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Shariwa Oke is a doctoral candidate, working with Dr. Laura Bellows. She received her undergraduate degrees in Physiology and Nutrition at the University of Arizona and her MS in Biomedical Visualization from the University of Illinois at Chicago where she developed a mobile app-based intervention to mediate patient-provider interactions surrounding obesity diagnoses. She then worked at the University of Chicago creating scientific visualizations and developing a tobacco cessation curriculum for public health research.
Shariwa’s current

Savita Sastry is a Ph.D. candidate in the Division of Nutritional Sciences, mentored by Dr. Tolunay Aydemir. Her research integrates experimental and computational approaches to uncover how zinc deficiency reshapes spatial host–microbe–nutrient interactions in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Combining multi-omics analyses, region-specific murine models, and ex vivo organoid systems, she investigates how zinc availability influences microbial function, intestinal barrier integrity, and tissue regeneration. Savita also develops computational pipelines to translate murine genomics and metagenomics insights

Sarah Hess is an Extension Associate with the Food and Nutrition Education in Communities (FNEC) group and the Regional Coordinator for the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP) at Cornell University. In this role, she provides leadership and support to EFNEP staff, facilitates trainings, and contributes expertise in curriculum development and social media communication. Prior to her work at Cornell, Sarah led policy, systems, and environmental change initiatives in school wellness and delivered direct

Victoria completed her undergraduate studies in Nutrition and Dietetics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She went on to attain her Master’s of Public Health in Nutrition at the University of Michigan, where she also completed her dietetic internship. While at Michigan, Victoria contributed to a study examining how coparenting relationships influence children’s home food environments and anthropometrics. Her research interests focus onculinary medicine, food security, and maternal and child nutrition, with a long-term goal of

Xiaotong (Lindsey) Fei is a second-year master’s student in Nutritional Sciences at Cornell University. She is conducting research in Dr. Kimberly O’Brien’s lab, focusing on the validation of a new database for heme iron calculation and the investigation of associations between dietary heme iron intake and biomarkers of iron status across different populations. After completing her master’s research at Cornell, she plans to pursue a Dietetic Internship and become a Registered Dietitian, with a particular

Valeria Savtyreva is a Master’s student in the Division of Nutritional Sciences on the Dietetics track. She earned her Bachelor of Science in Nutritional Science, with a minor in Biological Science, from Rutgers University. In 2020, she began working at a bariatric practice, an experience that sparked her interest in the relationship between nutrition and metabolic health. As an undergraduate, Valeria conducted research on the connections between the gut microbiome, metabolism, and women’s health. At