sop

I developed a deep-stated passion towards the discipline of Health and Biology. I always used to collect herbs and examine them with my microscope which was the best gift in my childhood. Since I was 7-8 years old I always enjoyed to go to medicinal herb stores with my mother and was fascinated by the various impacts that different herbs have on human’s health and since then I’ve been always combining them and giving them to relatives with specific problems such as blood pressure or insomnia. Even now I have dozens of different herbs at my apartment and serve them to my guest based on their health condition.

Through my passion to biological sciences, I chose the field of biology and took the university entrance exam which is held once a year throughout the country and got admitted to University of Guilan one of the best state universities of Iran and received full scholarship for my whole study. During my 4-year degree, i participated in many workshops and internships even if they were held in different cities to achieve a more profound knowledge about the field I’m studying at.

After I got my bachelors degree, due to my interest to research the good relationship I established with the laboratory staff and the faculty of the university, I decided to participate in the university entrance exam for a Masters degree and succeeded to get admitted at the same university in the field of cellular and molecular Biology under supervision of Prof. Farhad Mashayekhi who was also my professor during my undergrad. I participated in his lab research group which focused mainly on genes and polymorphisms involved in different types of Cancer including Breast and Ovarian Cancer. My thesis was about the association of OX40L gene polymorphisms in Breast cancer in Iran which included 123 men and women. The study showed a significant association between the OX40L gene Polymorphism with breast Cancer. Having Investigating these studies, I managed to publish a paper regarding the impact of OX40L gene polymorphism in Breast Cancer Development.

During my research and through the workshops I’ve attended, I gained valuable experiences such as Nucleic acid extraction, amplification and characterization, Epigenetics, Molecular Cloning and Expression systems, Cell Culture and cytometry, Protein Analysis with ELISA, Western Blotting, immunofluorescence, HPLC and other techniques. Besides laboratory techniques and academic skills, diligence and patience was one of the key factors which helped me to overcome problems due to the sanctions like difficulties in supplying many of the lab supplements and restricted access to many of the websites and articles. Teamwork was another aspect which contributed to a friendly environment during these years and made the lab my second home.

Because of the limited facilities in Iran especially in fields of Pharmaceutical sciences and restricted access to research materials and information resources, I moved to the United States in 2018 which made a gap between my research and application for PhD. I tried to take advantage of this gap and worked on my English language skills for my TOEFL and also studied for the Molecular Technologist certification which is awarded by the American society of clinical pathology to get a deeper understanding about other molecular techniques that we didn’t use in our university such as tissue typing, detection of inherited diseases and identification of microorganisms, Human Identification and many other skills.

During my research Experience, especially my research on Immune system genes involved in cancer, I learned a lot about signaling pathways in the cell, antigens and antibodies involved in different types of cancer as well as cell responses to different antigens. This knowledge lead to the decision to make the most of this experience. One of the main mechanisms of drugs is to specify the target cells and after recognizing them, enhancing the needed pathways in the cell in order to improve the drug efficacy by efficient drug metabolism, distribution and absorption.

Information about genetics and epigenetics makes it even easier to study how mutations affect the drug metabolism by means such as activating tumor suppressor genes or deactivating Oncogenes. One of my favorite fields of research is affecting nucleic acids expressions in disease therapeutics but I am always open to various research areas.

After Scrutiny about the university’s research areas and the research interests of the faculty I found this school the best place to gain the needed knowledge and experience to pursue my goals to investigate methods to develop medicine and therapeutic methods with the most efficiency, lowest cost and greatest impact.