Last week I attended a cafe hosted by my GRF, Shiv. He explained how he is currently pursuing his PhD in Biomedical Engineering and upon completing this feat, he will be applying to medical school. He also studied Biomedical Engineering during his undergraduate career at Boston University, so he has many years of experience in this field. He explained how organoids are basically mini organ models in a dish that aim to mimic a target organ’s functionality and structure. There is huge interest in these models to understand how the local environment affects how organs develop, undergo processes, or change into a disease state. His organoid model specifically aims to model the lymph node to understand how B cells make antibodies for therapeutic purposes. I was amazed to hear that he is the first one to successfully make B cells turn into antibody-secreting cells outside the body. He explained how you can take a Zika virus, put it in his system, and form antibodies to make a widely distributable cure in a matter of 4 days. Basically, he uses the organoids to make different environments since each patient is different. From these environments, he can predict which drugs the patient will respond to and make patient-specific treatment plans. In short, he’s using organoids to make cancer treatment personalized, and I hope he can make difference in the field. I’m so proud of his work, and I can’t what to see he will accomplish by the end of his PhD.