J. Crayton Pruitt Family Department of Biomedical Engineering

UF Diabetes Institute

Phelps Lab Members

Ed Phelps, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
J. Crayton Pruitt Family Department of Biomedical Engineering
Position available!
Laboratory Manager
Fixer, organizer extraordinaire and experimentalist
Sandra Ferreira, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow
Role of the neurotransmitter GABA on islet hormone secretion
Alexandra Cuaycal, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow
(joint w/ Mathews Lab)
Islet immune interface in living pancreas tissue slices
Mollie Huber, Ph.D.
Research Scientist
(joint w/ Mathews and Atkinson Labs)
Live human pancreas tissue slices as a platform for investigating immunopathological processes of type 1 diabetes
Adrienne Widener
Ph.D. Student
Granular hydrogel materials as extracellular microenvironments
Charles Lazimi
Ph.D. Student
Dynamic real-time sensing of pancreatic islet physiology
Austin Stis
Ph.D. Student
Mechanisms of islet GABA secretion
Cameron Manson
Ph.D. Student
Engineering local immune tolerance for beta cell replacement in type 1 diabetes
Aliyah Tate
Ph.D. Student
Engineering immune cell – beta cell interactions
Chris Spencer
Ph.D. Student
Pumin Sintara
Ph.D. Student
Dylan Smurlick
M.S. Student
Abilene Roberts
Undergraduate
Leigh Baratta
Undergraduate
Arabella Readey
Undergraduate
Collin Klaus
Undergraduate
Grace Koch
Undergraduate
Siri Yarrapatni
Undergraduate
Ananya Ramanand
Undergraduate
Christian Gomez
Undergraduate

Lab Alumni

Ph.D. Students

  • Walker Hagan, Scientist II – NMJ Team Lead, Hesperos, Inc.
  • Matthew Becker, Postdoctoral Fellow, Weaver Lab, Arizona State University
  • Jorge Santini-González, recent graduate
  • Mollie Huber, Postdoctoral Fellow, Kulkarni Lab, Joslin Diabetes Center, Harvard Medical School
  • Adrienne Widener, Postdoctoral Fellow, Russ Lab, University of Florida Diabetes Institute

Medical Fellows

  • Kendra Sylvester-Armstrong, M.D., private practice South Florida
  • Callie Reeder, M.D., University of Tennessee Medical Center

Masters Students

  • Jennifer Simonovich – University of Florida, BME Ph.D. Program
  • Robert Dolan – Engineer at U.S. Food and Drug Administration
  • Sushain Kaul – University of Florida, APK PhD Program

Undergraduates

  • Yarelis Gonzales Vargas, BME PhD Program, Georgia Institute of Technology
  • Mallika Bhatta, Medical Honors Program (joint BS, MD), University of Florida
  • Natalia Vallenilla, Clinical Specialist, Electrophysiology at Abbott
  • Kevin Ling, BME PhD Program, University of Rochester
  • Shabeen Raza, Technical Development Program Engineer at Edwards Lifesciences
  • Rebecca Erwin, Hydrogen Shot Fellow at DOE
  • Maryum Salim, Commissioning, Qualification, and Validation Engineer at Jacobs
  • Caroline Lesher, M.S.Program in Biomedical Engineering, University of Florida
  • Veronica Bubay, recent graduate, B.S. Biomedical Engineering, University of South Carolina
  • Conor Given, recent graduate, B.S. Biomedical Engineering, University of Florida