Inspiring Minds is a campus-wide partnership between Western Research, the School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies, the Writing Support Centre, Western Libraries, Student Experience, and Western's 11 faculties.
Inspiring Minds seeks to broaden awareness and impact of graduate student research, while enhancing transferrable skills. Being able to communicate your research to broad, interdisciplinary and lay audiences -- both inside and outside academia -- is becoming an increasingly important skill for scholars of all levels.
Inspiring Minds seeks to help graduate students enhance this skill.
This non-competitive showcase highlights work by Master's and Doctoral students from all 11 of Western's faculties and schools.
The following series highlights all submissions received from the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry.Submissions from 2025
Friend or foe? The immune system. Friend or foe? Stem cells., Nouran N. Al-Banaa
How do our brains process and perceive audiovisual information?, Mohammed Al-youzbaki
Improving Mobility in Adults with Spina Bifida, Ella S. Baker Lehnen
Flipping the Script on Huntington's Disease, Teija M I Bily
I’m listening; identifying cell communication that can relieve pain in osteoarthritis, Garth Blackler, Cheryle Séguin, and C Thomas G Appleton
Understanding the patterns of genetic engineering, Tyler S. Browne
Rewiring Recovery: Supporting Mental Health After Stroke, Michelle Chow
Serotonin Tunes Up Song Sparrow Attention to Novel Songs, Abeni R.S. Flynn
Invisible Stimulus: How Magnetic Fields Interact with the Human Body, Eleonore Fresnel
Smiles Without Borders: What Makes it Difficult for Newcomers to See a Dentist?, Giuliana Gadoni Giovanni Borges
A step towards accuracy in prostate cancer therapy, Shahin Ghaseminejad, Ting Yim Lee, and Glenn Bauman
Safety of Antidepressants for Aging Kidneys, Atefeh Jafari
Reading the Room: Understanding Embryo Quality through MicroRNA Clues, Louisa Lewicki
Bridging the Gap: Insulin Insights in Older Adults with Diabetes and CKD, Emma Loeschnik
Unraveling Cellular Crosstalk in Metastatic Cancers, Hiulin Niu
Lipoprotein(a) Synthesis and Secretion, Simon Ofiara
Mapping molecular changes in neurodegenerative disease brain tissue, Nikita Ollen-Bittle
How excited is your brain for pain?: Combined TMS-EEG during acute muscle pain, Thu Ngoc Minh Pham
Illuminating the Neural Mechanisms of Impulsivity and Negative Emotions, Sophia M H Robinson
Sensing Health with Light, Lee Sikstrom
Identification and evaluation of probiotic candidates in a 3D Bioprinted foreskin model for penile sexual health., Hnryroger Ssemunywa Mr.
The Nose Knows: How Resident Nasal Microbes Shape Our Viral Fate, Zeynep Gunes Tepe Demir, Jessica Prodger, and Ryan Troyer
A Viral Trick to Protect the Diabetic Heart, Sahanah Thirukumar
Answers Begin with Questions, Bavina F. Thirunavuakarsu
MicroRNAs: The Future Of In Vitro Fertilization, Allison Tse
Capturing the Genomic Language of Cancer Using Artificial Intelligence, Alfredo Varela-Vega
Mr., Ruixuan Xue
NO TITLE, Ruixuan Xue
The Primary Care Diabetes Support Program: Evaluating Care for Socially Complex Patients with Diabetes, Gillian F. Young
Submissions from 2024
Over Expression of GATA2 in Heart Macrophage Induce Development of Heart Disease, Amena Aktar
Investigation of a Novel Rheumatoid Arthritis Specific Treatment in Arthritic Mice, Gabrielle Buckley, Jaspreet Kaur, Ewa Cairns, and Lillian Barra
Running toward healthy hearts: maternal exercise reduces congenital heart disease, Iana Bulavko
Exploring Causal Cognition in Large Language Models, Vicky Chang
Feedback Focused: Alternative Assessments in Graduate Anatomy Education, Emily L. Dietrich and Sean C. McWatt
Role of Kindlin 2 in Cutaneous Squamous Carcinoma Cells, Anamika Dutta
Can we improve walking abilities with music and brain stimulation?, Marina Emerick
Are Oral Antibiotics Behind the Alarming Rise in Childhood Kidney Stones?, Riley C. Fidler
The Emotional Connection between Music and Autobiographical Memory in Older Adults with and without Mild Cognitive Impairment, Caitlin Fitzpatrick
Exploring the Impact of Powerline Magnetic Fields on Our Peripheral Nervous System, Eleonore Fresnel
Understanding the association between adolescent nicotine exposure and major depressive disorder at the neurocircuitry level, Robin Harrison
Getting to the fight: transport vehicles for far-forward surgery, Winston Hou and VIvian McAlister
The relationship between the height of leg bone fractures and motor vehicle bumpers in fatal pedestrian motor vehicle collisions in Ontario, Shania Kaczmarek
Enhancing Study Validity through Simulated Exploration of Missing Data in Pragmatic Trials, bahareh kheiri
Illuminating Brain Activity: Combining fMRI and Fibre Photometry, Sam Laxer
Investigating the training effect of isometric versus orthographic anatomical drawing exercises on anatomical knowledge and spatial ability, Lina Nasirkadir Miss
Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychosis, Ramez Salama
Exploring How the Brainstem Handles Sounds in Autistic individuals, Ala Seif
How Did Isotretinoin (Accutane) Survive a Public Relations Disaster? Finding New Uses for Abandoned Drugs, Rachel S. Simpson and Vivian McAlister
