• Sara Sharifpoor, PhD – Director, Office of  Research & Health Science Education, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto
• Jason De Melo, PhD – Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biochemistry, University of Toronto
• Tristan Woo, MSc – Research Strategy Development Specialist, Strategic Research Initiatives Development (StRIDe), University Health Network
• Arghavan (Ari) Ashouri, PhD – Research Grants Officer, University Health Network

This event is free and open to everyone! Note – this panel will be recorded and the recording will be accessible by UHN trainees, postdocs, and staff.

Panelist Bios

Dr. Sara Sharifpoor

• Dr. Sara Sharifpoor is a member of the senior administrative leaders for the Temerty Faculty of Medicine. As the Director for the office of Research and Health Science Education at Temerty Medicine at the University of Toronto, Sara’s portfolio covers all administrative matters pertaining to research (pre- and post-award management, research development, and operations including core facilities), and educational programs in health sciences from curriculum development to award administration and student services. After completing her PhD in Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto in 2011, Sara was offered a Research associate and Lab manager position where in addition to lab operations, she learned all the pre- and post-award administration for research funding opportunities along with financial and HR policies for the University. This experience led to her moving into a departmental level management role as the Director for Research Operations for the Donnelly Centre, where she managed the Centre’s Research programs and initiatives, facilities operations and all relevant financials and HR for the department. In her current role in the decanal office, Sara has administrative oversight on research operations and initiatives, and the health science educational programs in Temerty Medicine. Her role ensures sufficient administrative support is provided to all research programs and graduate health science trainees within the division. Her experience working in the lab as a graduate student combined with training in university policies, has been key to guiding the administrative policies and operations for research and health science education.

Dr. Jason De Melo

• Dr. De Melo (he/him) joined the Department of Biochemistry in August 2024 as an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream. Dr. De Melo joined the department from McMaster University where he was an Assistant Professor in the School of Nursing, teaching biochemistry, metabolism, and pathophysiology. Dr. De Melo’s career has provided him with extensive teaching, research, and writing experiences. His graduate studies focused on protein-protein interactions and the regulation of the tumour suppressor PTEN. After obtaining his Ph.D. from McMaster in 2014, he continued his training at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre as a postdoctoral researcher, where his research focused on the post-translational regulation of the MYC protein. During this time he developed and taught a laboratory course on CRISPR gene editing, taught research methodology in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto, and led the development of a new training program for graduate students and postdoctoral researchers at UHN. Before returning to academia as an Assistant Professor, Dr. De Melo was a medical copywriter at Klick Health where he helped develop educational content on clinical trials and newly approved therapeutics for health care professionals.

Tristan Woo

• Bio coming soon!

Dr. Arghavan (Ari) Ashouri

• Ari holds a Masters degree in Molecular Biology and a PhD in Medical Science / Bioinformatics from University of Gothenburg, Sweden. She was a Postdoctoral Researcher at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, UHN from 2022 – 2024. Ari is currently working as a Research Grants Officer at UHN.