The next generation of research leaders

Above from left to right, top to bottom: Karen Ardila Lopez, Benedicta Asante, Gabriella Gelinas, Makda Habtegergesa, Jackson Hewitt, Tapotosh Ghosh, Dana Hunter, Sarah Green, Heejae Lee, Caifeng Li, Megan Mah, Olivia O'Neill, Nina Pavlovic, Tucker Reed, Dorian Rojas-Villalta, Joseph Samuel, Olivia Scheibel, Matteo Sposito

From brain health and cancer care to sustainable energy and democratic representation, the University of Calgary's 2026 Izaak Walton Killam Memorial Scholars are pursuing research at the forefront of their fields. The 18 PhD students were selected for one of UCalgary's most prestigious graduate awards, which provides $45,000 per year for two years to support outstanding doctoral studies. As one of only five designated Killam universities in Canada, UCalgary carries forward the vision of Izaak Walton and Dorothy Killam, whose enduring legacy continues to advance research and scholarship nationwide.

“The Killam Scholarship is an award that not only recognizes the research excellence and scholarly achievements of our graduate students but also reinforces the University of Calgary’s position as a leading destination for graduate studies,” says Dr. Tara Beattie, PhD, dean and vice-provost (graduate studies).

“The recognition and vital funding provided through this scholarship empower exceptional PhD students to advance their research and make meaningful contributions to their fields. The impact of their work extends beyond our communities, helping to shape Canada and the world.”

Meet the 2026 Killam Scholars

To bring that work into focus, the 18 graduate students were invited to step outside the usual language of academic papers and explain their research in 100 words or less.

Karen Ardila Lopez, MSc’26, first-year PhD student, Schulich School of Engineering

Supervisor: Dr. Ethan MacDonald, MSc’10, PhD’14

• Improving brain disease detection with AI

“My research focuses on using medical imaging and computational methods to better understand brain aging and neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease. My work has explored how differences in brain structure and function relate to genetic, lifestyle and sex-related factors that may influence how the brain ages. Building on this foundation, my doctoral research investigates artificial intelligence (AI) methods that can derive information from medical images, including whether MRI can be used to estimate information typically obtained from PET scans. Ultimately, we aim to improve our understanding of the factors and biological changes that shape brain health across aging and neurodegeneration.”

Benedicta Asante, MSW’24, second-year PhD student, Faculty of Arts

Supervisor: Dr. Pallavi Banerjee, PhD

• Breaking barriers to cancer care for Black immigrants

“My research examines how Black immigrant cancer patients navigate cancer care and mental health services in Canada. Working with Cancer Care Alberta and community partners, I explore how structural barriers, including systemic racism and gaps in culturally responsive care, affect access to support. My research also examines the role of family and community networks in helping people navigate cancer care. By engaging Black immigrant communities as partners in the research process, the study aims to develop practical recommendations for more equitable and integrated cancer and mental health services. Ultimately, I hope this work will help improve access to care and reduce health inequities affecting Black immigrant communities.”

Gabriella Gelinas, BSc’23, second-year PhD student, Faculty of Science

Supervisor: Dr. Michael Wieser, BSc’91, MSc’94, PhD’98

• What toenails can tell us about lung cancer risk 

“Exposure to radon, a radioactive gas, is the leading cause of lung cancer among never-smokers. The UCalgary Cancer Metallomics Laboratory has shown that lead-210, a decay product of radon that accumulates in toenails, may provide a long-term record of radon exposure. I am working to strengthen this approach by developing a biomarker that distinguishes environmental lead uptake from lead released from the bones when bone density changes. By combining toenail lead-210 measurements with calcium isotope ratios that shift from skeletal remodelling, my work aims to provide a more complete picture of radon exposure and physiological influences on toenail lead-210 content, expanding the potential use of this non-invasive risk-assessment tool.”

Makda Habtegergesa, BA’20, third-year PhD student, Faculty of Arts

Supervisor: Dr. Susan Franceschet, PhD

• How race and gender shape political careers

"My research examines the experiences of racially minoritized women in Canadian politics. I ask how they become candidates and win elections, what they experience while serving in elected office, and how they understand their responsibility to represent others. Through interviews with current and former elected officials, I explore how race and gender shape political opportunities, experiences and approaches to representation. The project addresses an important gap in what we know about Canadian democracy, where women and racialized politicians are often studied separately. Ultimately, my research examines how political institutions can better reflect and serve the increasingly diverse public they represent."

Jackson Hewitt, MSc’24, third-year PhD student, Faculty of Arts

Supervisors: Drs. Sheri Madigan and Brae Anne McArthur, both PhD

• The two-way relationship between parent and child depression

“My research examines how mental health problems impact families. Specifically, I study whether depression in families is bidirectional in parent-child dyads, meaning that parents or children can influence each other’s depression rather than assuming that it is unidirectional, and that depression in parents influences their children, but not vice versa. The first study of my dissertation examines these bidirectional effects in mother-child dyads and includes father-child dyads, who are much less frequently studied. The second study of my dissertation focuses on the longer-term effects of child depression, by examining whether child depression predicts how maternal depression changes across time.”

