Courtney Vaughn, under the direction of Aziz Sancar, M.D., Ph.D., successfully defended her dissertation on May 6, 2020 and received her PhD. The title of her dissertation is “Exploring the role of DNA damage, nucleotide excision repair, and circadian rhythm on cellular response to platinum-based drugs”
During her time as a GMB gradaute student, Courtney was awarded a T32 fellowship through the Genetics and Molecular Biology curriculum and a F30 fellowship through the NCI. She received a Scott Neil Schwirck fellowship and the Gertrude B Elion Mentored Medical Student Research Award. She was involved in the John B Graham Medical Student Research Society and the MD-PhD program where she worked closely with the Pediatric Hematology-Oncology Division.
As part of the MD-PhD program, Courtney will return to medical school here at UNC-CH.