The Team

Dr. Patel received his MD and completed his neurosurgery residency at WashU Medicine. After residency, Dr. Patel  completed a post-doctoral fellowship in translational brain tumor research under Dr. Albert H. Kim at WashU Medicine. He was then named the 2022-2023 American Association of Neurological Surgeons Van Wagenen Fellow, focusing on tumor epigenetics with Dr. Felix Sahm at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg. Following a skull base neurosurgery fellowship at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, he joined the Department of Neurosurgery at WashU Medicine as an Assistant Professor.

Sangami Pugazenthi is a fourth year medical student and aspiring neurosurgeon-scientist, who completed her undergraduate training at Vanderbilt University before starting medical school at WashU Medicine. She has co-authored numerous publications and has several ongoing projects with Dr. Patel. Together they are focused on investigating meningioma, pituitary adenoma, and schwannoma molecular pathophysiology using systems biology techniques including whole exome sequencing, methylation array analysis and single cell RNA sequencing. Her expertise encompasses both traditional wet-bench techniques (cell culture, RNAi epistasis, QPCR, etc.) and advanced dry-lab computational analysis methods using programming languages like R and python.

Shree Pari is a first-year medical student and an aspiring neurosurgeon-scientist at WashU Medicine. He completed his undergraduate studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he studied chronological and biological aging through predictive methylation modeling. During his gap years in industry, he helped develop tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) therapy using air-liquid interface technology. With Dr. Patel, Shree is interested in leveraging 3D cell cultures and bioinformatic tools to study the molecular pathophysiology of skull-base tumors, including meningiomas, pituitary adenomas, and schwannomas. His skillset includes bioinformatics analysis (scRNA-seq, TCR sequencing, predictive modeling, etc.) and traditional wet lab techniques (cell culture, flow cytometry, organoid culture, etc.).

Originally from Mexico and raised in Missouri, Markus Anzaldua-Campos is a first-year medical student at WashU Medicine. During his undergraduate education at Harvard, he trained in the labs of Dr. Gavin Dunn and Dr. Albert H. Kim. As an aspiring neurosurgeon-scientist, he is interested in studying brain tumor immunology, developing effective immunotherapies, and characterizing brain tumor molecular profiles through bioinformatic approaches. His skills are immunology-focused wet-bench methods (cell culture, flow cytometry, mouse immune cell isolations, etc.) and computational analysis of scRNA-seq data.

Ziyan Zhang is a Washington University in St. Louis graduate who grew up in Shanghai, China before moving to the U.S. He has diverse experiences in both wet-lab research and patient-facing clinical roles. Besides being a member of the Patel lab, he also works as a neurosurgery clinical research coordinator with Dr. Patel and Dr. Albert H. Kim. An aspiring physician-scientist, Ziyan is passionate about developing personalized immunotherapies, studying the brain tumor microenvironment, and advancing health equity. His skill set includes in vivo stereotaxic mouse surgeries, cell culture, and clinical coordination.

Bailee completed her undergraduate degree in psychology at Mizzou, during which time she joined a neuroscience and learning lab. This sparked her interested in the brain which she has been following since. She joined the Patel lab as a research technician soon after moving to St. Louis with her fiancé and their three fur babies! In her free time Bailee likes to oil paint, read, and go on long walks.