Lab Members

Vinay Puduvalli, M.D.
Professor and Chair, Neuro-Oncology
Principal Investigator

Dr. Puduvalli’s clinical efforts are directed toward developing novel therapies for patients with primary brain tumors, specifically malignant gliomas. His clinical and laboratory research interests focus on the fields of epigenetics and apoptosis.

Jiyong Liang, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor

Dr. Liang has a background in signal transduction, targeted therapies and the immunology of gliomas. He is focused on delineating the immune profile of gliomas and using ex vivo organotypic glioma slices to understand glioma biology and therapy responses.

Pratibha Sharma, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor

Dr. Sharma’s research is on the role of energy metabolism in gliomas, with a focus specifically on the tumor-specific dependence of gliomas on nicotinamide phosphoribosyltransferase (NAMPT), the rate limiting step in nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) metabolism, using various glioma models.

Jihong Xu, M.D.
Senior Research Scientist
Lab Manager

Dr. Xu studies the role of heat shock proteins in gliomas using patient derived glioma cells, intracranial glioma mouse models and ex vivo human glioma tissue. She also participates in projects on novel drug development.

Xiaohua Chen, Ph.D.
Senior Research Scientist

Dr. Chen has a strong background in signal transduction. Her work focuses on drug development and treatment resistance research in gliomas using a combination of molecular and cell biology techniques, including CRISPR-based synthetic lethality.

Longfei Huo, Ph.D.
Research Scientist

Dr. Huo's background is in targeted therapies and drug development. His research is focused on the study of protein arginine methylation and assessment of organotypic slice cultures as a model for drug testing in gliomas.

Harsha Shankar Rao Sugur, Ph.D.
Postdoctoral Fellow

Dr. Sugur’s research is focused on synergistic drug actions and mechanisms for targeting gliomas. She takes a combination approach, leveraging patient-derived glioma spheroid cultures, ex vivo organotypic slices and animal models to explore the interaction of new therapeutic candidates with standard-of-care treatments.

Chetna Wathoo, M.D.
Associate Director, Research Planning & Development
Clinical Research & Data Director, PROACTIVE & NeuroHealth Initiative (NHI) Programs

Dr. Wathoo leads the PROACTIVE Program (Prospective Assessment of Correlative Biomarkers in Nervous System and Adnexal Tumor Patients and Central Nervous System Tumor Analysis Stream for Comprehensive Assessment). Through the PROACTIVE-NeuroOncology Lab, her team conducts cutting-edge clinical and translational research that integrates patient data, biospecimens and biomarker analysis to advance understanding and treatment of nervous system and adnexal tumors, with a focus on primary brain tumors. Their work bridges clinical care and laboratory science, fostering collaborative studies that drive innovation in glioma biology, treatment response and therapeutic development.

Gregory Buchold, Ph.D.
Senior Research Project Manager

Dr. Buchold contributes to the strategic and scientific objectives of the lab by providing valuable insights into research project development, synthesizing information from shared data and assisting in the preparation of presentations and related communications. Additionally, he facilitates academic engagement by coordinating seminars, lectureships and essential grant-related initiatives. He supports departmental internal and inter-institutional programmatic efforts (Cancer Center Support Grant, STRIDE-supported NeuroHealth Initiative, Cancer Neuroscience Program, Brain Tumor Center, GBM Break Through Cancer Consortium, and the McCain-Bayh Consortium). He also assists the finance team with post-award fiscal oversight of grants and endowments, annual reporting and philanthropic donor stewardship.