Investigating Muscle Associated with Hip Impingement, Hannah Traynor
Digital Technologies for the Enhancement of Anatomy Education, Sidney Wright
Submissions from 2023
The relationship between cortisol, perceived stress, and dental caries experience in adolescents and young adults, Naima Abouseta, Sharat Chandra Pani, Noha Gomaa, S. Jeffrey Dixon, and Ali Tassi
Combining non-invasive methods to guide brain surgery in children with epilepsy, Juan S. Bottan, Renee-Marie Ragguett, Lingkai Tang, Matea Zuljevic, Greydon Gilmore, Andrea Andrade, Michael T. Jurkiewicz, Emma G. Duerden, Maryam Nabavi Nouri, Roy Eagleson, and Sandrine de Ribaupierre
A Real Headache - Understanding Treatment Response to Migraine, Chloe L. Cheung
Insights into the debated gating of mtCU using computational modelling, Danielle M. Colussi
Exploring the roles of Kindlin 1 and Kindlin 2 in Cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinoma, Anamika Dutta
Which impacts? Peripheral nerve magnetic stimulation at powerline frequencies, Eleonore Fresnel
Finding Drug Targets in the Liver to Treat Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Diseases, Chen Jun Gao
Thinking Abilities in People with Seizure Conditions: Which Are Impaired?, Hannah G. Gray, Karnig Kazazian, Conor Wild, Dr. Derek B. Debicki, Dr. Adrian M. Owen, and Dr. Teneille Gofton
Are you an optimist or a pessimist? : Developing a rodent translatable task, Ashlyn Hersey
Let's Move! Motion Correction for MRI, Miriam Hewlett
Are we there yet?: The availability of surgery in Canada and the impact of traveling to access it in high-income countries, Curtis D. Jeffrey
Is Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging the Key to Finally Understanding how the Brain Works?, Sam Laxer
Impact of Access to Oral Health Care on Oral Health and Multimorbidity, Luis Limo
Long-term effects of adolescent cannabis use and its interaction with schizophrenia, Pedro Marinho
Perceptual hierarchy to beat perception across modalities, Zhaleh Mohammad Alipour
Using a Map of the Fly Brain to Create Multi-tasking AI, Jacob Morra
Determining a New Way to Diagnose Epilepsy, Keza T. Motlana
Shining Light on Hearing, Literally!: Using Functional Near-infrared Spectroscopy for Assessing Speech Processing in Unresponsive Patients with Acute Disorders of Consciousness, Reza Moulavi Ardakani
Why do women with breast cancer mostly die of heart attack?, Sepideh Nikfarjam
Neuropsychological Outcomes After Cardiac Surgery: A Pilot Feasibility Study, Sydni G. Paleczny
Rare but real; Systemic Autoinflammatory Diseases of the Childhood, David Piskin
Sensing Pressure with Light, Lee Sikstrom
Blowing cold air to treat acute brain injuries, Olivia Tong
MRS2: A Prospective Drug Target in Gastric Cancer:, Sukanthathulse Uthayabalan
Creating Radiation Treatment Plans with Artificial Intelligence, Edward Wang, Hassan Abdallah, Jonatan Snir, Jaron Chong, David A. Palma, Sarah A. Mattonen, and Pencilla Lang
From Doubts to Decision: Decoding Immigrant Vaccine Hesitancy in the Fight Against COVID-19, Yasaman Yazdani
Submissions from 2022
Prevention of new and recurrent breast cancer brain metastases using immune response guided radiation therapy, Sawyer Badiuk
Rerouting Neurotrauma Recovery, Eoin N. Blythe
Effectiveness of Machine Learning Classifiers for Cataract Screening, Ronald Cheung
More than just the powerhouse of the cell?, Danielle M. Colussi
E-cigarette Vapour Impairs Pulmonary Surfactant Function, Emma C. Graham, Akasha Tejura, Lynda McCaig, Gloria Shui-Kei Lau, Anne Cao, and Ruud Veldhuizen
Trauma Patterns Among Pedestrians and Cyclists Involved in a Motor Vehicle Collision, Moheem M. Halari, Michael Shkrum, Tanya Charyk Stewart, Kevin McClafferty, Allison Pellar, and Michael Pickup
Identifying Potential Disparities in Paediatric Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest Incidence and Outcomes, Samina Idrees, Kelly Kathleen Anderson, and Janice Tijssen
Novel Device for Improving Stroke Detection During Surgery, Farah Kamar
Lighting Up the Brain to Study Social Interactions, Michaela Kent Ms
Combining techniques to determine the cellular mechanisms responsible for whole-brain function, Sam Laxer
How do the kidneys repair themselves?, Yilong Li
Targeting Sepsis One Step at a Time, Rachel Low
Studying the brain, one neuron at a time., Erwan Martin
‘You are what you eat’: exploring relationships between nutrients and gut function, Karly Masse
An Examination of Global Perioperative Mortality, Kevin McIntyre, Janet Martin, Saverio Stranges, Daniel Lizotte, Yun-Hee Choi, and Ava A. John-Baptiste
HIV-1 Nef and SERINC5; the Front Line of an Evolutionary Arms Race, Mitchell J. Mumby and Jimmy D. Dikeakos
Neuropsychological Outcomes after Cardiac Surgery, Sydni G. Paleczny, Adrian M. Owen, and Kimia Honarmand
How do we predict rewards? : What animal models can reveal about basic behaviours, Harleen Rai
A split in the road: Developing blood vessel models that mimic real life, Sabrina Staples
Understanding and preventing early endothelial changes in diabetic complications, Eric Z. Wang
Investigating oxytocin’s potential as a treatment for empathy deficits in frontotemporal dementia, Soojung Yu