Student Achievements
Biomedical Sciences Laker Wins the Ray Owen Poster Award
March 13, 2023
Marlee Busalacchi (Biomedical Sciences, M.H.S.) presented a collaborative project, and won the Ray Owen Poster Award, at the 2023 Midwinter Conference of Immunologists, located in Monterey, California.
The event featured experts sharing cutting-edge research as well as presentations from immunology labs around the world through posters. This year, over 100 posters were displayed, including GVSU’s own Renkema Lab. The Poster Award is named after Ray Owen, who discovered immune tolerance in the 1940s, which led to immunosuppression being used in organ transplantation.
The poster is titled “Microbial experience influences anti-tumor immunity”. This is a collaborative effort by Marlee Busalacchi, Nicholas Bunda, Hanna Groeber, Cody Morrison, Roland Nulph, Maci DeBoer, and Dr. Kristin Renkema. All participants are from the Biomedical Sciences program, at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. The team aims to investigate how exposure to microbes shapes the adaptive and innate immune system, as well as the immune response to cancer.
Marlee is extremely grateful to Dr. Renkema for her guidance and mentorship throughout the program. She would also like to express gratitude to the lab members whose work in the Renkema Lab contributed to the poster.
Congratulations to Marlee Busalacchi and the Renkema Lab for this distinguished achievement!