Colorado StARR Program for Research in Residency Announces New Scholars

The Colorado NHLBI-supported StARR Program (Stimulating Access to Research in Residency) is pleased to announce the selection of one new scholar for the program. Congratulations to Shravya Pothula, MD.

The goal of the Colorado StARR Program – which is funded by an R38 award from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute at the NIH – is to recruit, train and retain outstanding clinician-investigators focused on translational research in heart, lung and blood disorders. The program supports a 1-2 year mentored research experience in heart, lung, and blood disorders for outstanding housestaff in Medicine, Pediatrics, and Surgery. 

These newly awarded scholars will join the program’s current scholars embarking upon dedicated time for research during their residency training.

New Scholars


Jason Breithaupt, MD, MPH

Jason Breithaupt, MD, MPH
Beginning June 2025
Department of Surgery

Mentor: Stephanie Nakano, MD, and Matthew Stone, MD
Project: Modeling ischemia reperfusion injury (IRI) and chronic hypoxia in tissue engineered myocardium made from cardiomyocytes derived from hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS) patient induced pluripotent stem cells. Dr. Breithaupt will determine if cyclosporine and naloxone attenuate IRI in wild type and HLHS tissue engineered myocardium.

Ioannis A. Ziogas, MD, MPH

Ioannis A. Ziogas, MD, MPH
Beginning July 2025
Departments of Surgery and Pediatrics

Mentor: Sarah Taylor, MD
Project title: Defining age-specific effects of cell senescence in obstructive cholangiopathies.
Project description: Dr. Ziogas will be examining the impact of senescent cells on liver disease severity and macrophage function in neonatal versus weanling mice following bile duct ligation, using efferocytosis assays and single-cell RNA sequencing. He will also translate these mechanistic studies to humans by defining the senescent cell signaling networks in liver tissues from children with cholestatic liver diseases using spatial transcriptomics.

Sarah Meller, MD

Sarah “Sadie” Meller, MD
Beginning June 2025
Department of Pediatrics

Mentor: Ken Tyler, MD
Project: Dr. Meller will examine how microglia, which are spinal cord resident immune cells, respond to Enterovirus D68 (EV-D68) infection and may drive the progression of acute flaccid myelitis (AFM). She hopes to increase understanding of pediatric vulnerability to AFM by contrasting the innate immune response of microglia to EV-D68 infection and interferon signaling during periods of vulnerability and resistance to the development of paralytic disease.

Incoming Scholars


Lauren Maloney

Lauren Maloney, MD
Beginning January 2025
Department of Pediatrics
Mentor: Sarah Taylor, MD
Project: Age-specific differences in the immune response to obstructive cholestasis. Dr. Maloney will be examining if age-based differences affect the immune cell response to bile acid toxicity in obstructive cholestasis and contribute to differences in disease phenotype in the neonate.

Current Scholars


Caitlin Eason

Caitlin Eason, MD
Beginning July 2024
Department of Surgery

Mentor: Chris Derderian, MD
Project: Effect of miRNAs and EVs on angiogenesis. Dr. Eason will be examining the effect of miRNA within extracellular vesicles on placental angiogenesis and by extension will establish whether this contributes to impaired fetal growth.

Shravani potula

Shravya Pothula, MD
Beginning March 2025

The goal of Dr. Pothula’s STARR program is to identify key networks and pairings between the murine and analogous human samples through meta-genomics. Using a virtual cohort of patients from completed clinical trials from publicly available meta genomics consortia to better characterize which genetic mutations predispose certain phenotypes of different disease expression, progression, or severity of inflammation.

Ryen Ormesher

Ryen Ormesher, MD 
Beginning June 2024
Department of Medicine
Mentor: Irina Petrache, MD
Project: Biomarkers in COPD predisposing to pulmonary hypertension. Dr. Ormesher will be examining if pulmonary vascular remodeling in COPD is associated with elevations of microRNA-126’ (miR126) cell type-specific targets.

Bo Chang

Bo Chang “Brian” Wu, MD
Beginning July 2024
Department of Surgery
Mentor: Brett Reece, MD, MBA, FACS, FAHA, FACC
Project: Protective role of mitochondrial transplantation in an in vivo murine middle cerebral artery occlusion stroke model. Dr. Wu will be examining if pretreatment with mitochondrial transplantation may strengthen the neuronal cells against ischemia-reperfusion injury.

Jack Zakrzewski, MD

Jack Zakrzewski, MD 
July 2023 – June 2025
Department of Surgery
Mentor: Matthew Stone, MD
This project aims to expand the number of donor organs for cardiac transplantation, the only curative treatment for patients with end-stage heart failure. The success of transplantation remains limited by the number of donor organs available, and by graft dysfunction due to ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) after transplantation.

Kellen Gil, MD

Kellen Gil, MD
January 2024 – January 2026
Mentor: Maria Amaya, MD
Department of Medicine
The goal of this project is to better understand the role of the pro-inflammatory signaling axis in myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) to facilitate development of an improved therapeutic strategy in patients with higher-risk MDS.

Previous Scholars


Jayce Pangilinan, MD

Jayce Pangilinan, MD

July 2020 – June 2021

Elizabeth McGinn, MD

Elizabeth McGinn, MD

January 2022 – December 2022

August Longino, MD

August Longino, MD

July 2022 – June 2023

Alexander Heilman, MD

Alexander Heilman, MD

July 2022 – June 2023

Isabel Hardee, MD

Isabel Hardee, MD

January 2023 – December 2023

Lindsey Thomson, MD

Lindsey Thomson, MD

March 2023 – February 2024

Natalie Longino, MD

Natalie Longino, MD

April 2022 – April 2024

Kaitlyn McLeod, MD

Kaitlyn McLeod, MD

April 2023 – April 2024

Katarina Leyba, MD

Katarina Leyba, MD

July 2023 – June 2024

Contact Us

David Schwartz, MD
Program Director
David.Schwartz@cuanschutz.edu 

Jennifer Kemp, PhD
Associate Program Director
Jennifer.T.Kemp@cuanschutz.edu

Paul Wood, MA
Program Manager
Paul.Wood@cuanschutz.edu

Sarah Miller
Business Coordinator
sarah.h.miller@cuanschutz.edu

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