior to joining MiKTMC, Matthew supported patient-physician relationships and managed scribes as a chief scribe associate at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital.

Outside of work, Matthew enjoys reading, hiking, cooking, and running.

‍

Brad is a molecular and cellular biologist by training. He has worked with the MiKTMC group since early 2014 after completion of post-doctoral work at The University of Michigan. His expertise within the MiKTMC team includes Next Generation Sequencing and Lab Management.

As an experimental biologist, Brad hopes to contribute his knowledge to the field of Chronic Kidney Disease and make a positive impact on patients lives.

John Hartman was a founder or co-founder of two companies (BioImage Corp. and Computational Biosciences, Inc., Ann Arbor, MI) where he worked for more years than he cares to admit in proteomics, genomics and bioinformatics. He also consulted with the University of Michigan and other clients in addition to working with Advaita Bioinformatics (Plymouth, MI) before joining the Kretzler laboratory as a computational biologist in June, 2016.

Margaret joined the MiKTMC team as a Biostatistician Expert in 2023.  Prior to that she worked as a Managing Senior Biostatistician, providing managerial and statistical support for a team of analysts and multiple data coordinating centers representing large national and international observational research studies.  She has also previously served as the lead statistician for a variety of Health Policy programs and worked as a statistician in a Women’s Health research center.  She received her bachelor's degree in Statistics from the University of Michigan and her master’s degree in Statistics from Eastern Michigan University.  She is widely published in scientific peer reviewed journals and served as the first author for a manuscript awarded as a CJASN Editor’s Pick in 2019.  

Outside of work, Margaret loves to spend time with her husband and two children, exercising, cooking, and quilting.

‍

Bethany has served in a project management role at the University of Michigan since 2018, working within the Division of Cardiology.  Bethany has a history of working with national and international consortia, facilitating collaborations to ensure successful and timely completion of projects.  Bethany has helped to further research within the Global Biobank Meta-analysis Initiative, Global Lipids Genetics Consortium, and various other NIH-funded research projects pertaining to cardiovascular genetics.     

In her free time, Bethany enjoys spending time with family, volunteering with her local church, and cycling.

‍

Maria joined the team as a Senior Statistician in 2019. She received her Biostatistics Master’s Degree from the University of Michigan School of Public Health in 2008.

Edmond recently graduated from the University of Michigan with an Bachelor of Science in Honors Biomolecular Science.

His undergraduate senior thesis was about hypertension and its relationship with kidney biomarkers. This led to his desire to join the MiKTMC Wet Bench Biomarker team in April 2022.

He is currently conducting research on various kidney biomarkers in human biological fluids for future chronic kidney disease treatments and performing ELISA kit validations.

Prior to joining the MiKTMC, Edmond worked as a research assistant with the University of Michigan Department of Cardiology, where he studied hypertension. 

‍

Edmond also served in the US and Republic of Korea Army for two years as a commander translator/operations staff at Camp Casey, Korea.

Outside of work, Edmond enjoys watching the English Premier League (soccer), playing golf with his friends, and teaching young students.

‍

Chrysta received a B.S. in Biopsychology/Brain, Behavior, and Cognitive Psychology from the University of Michigan. After college she volunteered with Americorps, first in Washington State with InterMountain Americorps, and the following year in Arkansas with Pfeiffer Camp, an alternative camp-school program.

Returning to Ann Arbor, Michigan in 2001, she began work as the Education Coordinator for the K30 Training Program in Clinical Research at the University of Michigan, which later evolved into a Program Manager position for the K12 and K30 Training Programs’ office. Her experience in the K12/K30 program office provided an opportunity for her to be exposed to clinical research from an educational perspective, thereby piquing her interest in the field.

Chrysta is the Clinical Project Manager for the 26-site multi-center, observational clinical research project NEPTUNE (Nephrotic Syndrome Network Study – www.neptune-study.org). Her primary responsibilities with the team include overseeing the study protocol, training staff, maintaining regulatory documentation for network sites across the U.S. and Canada, as well as offering expertise in up and coming related research. She is also a Project Monitor for the CureGN study (Cure Glomerulonephropathies – www.curegn.org) which is a sister study to the NEPTUNE project, following nephrotic syndrome participants over the course of their disease in 63 centers across the U.S., Canada, Italy, and Poland. Additionally, she consults for national and international studies such as the KPMP (Kidney Precision Medicine Project – kpmp.org), BEAt-DKD (Biomarker Enterprise to Attack Diabetic Kidney Disease www.beat-dkd.eu/consortium and H3 Africa (h3africa.org) where her unique skill set for longitudinal, observational clinical research is put to use.

