CANCELED: 11th Annual Pediatrics Research Retreat

SESSION ONE
08:10AM - 08:35AM
Literacy and Health: Evidence to Inform Maternal and Child Health - Lee Sanders, MD, MPH (Faculty, General Pediatrics)
-How does literacy influence health?
-What are the essential features of a “health-literate” system of care?

08:35AM - 08:50AM
Development of a hematopoietic stem cell-based therapy for Gaucher disease - Marc Gastou, PhD (Postdoc, Medical Genetics)
-Developing a safe and effective one-time therapy for Gaucher patients?
-Establish murine models of Gaucher disease amenable to human cell transplantation
-Mechanisms underlying the association of mutations found Gaucher disease and increased of risk for Parkinson disease.

08:50AM - 09:15AM
Learning New Tricks From Cone Snails: An Insulin Story - Danny Chou, PhD (Faculty, Endocrinology)
- How can we help people with diabetes to achieve optimal blood glucose control with minimal efforts?

KEYNOTE
09:15AM - 10:15AM
From Cognition to Cancer: Myelin Plasticity in Health and Disease - Michelle Monje, MD, PhD (Faculty, Neurology)
Neuronal activity regulates the proliferation and differentiation of oligodendrocyte precursor cells during development and as an ongoing mechanism of neural adaptation. In the healthy brain, this results in activity-regulated plasticity of myelin structure and consequent modulation of neural circuit function that contributes to attention, learning and memory. The robust influence of neuronal activity on normal oligodendroglial precursor cells, a putative cellular origins of pediatric high-grade gliomas, suggests that dysregulated or “hijacked” mechanisms of myelin plasticity might similarly promote proliferation in this devastating group of childhood brain cancers. Concordantly, neuronal activity drives glioma progression through activity-regulated secreted growth factors and through direct electrical signaling between neurons and gloom cells that structurally and electrically integrate into neural circuits. Targeting neuron-glioma interactions represents an important therapeutic target in glial malignancies of childhood.

SESSION TWO
11:15AM - 11:40AM
Cracking the Code on the Complication of Pancreatitis Due to the Anti-Leukemic Drug Asparaginase - Sohail Husain, MD (Faculty, Gastroenterology)
- What drives the pancreas to become inflamed with varying triggers, and, conversely, what protects the protect from becoming inflamed in most people?
- What are the cues that trigger the pancreas, and, on a broader level, organs, to recover and regenerate after injury?
- How can we harness this information to prevent organ inflammation and promote recovery and regeneration?

11:40AM - 11:55AM
Selection of Adeno-Associated Virus Vectors Targeting the Central Nervous System Using an In Vitro Model of Human Blood-Brain Barrier - Ren Song, PhD (Postdoc, Human Gene Therapy)
- Selection of Adeno-associated Virus Vectors Targeting the Central Nervous System Using an in vitro Model of Human Blood-brain Barrier
- Can we create and isolate rAAV vectors with enhanced ability to penetrate the human BBB and systematically deliver gene therapy to the CNS?
- Will these rAAV vectors also be able to transduce specific cell types in the CNS so that gene therapy can be targeted to specific diseases?

11:55AM - 12:10PM
The Effect of Stenosis Formation and Intimal Thickening on Tissue Engineered Vascular Graft Hemodynamic - Stephanie Lindsey, PhD (Postdoc, Pediatric Cardiology)

• What is the role that hemodynamics plays in scaffold degradation and neovessel formation?
• How does the local mechanical environment influence the body's immune response or the accumulation of monocytes?

12:10PM - 12:35PM
Coaching Learners to Enhance Performance - Becky Blankenburg, MD, MPH & Carrie Rassbach, MD, MAEd (Faculty, Hospital Medicine)
- How can coaching be used to optimize learner performance?
- What are the impacts of coaching on learners and faculty?

