Monday
Cecilia Sada Garibay – University of Arizona
Screen Time and Family Relationships
Before entering her Ph.D. program, Sada Garibay was a professor and researcher at the School of Communication at Universidad Panamericana in Mexico City. There, she taught courses on social media effects, cyber journalism, and Spanish-language communication.
Tuesday
Julianne Holt-Lunstad – Brigham Young University
Creating a More Connected, Resilient, and Thriving Society
Dr. Julianne Holt-Lunstad is the founding scientific chair and board member for the U.S.-based Foundation for Social Connection and the Global Initiative on Loneliness and Connection. She is also a professor of psychology and neuroscience and director of the Social Connection & Health Lab at Brigham Young University.
Wednesday
Johanna Smith – California State University San Bernardino
Finding the Courage to Demand Delight
Johanna Smith is a Professor of Theatre Education and Entrepreneurship at California State University, San Bernardino. She has served as an artist and educator for professional theatres, museums, colleges, libraries, public schools, private schools, and preschools around the world. She is a frequent presenter on puppetry as an accessible and powerful tool for educators and is the author of the award winning education text Puppetry in Theatre and Arts Education: Head, Hands, and Heart (Methuen Drama/Bloomsbury, London). She is also very proud of the improv curriculum she created and teaches for CSUSB’s Randall W. Lewis School of Entrepreneurship.
Thursday
Annemari Kilpelainen- University of Eastern Finland
Epilepsy in Frontotemporal Dementia
Annemari Kilpeläinen is a neurologist at the Neurocenter of Kuopio University Hospital and a PhD researcher at the University of Eastern Finland. Her clinical interests focus on epilepsy and movement disorders, while her research centers on frontotemporal dementia (FTD) spectrum diseases.
Friday
Joshi Alumkal – University of Michigan
The Gene PROX1 is an Early Driver of Prostate Cancer Aggressiveness
Alumkal spent most of his childhood and early adulthood in Texas. He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Texas with a bachelor’s in biology. He received his medical degree from Baylor College of Medicine. He completed an internship, residency, and chief residency at UT Southwestern Medical Center. Dr. Alumkal completed a clinical fellowship in medical oncology and a post-doctoral fellowship focused on cancer epigenetics at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Alumkal joined the Knight Cancer Institute Prostate Cancer Research Program at Oregon Health and Science University in 2007 and became the co-leader of the program in 2013. In 2014, Dr. Alumkal was honored with the Richard T. Jones New Investigator Award for exceptional promise early in a career in biomedical research in Oregon. In 2019, Dr. Alumkal re-located to the University of Michigan to lead the Genitourinary Medical Oncology Section in the Division of Hematology-Oncology and the Rogel Cancer Center, where he is a professor of Internal Medicine. He also serves as co-leader of Rogel’s Translational and Clinical Oncology Program. He was named a Rogel Cancer Center Rogel Scholar in 2019.
