Dr. Howard completed her pediatric residency at University of California, San Francisco. She received her bachelor’s degree in Neuroscience from Amherst College and completed a Master of Philosophy degree in Biological Science from University of Cambridge. She obtained her medical degree from the Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons. During residency, she studied the development of blood vessels in the fetal brain, analyzed human single cell RNA sequence data of the fetal vascular microenvironment, and identified cell-to-cell signaling networks and their evolution across multiple developmental stages. She is interested in basic science research focused on defining the unique in utero environment that contributes to brain development to ultimately improve care for extremely premature infants.

Dr. Juttukonda completed her pediatric residency in the Boston Combined Residency Program. She received her undergradu- ate degree in Chemistry and Violin Performance, and her medical degree from the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. She received her PhD in Microbiology & Immunology from Vanderbilt University. During residency, she was a research associate under Dr. Elisha Wachman and Dr. Elizabeth Taglauer and investigated the placental immune response to COVID-19 using placental clinical samples. She is interested in basic and translational research, specifically examining how early life inflammation from microbial infections can alter neonatal immune development and function, and to translate this information into clinical care in the NICU.

Dr. McCullagh completed her pediatric residency in the Boston Combined Residency Program as Chief Resident. She received her bachelor’s degree in English from Wellesley College and obtained her medical degree at the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine. During residency, she worked with a research team to develop an innovative, systems-based approach to address ingrained inequities in access to services that optimize care for infants followed in the NICU Growth and Developmental Support Program under Dr. Jonathan Litt. She also worked to form a task force that will review previously collected data from interviews with families/staff and health literacy assessments. She is interested in health services research and quality improvement with a focus on optimizing the outcomes for high-risk infants in the NICU GraDS program.

Dr. Michael completed her pediatric residency in the Boston Combined Residency Program. She received her undergraduate and medical degree at the University of Athens School of Health Sciences. During residency, she worked under Dr. Sule Cataltepe at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in a retrospective study comparing the efficacy of hydrocortisone and dexamethasone for decreasing respiratory support in premature infants with developing bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD). She previously worked as a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Helen Christou’s lab and is interested in basic science research in neonatal lung biology.

Dr. Odumade completed her pediatric residency at the University of California, San Diego. She received her bachelor’s degree at Hamlin University in Biology and Psychology, her medical degree and PhD at the University of Minnesota Medical School, and completed the Global Health Pediatric Research Fellowship at Boston Children’s Hospital. She most recently worked as faculty in the Precision Vaccines Program (PVP) under the division of Infectious Diseases at Boston Children’s Hospital and directed by Dr. Ofer Levy. She worked on several projects including a National Institutes of Health (NIH)/National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Diseases (NIAID) U19-funded human immunology project consortium (HIPC) study on human in-vitro modeling of vaccine responses. She is interested in pursuing translational research focusing on neonatal sepsis.

Dr. Yannekis completed her pediatric residency at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia as Chief Resident. She received her bachelor’s degree in Sociology and Chemistry from Barnard College. She obtained her medical degree from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. During residency, she conducted a retrospective cohort study delineating the differential impacts of neonatal intensive care unit level and volume on morbidity of minority versus non-Hispanic white neonates and evaluated effects of delivery hospital quality on disparities in neonatal outcomes. Her work was presented at multiple national conferences and published in the Journal of Perinatology. She is interested in health services research and in particular, the effects of delivery hospital on minority outcomes. She hopes to earn her master’s in public health during the fellowship.

Dr. Loren completed his pediatric residency at University of Washington/Seattle Children’s Hospital. He received his undergraduate degree in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology from Harvard University, and his medical degree from the University of Chicago. During residency, he participated in research on post-partum depression in the era of COVID-19, collecting data regarding rates of depression and social outcomes after NICU stays during the COVID-19 epidemic. He is interested in optimizing lung function and identifying the best nutritional strategies for growth, as well as advocating for appropriate dissemination of evidence-based strategies.

