Each year the University of Washington's (UW) Department of Global Health is able to provide partial to full funding to recruit top applicants. In addition to financial support, some recipients also receive mentorship and real-world experience through research assistant positions. For the 2024-25 academic year, 19 outstanding graduate students received funding to support their studies, 15 of whom are highlighted here. Learn more about this impressive cohort, including their journeys to arrive at the UW and the impact they hope to have on the field of global health.
Master of Public Health in Global Health
Husam Alattar, DGH Excellence Award Teaching Assistantship
Husam is a Palestinian from the Gaza Strip, raised in the Khan Younis refugee camp. Growing up there, he developed a deep sense of community, resilience, and compassion, which shaped his commitment to serving others and creating meaningful connections. He earned his doctor of medicine degree from the medical school at the Islamic University of Gaza, where he trained and worked in local medical centers. As a medical student, he actively participated in campaigns and volunteer work through the Palestinian Medical Forum, contributing to hospitals and community initiatives across Gaza. His experiences in Gaza and the U.S. inspired his focus on clinical research for underserved populations, and he is committed to addressing health disparities, promoting equity, and improving healthcare delivery in resource-limited settings like Gaza, fostering a system rooted in self-representation and resilience. Read More.
Ale' Barrientos, GSEE and DGH Graduate Excellence Award Research Assistantship with Susan Graham
Ale' Barrientos is a health care professional and researcher with over nine years of experience in patient-facing care. He holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Community Health and Education from Seattle Central College, a Master of Science in Applied Anthropology from the University of North Texas and is currently pursuing a Master of Public Health at the University of Washington, focusing on global health issues. In his roles as a social service specialist at Seattle Children’s Hospital and research assistant in the Department of Global Health, Ale' integrates anthropological insights into public health initiatives to address health disparities and improve health care access for vulnerable populations. His research interests include resiliency and the social processes of navigating healthcare as a migrant or immigrant with limited-English proficiency. He is particularly committed to addressing health inequities affecting historically marginalized communities. Read more.
Ricardo Moreno Garcia, DGH Excellence Fellowship, and GSEE Supplemental Award
Ricardo is from the Tri-Cities, Wash., and was born in Mexico. He is the first member of his family to receive a college degree, and he continues to pursue higher education as a student in the Master of Public Health in Global Health program at the UW. While pursuing his undergraduate degree in public health, he was inspired to continue his education in global health. Ricardo is passionate about supporting the health of BIPOC agricultural workers, specifically focusing on the Latinx community. During his time at undergrad, he had the opportunity to be a research assistant and support the projects of multiple doctoral students and faculty members at the Health Promoting Research Center here at the University of Washington. Read more.
Cirilus Ogollah Osongo, Research Assistant with START
Cirilus Osongo is a first-year student in the Master of Public Health program at the University of Washington. Before joining the UW, Cirilus had extensive experience working on HIV/AIDS, cervical cancer prevention, and tobacco cessation initiatives across counties in the former Western Kenya region. With a diploma in clinical medicine and surgery from the Kenya Medical Training College and a Bachelor of Science in public health, he brings over a decade of expertise in public health program implementation and research. Currently, Cirilus is conducting innovative randomized trials exploring self-administered topical creams as alternatives to traditional cervical precancer ablation and excision procedures. He is also leading a tobacco cessation intervention study aimed at supporting individuals living with HIV in their efforts to quit smoking. His research focuses on applying quantitative epidemiological methods to design, discover, and implement public health strategies that improve quality of life, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. Read More.
Christelle Urujeni, DGH Excellence Award Teaching Assistantship
Christelle is an aspiring public health practitioner and researcher from Rwanda. She earned her Bachelor of Science in biology from Oklahoma Christian University. Throughout her undergraduate studies, Christelle strived to engage in research to supplement her biology training, and secured an internship at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center where she designed a research project addressing racial and ethnic disparities in the occurrence of late-stage gastric cancer. This experience was deeply formative for Christelle, and reaffirmed her commitment to pursue a Master of Public Health in Global Health to further explore what can be done to address and combat the existing health disparities and inequities both in the U.S. and abroad. Although Christelle is looking to broaden her research interests, some of her existing interests include health disparities and inequities, health system strengthening, and addressing barriers to adequate care in underserved populations. Read more.
