Keypoint Newsletter: Introducing the New Fellows Class of 2025

By Heather Gerhart

Keystone Symposia is pleased to introduce the Keystone Symposia Fellows Class of 2025! This year we welcome 12 Fellows to the Keystone Symposia Fellows Community Network, including 7 early-career investigators and 5 post-doctoral fellows. Representing 9 states from across the United States, all come from populations that are underrepresented in biomedical research.

Application numbers increased by 44% this year, attesting to the value of this transformative and prestigious program. With an extremely competitive pool of outstanding rising scientists to choose from, the selection process was particularly challenging this year and we extend our congratulations to those who rose above the rest to join the ranks of the Fellows Community.

The 2025 class showcases the diversity of talent at the cutting edge of life science discovery. Fellows were selected for their innovative research, as well as their dedication to promoting inclusive excellence at their institutions and within the scientific community at large. 

"The Fellows selected to participate in the 2025 class are truly remarkable individuals,” says CEO & President Dr. Jamie Baumgartner.  “The range of disciplines and research institutions represented is extremely impressive. The value this program provides to post-docs and early-career investigators is reflected in the increasing demand and competition for limited spots as we see large increases in applicants."

Read about each new Fellow's research and accomplishments below! 

In January, incoming Fellows will kick off their Program experience by participating in the Keystone Symposia Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) meeting in Keystone, Colorado. There, they will be immersed in SAB committee discussions with academic and industry field leaders to identify emerging research areas and chart the course of future conference programming. In addition, Fellows will have the opportunity to connect with their peers from the graduating Fellows Class of 2024 to glean advice on how to make the most of the upcoming year. Fellows will also be paired with a distinguished member of our SAB, who will provide one-on-one guidance throughout the year on career-development, leadership and skills to succeed along their intended career path.

We are incredibly grateful for the dedicated members of Keystone Symposia’s SAB and the Keystone Fellows Community who have contributed their time and expertise to advising our Fellows. In particular, we wish to acknowledge the following individuals who served as mentors to the 2024 Fellows: Eric Baehrecke, Kizzmekia Corbett-Helaire, Richard DiMarchi, Jessica Dunne, Jason Gestwicki, Geoff Ginsburg, Anne Murphy, Lee Niswander, Manu Platt, Laszlo Radvanyi, Kiersten Stead, Lori Sussel, Elizabeth Villa and Arturo Zychlinsky.

In addition to one-on-one mentorship, Fellows will participate in monthly “Fellows Fridays” virtual sessions, which provide a forum for dynamic group discussions addressing early-career challenges. These discussions feature experts from academia, industry, publishing and esteemed members of our Fellows Alumni Network, who provide Fellows with insights and connections critical to their success. Enhancing their access to thought-leaders from within and outside of the SAB, Fellows Fridays provide the opportunity for Fellows to expand their professional networks and develop strategies to achieve their career goals.

With the 2025 class, the Keystone Symposia Fellows Community now comprises 114 esteemed scientists, many of whom now hold leadership roles throughout academia, industry and government. Established in 2009, the Keystone Symposia Fellows Program aims to provide early-stage independent researchers from underrepresented backgrounds with the skills, professional connections and visibility to support their success at this pivotal career stage. Importantly, “alumni” Fellows remain connected to Keystone Symposia, as speakers and organizers of our conferences, as mentors to current Fellows, and as strategic advisors on our Board of Directors and Scientific Advisory Board, thereby further advancing our mission to promote inclusive excellence in the life sciences. 

View the Full Fellows Directory Here 

We thank all the generous sponsors who have made the Fellows Program Class of 2025 possible. Their funding is essential to the strength, value and longevity of the program, and to our ability to support these incredible scientists to become leaders in their research fields and their communities.

• Individuals: Cherié Butts, Stephanie Watts, Bei Zhang & Mark Erion, Aristides Economides & Heike Doerr
• Organizations: Burroughs Wellcome Fund, Cytokinetics, Inc., Eli Lilly & Co., Endocrine Society

We welcome additional sponsors!

