{"id":5572,"date":"2015-08-25T14:42:30","date_gmt":"2015-08-25T18:42:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/?p=5572"},"modified":"2018-04-13T15:31:29","modified_gmt":"2018-04-13T19:31:29","slug":"geisel-md-phd-student-receives-priscilla-schaffer-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/2015\/geisel-md-phd-student-receives-priscilla-schaffer-award\/","title":{"rendered":"Geisel MD-PhD Student Receives Priscilla Schaffer Award"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Geisel MD-PhD student Yike Jiang is investigating how immune system response to HSV1 can lead to blindness, and how to prevent it. (photo by Jon Gilbert Fox)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Herpes simplex virus type-1 (HSV1) is highly contagious and common worldwide. While a majority of the population has the virus\u2014its most common manifestation is cold sores\u2014most don\u2019t have symptoms. But the virus can also lead to disease with severe complications, such as encephalitis (inflammation of the brain) and keratitis (inflammation of the eye\u2019s cornea).<\/p>\n

\u201cHerpetic stromal keratitis is the leading cause of infectious blindness in the US,\u201d says Yike Jiang, an MD-PhD candidate at Geisel School of Medicine. \u201cAnd what\u2019s interesting about this ocular form of HSV1 is that it\u2019s not entirely due to the virus, but to the body\u2019s immune response.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under David Leib\u2019s tutelage, Jiang is investigating immune pathways that may lead to mitigating damage to the eye and stopping the body\u2019s response to the virus in its tracks. Her work has yielded striking results and earlier this summer she received the Priscilla Schaffer Award for Outstanding Graduate Student Presentation during the 40th annual International Herpesvirus Workshop, which brings together more than 600 investigators from around the world. The award commemorates Dr. Schaffer\u2019s contributions to herpes virology and her dedication to mentoring young virologists.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor many graduate students, when they first begin conducting research, there\u2019s a constant feeling of self-doubt\u2014you\u2019re always asking yourself if you are good enough, smart enough, or if what you are doing matters,\u201d Jiang says. \u201cGetting this award from the larger scientific community is a nice affirmation that I\u2019ve made a contribution to the field. It confirms that I should keep doing what I\u2019m doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

What Jiang is doing is looking at dendritic cells\u2014the immune system\u2019s antigen-presenting cells, which play an important role in immunity by acting as messengers between the innate and the adaptive systems. \u201cBecause the adaptive immune system response is critical to the development of the ocular disease, if we manipulate how dendritic cells are talking to the adaptive immune response, we can lessen the disease caused by the immune response in the eye,\u201d she explains. As a result of this finding we may be able to use drugs to change the immune response in the eye that can still lead to protection against this virus, she says, but not lead to this immune mediated disease.<\/p>\n

\"Yike
Yike Jiang with her mentor David Leib, PhD, professor of Microbiology and Immunology at Geisel.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cYike receiving the Schaffer Award is particularly meaningful to me because I trained with Priscilla Schaffer in the late 1980s while I was a postdoc at Harvard,\u201d says David Leib, PhD, professor of microbiology and immunology at Geisel and Jiang\u2019s mentor. \u201cPriscilla died in 2009, but Yike is the type of student of which Priscilla would have been proud and supportive\u2014Priscilla was both a tough and terrific mentor with little love of sentimentality, but she was always strongly supportive of her trainees at all levels.<\/p>\n

\u201cYike\u2019s work links cell biology and immunology to a common and serious ocular infection, and truly points toward new avenues for therapy against this incurable and blinding disease,\u201d he says. \u201cThis is exactly the type of work that Priscilla championed and she would have admired Yike\u2019s indomitable scientific spirit and her lucid presentations\u2014the essence of which gained her this award.\u201d<\/p>\n

Science is hard work\u2014long hours are spent in the lab asking the wrong questions and making mistakes until you get it right, Jiang notes, but having a wonderful mentor makes a big difference, especially someone who encourages you to do your own work. \u201cDavid has a good sense of humor and is easy-going,\u201d she says. \u201cHe gives me the independence and creativity I need, but he also checks up on me\u2014especially when I\u2019m having a bad day. He\u2019s also very forgiving and that\u2019s what I enjoy about working with him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leib says he learned from Schaffer how vitally important it is as a community to nurture scientific talent at all levels, from high school students to faculty. \u201cFostering and watching the scientific development of students here at Dartmouth is the most satisfying aspect of my job\u2014they are a terrific group and students like Yike make my job easier.\u201d<\/p>\n

Repeating a familiar refrain about the warm and receptive culture of Dartmouth and Geisel School of Medicine, Jiang says, \u201cI feel completely comfortable here because the people I\u2019m around reflect the person I want to become.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Geisel MD-PhD candidate Yike Jiang received the Priscilla Schaffer Award for Outstanding Graduate Student Presentation during the 40th annual International Herpesvirus Workshop, which brings together more than 600 investigators from around the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":5573,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9,1],"tags":[398,25,514,320,549],"class_list":["post-5572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","category-news","tag-award","tag-immunology","tag-md-phd","tag-research-2","tag-student-achievement","author-12"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2015\/08\/yikejiang-2.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4r3h1-1rS","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5572"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5572\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9799,"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5572\/revisions\/9799"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geiselmed.dartmouth.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}