When not at the University, Chrysta enjoys cycling, running, reading, tennis, traveling, and spending time with her family – particularly having fun with awesome nieces and nephews.

Tina Mainieri joined the Kretzler Lab in 2015 as the NEPTUNE Consortium Project Manager. In her current role, she develops and implements project management and operational processes for the NEPTUNE Data and Coordinating Center, Pilot and Ancillary Studies Program, and Career Development Program. She provides oversight of consortium policies and activities to facilitate translational research opportunities with its investigators, successful achievement of grant objectives, and close coordination with the RDCRN on programmatic requirements. Ms. Mainieri holds a master’s degree in applied social psychology and survey methodology from The Claremont Graduate School.

Prior to joining NEPTUNE, Ms. Mainieri managed large-scale population studies in economics and public policy at the Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, and hospital-based clinical care studies at the VA Center for Clinical Management Research. Outside of work, she enjoys camping, kayaking, hiking, and knitting.

Tomas joined MiKTMC in May of 2023 as a Project Senior Manager. Tomas earned both his Master of Science in Applied Behavior Analysis in 2021 from the University of Michigan-Dearborn as well as his undergraduate degree in psychology in 2017. Prior to joining MiKTMC, Tomas served as a Program Manager for Medical Student Education at the University of Michigan Medical School where Tomas collaborated with an array of different departments and disciplines to promote continuity throughout Medical Student Education while supervising the compilation, design, creation, and production of deliverables. 

Outside of work, Tomas enjoys outdoor activities such as kayaking and attending Baseball games.

‍

Laurie joined the MiKTMC team in January 2023. She received her ABA Degree, as well as a Meeting Management Certificate from Cleary University in 2014. Prior to joining Michigan Medicine, she worked in the Division of Student Life for 11years where she provided administrative support as well as meeting planning/executing to a variety of campus events as a Meeting & Events Assistant at the Student Union.

Dr. Phillip McCown joined the MiKTMC team after completing his postdoctoral fellowship from the University of Notre Dame in the lab of Professor Jessica Brown. There, he assembled the first predicted secondary structure of the human long noncoding RNA MALAT1, which has significant roles in cancer progression and metastasis and is implicated in having roles in acute kidney injury.

While also at Notre Dame, he compiled an exhaustive review of every known naturally occurring RNA modification. Prior to his time at Notre Dame, Dr. McCown completed his Ph.D. from Yale University, under the direction of Professor Ronald R. Breaker. While there, he conducted extensive computational and biochemical analyses on riboswitches and ribozymes. Prior to Yale, he completed a B.S. and M.S. from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

Dr. McCown is excited to be back at his alma mater, where he will be contributing his talents and analytic efforts in ongoing analyses within the group on chronic kidney disease and on the roles and involvement of RNA in these processes.

Becky has 20+ years of experience within software development & architecture, with the last decade devoted mainly to bioinformatics tools. She is passionate about developing high-quality software for users. Prior to joining the MiKTMC team, Becky worked for Thermo Fisher Scientific and Compendia Bioscience developing software tools to identify and visualize genes activated and mutated in cancers.

Becky is responsible for developing robust software applications for several MiKTMC projects which allow researchers to understand their data better.

Along with 20+ years of experience within IT and software development, Michael has spent 12 years in the User Experience (UX) field. Michael is customer and user-focused and specializes in providing solutions for user problems by designing simple and intuitive user interfaces and content. Prior to the University of Michigan, he has worked in the Healthcare sector designing complex and visually appealing healthcare analytics applications for Truven Health Analytics and Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Since joining the MiKTMC team, Michael has expanded his skill set by providing graphic design services and has designed, developed, and administered several study websites; including this site.