Dana Hunter, BA’17, MSc’23, third-year PhD student, Faculty of Kinesiology

Supervisors: Dr. Matt Jordan, BKin’99, MSc’03, PhD’17, and Dr. Tara-Leigh McHugh, PhD

• The unique recovery challenges of female athletes

“My research looks at why females often struggle more than males to fully recover and return to sports after tearing their anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), a major knee ligament. Much of today's testing and recovery criteria was developed using mostly male athletes, with only six per cent of sport and exercise-science research focused exclusively on females. My work combines several studies: examining sex differences in how strength training attitudes relate to leg strength in college athletes; synthesizing existing research on girls' and women's rehabilitation experiences; exploring how strength training relates to re-injury risk; and interviewing young female athletes about return-to-sport tests, so their voices help shape more equitable care.”

Tapotosh Ghosh, fourth-year PhD student, Faculty of Science

Supervisor: Dr. Farhad Maleki, PhD

• Building reliable AI for medical and agricultural imaging 

“My research focuses on developing trustworthy artificial intelligence (AI) methods for medical and agricultural imaging. AI can transform health care and improve agricultural decision-making, but real-world adoption remains challenging due to limited annotated data, privacy concerns and environmental variations. My work explores self-supervised learning techniques that leverage unlabelled images to reduce the need for costly expert annotations. I also develop federated learning approaches that enable organizations to train models collaboratively while keeping sensitive data secure. By addressing data heterogeneity, efficiency and generalization challenges, my research aims to enable accurate, scalable and reliable AI solutions for real-world health-care and agricultural applications.”

Sarah Green, third-year PhD student, Faculty of Graduate Studies

Supervisor: Dr. Jennifer Markides, MEd’13, PhD’20

• Remembering residential school histories through storytelling

“My research lives at the intersection of story, land, and memory. As a Kanien’kehà:ka woman with ancestors who attended residential schools, this work is both personal and ancestral. Through Indigenous Métissage, life writing and verbatim theatre, I collaborate with Survivors and community members of the Deshkan Ziibiing — the Chippewas of the Thames First Nation — to explore the living history of the Mount Elgin Indian Residential School and its enduring impact on the community residing there today. Embracing relationality and reciprocity, this heart-work is committed to unearthing the stories that have lived in the shadows for far too long.”

Heejae Lee, third-year PhD student, Cumming School of Medicine

Supervisors: Drs. Jongbok Lee (primary) and Nicole Culos-Reed (co-supervisor), both PhD

• How exercise may improve cancer cell therapy

"Adoptive cellular therapy (ACT) is a leading immune cell-based cancer therapy that involves infusing anti-cancerous immune cells into patients. Most ACT uses the patient’s own immune cells for their safety, however, patient immune cells are often compromised due to chemotherapy and ongoing disease, which limits the effectiveness of treatment. Double-negative T-cell (DNT) therapy is a novel form of ACT that uses immune cells from healthy donors instead, enabling the option to choose desirable donors. Leveraging the evidence that exercise strengthens our immune system, this project implements a pre-donation exercise program in DNT donors to build a more effective therapy."

Caifeng Li, third-year PhD student, Faculty of Science

Supervisors: Drs. Quan Long and Jingjing Wu, both PhD

• Unlocking the genetic clues behind complex diseases

"My research focuses on the intersection of genetics, statistics and artificial intelligence. I study how genetic variation contributes to complex traits and diseases, especially when these relationships are nonlinear and difficult to capture with traditional statistical models. I develop statistical and machine-learning methods to simulate, analyze and interpret complex genetic patterns in biomedical data. My work aims to make genetic prediction more accurate, stable and biologically meaningful by integrating genetic variants, biological pathways and clinical information. Ultimately, I aim to help researchers better understand the genetic basis of complex diseases and support advances in disease prediction and personalized medicine."

Megan Mah, BSc’18, MA’26, first-year PhD student, Faculty of Arts

Supervisors: Dr. Amanda Melin, BSc’03, MA’06, PhD’11, and Dr. Tyler Bonnell, PhD

• What monkeys can teach us about surviving a hotter world

“As global temperatures rise, heat stress and dehydration (HS&D) are growing drivers of human mortality and biodiversity loss. Understanding how individuals and species respond differently to these stressors is critical for developing effective mitigation strategies. My research will explore variation in health and behavioural impacts of HS&D among capuchin, howler and spider monkeys living in an environment with frequent heatwaves and droughts. This work aims to identify factors shaping vulnerability to environmental stressors that are intensifying under climate change, using a wild primate system with translational relevance to humans. Ultimately, this may inform public health and wildlife conservation strategies while revealing scientific insights into climate resilience.”

