Leadership

Executive Board

Patrick Kasl

President

Patrick is a 3rd year in the Smarr lab studying the use of wearables for longitudinal physiological monitoring. When he's not coding, he enjoys lifting, running, and backpacking.

Jason Wu

Vice President, Finance

Jason is a 3rd year in the Kwon lab studying the use of nanomaterials for therapeutic intervention of traumatic brian injury. When he's not wet-labbing he enjoys surfing, attending the cinema, and lifting with his bestie Patrick.

Rayyan Gorashi

Vice President, External

Rayyan is a 2nd year PhD student developing patient-derived models of cardiovascular disease using biomaterials. She loves photography, video games, baking, surfing, and exploring San Diego through the lens of her camera.

Nicole Félix-Vélez

Vice President, External

Nicole is a 2nd year PhD student in the Aguado Lab studying how patient-specific biochemical cues can affect heart valve disease progression. She loves salsa dancing, reading books by the shore, and a good cup of coffee.

Internal Board

Omeed Djasemmi

Academic Chair

Omeed is a second year Masters student in Joseph Wang’s Lab. He enjoys sports and music.

Tiffany Zhou

Bear Hug Co-Chair

Tiffany is a 5th year PhD student in the Hasty lab working on bacteria-based therapeutics. She enjoys eating good food, playing video games, and obsessing over various TV shows and Broadway musicals.

Chloe Nguyen

Bear Hug Co-Chair

Chloe is a 2nd year PhD student in the Hasty lab, where she works on genetic engineering of the bacterial stress response. When she's not in lab, she loves running her balloon business and being a foodie!

Katelyn Miyasaki

Communications Chair

Katelyn is a 3rd year in the Kwon lab studying lipid nanoparticles targeted to the brain for treating traumatic brain injury. She enjoys playing music and writing fanfiction.

Vikrant Jaltare

Mentorship Chair

Vikrant is a 2nd Year PhD student in the Sejnowski and Cauwenberghs labs and is interested in using AI to study learning and memory. He likes hiking, running and aspires to run an Ironman one day.

Nuri Chung

Community Development Chair

Nuri is looking forward to meeting all of you at the BEGS events! She loves going to beaches, hiking, and cute boba tea places. Watching California sunsets is her favorite part of living in San Diego. Her research interest is in cardiac imaging and she works for Dr. Contijoch.

Elanood Nour

Diversity Chair

Elanood is a 2nd year MS student. Her focus as a clinical engineer is on hospital-based practice; additionally, she is interested in developing medical implants. She enjoys reading, traveling, & volunteering.

External Board

Josh Mesfin

Alumni Chair

Josh is a 4th year PhD student in the Christman and King Labs using transcriptomics and biomaterials to study and treat the heart. He entertains himself by traveling, trying out new recipes for cooking and baking, occasionally transforming into a potato, and discovering new things he hasn’t tried yet.

Zahra Mesrizadeh

Festival Chair

Deepakshi Kasat

Breakfast With Industry
Co-Chair

Deepakshi is a 2nd year MS thesis student in the Bui lab studying the role of innate immunity in tumor progression. She loves traveling, dancing, and re-watching The Office!

Chinmayi Kashyap

Breakfast With Industry
Co-Chair

Chinmayi is a 2nd year MS student in the Cheresh Lab at Sanford Consortium for Regenerative Medicine. Her research is focused on characterizing the ECM secreted by tumor-initiating cancer cells. She enjoys reading, singing, dancing and trying new cuisines.

Abigail Teitgen

High School Outreach Co-Chair

Abby is a 5th year PhD student in the McCulloch lab studying cardiac biomechanics. She loves hiking, running, cooking, and exploring new things to do in San Diego.

Ekko Zhu

High School Outreach Co-Chair

Ekko is a 2nd year master’s student working on spatial transcriptomics in the Zhong lab. As outreach co-chair, he requests that you come join us for fun events! A little fun about him: he just got a golden retriever named Kiko!

Yazmin Hernandez

Recruitment Chair

Yazmin is a 2nd year PhD student in the Kwon lab working on nanoformulations for traumatic brain injury treatment. Outside of lab she enjoys listening to true crime podcasts, reading, going to concerts and trying new restaurants with friends.

Keya Trivedi

Industry Co-Chair

Keya is a 2nd year M.S student in the Zhong lab working on Protein-Protein Interactions. She loves watching sports, especially soccer and tennis, reading, and exploring San Diego.

Shivani Shukla

Industry Co-Chair

Shivani Shukla works with Dr. Zeinab Jahed in Nanoengineering to fabricate nanoelectrode arrays for recording intracellular action potentials from single cells in 2D and 3D culture. In her free time she enjoys social dancing, exploring San Diego, and growing plants.

Omowuyi Olajide

Professional Development Chair

Omowuyi is a 2nd year PhD student in Gert Cauwenbergh's Lab developing very large scale integration systems that emulate neuro-biological architectures present in the nervous system. He loves playing soccer, chess, video games and tennis.

GPSA Representatives

Anahid Foroughishafiei

TBD

2022-2023 BEGS Leadership

Executive Board

Internal Board

External Board

GPSA Representatives