GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE TRAINING

Academic Year 2022-2023

In addition to training students for the MD degree, the John A. Burns School of Medicine offers the MS, Graduate Certification, and/or the PhD degrees in biomedical sciences with concentration in several disciplines such as clinical research, epidemiology, and developmental and reproductive biology, and tropical medicine, as well as through an interdisciplinary program in cell and molecular biology; an MS degree in communication sciences and disorders; and training in an undergraduate program leading to a BS degree in medical technology.

Doctor of Philosophy

Ryan Shontell

Kohala, HI

BS Biology, 2018, University of Hawaii, Manoa

Advisor: Gernot Presting

Dissertation: "Centromere-specific Retrotransposons: Integrase Activity and Targeting Specificity”

David Maison

Battle Creek, MI

BS Human Biology 2011, Michigan State University

MS Pharmacology & Toxicology 2016, Michigan State University

PhD Tropical Medicine, 2023, University of Hawaii, Manoa

Advisor: Youping Deng, Ph.D.

Aquena Ball

Pacific Palisades, CA

BS Molecular Cell Biology, 2017, University of Hawaii at Manoa

PhD Tropical Medicine, 2023, University of Hawaii, Manoa

• Mentor: Dr. Axel Lehrer

• Dissertation: “Correlates of Protection for Recombinant Subunit

Filovirus Vaccines in a Non-Human Primate Model”

Kaitlin Driesse

Schenectady, NY

BA 2016, SUNY University of Albany

MS 2018, SUNY University of Albany

PhD Tropical Medicine, 2023, University of Hawaii, Manoa

• Adviser: Sandra Chang, PhD

• Dissertation: "Impact of Dengue and Zika Cross-Reactive Antibodies on the Development of Congenital Zika Syndrome"

Graduate And Undergraduate Training

Master of Science

Cell and Molecular Biology

Therese Anagaran Nick Bly

Jack Heck

Communication Sciences and Disorders

Scott Davis Lindsay Delmont

Leticia Garcia Kristin Howard

Alexis Jorgensen Sylvia Maldonado

Andrew Niles

Developmental and Reproductive Biology

Margaret Huntsman

Tropical Medicine, Medical Microbiology and Pharmacology

Natalie Subia Rodson Zorilla

Master of Science

Quantitative Health & Clinical Research

Katlyn Ji Rhan An Gino R. Quintal

Nicole Kazuyo Nakamura

Bachelor of Science

Medical Technology

Chela Abregana Nicole Faye Bumanglag

Alexis Taylor Cariaga Kobi Jiro Gima

Corey Mak Kasandrae Brooke Natividad

Krystal Plan Mark Kevin Razalan

Tarnwisut Muangkieng Taumua

Graduate Certificates

Clinical Research

Robert Yuan Branan Steven Ferguson

Gwendolyn Victoria Solheim

Tropical Medicine

Cade Akamu Cody Chun

Jeff Fujii Mari Guillermo

Elisabeth Kamaka Deborah Kobayashi

Tiana Koch Bernadine Sunio

Pōpolo Berry

Convocation 2023

Keynote Speaker:

Neal Palafox, MD, MPH

Neal A. Palafox, M.D., M.P.H. is currently Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health at the John A. Burns School of Medicine (JABSOM), and Professor of Cancer Prevention and Control in the Pacific at the University of Hawaiʻi Cancer Center.

i, he is the grandson of Emeterio Palafox who was recruited from the Philippines to work on the Honokaʻa sugar plantation in 1925, and the son of Anastacio Palafox who immigrated in 1931 . Dr. Palafox is a graduate of the 3 rd ʻImi Hoʻōla class in 1976, completed JABSOM in 1980, followed by a Family Medicine residency at UCLA Hospital and Clinics. With the US Public Health Service (’83-’92) , he served in the Marshall Islands as a hospital physician , the medical director of public health, and director of a healthcare program for Marshallese affected by the US nuclear weapons testing program.

Receiving an MPH at Johns Hopkins University in 1993, he returned to Hawaiʻi to assist with developing JABSOM’s Department of Family Medicine and Community Health (DFMCH) , serving as the Chair for 13 years. He has worked on reducing health disparities in Hawaiʻi and the US Affiliated

Pacific Islands (USAPI) for the last 30 years through utilizing seven different grant mechanisms from the US National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and Private Foundations. He now oversees nine million dollars of research and programmatic grant funding annually.

He has academic expertise in ciguatera treatment, vitamin A deficiency, cancer heath care disparities in the US Affiliated Pacific, health effects of nuclear testing, and implementing new cervical cancer screening technologies in low-resource countries. He was a founder of the DFMCH, the CDC-funded Pacific Regional Central Cancer Registry, the Cancer Council of the Pacific Islands, a Pacific Regional Cancer Prevention and Control Network, and the lead editor of a handbook developed as a medical student on Cross-Cultural Caring in Hawaiʻi (’80).

He has been an invited speaker on cancer and nuclear health concerns to the US President’s Cancer Panel, CDC, the Union for International Cancer Control, the International Comprehensive Cancer Control Partnership, and the US Institute of Medicine. He was honored to be inducted as a Marshallese Citizen by their Government in 2011, and sailed home on the closing leg to the Malama Honua voyage from Tahiti to Hawaiʻi with the Hokulea and Hikianalia in 2017.

His greatest assets and blessing—are his seven children and his wife, Dr. Momi Kaʻanoi.