Abby Smith, a Boston native, returned to the city this summer after spending four years at Hamilton College studying Biochemistry and Molecular Biology while also playing ice hockey and lacrosse. As a member of the OrACORe team, Abby contributes to participant-facing projects, including CoMeT, KArAT, PIKASO, and TOPS. When Abby isn’t busy collecting samples from patient ACL reconstructions for PIKASO,…

Hailing from Korea, a Southern California Harvey-Mudd College graduate, and now working at OrACORe in Boston, first-year Paul Oh is our requisite world-traveler. In fact, Paul tells us that he has visited ten different countries, although interestingly has yet to set foot in Europe! Along this journey, Paul completed a joint BS degree in Biology and Chemistry, which he plans…

After spending four years in Charlottesville earning her BS in Biology, Maddie decided to move back to her home-state of Massachusetts, and her OrACORe colleagues could not be happier. Whether she is discussing her research on social determinants of health, helping to recruit TOPS participants, or leading a riveting journal club, we can always count on Maddie to bring something…

After graduating from Columbia University in May of 2024 with BAs in Biology and Computer Science, Ethan joined the OrACORe team in July 2024. His unique combination of degrees has proved useful in projects such as FraPol, OAPol, KArAT and TOPS – and we’ve quickly learned that Ethan is the man to go to if you need a process automated!…

Annie became so hooked on New England during her four years at Dartmouth College studying Biology and Philosophy that she decided to extend her stay! While Boston may be different from the small town of Hanover, NH, Annie has made herself at home at OrACORe working on projects like BriCC-PIKASO, KArAT, OAPol, TeMPO, and TOPS. Post-grad life has also reintroduced…

After graduating from Brown in May 2024 with a BS in neuroscience, Sasha wasted no time before beginning her stint with OrACORe that summer. Since then, Sasha has been invaluable in the advancement of many projects including AF-Obesity, INFORM, KArAT, MeTeOR, OAPol and TOPS, and has enjoyed getting to know her coworkers, faculty mentors, and study participants. Since moving to…

We would not have OrACORe without Dr. Katz. And we would not have Dr. Katz without Jeff – the young college graduate who took a leap of faith into the field of medicine. In hindsight, we can claim with certainty that Jeff made the right decision, but this was not always so obvious. In fact, Jeff describes his initial choice…

Post-Doctoral fellow Rey Zafarnejad was born in Iran and came to the United States at the age of 22 to pursue higher degrees in Industrial Engineering after graduating from the University of Tehran. She began her PhD at Purdue University in 2019, but followed her mentor to Pennsylvania State University in 2020, resulting in an MS in Industrial Engineering from…

Lauren Mitchell began her time working at OrACORe in the summer of 2022 after graduating from Tufts University with a Bachelor of Science in Community Health and Biology. Over her two years at OrACORe, Lauren spearheaded the start of recruitment for the KArAT study, contributed to MeTeOR, TeMPO, and FraPol, and was a key member of the social media team.…

Lily Waddell began working at OrACORe in the summer of 2022 after graduating from Dartmouth with a Bachelor of Arts in Biology. During her time at OrACORe, Lily spent her time leading both the CoMeT and PIKASO study and contributing to projects on BriCC, TeMPO, and ORBIT. Throughout her time in Boston, Lily volunteered with Read to a Child, YES,…