Please consider joining us in our mission to support the next generation of a diverse biomedical and life science workforce! 

Contact: DLSP@keystonesymposia.org

Or Make a Donation to Support the Fellows Program HERE

Post-Doctoral Fellows 

Alicer Andrew, PhD 

Postdoctoral Fellow, Gladstone Institutes 

Field of Study: Immunology 

Dr. Alicer K. Andrew is an Antiguan-born postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Dr. Nadia Roan at the Gladstone Institutes in San Francisco, California. She works in the Institute of Virology, where she uses advanced single-cell approaches to deeply characterize the phenotypes and functions of total and HIV and CMV-specific T cells from people with HIV. Prior to her postdoctoral work, Dr. Andrew earned a Ph.D. in Infectious Diseases and a B.S. in Biology from the University of Georgia. During her doctoral work, Dr. Andrew led research that explored the interplay between malaria-induced mediators of inflammation, coagulation, and oxidative stress, in the context of pregnancy. Through this work, Dr. Andrew has demonstrated, using multiple murine models of malaria infection during pregnancy, that these host responses to malaria work synergistically to promote poor pregnancy outcomes and represent a therapeutic target for preserving maternal-fetal health.

Dr. Andrew is extremely passionate about research that aims to improve women’s health, particularly for minority communities, and has a long-term goal of investigating the impact of sex differences on viral immunity and pathogen persistence. Dr. Andrew is also deeply committed to inclusive mentorship and effective science communication between scientists and community members

Maigen Bethea, PhD 

Research Instructor, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus 

Field of Study: Metabolic Diseases

*Sponsored by Future Leaders Advancing Research in Endocrinology (FLARE) | Endocrine Society

Dr. Maigen Bethea is a Research Instructor in the Department of Pediatrics, Section of Nutrition, at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. Growing up in a region heavily impacted by obesity and its metabolic consequences, she is passionately driven to develop innovative therapies that alleviate this significant healthcare burden on her community.

Dr. Bethea earned her Bachelor of Science in Biology from Francis Marion University in Florence, South Carolina, before pursuing her doctoral degree at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Under the mentorship of Dr. Chad Hunter, her PhD research explored transcriptional complexes that regulate the development and function of pancreatic islet cells. During her postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus in the laboratory of Dr. Darleen Sandoval, she investigated the neurocircuitry underlying bariatric surgery-induced metabolic improvements. 

As a National Institutes of Health (NIH) Building Interdisciplinary Research Careers in Women’s Health (BIRCWH) K12 Scholar, Dr. Bethea’s research focuses on the gut-brain axis, specifically examining how intestinal stretch influences feeding behavior and glucose homeostasis in a sex-specific context. Her work is at the forefront of understanding the intricate mechanisms linking gastrointestinal signals to metabolic health. Beyond her scientific pursuits, Dr. Bethea is deeply committed to mentoring and inspiring the next generation of scientists, fostering a diverse and inclusive scientific community.

Colwyn Headley, PhD 

Postdoctoral Fellow, Stanford University 

Field of Study: Immunology

Dr. Colwyn “CoCo” Headley completed both his B.S. (Microbiology) and Ph.D. (Biomedical Sciences – Immunology) studies at The Ohio State University. His doctoral work primarily focused on the impact of biological aging on adaptive immunity and potential strategies to boost elderly immune function.

Currently, Dr. Headley is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford University’s Cardiovascular Institute. He is using his long-term interests in aging-associated mitochondrial dysfunction and immunity to uncover novel perspectives on immune-mediated cardiovascular dysfunctions, like abdominal aortic aneurysms, and peripheral artery disease. Dr. Headley is particularly interested in the application of mitochondrial transplantation as a broad therapy for aging-associated pathologies.