PhD in Pathobiology
Margaret Chi, Research Assistant, and UW Fellow for Academic Excellence
Margaret was born and raised in Seattle, Wash. She received her Bachelor of Arts and Science in chemistry and religious studies from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, where she learned to love interdisciplinary research. After graduation, Margaret spent a year studying the genomics of dengue virus in Dhulikhel, Nepal as part of a Fulbright research grant. Broadly, Margaret is interested in exploring the interface between disciplines and utilizing methodologies from multiple fields in order to pursue the same large-scale questions, which is part of the reason she chose the Pathobiology Graduate Program at the UW. Margaret's specific research interests include studying virology and the host-pathogen interactions which drive pathogenesis. Read more.
Maria Fernanda McCavitt-Malvido, Research Assistant, and UW Fellow for Academic Excellence
Maria received her Bachelor of Science from UC San Diego with a major in microbiology and a minor in global health. After graduating, she worked at a company in San Diego, supporting antibody development against neglected pathogens such as botulism and Ebola. Originally a Bay Area native, she relocated to San Francisco to work in Melanie Ott’s lab at the Gladstone Institutes at the University of California San Francisco. There, she worked on characterizing SARS-CoV-2 infection in a human airway organoid model and screening structural-based viral inhibitors. Maria’s research interests include host-pathogen interactions, and emerging and neglected diseases. Read more.
Yena Park, Research Assistant, and UW Fellow for Academic Excellence
Yena holds a Bachelor of Science in microbiology from the University of Washington, where her undergraduate research focused on bacterial pathogenicity and antibacterial agents. After graduating, she worked at a biotechnology startup, where she expanded her technical skills in a fast-paced industry setting, working on innovative projects aimed at developing therapeutic solutions. This experience affirmed her passion for research and heightened her interest in infectious disease and therapeutic discovery. She is particularly dedicated to advancing health outcomes in women’s and children’s health through rigorous, impactful research and am committed to fostering inclusivity and collaboration within the scientific community. Read more.
Quinn Peters, Research Assistant, Achievement Rewards for College Scientists (ARCS) Foundation Fellowship, UW Fellow for Academic Excellence, and UW Graduate Top Scholar
During her undergraduate studies at Seattle University, Quinn worked in the Whidbey Lab studying commensal mechanisms of protection in the vaginal microbiome. Under the mentorship of Dr. Chris Whidey, she learned how to use chemistry to tease apart complex biological processes and developed perseverance for failing forward in academic research. After she graduated with a Bachelor of Science in biochemistry in 2022, she worked as a research scientist in the Harrington Lab at Seattle Children’s Research Institute, studying maternal-fetal medicine. In addition to studying mechanisms of immune dysregulation in HIV-exposed uninfected infants, she was given the opportunity to pursue an independent project in which she developed a non-invasive self-sampling method for isolating immune cells in the female genital tract. This parlayed into a project that used this non-invasive sampling method to profile immune aging in the female genital tract. As a graduate student, Quinn hopes to continue studying mucosal immunology and host-microbe interactions in understudied groups. Read more.
Elizabeth Platin, Research Assistant, and UW Fellow for Academic Excellence
Liz was born and raised here in Seattle, and received her Bachelor of Science in molecular, cellular, and developmental biology with a minor in biological ethics from the University of Washington. During her undergraduate studies, she was an undergraduate research assistant in the lab of Dr. Georg Seelig at the UW for three years, where she worked on optimizing a Yeast-2-Hybrid protocol. After graduating, she went to complete a post-baccalaureate scholar program at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in the lab of Dr. M. Juliana McElrath. Her post-baccalaureate project focused on characterizing phenotypic similarities between antigen-specific B cells that produce HIV-1 neutralizing antibodies elicited by vaccine administration. Her research interests lie mainly in B cell and developmental immunology, virology, viral pathogenesis, and gene therapy. Read more.
Prerana Shrestha, Curci Foundation Two-Year Fellowship, Kenny Endowed Fellowship Recipient, and UW Fellow for Academic Excellence
Prerana is an international student from Kathmandu, Nepal, and started her journey in the U.S. approximately seven years ago to pursue her undergraduate degree in biochemistry at North Central College. After graduating, she worked in Dr. Karen Visick’s lab at Loyola University Chicago where she investigated the roles of fifty c-di-GMP modulating genes in controlling Vibrio fischeri motility. While these experiences laid a strong foundation for a career in research, Prerana yearned for work that would impact not just science but also people. In her search, she came across Dr. Jonathan Li’s translational research on reservoirs, pathogenesis and cure of HIV-1 at Brigham and Women’s Hospital where she worked for the past two years. Working with a brilliant team of scientists solidified her career goals of working in translational research, and prepared her for a graduate degree. Read more.
