Past Spotlights on Biomedical Engineering
2025
Student highlight
Name: Brandon Pacheco-Hernandez
Degree: MS in Biomedical Engineering
Faculty lab: Assistant Professor Nisha Iyer
Hometown: Guatemala/Riverside, California
Why Tufts?
The tight-knit community. My previous institution had such big departments that it was hard to connect with different groups and people. At Tufts, crosstalk between research groups and departments is much more feasible and supportive of collaborations and interesting research conversations. This has brought a real sense of community within each department where we can all learn from each other.
Favorite thing about living in the Medford/Somerville and Boston area?
My favorite things about living in the Medford/Somerville and Boston areas are the bodies of water and their accessibility by foot or public transit. I love walking my dog by the Mystic River trails and will occasionally venture to Boston to visit the Charles River. Being around water can be such a calming experience and the people do a pretty good job of maintaining its beauty and access to the public.
Any advice you’d give to prospective students or new graduate students?
At Tufts, you have a chance to connect and form a community, unlike other institutions. At Tufts, people will greet you with a smile, and come up to you wanting to learn about the exciting things you are doing. Take advantage of this opportunity to make meaningful connections and form relationships that will outlast your time at Tufts.
Faculty highlight
Name: Assistant Professor Nisha Iyer
Research interests: Stem cells, neural tissue engineering, organoids, disease modeling, spinal cord injury, biomanufacturing
About Assistant Professor Iyer:
Nisha Iyer’s research interests are at the intersection of developmental biology and regenerative medicine, using stem cells to understand and advance neural repair. Her lab focuses on how regional specificity impacts development, degeneration, and regeneration in the central nervous system and beyond, developing biomanufacturing strategies and organoid technologies to direct cell therapy research. Iyer is also a passionate educator who seeks to lower barriers to higher education in STEM and to engage the broader community in conversations about science and society.
2023
Student highlight
Name: Nilay Vora
Degree: PhD in Biomedical Engineering
Faculty lab: Professor Irene Georgakoudi
Hometown: Jersey City, NJ
Why Tufts?
When I was applying for grad school I heard a Spotify ad that said, “There is small, there is big, and then there is Tufts.” That really encapsulates what Tufts is and why I love it here. Tufts is perfectly nestled outside of Boston, giving students a chance to collaborate not only within the school, but also with other schools in the area. At Tufts you’re not just a face; professors in the department know who you are, even if you work in a different lab. Tufts truly gives students an opportunity to grow and pursue what they are passionate about, both as students and as individual people.
Favorite thing about living in the Medford/Somerville and Boston area?
With Boston only a train ride away, food, concerts, and museums are always an option. At the same time, Medford and Somerville offer you a break from city with hiking and biking trails and kayaking in the Middlesex Fells Reservation.
Any advice you’d give to prospective students or new graduate students?
Finding a good work-life balance really makes the experience of graduate school worth it. Whether it's taking a short break during the day to go for a walk or leaving the lab at a reasonable time, having a good balance can really enhance your experience as a student. Finding my hobbies outside of lab led me to become friends with some really amazing people and helped foster my passion for my research!
Faculty highlight
Name: Professor Irene Georgakoudi
Research interests: Label-free high resolution tissue imaging, non-linear microscopy, metabolic imaging, matrix characterization, in vivo flow cytometry, cancer detection, osteoarthritis, and neurodegenerative diseases.
About Professor Georgakoudi:
Irene Georgakoudi has been working on the use of lasers for therapeutic and diagnostic applications since her undergraduate years. She is the author of several patents on spectroscopy and imaging approaches to characterize tissues or to detect specific populations of cells, and has published extensively on the topic. Her lab is interested in the development of innovative technologies that rely on light interactions with molecules that are naturally present in our cells and tissues to help us understand how cells communicate with each other and their surrounding environment with micron scale resolution. These optical tools obviate the need for a biopsy or for an exogenous contrast agent and enable us to uncover dynamic interactions in space and time in living samples of all scales, from organelles to humans. These methods will yield critical new insights regarding how conditions such as cancer, osteoarthritis, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases develop and will provide new paradigms for disease detection and treatment.
2022
Student highlight
Name: Justinne Renee Guarin
Degree: Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering
Faculty lab: Tiampo Family Assistant Professor Madeleine Oudin
Hometown: Lexington, MA
Why Tufts?
It was clear when I first visited that the school valued people of all backgrounds and experiences. Tufts is highly interdisciplinary and encourages collaboration between departments as well as other schools. I felt like I belonged even though I did not come from an engineering background in undergrad.
Favorite thing about living in the Medford/Somerville and Boston area?
Proximity to nearby schools for collaboration and all the food!
Any advice you’d give to prospective students or new graduate students?
Make time to do the things you love so that you can maintain a healthy lifestyle around your research. I was able to balance playing for Tufts Women’s Ultimate Frisbee while making good progress with my research and made some great friends through it! I am also very fortunate to have an advisor that understands and supports a healthy work-life balance.
Faculty highlight
Name: Tiampo Family Assistant Professor Madeleine Oudin
Research interests: Cancer biology, the tumor microenvironment, and mechanisms of metastasis and drug resistance.
About Professor Oudin:
Madeleine Oudin's graduate research focused on understanding the interplay between multiple signaling pathways in driving neuronal cell migration in response to growth factors during adult neurogenesis. Following the completion of her Ph.D. from King's College London, she completed postdoctoral studies in Professor Frank Gertler’s lab at the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT. There, she investigated the process of cancer metastasis to understand what tumor cells are likely to metastasize, what pathways render them highly invasive and sensitive to local guidance cues, and how the presence of highly metastatic cells might affect response to therapy.
Read a Q&A with Professor Oudin on bringing a biologist's perspective to biomedical engineering!