Juan Inclan Rico, PhD 

Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Pennsylvania 

Field of Study: Immunology 

Dr. Juan Inclan-Rico’s long-term goal is to investigate how distinct subsets of itch-inducing neurons regulate skin immunity during infectious and non-infectious conditions. Dr. Inclan-Rico is pursuing this goal as a postdoctoral researcher in Dr. Wenqin Luo’s lab in the Department of Neuroscience at the Perelman School of Medicine in the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn). His lifelong interest in host immunity against parasitic infections started after majoring in biochemistry and pharmaceutics at the School of Chemistry of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). After graduating from UNAM, Dr. Inclan-Rico engaged in different research experiences in Mexico and the United States focused on dissecting the contributions of vagus nerve stimulation to the control of systemic inflammation and sepsis.

These research experiences motivated him to pursue a doctorate in biomedical sciences at Rutgers, New Jersey Medical School, where he joined the laboratory of Dr. Mark Siracusa and led two main projects focused on the regulation of immunity against parasitic helminths. The first one defined the central contribution of the enzyme carbonic anhydrase 1 (Car1) for mast cell development induced by infection with the helminth Trichinella spiralis (Inclan-Rico et al., PLOS Pathogens, 2020). His second project (Inclan-Rico et al., Nature Immunology, 2020) revealed an unexpected crosstalk between basophils and group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2s) that allows ILC2s to respond to the neuropeptide Neuromedin B (NMB), which limits their cytokine secretion.

After defending his Ph.D. thesis, Dr. Inclan-Rico joined the laboratory of Dr. De’Broski Herbert at the School of Veterinary Medicine at UPenn for his postdoctoral training to investigate if and how cutaneous immunity against skin-penetrating helminths can be developed. His work (Inclan-Rico et al. Nature Immunology, 2024) revealed that the blood fluke Schistosoma mansoni can be recognized by itch-inducing neurons bearing the receptor MrgprA3, but this interaction results in their inactivation. This work also showed that MrgprA3 neurons elicit IL-17-mediated skin anti-helminth immunity by inducing pro-inflammatory cytokine secretion in myeloid antigen-presenting cells. These studies were awarded prestigious awards from the Life Sciences Research Foundation (LSRF) and the Skin Biology and Diseases Resource-based Center (SBDRC) of UPenn. During his Ph.D. and postdoctoral studies, Dr. Inclan-Rico has authored several reviews and participated in multiple national and international conferences that positioned him as an emerging leader in neuro-immunoparasitology. 

Brea Manuel, PhD 

Postdoctoral Associate, HHMI/University of Maryland, Baltimore County 

Field of Study: Biochemistry 

Dr. Brea A. Manuel is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Postdoctoral Scientist at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, where she works under the mentorship of Dr. Michael Summers. She received her B.S. in Chemistry from Louisiana State University in 2018 as both a McNair and LS-LAMP Scholar, conducting research on anti-HIV small molecules under the guidance of Dr. Isiah Warner. Dr. Manuel went on to earn her Ph.D. in 2022 from Emory University as Centennial Fellow, where she worked with Dr. Jennifer Heemstra to develop innovative nucleic acid-based tools for biological sensing and therapeutic modulation.

Currently, Dr. Manuel’s research is focused on understanding the molecular mechanisms of retroviral genome packaging. Using advanced NMR and biophysical techniques, she aims to uncover insights into virus evolution and identify novel therapeutic strategies for infectious diseases. Her long-term goal is to develop nucleic acidbased therapeutics to target pathogenic systems. Outside the lab, Dr. Manuel is a passionate advocate for diversity and inclusion in STEM. She co-authored the influential Nature Reviews Chemistry article on recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce, which has sparked significant discussions on fostering inclusivity in science

Early-Career Scientists

Daniel Abebayehu, PhD 

Assistant Professor, University of Virginia 

Field of Study: Bioengineering 

Dr. Daniel Abebayehu is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Virginia where his lab focuses on using biomaterials and high-dimensional approaches to study immuno-stromal axes to determine avenues for intervention that prevent fibrosis and promote repair. His academic and research training have provided him with a strong background in regenerative medicine, molecular immunology, and fibroblast biology.