PhD in Global Health Metrics and Implementation Science
Md Koushik Ahmed, Provost PhD Fellowship, and DGH Excellence Award Teaching Assistantship
Koushik earned his Bachelor and Master of Arts in English and Master of Development Studies from the University of Dhaka, and a Master in Public Health in Global Health from Syracuse University in New York. Prior to joining the Implementation Science degree program, Koushik managed a collaborative mental health care service delivery and research program called Services for Afghan Survivors Impacted by Combat (SASIC), a joint initiative between Center for International Health, Upstate Medical University and Catholic Charities of Onondaga County, Syracuse, N.Y. His global health work experience includes contexts in several countries including Bangladesh, Lebanon, Ghana, Morocco and the United States and aimed to address some of global health’s most pressing challenges. His research interests include social determinants of health, infectious disease, refugees and migrant health, implementation science and a collaborative model for health care and service delivery. Read more.
Cynthia Pauline Aluoch Auma, Top Scholar Award Research Assistantship
Cynthia Pauline Aluoch Auma is a dedicated physician-researcher and rising scholar in global health, currently pursuing a Ph.D. degree in implementation science at the University of Washington. With a medical degree from Maseno University and Master of Public Health in Global Health earned as a Fogarty International Scholar at the University of Washington, Cynthia integrates a robust clinical background with rigorous public health training to address some of the most pressing challenges in global health. Her research focuses on advancing biomedical and behavioral interventions to mitigate the unique vulnerabilities faced by young African women in preventing HIV. As a senior medical officer working in public hospitals in Kenya, and later in roles as a study doctor, clinical research scientist, and study coordinator at the Kenya Medical Research Institute, Cynthia is enthusiastic about implementing and advancing HIV prevention research. Her contributions incudes leading efforts in the INSIGHT cohort and pharmacy-based PrEP studies, important initiatives aimed at advancing HIV prevention strategies for young women. Additionally, she has been involved in clinical trials evaluating the safety and efficacy of oral Islatravir as a once-monthly HIV PrEP option and molnupiravir for COVID-19 prophylaxis, reflecting her dedication to addressing critical global health challenges. Read more.
Samuel Mpinganjira, Provost PhD Fellowship, and Research Assistant with START
Sam is a doctoral student in the implementation science program in the Department of Global Health at the University of Washington. He completed his medical training in 2018 at the University of Malawi, College of Medicine (now called Kamuzu University of Health Sciences) and received a master's of vaccinology and drug development from the University of Siena, Italy in 2023. He worked at the WHO's Malawi Country Office as an immunization officer and epidemiologist, where he contributed to the Polio Outbreak Response, and the introduction and routinization of TCV, C-19, and malaria vaccines between 2022 and 2024. Prior to joining WHO, he worked as a study coordinator for a C-19 infection household-based study which also aimed at supporting the Blantyre district's C-19 response during the pandemic. His research includes implementation of evidence-based interventions against infectious diseases, mainly malaria, TB, C-19 and HIV. Sam hopes to build capacity in optimal implementation of evidence-based interventions (including new vaccine introduction) against infectious diseases, particularly amongst the vulnerable populations in LMIC's. Additionally, he is interested in vaccine clinical trials and conducting programmatic, economic, and impact evaluations to ensure evidence-based interventions are effectively contributing to change in the epidemiology of infectious diseases, and are cost effective. Read more.
Grace Soma, Provost PhD Fellowship, and Research Assistant with START
Grace Juan Soma is a doctoral student in the Global Health Metrics and Implementation Science program in the Department of Global Health at the University of Washington. A medical doctor originally from South Sudan, Grace brings extensive clinical, academic, and research expertise spanning East Africa and beyond. She earned her medical degree (MBChB) and a Master of Medicine (MMED) in Pediatrics and Child Health from the University of Nairobi, Kenya, coupled with an Master of Science in Tropical Pediatrics from the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, UK. In her most recent role, Grace participated in the prestigious NIH–Fogarty Global Health (LAUNCH) Fellowship as a postdoctoral research associate under the ACHIEVE consortium at the International Center for Child and Adolescent Health at Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., focusing on pediatric HIV research in Kenya. Grace’s research is driven by a passion for addressing the barriers to quality care for children living with HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa. Her focus lies in improving pediatric HIV testing services and exploring innovative and scalable solutions to improve test uptake and care delivery. She is particularly interested in integrating novel approaches such as saliva-based HIV tests for children, clinical algorithms and risk-screening tools tailored to pediatric care, and mobile and digital health technologies, including artificial intelligence, to enhance HIV test acceptance and delivery of services. Read more.
