Collaborative Workshops
McGovern Medical School Research Committee has launched a series of interdisciplinary professional development workshops designed to appeal to both clinicians and basic scientists to promote collaborative research interactions across the UTHealth campus. The schedule for FY 2025 is listed below.
Spatial Omics: The New Era in Precision Medicine
Understanding the spatial context of the changes and tissue heterogeneity that occur in molecular and cellular interactions during disease is critical for the development of effective diagnostics and novel therapies. Spatial omics or spatial biology, is the recently coined blanket term covering the science and technologies that allow scientists and clinicians to study these changes: to visualize and study the interactions of individual molecules, tissues, and cells in context in 2D or 3D space. With multiple technologies still in the early development phase, a key practical challenge for spatial omics is how to develop standardized, integrated experimental and computational methods to jointly analyze single cell sequencing, multi-modal spatial omics, and imaging data. Acknowledging a growing interest in and reliance single cell sequencing, spatial transcriptomics, spatial proteomics, spatial metabolomics, and the advanced data analysis, this collaborative workshop will feature faculty from McGovern Medical School, McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics, Institute of Molecular Medicine, and School of Public Health at UTHealth Houston, who are conducting cutting-edge research and applying the latest spatial omics and bioinformatics to different diseases at UTHealth Houston. The workshop program will feature a brief overview of spatial omics and integrated data analysis, as well as presentations on various applications of spatial omics and computational modeling approaches.
April 2, 2025
Chaired by Xiaobo Zhou, McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics
9:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
MSB 2.135
| Time | Speaker |
| 9:00 am – 9:15 am | Xiaobo Zhou, Ph.D. McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics Spatial Omics: The New Era for Precision Medicine |
| 9:15 am– 9:30 am | Jeffrey Chang, Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Heterogeneity of Multi-Site Metastatic Breast Cancer Tumors at the End Stage |
| 9:30 am – 9:45 am | Shervin Assassi, Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Skin transcriptomic profiling in scleroderma provides insights into disease pathogenesis of a systemic disease |
| 9:45 am - 10:00 am | Guanyu Hu, Ph.D. School of Public Health BNPSpace: Bayesian Nonparametric Clustering for Spatially Resolved Transcriptomic Data |
| 10:00 am - 10:15 am | Sheng Pan, Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Untargeted spatial proteomics towards single-cell resolution |
| 10:15 am - 10:30 am | Ai (Andy) Di, M.D., Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Deciphering the Genetic Landscape of Invasive Paget Disease of the Breast |
| 10:30 am – 10:50 am | Coffee Break |
| 10:50 am – 11:05 am | Wei Cao, Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Tau-mediated neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s disease |
| 11:05 am – 11:20 am | Jim Zheng, Ph.D. McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics Collaborative Spatial Transcriptomics Research at UTHealth Bioinformatics High-Performance Computing Service Center |
| 11:20 am – 11:35 am | Matthew DeBerge, Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Decoding microglia function during cardiometabolic disease |
| 11:35 am – 11:50 am | Jun Jiang, Ph.D. McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics H&E referenced multiplexed immunofluorescence interpretation |
| 11:50 am – 12:05 pm | Damian Gorski and Claudio Soto, Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Decoding Strain-Specific Transcriptomic Responses in Prion and Tau Aggregation |
| 12:05 pm – 12:20 pm | Long-Jun Wu, Ph.D. McGovern Medical School Rod-shaped microglia regulate neuronal excitability in TDP-43 neurodegeneration |
| 12:20 pm – 12:30 pm | Discussion and Wrap-up |
Women’s Health Collaborative Workshop
The Women’s Health Collaborative Workshop focuses on promoting interdisciplinary research in women’s health. It brings together experts in various fields of women’s health for a day of learning and collaboration. Presentations will address cardiovascular health across the lifespan, sex differences in stroke, metabolism in neonates with congenital heart disease, and updates in breast and ovarian cancer treatments. Attendees will engage with emerging research and strategies to address health disparities and promote leadership in the medical field. The workshop provides a platform for collaboration between clinicians and researchers across UTHealth.
