The American Transplant Congress (ATC) has awarded Dr. Brian Ezekian, General Surgery Resident, and Qimeng Gao, third-year Duke-NUS medical student, ATC Young Investigator Awards for their excellent abstracts. This award recognizes young investigators for their outstanding work and helps to offset the expense to attend the ATC conference this June in Seattle, Washington.
Dr. Ezekian’s abstract was rated the #1 abstract for the conference, and as a result, he will give the opening plenary talk at the meeting. Dr. Ezekian’s abstract is titled “Carfilzomib and Belatacept Reduce DSA and Prolong Survival in a Highly Sensitized Rhesus Model of Kidney Transplantation.”
A visiting medical student from Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, Qimeng Gao works in the laboratory of Dr. Allan Kirk, Chair of Surgery. Qimeng received a Young Investigator Award for his abstract “The Role of CD46 in Early Islet Engraftment in a Dual Transplant Model.”
The ATC is the Joint Annual Meeting of the American Society of Transplant Surgeons and the American Society of Transplantation. Physicians, surgeons, scientists, nurses, organ procurement personnel, pharmacists, and other transplant professionals from around the world convene annually to exchange new scientific and clinical information relevant to solid organ and tissue transplantation.