Olivia O’Neill, second-year PhD student, Faculty of Arts

Supervisor: Dr. Derya Sargin, PhD

• Why stress in adolescence can shape mental health for life

“During adolescence, the brain undergoes critical developmental change. Experiencing chronic stress during this time can have lasting effects on brain function and long-term mental health outcomes. Importantly, these outcomes have been shown to differ between men and women. My research investigates how chronic stress during adolescence alters brain circuits involved in emotion and social behaviour, contributing to long-term vulnerability to mental health disorders. Using innovative neuroscience approaches, my PhD research will identify how stress reshapes the developing brain at the circuit and cellular levels considering biological sex as a critical variable. My goal is to advance our understanding of developmental stress and inform future approaches to mental health treatment.”

Nina Pavlovic, BSc’22, MSc’26, first-year PhD student, Schulich School of Engineering

Supervisor: Dr. Sarah Manske, PhD’11

• The hidden changes driving osteoarthritis

“Osteoarthritis (OA) is a highly prevalent degenerative joint disease that currently has no disease-modifying treatments. As a result, my research focuses on bone marrow lesions (BMLs), a key pathological feature of knee OA, to better understand their formation, cellular composition and role in disease progression. By combining medical imaging with histology and biomechanics, this work advances our understanding of OA pathophysiology and provides new insights to support the development of targeted interventions that preserve joint function, reduce pain and improve quality of life for people living with OA.”

Tucker Reed, BSc’24, second-year PhD student, Cumming School of Medicine

Supervisor: Dr. David Campbell, MD, PhD

• Bringing diabetes care directly to those who need it most

“My research examines the intersection of diabetes and structural vulnerability, asking how factors such as homelessness and poverty manifest clinically among people with diabetes. Managing diabetes demands consistent access to medication, food and health care — all of which become precarious amid housing instability and poverty. During my doctoral studies, I helped implement the Diabetes Mobile Clinic (DMC), bringing specialized diabetes care directly to people facing significant barriers to care, including lack of transportation and competing priorities like securing housing. This work is deepening my understanding of the gap between clinical guidelines and patients' lived realities, informing more equitable models of diabetes care.”

Dorian Rojas-Villalta, second-year PhD student, Cumming School of Medicine

Supervisor: Drs. Marie-Claire Arrieta and Antoine Dufour, both PhD

• The early life microbes that help build a healthy immune system

"My project focuses on advancing the understanding of early life gut microbes in infants born prematurely and their association to immune development during the first years of life. This research addresses an important knowledge gap by contributing to the standardisation of computational analysis approaches and identifying drivers of beneficial microbial establishment and its influence on health outcomes. Ultimately, this work can help guide the development of new therapeutics to support the healthy gut and immune development of preterm infants."

Joseph Samuel, MSc’25, second-year PhD student, Faculty of Arts

Supervisor: Dr. Chris Hugenholtz, PhD’06

• Making sense of decisions in changing environments 

“My research is interested in how people make decisions when they are faced with uncertainty or continually changing circumstances in spatial situations. I would like to further our understanding of how people take in information from their surroundings, decide what is useful and use it to determine what to do next. I am exploring how experiments and computer models could help reveal how people navigate these situations, and how their choices compare with what might be optimal based on the information available to them.”

Olivia Scheibel, fourth-year PhD student, Haskayne School of Business

Supervisors: Dr. Oleksiy Osiyevskyy, PhD’14 (supervisor), and Dr. Olga Petričević, PhD (co-supervisor)

• The business of adapting to change

“My research explores how firms keep innovating under uncertainty, whether driven by new regulations like data-privacy laws, shifting industry policies or growing demand for sustainability. Since firms vary in resources, capabilities and risk appetite, some adapt smoothly while others falter. I investigate why, focusing on how firm characteristics shape adaptation in these shifting conditions. My goal is to help firms sustain what they do best, while giving policymakers clearer insight into how regulation and risk shape innovation, so Canadian firms can keep contributing to sustainable, economic growth.”

Matteo Sposito, fourth-year PhD student, Schulich School of Engineering

Supervisors: Drs. Ignacio Galiano Zurbriggen (primary) and Philippe Gray (co-supervisor), both PhD

• Faster, smarter energy transfer for electric vehicles

"My research focuses on making sustainable power conversion systems more efficient, reliable and compact. Specifically, I design advanced control methods for power electronic converters, the essential building blocks that manage energy flow in these applications. For technologies like Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X), the current must flow in two directions, allowing an electric vehicle to either charge from the grid or send power back to a home when needed. My work is to develop an innovative state-plane control algorithm to make this two-way transfer process significantly faster, highly predictable and much more reliable."

To learn more about our exceptional scholars and awards, visit the Exceptional Scholars webpage.