CPIN Trainee News

Congratulations to CPIN student member Madison Walker (Institute of Medical Science, Dr. Michael Cusimano) on recently completing the CPIN requirements and graduating from her MSc program.

Madison's work focused on the effect of recreational cannabis legalization and COVID-19 on rates of injury.

Madison was an executive member of the CPIN Undergraduate Mentorship Program for two years and was also a Volunteer Leader at CPIN Research Days. She was highly involved in student leadership initiatives through the St. Michael's Hospital Research Student Association (SRSA), in the roles of Director of Equity and subsequently Vice Chair.

She was in the inaugural cohort of the Toronto Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research Consortium (TC3) Fellows and was also awarded an Ontario Graduate Scholarship.

Madison is currently a first-year medical student at McMaster University.

Congratulations to CPIN student member Jiwon Lee (Institute of Medical Science, Dr. Margaret Hahn) on recently completing the CPIN requirements and graduating from her MSc program.

Jiwon’s research with Drs. Hahn and Agarwal focused on cardiometabolic risk of patients with psychosis spectrum disorders. Specifically, her MSc thesis examined transcriptomic and metabolomic signatures of metabolic dysfunction in antipsychotic-naïve patients. The findings are now being prepared as first-author manuscripts for publication. Jiwon also has a shared first-author publication and co-authored two publications.

During her MSc, Jiwon was awarded the Ontario Graduate Scholarship, Dr. LG Rao/Industrial Partners Graduate Student Award, and Hilda and William Courtney Clayton Paediatric Research Fund Award.

Outside of research, Jiwon mentored undergraduate students and incoming graduate students through CPIN and the Institute of Medical Science. She has also been involved with community advocacy work related to sexual violence and mental health.

Jiwon is currently a first-year medical student at University of Toronto.

Congratulations to CPIN Postdoctoral Fellow Joe Steinman (Department of Physiology, Dr. Zhong-Ping Feng) on completing his postdoc.

Joe Steinman’s research interests included development and application of vascular imaging technologies to assess vascular remodeling in response to brain injury and its effect on blood flow and brain function. During his postdoc, Joe’s research encompassed vascular remodeling in neonatal brain injury, and use of video technologies for measuring blood pressure and assessing cardiovascular health.

Joe has conducted medical research at U of T since 2010, completing his MSc and PhD in Medical Biophysics (2013 and 2019 respectively) and his postdoc in Physiology in July 2022. During this time, he was a first author or co-author on 12 peer-reviewed publications and numerous conference presentations and abstracts. He was heavily involved in the CPIN community as a mentor, Workshop Coordinator, and Program Director for the CPIN Mentorship Program; Graduate Student/Postdoc lead for four CPIN Research Days (2018-2021); and judge and speaker at the Toronto Brain Bee.

Currently, Joe is in his first year of medical school at McMaster and hopes to build on his background in research for a career as a clinician scientist.