Ford Lab News:
CONGRATULATIONS FOR 2022 ACHIEVEMENTS!
Connor Purdy Wins Director's Award
Congratulations to Connor Purdy who received the Director’s Award at The Cancer Biology Graduate Program end of the year picnic and award ceremony! This award is for a student who goes “above and beyond” for their grad program- which Connor has clearly done for Cancer Biology! Shown to the left is Connor with Heide as he is receiving his award.
MOLB T32 Institutional Research Training Grants Slots awarded
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BIG Congrats to both Annika Gustafson and Kaiah Fields- who were awarded T32 slots on the Mol Bio Training grant for another year! Pictures of Annika (left) and Kaiah (below ) are shown.
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CONGRATULATIONS FOR 2021 ACHIEVEMENTS!
Congratulations to Dr. Jessica Hsu
Jessica Hsu successfully defended her PhD thesis and was first author on a Cell Reports paper entitled , "SIX1 reprograms myogenic transcription factors to maintain the rhabdomyosarcoma undifferentiated state".
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2022.110323
Good luck on your new job at as a scientist at Foresight Diagnostics ! Shown to the right is a picture of Jessica along with some of her cool data showing MyHC expression (purple) and that the RMS cells are becoming multi-nucleated (yellow) in response to SIX1 knockdown. Below is the whole lab in our fish bowl T-shirts in support of Jessica at her defense!
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2022.110323
Good luck on your new job at as a scientist at Foresight Diagnostics ! Shown to the right is a picture of Jessica along with some of her cool data showing MyHC expression (purple) and that the RMS cells are becoming multi-nucleated (yellow) in response to SIX1 knockdown. Below is the whole lab in our fish bowl T-shirts in support of Jessica at her defense!
Congratulations to Connor Hughes who was awarded an individual F30 NRSA for his work on EYA3 in breast cancer metastasis! Above is the announcement for Connor's NRSA, along with his headshot.
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Congratulations to Ford lab alum Christie Towers on her new faculty position at The Salk Institute for Biological Studies! Christie graduated from the Ford lab with a PhD in Molecular Biology in 2016, and then completed her postdoctoral fellowship in Andrew Thorburn's lab working on autophagy. She started her Assistant Prof position summer of 2021- and is rocking it! Above is a picture of Christie while in our lab.
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CONGRATULATIONS FOR 2020 ACHIEVEMENTS!
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Ford Lab members go Over the Edge to raise money for cancer research funded by the Cancer League of Colorado! We all had to overcome some fears for this one! Pictures to the left show us rappelling off a 40+ story building!
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Hengbo published three papers this year, including two on which he was first author (in Cancer Research and Oncogene). He was invited to give a talk at the Experimental Biology Meeting in San Diego for his work (had to give a virtual talk due to COVID)... Above is a headshot of Henbo.
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Congratulations to Hengbo for his successful thesis defense. The virtual defense (first ever in the lab) and virtual after party will be events to remember. Hengbo was awarded the Best Graduate Dissertation Award for his thesis work around "Targeting the SIX1/EYA Complex in Breast Cancer Metastasis". We wish him the best of luck as he moves on to Harvard for his postdoctoral work! Shown above is a zoom celebration with the lab for his defense!
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CONGRATULATIONS FOR 2019 ACHIEVEMENTS!
Congratulations to Mike Oliphant for successfully defending his PhD! Mike had another terrific year, publishing a first author paper in Cancer Research entitled " Six2 mediates late-stage metastasis via direct regulation of Sox2 and induction of a cancer stem cell program". We wish Mike the best success as he moves on to Harvard Medical School for his postdoctoral fellowship. We will miss him in the lab! Shown to the right is a picture of Mike and Heide at his graduation ceremony.
CONGRATULATIONS FOR 2018 ACHIEVEMENTS!
Congratulations to Hengbo for an incredible 2018! Hengbo received an F99/K00 award in 2018, published 3 papers (including a co-first author in Nature Communications, a second author in J Clin Invest, and a first author review in Int J Biochem Cell Bio). In addition, Hengbo won the Department of Pharmacology Student Award for Outstanding Achievement AND The Cancer Biology Graduate Program Outstanding Research Award! Way to go Hengbo! The picture to the left shows Hengbo at the Pharmacology Awards Ceremony along with lab members and students- showing off his award!
Mike has had another great year. His first author paper on the role of Six2 in mediating a cancer stem cell phenotype was just accepted in Cancer Research, he won numerous awards such as the 2018 Minority Scholar in Cancer Research Award to attend the 2018 AACR national meeting (where he gave a talk!), the 2018 Top Poster in Cancer Research Award at the New England Science Symposium at Harvard Medical School, and a poster award at the University of Colorado 33rd Annual Student Research Forum. He has just accepted a postdoctoral position at Harvard Medical School with Joan Brugge and Senthil Muthuswamy. Exciting times are ahead for Mike (after he defends his thesis!).... Shown above is Mike giving his presentation at the AACR meeting.
Congratulations to Becky on her publication this year in J Clin Invest related to Eya3-mediated immune suppression in breast cancer. The paper was highlighted in Cancer Discovery shortly after its publication! Congratulations also for your new job as a scientist at The Gates Biomanufacturing Facility working on immune therapies. The Ford lab wishes you the best in your new position! Shown to the right is Becky in Finland while attending the EMBO Protein Phosphatase meeting.
CONGRATULATIONS FOR 2017 ACHIEVEMENTS!
Sept. 2017-Congratulations to Mike for receiving a prestigious F99/K00 award from The National Cancer Institute! This award gives Mike 2 years of funding to finish his Dissertation work in our lab, and then 4 years of funding in a postdoctoral position! Shown to the left is a headshot of Mike.
Nice shout-out to Mel from the ALSF regarding the postdoctoral fellowship grant she received in 2016 and the work she is doing on medulloblastoma! Shown to the right a picture of Mel in the lab, and the announcement from ALSF.
Congratulations to Becky on her recent graduation (Dec. 2017)! Becky is moving on to a Scientist job at the Gates Biomanufacturing Center where she is working on CAR T-cell therapy. We wish her all the best! Shown in the picture are Becky and Heide together at her graduation ceremony.
Congrats to Hengbo on his recent publication in Nature Communications, as a co-first author along with Lingdi Zhang from the Zhao lab! Hengbo is shown here with his committee member, James DeGregori, after giving a talk at the King Symposium sponsored by the Department of Pathology and the Cancer Biology Graduate Program.
Congrats to Jessica for receiving a competitive Colorado Clinical Translational Sciences Initiative TSI predoctoral fellowship in 2017! As part of this fellowship, Jessica will continue to perform her work to understand the progression of rhabdomyosarcoma, using zebrafish, rodent, and human models, and will also gain some clinical insight into pediatric sarcomas through her shadowing of Tim Garrington at Children's Hospital, an Associate Professor in Pediatrics and Director of the Pedi-Heme Onc Fellowship Program. Shown to the right is a headshot of Jessica in the lab.