With just one slide and three minutes, fourth-year graduate student Erin Keblish described how she is developing a carbon nanotube-based sensor that could act like a “smoke detector” for early signs of deadly sepsis, during Weill Cornell Medicine’s ninth annual Three-Minute Thesis (3MT®) competition on November 13.
Keblish, who is a graduate student in physiology, biophysics and systems biology, explained how the excess production of inflammatory molecules called cytokines in response to an infection can trigger a life-threatening complication called sepsis. She noted that clinicians can successfully treat the condition if caught early.
However, there are no fast and accurate ways to measure cytokines in the clinic, leaving doctors to monitor and treat symptoms as they arise. “I am working on a smoke detector for the immune system which can alert us when cytokine production is beginning to get out of control, and we can address the issue quickly," she said.
The presentation earned Keblish first place in the competition, featuring brief, rapid-fire presentations by 12 student scientists from Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences and Gerstner Sloan Kettering Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.
“It was a lot of fun thinking about the best ways to communicate my research and make the most of the time and space we were given,” said Keblish.
The competition, which was created by The University of Queensland, Australia, has since been adopted by institutions around the world. It is an opportunity for doctoral students to hone and display their science communication skills in a way that a non-specialist audience can understand and appreciate.
“Even beyond the great opportunity for skill-building amongst the competitors, this annual event brings our students out of labs to cheer each other on. You can really feel the community,” said Dr. Aubrey DeCarlo, assistant director of career and professional development at the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences.
A panel of judges, including Deans and former graduate student and postdoc winners of 3MT® and of Memorial Sloan Kettering's Postdoc Slam, evaluated the presentations for accessibility and accuracy. The top three presenters and a special audience-choice awardee each received a $500 grant.
“All 12 finalists did a fantastic job, making it very hard for the judges to choose the winners!” said Dr. Thalyana Stathis, associate director of the Office of Career and Professional Development at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. “This was also a great forum for the MSK and Weill Cornell Medicine communities to come together and hear the latest developments in the thesis projects of these impressive PhD students.”
Winning Presentations
Rachel Payne, a fourth-year pharmacology graduate student at Weill Cornell Medicine, won second place for her presentation, Battling Bystanders in Advanced Prostate Cancer. “The most challenging part of this competition was distilling my research down to its core concepts,” she said. “As a researcher, I tend to delve into details. This experience forced me to look at the big picture and consider the critical question: why does my work matter?”
Left to right: Evi Hadjimichael, Erin Keblish, Thaís Klevorn and Rachel Payne.
Two-thirds of patients with advanced prostate cancer die within five years despite modern therapies targeting a protein on the surface of some prostate cancer cells called prostate-specific membrane antigen or PSMA.
The problem is that not all cancer cells express the PSMA protein, allowing them to survive the treatments. To combat this, Payne described her research to better understand a phenomenon called the "bystander effect," in which prostate cancer cells that have been impacted by radiation send out a death signal to the tumor cells around them. She hopes her preclinical studies will help scientists predict and improve patient response to radiation-based therapy.
Thaís Klevorn, a seventh-year graduate student in the Immunology and Microbial Pathogenesis program at Weill Cornell Medicine, won third place for her presentation, Too Hard to Kill: Weakening the Tuberculosis Bacteria. Klevorn described how a protective envelope surrounding the tuberculosis bacteria acts like a “raincoat,” protecting them from antibiotics and contributing to the need for months-long treatment to kill this persistent infection. Her lab discovered that tuberculosis bacteria lacking the fecB gene are more susceptible to antibiotics because their raincoat is easier to penetrate.
Her work went on to show that the protein encoded by fecB not only keeps the raincoat intact but also helps the bacteria move nutrients across the protective barrier. “Now we can start to think of new treatment strategies that target fecB alongside existing antibiotics which could lead to faster cures and save millions of lives,” Klevorn said.
“I would highly recommend other graduate students to participate—the public speaking skills developed during the competition will prove helpful beyond graduate school,” she added.
Fan Favorite
Evi Hadjimichael, a fourth-year graduate student in the Biochemistry and Molecular Biology program at Weill Cornell Medicine, took home the People’s Choice award for her presentation, Disguised and Dangerous: Exposing Plasmodium falciparum’s Stealth Tactics in Pregnancy-Associated Malaria. “Participating in the 3-Minute Thesis competition challenged me to find common ground with people who have diverse backgrounds and convey complex ideas in a clear and engaging way,” said Hadjimichael.
Graduate students hangout at the reception after the competition.
She described how the parasite that causes malaria, Plasmodium falciparum, escapes the immune system using ever-changing protein “disguises.” The parasites are transmitted to humans via mosquito bites and invade the host's red blood cells where they can hide out. The parasite exports a protein to the surface of the blood cell that allows it to stick to blood vessel walls and avoid circulating to the spleen where it would be eliminated.
“But then they’re exposed to the immune system—their cover is blown. To escape detection, they constantly change the protein that is exported to the surface of the blood cell,” she explained. “Almost like swapping one trench coat for another, leaving our immune system police puzzled and always one step behind.”
One of these proteins specifically allows the parasite to target the placenta, which carries blood from the mother to the fetus during pregnancy. Hadjimichael is studying the parasites in placental tissue in the laboratory to identify signals that trigger expression of this protein. The findings could help prevent malaria-related placental issues, such as hindering nutrient and oxygen supply to the fetus, which increases the risk of fetal death and low birth weight.
“It was a real pleasure to see the 3MT® contestants improve their stories, slides and communication strategies after receiving initial feedback from the judges, participating in a communications workshop and practicing in the dress rehearsal,” said Dr. Stathis.
The winners’ presentations can be viewed at the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences site. The event was organized by Judith Farber, Operations Coordinator at the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences and primary event coordinator, Dr. DeCarlo and Dr. Stathis.