Shanta Murthy (’22), Rising 1st-Year PhD Student

Shanta graduated from the Systems Medicine Program in 2022.

“My journey into biomedical research stemmed from a profound fascination with both medicine and quantitative sciences, and a desire to merge these interests to enhance patient care. Following my initial exposure to the bioinformatics field as a post-baccalaureate trainee at the National Institutes of Health, I was eager to build my foundation in -omics and data-driven approaches to advance our understanding of human disease. The M.S. program in Systems Medicine at Georgetown provided invaluable insight into interdisciplinary approaches within precision medicine research and equipped me with the necessary tools to investigate complex diseases such as autoimmune conditions and cancer. I am incredibly grateful for the unwavering support from faculty and peers throughout the program and afterward. This guidance has been instrumental in inspiring my decision to pursue further studies.

In my current role as a bioinformatics analyst at Emory University, I employ the skills of multi-omics analysis acquired from the program to evaluate patient signatures of Crohn’s disease. I have thoroughly enjoyed being immersed in cutting-edge research and collaborating with clinicians and scientists of diverse expertise to discern gene programs that distinguish relapsing and remitting disease profiles. I am excited to delve deeper into the intersection of statistics, biology, and big data approaches during my next chapter as a Ph.D. student studying Biostatistics with a Bioinformatics concentration at Harvard. I look forward to embarking on this next step and aspire to develop methods that can advance our understanding of disease pathogenesis and ultimately improve health outcomes.”