Dr. Sharma completed his pediatric residency at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. He received his undergraduate degree in Chemistry from Northwestern University, and his medical degree from the University of Cincinnati. During his residency, his primary research focus was the identification of potential antecedent perinatal and neonatal clinical factors associated with the presence of diffuse white matter abnormality in term-adjusted MRI. He was involved in an NIH-funded study to identify biomarkers on MR imaging that may better predict neurodevelopmental outcomes of preterm infants. He is interested in the identification and utilization of biomarkers to predict long-term outcomes.

Dr. Stadelmaier completed her pediatric residency in the Boston Combined Residency Program. She received her undergraduate degree in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of Michigan, and her medical degree from Albert Einstein College of Medicine. During residency, she worked on a project that involved analyzing a large cohort of infants for whom genetic testing was sent in order to identify patterns in testing strategy and diagnostic yield. She received a Fred Lovejoy House Officer Research Award from Boston Children’s Hospital in support of this project, and her abstract describing the preliminary results was accepted at the 2020 PAS meeting and the 2020 NEPS meeting. During fellowship, she would like to study inequalities in genetic testing and diagnosis.

Dr. Thomas completed her pediatric residency at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. She received her undergraduate degree in Comparative Literature (English and Spanish) from Brown University, and her medical degree from Yale University. Her research during residency looked at the first minutes after birth for newborns with cyanotic congenital heart disease. By characterizing the transitional physiology of these newborns and the resuscitative measures they required, she aimed to deepen understanding of how to manage these challenging deliveries. The abstract for this work was accepted to both the PAS and ESPR conferences. She was a co-leader of Project SPHERE, a resident-led QI project aimed at streamlining and improving family and physician satisfaction with the rounding model by increasing resident teaching at the bedside. During fellowship, she plans to pursue clinical research on infants with congenital anomalies to improve outcomes.

Dr. Winkler completed her pediatric residency at Massachusetts General Hospital for Children. She received her undergraduate degree in Psychology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and her medical degree from the University of Massachusetts. During her residency, she generated the standard operating procedure (SOP) for the construction, maintenance, and trouble-shooting of a low-cost, sustainable bubble CPAP built from local materials for use in low-resource settings in Uganda. She also participated in a research project with a multidisciplinary team extrapolating the effect of proning in adults to determine efficacy in improving bronchiolitis outcomes in pediatric patients. She would like to continue to work on the development and distribution of affordable medical technologies to resource-limited areas of the world, as well as evaluating the safety and utility of new devices in the care of neonates.

Dr. D’Gama completed her pediatric residency training in the Boston Combined Residency Program on the Accelerated Research Pathway. She received her undergraduate, medical, and doctorate degrees from Harvard University. She conducted her PhD research with Dr. Christopher Walsh, investigating germline and somatic mutations in neurodevelopmental disorders. Dr. D’Gama is interested in research in developmental neuroscience and translational genomics, and is co-mentored by Drs. Annapurna Poduri and Timothy Yu.

Dr. Guyol completed her pediatric residency in the Urban Health and Advocacy Track of the Boston Combined Residency Program. She holds an undergraduate degree in History and Spanish from Middlebury College, a masters in Special Education from National-Louis University, and a medical degree from Boston University. Prior to medical school, she taught early elementary special education as a Teach for America corps member in Chicago. Under the mentorship of Drs. Meg Parker and Jonathan Litt, she is conducting her fellowship research on medical, social, and environmental factors affecting school readiness among NICU graduates. For this work, she received the AAP Marshall Klaus Perinatal Research Award in Health Services Research. She hopes to use this research to guide development of interventions that will improve educational equity for preterm infants and is also serving as an advocacy and public policy fellow in the Boston Children’s Office of Government Relations during this academic year.

Dr. Yazawa completed her pediatric residency training at Columbia University. She received her bachelor’s degree in hiology and Hispanic studies from Boston College, and her medical degree from Boston University. Her residency research examined outcomes (safety and efficacy) in neonatal patients who received inhaled iloprost for the acute management of severe pulmonary hypertension. Under the mentorship of Dr. William Pu, she is studying gene therapy for inherited cardiac disease by utilizing adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors as a platform for gene therapy delivery. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her husband and their goldendoodle puppy!