Sara Zufan, Mph Email & Phone Number

Rockville, MD, US

Frederick, Maryland, United States

• Nominated to the COMBINE Executive Committee, a student-run Australian organisation for students in computational biology, bioinformatics, and related fields.
• Facilitates communication between COMBINE office bearers and stakeholders.
• Organises and maintains official documents and records.

Parkville, Victoria, Australia

• Evaluate novel laboratory and bioinformatic methods for the identification and characterisation of pathogens within the Microbiological Diagnostic Unit Public Health Laboratory.
• Seconded to assist Victoria’s COVID‑19 pandemic response by establishing protocols for rapid genomic surveillance and analysed sequence data to create weekly quality control reports.

Greater Atlanta Area

Greater Atlanta Area

• Enhancing the detection and characterization of high consequence and novel pathogens that cause viral hemorrhagic fever (VHF)-like symptoms by:- Investigating bioinformatics methods to improve the pathogen detection.
• Deep sequencing clinical material to construct detailed phylogenies for high consequence viral families.
• Improving sample preparation methods for next generation sequencing of VHF viruses and novel pathogens.

Greater New York City Area

• Provide administrative support to the professor to manage course files, student grades, and course logistics for the course.
• Facilitate academic support to students regarding concepts of spatial analyses and research design in Geographic Information Systems.
• Troubleshoot technical difficulties in QGIS, GeoDa, SatScan, and R.

Greater New York City Area

• Collaborate with faculty to develop assignments and rubrics.
• Manage office hours, exam pre-testing, grading, and mentorship for 10 teaching assistants.
• Maintain CourseWorks site and communicate pertinent course information to over 400 students across four course sections.
• Research and assign academic literature to supplement student learning.
• Meet with students and teaching assistants to address course-related concerns.

Greater New York City Area

• Create high school environmental justice curriculum in partnership with WHEELS Academy.
• Teach environmental justice lessons to high school students.
• Mentor students in developing community-focused environmental justice projects.

• Applied ecological principles and statistical modeling to estimate the spread of tick-borne diseases in the United States.
• Implemented statistical models to assess the influence of environmental factors on the geographic expansion of Lyme disease in Maine.

• Collected ticks across Connecticut to screen for infection of tick-borne pathogens, including Borrelia burgdorferi and Babesia microti.
• Utilized dragging method for collection.
• Recorded collection location with GPS.
• Captured small rodents for mark and recapture.
• Collected parasites and biological samples to investigate population and within-host dynamics of tick-borne pathogens.
• Recorded measurements and observations.

Greater New York City Area

Aided in day-to-day operations of a large-scale BSL2 laboratory that focuses on surveillance, discovery, and diagnosis of infectious and chronic diseases. - Prepared reagents and chemical solutions. - Maintained laboratory supplies and orders. - Shadowed technicians to learn methods used for projects in the lab.

Greater Chicago Area

• Responsibilities
• Wrote curriculum for online educational programs aligned with national science standards.
• Facilitated the production of online educational programs.
• Coordinated with creative professionals to produce online educational programs and materials.
• Created digital media and computational thinking learning projects for youth audiences ages 12-18 in collaboration with Field Museum staff and scientists.Leadership
• Designed a survey tool for the Education Department to analyze their educator audience in order to inform future programming and identify needs.Accomplishments

Greater Chicago Area

• Responsibilities
• Designed and implemented curriculum for biology, AP Biology, and earth and space science.
• Managed student data to target areas of growth and weakness to provide individualized classroom support.Leadership
• Developed data-driven, school-wide interventions and incentives in collaboration with administration, content-, and grade-level leads on the Instructional Leadership Team.
• Analyzed and communicated freshman data to teachers in order to create student specific interventions as the Ninth Grade Team Lead.
• Collaborated with school leaders on how to successfully implement CCSS school-wide as the Common Core Early Adopter (Science) Lead.

Douglas County, Minnesota

• The Echinacea Project
• Developed a study to determine which ant species visit Echinacea angustifolia in fragmented prairies.
• Assisted in ongoing field projects; including plot management, censusing, phenology assessment, and hand-pollinating.
• Presented preliminary findings at the Chicago Area Ant Lab Meeting in 2013.

Greater Chicago Area

• NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates Intern, Moreau Lab
• Conducted independent research on ant-bacteria co-evolution using molecular genetics including DNA extraction, PCR, and DNA sequencing.
• Participated in a phylogenetics workshop in order to apply tree construction to REU research project.
• Published a literature review of the ant, Pseudomyrmex ferrugineus in Encyclopedia of Life (see link below). Insects Division Intern, Moreau Lab
• Assisted with collections based curation, sorting of insect samples, and DNA based research on ants and their endosymbiotic bacteria.Bivalves Division Intern, Collections
• Involved in a proof-of-concept research grant that tested the feasibility of using voice recognition software as a means of retrospective data capture or museum zoological collections.

Greater Chicago Area

• Aguirre Lab
• Studied the genetic diversity and divergence of a recently established threespine stickleback lake population.
• Implemented microsatellite analysis to test for significant genetic differentiation and contrast genetic diversity.

Greater Chicago Area

• Shimada Lab
• Contributed to the first skeletal description of a species of Odontaspis shark with the intent to conduct a phylogenetic analysis to determine the systematic position and review its taxonomic status.
• Applied linear regression analysis to quantitatively examine the relationship between total body length and tooth crown height of Lamna nasus.
• Received funding to present findings at local and regional conferences.

Greater Chicago Area

• Referred by faculty as a model student to facilitate peer groups on thinking, organization, and mastery in biology, genetics, and pre-calculus courses.
• Utilized instructional strategies to strengthen student performance in traditionally difficult academic courses.
• Developed lesson objectives and assessments based on course lectures.
• Advanced leadership skills through program training and workshops.

Greater Chicago Area

• Set up laboratory apparatus for undergraduate General Biology lab section.
• Demonstrated procedures, guided instructions.
• Checked for understanding using various assessment techniques.
• Graded lab reports.

Doctor Of Philosophy - Phd, Microbiology And Immunology

Activities and Societies: Secretary, COMBINE Emory University Global Health Case Competition 2023 Indo-Pacific Global Health Case.

Master Of Public Health (Mph), Environmental Health Sciences, Certificate In Infectious Disease Epidemiology

Activities and Societies: President, Students for Environmental Action

Master’S Degree, Science Education

Activities and Societies: Member of the STEM Leadership cohort.

Bachelor’S Degree, Ecology And Evolutionary Biology

Activities and Societies: Peer Education Achievement Council, Intramural Scrabble (Champion of 2010, 2011), DePaul Women's Rugby.