Eberly graduate student receives American Heart Association fellowship
Two Penn State graduate students enrolled in Intercollege Graduate Degree Programs administered by the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences have each been awarded two-year American Heart Association (AHA) Postdoctoral Fellowships. Junyao Yuan is a graduate student in the integrative and biomedical physiology program and Julio Flores Cuadra is a graduate student in the neuroscience program. Approximately 5,000 fellowship proposals are submitted to the AHA annually and fewer than a third are awarded. Funds from the program cover a stipend and health insurance for the awarded graduate student, as well as modest project support for an independent research project.
Prior to submitting their successful proposals to the AHA, both Yuan and Flores Cuadra received training via a National Institutes of Health-funded T32 interdisciplinary program administered by the Huck Institutes. Titled "Physiological Adaptations to Stress," the program aims to prepare students for emerging academic and non-academic careers in the biomedical sciences, with a strong focus on career development. The training culminates in a capstone course designed to help students develop translational hypotheses and design rigorous experiments.
“This program provided me with a deep understanding of how the body adapts to stress,” Yuan said. “The rigorous training emphasized multidisciplinary approaches, from molecular biology to systematic analysis, which laid the groundwork for my current research. The mentorship I received also equipped me with critical thinking and experimental design skills that are directly applicable to my fellowship.”
Students in the T32 program are introduced to faculty mentors, and participate in activities that enhance professional development, such as a weekly journal club and business entrepreneurship training. Students can also participate in elective interest tracks to further their learning and are encouraged to develop their own grant proposals, such as those submitted by Yuan and Cuadra to the AHA Postdoctoral Fellowship program.
“Engaging with doctoral students and faculty from diverse programs improved my communication skills, allowing me to effectively present different aspects of my project to scientists across various research fields,” said Flores Cuadra, who is co-mentored by Nikki Crowley, Huck Early Career Chair in Neurobiology and Neural Engineering, and Patrick Drew, professor of engineering science and mechanics, of neurosurgery, of biology and of biomedical engineering.
Yuan’s AHA fellowship will support novel research on inflammation and immune responses after acute myocardial infarction (AMI) — commonly known as a heart attack — in postmenopausal women. AMI is a form of heart disease, which is leading cause of death in the United States. Additionally, Yuan will focus on clonal hematopoiesis of intermediate potential (CHIP), a condition in which an individual may have mutations related to a blood-related cancer without actually having the cancer. CHIP occurs with aging and has been strongly linked to increased risk of cardiovascular disease.
“Our studies may uncover previously unidentified interconnections between CHIP and AMI to inspire therapeutic interventions targeting myeloid cells to limit AMI,” said Yuan, who is mentored by Donna Korzick, professor of physiology and of kinesiology and director of graduate training initiatives at the Huck Institutes.
Flores Cuadra’s fellowship will support research on the effects of alcohol binge drinking during sleep. Understanding the role of somatostatin neurons — which help inhibit activity of other neurons — in the prefrontal cortex could provide actionable insights to promote brain health, as these neurons have been implicated in alcohol-induced sleep dysregulation.
“The AHA Predoctoral Fellowship will provide me with the opportunity to acquire advanced brain imaging techniques and cross-disciplinary research tools to investigate the effects of alcohol consumption on sleep-induced hemodynamic changes,” Flores Cuadra said. “This training will be instrumental in achieving my future goals of becoming a lead research scientist and contributing to the development of public health policies focused on prevention strategies.”
According to Korzick, it’s rare that students are awarded funding with their first attempt at a proposal. Typically, multiple revisions and re-submissions are required, and even then, some students are still not selected for funding. But Yuan and Flores Cuadra had their proposals funded with no revisions whatsoever.
“Junyao and Julio have taken advantage of all of the professional development activities our training program has to offer,” Korzick said. “They are outstanding young scientists and having these grants funded on the first submission is a reflection of their hard work and dedication.”