December 10, 2024
Chaired by Jacqueline Parchem and Abigail Zamorano, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
8:30 a.m. – 3:40 p.m.
MSB 3.001
| Time | Event |
| 8:30 a.m. - 8:45 a.m. | Coffee and light breakfast |
| 8:45 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. | Introduction |
| Cardiovascular Health Across the Lifespan | |
| 9:00 a.m. - 9:20 a.m. | Bindu Akkanti, MD Professor of Medicine Graham Endowed Professor in Pulmonary Medicine Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Critical Care Pulmonary Vascular Disorders in Women |
| 9:20 a.m. - 9:40 a.m. | Louise McCullough, MD, PhD, FAHA Professor and Chair, Department of Neurology Roy M. and Phyllis Gough Huffington Distinguished Chair, Co-Director, UTHealth Neurosciences Sex Differences in Stroke |
| 9:40 a.m. - 10:00 a.m. | Tina Findley, MD Associate Professor, Department of Pediatrics Sex Matters: Metabolism in Neonates with Congenital Heart Disease |
| 10:00 a.m. - 10:20 a.m. | Panel Q&A |
| 10:20 a.m. - 10:40 a.m. | Coffee Break |
| 10:40 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. | Featured Keynote Address: Kathryn Gray, MD, PhD Associate Professor, University of Washington (Seattle, WA) Division Chief and Director of Research, Maternal-Fetal Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine Advancing Equitable and Informed Pregnancy Care: Why We Need Genetics and Why We Need Each Other |
| 11:30 a.m. - 11:45 a.m. | Q&A |
| 11:45 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. | Lunch (Provided for the First 150 attendees) |
| Women's Cancers, Next Frontiers | |
| 12:30 p.m. - 12:50 p.m. | Hui-Wen Lo, MS, MA, PhD Distinguished Professor in Neuro-Oncology Director of Metastatic Brain Tumor Research Program Professor and Vice Chair for Research The Vivian L. Smith Department of Neurosurgery Breast Cancer Brain Metastasis: Biology and Therapeutic Challenges |
| 12:50 p.m. - 1:10 p.m. | Featured Early Career Researcher: Mary Mullen, MD, MSCI Assistant Professor, Gynecologic Oncology Washington University in St. Louis Targeting the DNA Damage Response to Overcome Platinum Chemotherapy Resistance in Ovarian Cancer |
| 1:10 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. | Kathrin Milbury, PhD Professor, Department of Behavioral Science, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center Psychosocial Care for Patients with Cancer and Minor Children |
| 1:30 p.m. - 1:50 p.m. | Q&A |
| 1:50 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. | Break |
| Beyond the Clinic: Social Determinants of Health, Education, Leadership, Advocacy | |
| 2:00 p.m. - 2:20 p.m. | Anjail Sharrief, MD, MPH Professor and Director of Stroke Prevention, UTHealth Institute of Stroke and Cerebrovascular Disease Director, Stroke Transitions Education and Prevention (STEP) Program Intersectionality: Gender, Race and Other Social Determinants of Health and Stroke Care |
| 2:20 p.m. - 2:40 p.m. | Yen Chi Le, PhD Executive Director, Innovation & Quality - Practice Plan, Director, UT Physicians Center for Population Health Management & Quality, UTHealth School of Public Health Transforming Healthcare: Leveraging the EHR for Quality Improvement and Health Equity |
| 2:40 p.m. - 2:50 p.m. | Q&A |
| 2:50 p.m. - 3:10 p.m. | Elizabeth Nugent, MD, MS Associate Professor Divisions of Gynecologic Oncology and Geriatric and Palliative Medicine, Departments of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences and Internal Medicine Weaving Women’s Health into the Fabric of Medical Education |
| 3:10 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. | Rana Afifi, MD Associate Professor, Complex Aortic Surgery Fellowship Program Director Department of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery Mind the Gap: Tackling Barriers to Women’s Leadership in Surgery and Research |
| 3:30 p.m. - 3:40 p.m. | Q&A and concluding remarks |