SESSION THREE
01:15PM - 01:30PM
Polygenic Architecture of Computationally Derived Aortic Diameter Predicts the Risk for Aortic Aneurysm and Dissection - Catherine Tcheandjieu, PhD (Postdoc, Pediatric Cardiology)
- How can we combine machine learning and genomics to better understand the genetic architecture heart anatomy, predict the risk of aortic disease, and better understand which risk factors are causal for disease

01:30PM - 01:55PM
Developmental Heterogeneity of Pulmonary Endothelial Cells at Single Cell Resolution: Implications for Lung Development, Injury, and Repair
Cristina Alvira, MD (Faculty, Critical Care Medicine)

01:55PM - 02:10PM Defining the Neointima in an Inflammation Driven Model of Pulmonary Hypertension - Lea Steffes, MD (Fellow, Pediatric Pulmonology)
-What cellular signals drive the neointimal formation and proliferation seen in pulmonary vascular disease?
-Is the transcriptomic signature of a neointimal cell different from that of their smooth muscle cell progenitors? 

02:10PM - 02:35PM
Listen to Your Mother: A Randomized Clinical Trial of Maternal Speech Exposure on Structural Brain Connectivity in Preterm Newborns - Katherine Travis, PhD (Faculty, Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrics)
- How does brain development contribute to language learning in infants and young children?
- How do early life experiences contribute to brain development and neurocognitive outcomes in children?

02:35PM - 3:00PM
Overcoming Barriers to Immunotherapy for Pediatric Solid Tumors - Robbie Majzner, MD ( Faculty, Hematology/Oncology)
- The immune response in pediatric cancer is very different than in adult malignancies - how can we manipulate the immune system of children to defeat pediatric cancers?
- CAR T cells rely on synthetic receptors that were generated to mimic the natural T cell receptor but behave very differently – how can we generate receptors that are well suited for killing tumors but sparing normal tissues.

KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Michelle Monje, MD, PhD

Michelle Monje, MD, PhD, is a physician-scientist studying the molecular and cellular mechanisms of postnatal neurodevelopment and neuroplasticity at the intersection of neuroscience and pediatric brain tumor biology. Her scientific training is in the field of neural development, with an emphasis on glial biology and cell signaling. Her research program focuses on gliomas such as glioblastoma and diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) and the microenvironmental determinants of normal and malignant neural precursor cell behavior. Microglial influences on normal neural precursor cell function and the impact of microglial neuroinflammation following cancer therapies on cellular mechanisms of neuroplasticity and brain homeostasis is one area of deep focus (Monje et al, 2002, Nature Medicine, Monje et al, 2003, Science, Monje et al, 2007, Annals of Neurology, Gibson et al., 2019 Cell; Geraghty et al, 2019 Neuron). The regulation of normal and malignant glial cells by neuronal activity is another area of particular emphasis (Gibson et al., 2014, Science; Venkatesh et al., 2015, Cell; Geraghty et al, 2019 Neuron) and her research group is working to decipher and therapeutically target the molecular mechanisms that underlie neuronal interactions with gliomas (Venkatesh et al, 2017, Nature; Venkatesh et al., 2019 Nature). In addition to these studies of mature neurons in the glioma microenvironment, we also study the influences of neural precursor cells on glioma (Qin et al., 2017, Cell). Together with these basic studies, her research program executes preclinical studies of novel therapeutics for high-grade gliomas (Grasso et al, 2015, Nature Medicine; Nagaraja et al, 2017, Cancer Cell; Mount et al, 2018 Nature Medicine; Lin et al, 2019 Science Translational Medicine) in order to translate new therapies to the clinic for glial cancers.   Stanford CAP Profile

Abstract Guidelines

We recommend that you prepare your abstract in a word processing application and then paste each component into the corresponding online section. Your abstract should not exceed 500 words. An abstract submission is considered a commitment to attend the retreat and present, if accepted.

Abstract decisions will be sent to the primary author in February 2020. All abstracts will undergo a review process by the Research Retreat Executive Committee reviewers. All abstracts should include a trainee as the primary author. The trainee categories in Pediatrics include: Instructors, Fellows, Residents, Postdocs, and Students.

Oral Presentations
Five trainees will be selected to present an oral presentation as part of the main agenda. Oral presentations include a short 10 minute overview of the research and 5 minutes for Q&A.Oral abstract and poster submissions are due by 5pm on January 15, 2020.

Poster Presentations
Poster presenters are expected to be available to discuss their research with session attendees during the poster sessions.

Oral abstract and poster submissions are due by January 15, 2020.