I am an Assistant Professor of Pharmacology and Medicine at SUNY Upstate Medical University, and a member of the Neuroscience Graduate Program. I developed and lead a productive (19 1^st/senior author papers), collaborative (19 publications), and consistently funded (NIH-NINDS R61/R33, NIH-CTSA KL2, AES Career Development, AHA Career Development, CURE Epilepsy, Dravet Syndrome Foundation, and 9 pilot awards as PI) research program. I gained national reputation as I co-chaired 3 national scientific committees, serve as a reviewer for many grants and manuscripts, received 20 awards, and in 2020 I was elected a Fellow of the American Epilepsy Society.

I had the pleasure of speaking at numerous patient advocacy group events and am on the Board of Directors for Empowering People’s Independence (EPI, affiliate of Epilepsy Alliance of America). Through interactions with the families of patients with severe genetic diseases, I developed the passion and determination to advance the understanding of electrical diseases of both the brain (seizures) and heart (arrhythmias.) I have the skills to lead a productive and innovative research program that will make significant scientific advancements. I have significant expertise in clinical database analyses, wearable technology, and basic science techniques (e.g., cellular, tissue, & whole animal electrophysiology.) I aim to develop novel strategies to identify patients who are at a high risk of sudden death (e.g., Sudden Cardiac Death, SCD; Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy, SUDEP), which will then lead to novel strategies to reduce/eliminate these risk factors.

I made important insights into the prevalence, risk factors, and mechanisms for seizures and cardiac arrhythmias. My laboratory demonstrated that it is critical to take a multi-system and multi-scale approach to studying electrical diseases of the brain and heart. In genetic models of epilepsy, I showed it is critical to look outside the brain, as there are alterations in cardiac electrical function, which provides a substrate for lethal cardiac arrhythmias. Following a bench-to-bedside paradigm, we demonstrated that there is a >10-fold higher prevalence of ECG abnormalities in people with developmental epileptic encephalopathy, compared to healthy controls. We reported a case of near-lethal arrhythmias in a patient with a severe genetic form of epilepsy. We are developing cardiac ECG markers to identify epilepsy patients at an increased risk of arrhythmias and SUDEP, as well as distinguish epileptic vs. functional and dissociative seizures. These algorithms will provide non-invasive out-of-hospital diagnostic and risk assessment tools.

Applying my clinical database analytical skills, I demonstrated that patients with a classically studied inherited cardiac arrhythmia disease, Long QT Syndrome (LQTS), are at an increased risk of seizures. I developed a novel mutant rabbit model of LQTS, which reproduces the neuro-cardiac pathologies seen in LQTS patients. It enables us to conduct translational studies to investigate the mechanisms for arrhythmias and seizures in LQTS, as well as evaluate the cardiac safety of neurotherapeutics.

Training: I have been actively involved in mentorship and teaching for ~10 years. I mentored 43 undergraduate and graduate/medical students. Presently, I am the primary thesis mentor for 2 PhD, 1 MD/PhD, and 1 MS students. I graduated 1 MS student. All trainees have gone on to graduate/medical school or matched in competitive residency programs. Many trainees have 1^st author publications and received research and presentation awards.

I lead a diverse research team that strives for a scientifically productive environment. Our laboratory is diverse in terms of sex (presently 4 women), sexuality, race/ethnicity (Nigeria, India, & Iran), and expertise (biologists, physiologists, engineer, mathematician, & public health). I participate in programs (PREP-Up, SYNERGY, & MACNY-PTech) that introduce recent high-school and college graduates from disadvantaged and underrepresented socio-economic backgrounds to biomedical research. My research team works together to mentor younger scientists, teach each other new scientific approaches, and promote scientifically sound and reproducible results. Each member of the lab brings unique scientific perspectives and approaches. Furthermore, I co-chaired the American Epilepsy Society Junior Investigator and Fellow Committee that organizes small satellite sessions throughout the year, and I organized a 1.5-day workshop at the annual national meeting on topics related to career development. I teach medical/graduate lectures on cardiac electrophysiology and ion channels. I led discussion groups on biomedical ethics and rigor/reproducibility, human structure function, mastering medical information, and grant writing.

Summary: The combination of a strong translational research program with a passion to develop strategies to combat these neuro-cardiac pathologies, equip me to lead innovative studies, and further develop my research program as an independent investigator in translational biomedical science. I am passionate about building and mentoring a multi-disciplinary research team, recruiting people from around the world to Upstate, developing tools to improve health care for under-served populations, and advocating for epilepsy patients who are often socio-economically disadvantaged.