![\"Portrait](\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Shereen_Yassine-03052025-5843a.jpg\")
Shereen Yassine, a bioengineering senior, joined the research laboratory of Dr. Steven Haller and Dr. David Kennedy the summer after her freshman year.<\/p><\/div>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s one thing to be able to do research as an undergraduate, but it\u2019s another to have such a supportive environment,\u201d Yassine said. \u201cI was hands-on and involved right away.\u201d<\/p>\n
Undergraduate research has opened numerous doors for Yassine, now a bioengineering<\/a> senior who has co-published research in the peer-reviewed journal Cells<\/a> and presented her work at UToledo and at national conferences of the Biomedical Engineering Society in 2022 and the Society of Toxicology in 2024.<\/p>\n And there\u2019s more to come.<\/p>\n Yassine said she hopes to continue her research with the lab as a medical student at the College of Medicine and Life Sciences, where she\u2019s been looking forward to being a student since she began at UToledo with an eye on its early medical school pathway BACC2MD.<\/p>\n She recently received her acceptance.<\/p>\n \u201cUToledo has offered so much to me,\u201d Yassine said. \u201cI don\u2019t know why I\u2019d want to go anywhere else.\u201d<\/p>\n Yassine is engaged across campus and the community, having participated in two international trips through the UToledo chapter of Global Medical Brigades and regularly volunteering with the free Halim Clinic in Toledo. She\u2019s also preparing for a study abroad experience this summer, most likely in Lyon, France, to advance the interest in foreign languages that\u2019s motivating her to pursue minors in Arabic and French, as well as chemistry, and a certificate in Intercultural Competency.<\/p>\n She\u2019s come to be particularly invested in the undergraduate research community.<\/p>\n She and other undergraduate researchers are supported by an extensive research ecosystem at UToledo, which logged more than $72.2 million<\/a> in competitive external awards in fiscal year 2024 and in February was recognized with a prestigious R1 Classification<\/a> in the latest Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education.<\/p>\n In working with Haller and Kennedy, each an associate professor of medicine, Yassine contributes to an area of research excellence at the University. Among the environmental toxins the researchers consider is the microcystins released by the cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms that annually affect the western basin of Lake Erie.<\/p>\n Yassine, born and raised in Sylvania, is attuned to the significance of their research.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re doing work that\u2019s impactful on a regional level, but also these are toxins that exist all over the planet,\u201d she said. \u201cOur work also has impacts across the globe, really.\u201d<\/p>\n Yassine connected with the lab through the Office of Undergraduate Research\u2019s First Year Summer Research Experience, which funds students to pursue research and creative projects during the summer following their first year on campus.<\/p>\n She\u2019s found a supportive community there, eager to engage her in hands-on research and offer above-and-beyond support with research proposals and scholarship applications. She’s remained active in the lab, including the year she spent working on the research and development of new implants and surgical instruments for hip replacements and reconstruction surgery at Johnson & Johnson in Warsaw, Indiana, through the integrated cooperative education program<\/a> at the College of Engineering.<\/p>\n \u201cAs biomedical researchers, one of our most important jobs is mentoring the next generation of scientists,\u201d Haller said. \u201cShereen is intelligent, highly motivated and embodies our philosophy of team-based science. It has been a pleasure working with her and we look forward to watching her career flourish as an aspiring physician-scientist.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Shereen Yassine is a bioengineering senior whose undergraduate research has been published in a peer-reviewed journal and presented at national conferences.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":908,"featured_media":91782,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,34,36,38,1,71,7],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91781"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/908"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91781"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":91793,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91781\/revisions\/91793"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Portrait](\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Shereen_Yassine-03052025-5843a-150x150.jpg\")
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