Organizing Committee
Leads
Stefan Aguiar (He/Him)
Program: PhD – Third Year
Field of Research: Psychosocial Oncology, MAiD and End of life care
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
Aging? What’s that? Never heard of it!
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
That Dr. Strange could’ve used the timestone to reverse the effects of aging on Thanos a long time ago!
Anthaea-Grace Patricia Dennis (She/Her)
Program: PhD – Second Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/agp-dennis
Field of Research: My research aims to use machine learning and AI for efficient and early Parkinson’s Disease diagnosis and prediction.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
Is there a way to mitigate negative effects of aging, such as memory loss?
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Having the time and resources to do “bucket-list” items, but not having the physical capacity or energy for it.
Organizing Team Members
Aria Afsharian (He/Him)
Program: MSc – First Year
Social Media: http://www.linkedin.com/in/aria-afsharian-366299232
Field of Research: My research is in cell biology where I am investigating how certain signaling proteins interact with one another in the context of a viral infection pathway.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I definitely feel like I age faster in winter. I don’t know if it’s because of it always lining up with exam season or if it’s the climate, but I would love to learn more about how our environment affects how we age. Like if colder weather makes us more stressed out, which might age us faster.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Since I come from a biology background, I just think of telomeres, which are pieces of your chromosomes at the ends that gradually shrink as you age and as your cells continue to divide.
Jasmine Amini (She/Her)
Program: MSc – First Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasmine-amini/
Field of Research: My research focuses on the impact of social media use on suicidal behaviours and family functioning among youth with an acute suicide or self-harm related concern. Specifically, I’m interested in understanding the ways social media can help or hinder mental health within this population.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I am really excited to learn more about the microbiome’s role in aging. I remember learning about the important roles of diet and exercise on mental health in my undergraduate neuroscience classes, but haven’t really delved into microbiome research since then.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Perhaps it’s cliche, but I think about gaining new experiences, seeing new places, learning new things, etc.
Alexandra Puchiele (She/Her)
Program: MSc – First Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandra-puchiele-b17325249
Field of Research: My research focuses on the genetic underpinnings of sleep disturbances in youth with mood disorders by examining polygenic risk scores.
Out of sleep, environmental effects (climate, pollution) and microbiome, which do you feel has impacted you the most as you age?
Sleep has been the most obvious contributor to early signs of aging for me. The effects of poor sleep are clear, especially during busy periods. Researching sleep and youth mental health has made me an advocate for healthy sleep habits and against the “sleep while I’m dead” mindset.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Aging seems to me like a paradox of the body slowing down but the mind and soul grow clearer. Wisdom and gratitude deepen, even as physical limits begin to emerge within the body.
Mariam Elsawy (She/Her)
Program: MSc – First Year
Field of Research: I study the health and social effects of criminalizing drugs, and investigate alternative drug policies that can improve outcomes.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I’m excited to learn about how nutrition and the gut microbiome impact health and the process of aging.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Muscle mass!
Karen Fang (She/Her)
Program: PhD – First Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karen-kl-fang
Field of Research: My research focuses on leukemia and cancer immunotherapy.
Anna Mouzenian (She/Her)
Program: MSc – First Year
Field of Research: My research focuses on predicting treatment outcomes for individuals with substance use disorders using wearable devices.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I’m excited to learn more about how aging affects cognition and what factors, including lifestyle factors and interventions, play a role in preserving memory.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
The first thing that comes to my mind is the idea of growth and the opportunity that exists to continuously evolve and learn.
Jittanan (Meg) Nakpu (She/Her)
Program: MSc – First Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jittanan-nakpu
Field of Research: My project is focused on developing an organ culture system for the mouse uterus to study embryonic development.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I want to know how climate change affect aging and how older population can adapt with climate related events both mentally and physically.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Retirement and relaxation, enjoying the time that you didn’t get to enjoy while working.
Phuong Nguyen (She/Her)
Program: PhD – First Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/phuong-nguyen-592287118/
Field of Research: Predict drug response outcomes between different spondyloarthritis conditions.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I am most excited to learn about what are the factors that influence aging and how we can work for our future self to slow it down.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Inner peace in having lived a meaningful life. A gentle dance with time.
Elsa Salvant (She/Her)
Program: PhD – Third year
Field of Research: I study a post-COVID hyperinflammatory disease in children known as Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS-C). The goal of my research is to understand the underlying immune mechanisms that lead some children to go on to have MIS-C following acute COVID-19 illness.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I think it would be really cool to see how the gut microbiome can influence aging and how the composition of our microbiome changes over time!
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
I think it is really cool to think about aging at a cellular level and how different mechanisms are in place to monitor cellular division, metabolism, and the overall “aging” of cells prior to cellular senescence. Just like our body as a whole, long-term exposure to stressful stimuli like climate change, the microbiome and lack of rest can “age” our cells!
Steven Shen (He/Him)
Program: MSc – First Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/steven-shen-b4aab6200/
Field of Research: Predicting Crohn’s disease relapse after surgery using microscopic and microbiome features
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
Active ways you can slow down aging through your lifestyles
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Not being able to exercise the way I used to enjoy with slower recovery.
Siya Verma (She/Her)
Program: MSc – Second Year
Field of Research: Biomarkers in Major Depressive Disorder
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?s you age?
I’d love to learn more about how aging differs based on different life experiences and habits and possibly if that’s different externally vs internally//any visible indicators of aging poorly vs well
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Positive: You gain more life experiences and a better understanding of yourself, Negative: Increased fatigue
Abigail Wolfensohn (She/Her)
Program: MSc – First-Year
Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/abigail-wolfensohn/
Field of Research: My research focuses on the relationship between chronic facial pain, accelerated brain aging, and impaired waste clearance in the brain.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I’m curious to learn more about the relationship between climate change and aging. Climate change is expected to have a wide variety of consequences on the way we live in the coming decades, but I haven’t learned much about its effects on aging in particular yet.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
Fine wine and cheese! Both improve with age, developing unique richness and nuanced flavour. Just like them, we humans also gain complexity and character as time passes.
Maia Zilberman (She/Her)
Program: MSc – Second Year
Field of Research: My work uses brain imaging to investigate changes in brain connections in youth with PTSD and other mental health disorders.
What is something you are most excited to learn about aging based on your own experiences?
I think that there are a lot of factors in our day to day that affect our aging that we don’t even even know about. I want to learn more about what these may be.
What is the first thing that comes to your head when you think about aging?
I wonder what the world will look like in 50 years.
UofT Talks 