The Abebayehu lab’s specific areas of interest are in pulmonary injury and repair, modulating responses to biomaterials, and identifying novel diagnostic and therapeutic approaches for endometriosis. His research program is focused on investigating immune cell and fibroblast crosstalk in the context of fibrosis and tissue repair and the interdisciplinary nature of this work allows the lab to sit at the intersection of different fields. That position allows the research group to see scientific questions and problems in a new way and pose innovative solutions.   

Ewa Bomba-Warczak, PhD

Assistant Professor, University of Pennsylvania 

Field of Study: Neurobiology 

Dr. Ewa Bomba-Warczak is an incoming tenure track Assistant Professor in the Department of Physiology at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine opening her laboratory in January 2025. Her research investigates how cells with exceptionally long lifespans – neurons and oocytes – establish and maintain their mitochondrial networks throughout their life, and how the stability of mitochondrial components contributes to cell’s health and age-dependent degeneration. In her laboratory she combines in vitro cell and in vivo mouse models with mass spectrometry-based proteomics, biochemistry, genetics, and fluorescent imaging to define the mechanisms governing the lifelong mitochondrial homeostasis in health and disease

Dr. Bomba-Warczak received her PhD from University of Wisconsin – Madison in the laboratory of Dr. Edwin Chapman, and HHMI Investigator, followed by postdoctoral studies under the mentorship of Dr. Jeffrey Savas at Northwestern University. She has received her B.S. in Biological Sciences with honors from University of Illinois at Chicago – a degree she obtained thanks to the generosity of federal Pell grants and Honors College Tuition waivers. Ewa is a recipient of a Jerzy Rose Award for most outstanding graduate thesis in Neuroscience at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, NIH Kirschstein-NRSA postdoctoral fellowship and NIH MOSAIC K99 Pathway to Independence Fellowship to Promote Diversity. She was recently selected as a Leading Edge Fellow, an initiative to improve gender diversity of life sciences in the USA. As an immigrant and first-generation college graduate, most of her career she has focused on the recruitment and retention of low-income and first-generation college students in STEMM. She is also a co-founder of MITOchats, online seminar series featuring graduate students and postdoctoral fellows working in the field of mitochondria. 

Vivien Maltez, PhD 

Assistant Professor, UC San Diego 

Field of Study: Immunology

Dr. Vivien Ileana Maltez, is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Allergy, Immunology, and Rheumatology within the Department of Pediatrics at the University of California San Diego. A California native, she majored in Molecular Biology at Scripps College in Claremont, California, and then jumped coasts when she was selected to join the 2nd cohort of UNC Chapel Hill’s Postbaccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP). She chose to stay and earned her Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology studying bacterial pathogenesis, innate immunity, and cell death.

She then transitioned to the National Institutes of Health and was selected for the Postdoctoral Research Associate Training Program to fund her cancer research. She then successfully competed for the MOSAIC K99/R00, a career transition award with an emphasis on improving diversity at the faculty level. She has now returned to her home state as part of the UCSD FIRST Faculty program to head her own laboratory focused on decoding the cellular interactions that dictate tumor responsiveness to immunotherapy. She will primarily leverage a suite of imaging techniques that retain crucial spatial information while providing single cell resolution. 

David Martinez, PhD 

Assistant Professor, Yale University School of Medicine 

Field of Study: Infectious Diseases 

Dr. David R. Martinez studies immunity to viral pathogens of global health importance. David Martinez received his Ph.D. from Duke University in the laboratory of leading vaccine immunologist, Dr. Sallie Permar. David Martinez trained as a postdoctoral scholar with one the world’s leading coronavirologists, Dr. Ralph Baric, at UNC Chapel Hill before and during the COVID-19 pandemic studying immunity to flaviviruses and coronaviruses. David Martinez was part of the teams that contributed to the development of the FDA-approved and widely used Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. David Martinez also contributed to the pre-clinical development of COVID-19 human monoclonal antibody therapies used in humans.