Cathy joined MiKTMC in June 2023. Before that, Cathy earned a BS in Mathematical Sciences, an MS in Biostatistics, and, as part of Dr. Jacob Kitzman's lab, a PhD in Bioinformatics all from the University of Michigan. Their most recent work used massively parallel splicing assays to identify splice disruptive variants in human disease genes which included an interrogation of WT1 exon 9 where altered splicing is associated with Frasier's syndrome and FSGS. Outside of work, Cathy enjoys gardening, cooking, and going to fancy dinners.

‍

Lalita supports and manages the dissemination of research findings from the Kretzler laboratory. She works with the team on developing manuscripts, abstracts, grants and related scientific writing tasks. Lalita has a PhD in Biomolecular Chemistry and a Master of Public health degree from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. She brings a breadth of translational science experience from her prior work as scientist and project manager in kidney health research, molecular oncology and drug development to these writing efforts.

Emily Tanner received a Bachelor of Science degree from Michigan State University where she double majored in Genomics & Molecular Genetics and Microbiology with a specialization in Bioethics, Humanities, and Society. Upon graduation, she worked for a year at a food safety company in Lansing, Michigan before pursuing a career at University of Michigan.

Prior to joining MiKTMC, Emily worked for 3 years for the Heinz C. Prechter Bipolar Research Program. The research lab’s focus was using induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) to study the cellular and molecular neurobiology of Bipolar Disorder.

Emily joined MiKTMC in November 2017 as a Research Technician. She works in the Wet Bench group, primarily under Dr. Wenjun Ju, identifying and validating non-invasive biomarkers for prognosis and diagnosis of chronic kidney disease. She also lends support to Dr. Jennifer Harder and Noel Wys on the stem cell and kidney organoid projects when needed.

Outside of work, Emily enjoys spending time with her husband and newborn son. She also enjoys crafting and cooking in her spare time.

Haneen joined MiKTMC in May of 2023. She works as a programmer on the software team, developing software for projects such as the KPMP Kidney Tissue Atlas. She has a great passion for the intersection of software engineering and medicine and hopes that her work with the team can bring about a positive change in the lives of patients with chronic kidney disease around the world. Haneen received her Bachelor's in Computer Science from the University of Michigan in 2022.

When not at work, Haneen enjoys crocheting, playing videogames, and discovering new music.

‍

Joe’s research and project management interests have focused on cancer biology, human nutrition, toxicology, and kidney disease. Joe’s professional focal points include technical project management, quality analysis and control, project scoping, requirements gathering, regulatory compliance, best practices, team development, and complex problem solving.

Most recently, Joe was the Senior Technical Reviewer with NSF International and spearheaded all technical projects as well as the appraisal and final approval of health and safety certifications. He initiated successful departmental activities concerned with regulating the quality and safety of drinking water, and presided over numerous projects regarding the complete restructuring of several key information and project management systems. In addition, he liaised with senior leadership, stakeholders, and cross-functional teams to ensure the company’s regulatory compliance structure was driving the business forward with minimal expenditures.

Colleagues describe Joe as a progressive, driven, down-to-earth expert who can be relied on to offer superior solutions that deliver desirable results on time and under budget.

Virginia joined the MiKTMC laboratory in August of 2019, following several years of collaboration with the laboratory, through her previous PI, Dr. Matthew Sampson. She is currently utilizing her knowledge of kidney disease for work in biomarker validation and the culturing of kidney organoids. Virginia has worked in area of Nephrology at the University of Michigan since 2001. Over the course of 19 years she has worked with Dr. William Smoyer (Associate Professor, Pediatrics) working with cultured podocytes and with Dr. Matthew G. Sampson (Assistant Professor, Pediatrics), Dr. Hildebrandt (Professor, Pediatrics) and Dr. Edgar Otto (Assistant Professor, Pediatrics), performing mutational analysis in patients with kidney diseases (Nephrotic Syndrome ), in an attempt to determine new, and as yet unknown genetic mutations. The eventual goal being to develop highly specific and less invasive treatments, in what could become Patient-Specific, Personalized Medicine.

Virginia received an M.S. and Ph.D. in Food Science from Michigan State University. Following this, Virginia did two Post-Doctorial Fellowships, one at MSU and the second at the University of Michigan Medical School. She received her B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from her native country of Nicaragua.

Bio not supplied.