David Martinez is a Hanna Gray Faculty Fellow of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. In 2023, David Martinez began his laboratory in the Department of Immunobiology at Yale University School of Medicine

Ivana Parker, PhD

Assistant Professor, University of Florida 

Field of Study: Bioengineering

*Sponsored by Future Leaders Advancing Research in Endocrinology (FLARE) | Endocrine Society

Dr. Ivana Parker is a Fulbright Scholar, and Assistant Professor in the J Crayton Pruitt Family Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Florida. With over a decade of experience in HIV research spanning prevention, comorbidities, and diagnostics, her work has had global impact within Africa, Asia, and the Americas. Recognized by receipt of the NIH DP-1 Director’s Pioneer Award, her lab at the University of Florida explores questions at the intersection of global health, immunology, and women’ s health and aims to identify novel therapeutic targets to decrease HIV risk. Dr. Parker aims to improve health outcomes for underserved and vulnerable communities through research and advocacy. This impact is amplified by educating and empowering the next generation (or students) to create change through their own innovation and research.  

Before coming to UF, Dr. Parker was awarded a Fulbright to the University of Cape Town in South Africa, where she investigated mechanisms of maternal to child transmission of HIV. For her postdoctoral work, Dr. Parker received an ASM/CDC postdoctoral fellowship in Infectious Disease Microbiology and Public Health.  At the CDC, she evaluated the impact of HIV prevention techniques on diagnostic assay accuracy and identified trends to optimize assay design. Dr. Parker received her PhD in Bioengineering from Georgia Tech, and she received numerous awards while there, including the NSF graduate research fellowship and the NIH Cell and Tissue Engineering Trainee. She also received a Whitaker Grant to develop artificial aortic valves in Cape Town, South Africa and facilitated set-up of a lab in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Dr. Parker earned her BS in mechanical engineering from the University of Florida in 2009.

Novalia Pishesha, PhD 

Assistant Professor, Boston Children's Hospital 

Field of Study: Immunology

Dr. Novalia “Nova” Pishesha grew up in Indonesia as the daughter of toy shop owners with no formal high school education. Recognized early for her academic talents, she emigrated to the United States alone to pursue higher education. Nova attended the University of California, Berkeley, on a full-ride scholarship and later earned her PhD in Biological Engineering at MIT under the mentorship of Drs. Harvey Lodish and Hidde Ploegh. After PhD, Nova was elected as a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows, where she continued her research with Dr. Ploegh and received additional mentorship from Dr. Aviv Regev at the Broad Institute/MIT and Dr. Sangeeta Bhatia at the Koch Institute/MIT.

Her work has laid the foundation for two biotech companies, including Cerberus Therapeutics, which she co-founded in 2022. Nova has been honored with several awards, including the MIT Technology Review’s Innovators Under 35 (Asia Pacific) and the STAT+ Wunderkind by The Boston Globe. She is also the recipient of the National Multiple Sclerosis Foundation Career Transition Award and the Rheumatology Research Foundation Innovative Award. In January 2024, she launched her own lab as an Assistant Professor in the Division of Immunology at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, focusing on advancing immune engineering to combat pathogenic immunity.

Chrystal Starbird, PhD 

Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine 

Field of Study: Structural Biology 

Dr. Chrystal Starbird was inspired by her early love of nature to study science. She completed her undergraduate work at UNC Chapel Hill and spent a few years afterwards working in academic and industry labs before returning to UNC to complete a year-long PREP program. Following this, Dr. Starbird completed her graduate work in chemical and physical biology at Vanderbilt University. She completed her postdoctoral work as a MOSAIC K99/R00 postdoctoral fellow in the Cancer Biology Center at Yale before moving into her current position as faculty in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at UNC Chapel Hill, where her lab broadly studies the molecular mechanisms of disease.

As a non-traditional student in many ways, Dr. Starbird is a strong advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion, and publishes regularly on strategies to maximize the impact of mentoring and to build an inclusive lab. When not in the lab, Chrystal can usually be found searching for the next waterfall to visit with her family (partner and three children). 

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