Amanda Williams joined the lab in 2015 and works with the clinical cohorts team as a research coordinator. She works on several longitudinal observational cohort studies where she recruits and follows study participants. She also provides support to several working groups and committees, including the NEPTUNE Recruitment and Retention Committee and the NEPTUNE Patient Advisory Council for Therapies (NPACT).

Prior to joining MiKTMC, Amanda worked as a Registered Pulmonary Function Technologist. Outside of work she enjoys making homemade yogurt and cheeses.

Bio not supplied.

Dr. Bitzer graduated from the University of Erlangen-Nurnberg, Germany and also received a chemistry master's degree from the University of Erlangen-Nurnberg, Germany. He completed his internal medicine/nephrology residency at the University of Erlangen-Nurnberg, Germany and medicine residency at Montefiore Medical Center, New York. He completed his nephrology fellowship at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York. Dr. Bitzer is board-certified in internal medicine and nephrology. He has a special interest in all aspects of general adult nephrology, including chronic kidney disease (CKD).

His research attempts to discover new mechanisms and biomarkers for progressive organ fibrosis using the kidney as a model system. Our focus is on the identification of crosstalk between signaling cascades including TGF-beta and Growth Hormone signaling and on the role of small non-coding RNAs in this process. His team is applying models of acute and chronic kidney injury to mutant and transgenic mice and rats and use cell culture systems for further analysis.

Dr. Hodgin is an investigative renal pathologist with a unique set of skills from over 10 years of training. He has extensive experience working with mouse models beginning in the laboratory of Drs. Oliver Smithies and Nobuyo Maeda at the University of North Carolina. His research interests now include mouse models of glomerular injury, with a focus on podocyte biology, including diabetic nephropathy, hypertension, and lupus nephritis. To investigate the key pathogenic mechanisms of mouse disease models, he is employing systems biology approaches to identify cross-species, human-mouse shared transcriptional networks. In addition to the injury models listed above, he has employed Cre-lox technology to investigate the role of the Rho-GTPase Rac1 in podocyte health and disease. In addition, his years of experience as a renal pathologist and as part of the pathology group of the Nephrotic Syndrome Study Network (NEPTUNE), has complemented and enhanced his research by guiding his focus towards pertinent features of glomerular structure and function in the diseased state.

Leah Guthrie is an HHMI Hanna H. Gray Fellow in Dr. Justin Sonnenburg’s lab at Stanford University. Dr. Guthrie completed her doctoral work at Albert Einstein College of Medicine under the mentorship of Dr. Libusha Kelly, where she used a combination of mass spectrometry, metagenomics, and cheminformatics approaches to understand how bacterial enzymes influence drug metabolism and toxicity. This work propelled her interest in the vast realm of undefined bacterial enzymatic reactions and products with poorly defined impacts on human biology. As a postdoc in the Sonnenburg lab, she investigates the modes of production, functionality, and factors underlining interpersonal variability in diet-derived bacterial metabolites that are associated with adverse health outcomes, with a focus on the role of bacterial metabolism in shaping the progression and severity of cardio-renal diseases. Leah is visiting the Organoid Group within MiKTMC to learn more about the technical aspects of using kidney organoids to model human kidney disease.

‍

Jenni joined MiKTMC in September 2023 as a graduate student research assistant. Jenni received a BS in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Michigan before starting her MS in Computational Biology& Bioinformatics this year. During her undergraduate studies, she gained experience in Dr. Sriram Chandrasekaran's System Biology Laboratory conducting antibiotics research using machine learning algorithms. She will support the Bioinformatics team with various projects in translational research while learning new bioinformatics, statistical, and machine-learning approaches to analyze single-cell sequencing and spatial expression data.

Outside of work, Jenni enjoys exploring new places, food, and playing Volleyball.

Akihiro Minakawa M.D. is from the University of Miyazaki and joined MiKTMC in September 2021. He studied the relationship between diabetic kidney disease and podocytes using a rat model of diabetes. He received a Ph.D. degree from the University of Miyazaki. His interest in this laboratory is to learn how to handle and understand the organoids, of which knowledge gives him more detailed information on kidney diseases. He is also impressed by the concept of NEPTUNE. He wants to be able to explore new mechanisms and targets in diabetic kidney disease using these strategies.

‍