2025 Ph.D. Connections Conference Speakers

Desnor Chigumba, Ph.D.

Venture Analyst, University of Michigan Innovation Partnerships
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Desnor brings a unique combination of scientific expertise and entrepreneurial experience in the life sciences sector. She holds a Ph.D. in chemical biology from the University of Michigan and a graduate certificate in innovation and entrepreneurship. With a strong background in assay development and multi-omics for drug discovery, she has contributed to innovative platforms, including developing a multi-omics approach for plant cyclic peptide discovery.

As co-founder and co-Managing director of Nucleate Michigan, Desnor led the Activator accelerator program and fostered partnerships within Michigan's life sciences ecosystem. Currently, as a venture analyst at the University of Michigan Innovation Partnerships, she supports due diligence and fund management for the Accelerate Blue Fund and the Michigan University Innovation Capital Fund, leveraging her expertise to evaluate and advance early-stage business development for university research technologies and startup spinouts. Desnor is passionate about bridging cutting-edge scientific innovation with impactful commercialization in the life sciences.

Meagan Elliott, Ph.D.

President and CEO, Belle Isle Conservancy
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Meagan Elliott is the president and CEO of the Belle Isle Conservancy, a 982-acre island park situated in the Detroit River between the United States and Canada and originally designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. The Conservancy's mission is to protect, preserve, restore and enhance the natural environment, historic structures, and unique character of Belle Isle as a public park for the enjoyment of all—now and forever. She has spent the last decade leading green space planning initiatives for the City of Detroit, first as the city's first chief parks planner and, since 2021, as deputy CFO over development and grants where she oversaw $2.3 billion in grant funds including all American Rescue Plan Act dollars. Elliott led the Joe Louis Greenway Framework Plan, was the public lead in the $350 million campaign for a Unified Greenway for the Joe Louis Greenway and the Detroit Riverfront Conservancy, and serves as co-chair to the Joe Louis Greenway Partnership. She has her doctorate in sociology and master’s in urban planning from the University of Michigan.

Heidi Gansen, Ph.D.

Education Research Analyst, U.S. Department of Education
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Heidi received her Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Michigan in 2018. She has spent the past three years working as a contracting officer's representative in the Regional Educational Laboratory Program, which is part of the Institute of Education Sciences within the U.S. Department of Education.The ten Regional Educational Laboratories (RELs) partner with educators and policymakers nationwide. RELs collaborate with school districts, state departments of education, and other education stakeholders to help generate and apply evidence, with the goal of improving learner outcomes. In this position, she provides technical direction and management on two REL contracts, spanning 10 states. Prior to this position, Heidi spent three years working as a postdoctoral researcher at Northwestern University in the School of Education and Social Policy. In this position she managed and collaborated with the principal investigator, Simone Ispa-Landa, on their William T. Grant Foundation funded project. This project involved a research-practice partnership study with a large public high school district. The work examined the impact of school-wide reform efforts to decrease racial disproportionately in student discipline outcomes. Heidi's dissertation examined how inequalities surrounding race, gender, sexuality, and social class are produced and reproduced through institutional and interactional disciplinary practices in preschool classrooms. Her work has been published in journals such as Sociology of Education and Social Problems . Heidi’s work has also received several awards, including Outstanding Graduate Student Paper awards from the American Sociological Association's (ASA) Sociology of Education Section, as well as the Children and Youth section of ASA, and the Mark Chesler Paper Award from the Department of Sociology at the University of Michigan.

Allison Hobgood, MA, Ph.D.

Executive Director, Corvallis Daytime Drop-In Center

Allison Hobgood, Ph.D., M.A., B.A. (she/her) works as executive director of Corvallis Daytime Drop-In Center, a day community resource and navigation hub for individuals experiencing poverty. She previously worked as a professor in higher education teaching disability studies and now does grassroots community organizing for disability and homelessness justice.

Kate Waggoner Karchner, Ph.D.

Eighth Grade Social Studies Teacher, Anthony Wayne Local Schools

I graduated with a B.A. from Denison University in 2013 where I studied history and Latin, before entering the Ph.D. program in history at the University of Michigan in the fall of 2013. Halfway through my program, I simultaneously began working to earn my alternative teaching license for social studies in the State of Ohio, at which time I also began substitute teaching. I received both my Ph.D. and my alternative licensure in 2019. I was hired by my current employer, Anthony Wayne Junior High School, for the 2020-21 school year, and I am currently in my fifth year of teaching there. I am currently serving in my second year as chair of the social studies department, and my book (based on my dissertation) comes out this February 2025 with Routledge Press. I have also enjoyed my position at a local school coaching track and field over the past several years.

Mike Kuehne, Ph.D., M.S.

Physician Assistant, ProMedica Physicians Group

Mike Kuehne earned his Ph.D. in exercise physiology and cardiopulmonary physiology from the University of Toledo and his M.S. in physician assistant studies from the University of Detroit, Mercy. He currently works as a physician assistant specializing in cardiothoracic surgery at ProMedica Health System in Toledo, Ohio. His research interests involve new cardiac devices and valves, interventions, and pharmacologic agents for the treatment of cardiothoracic diseases and conditions.

Brittanie Kuhr, Ph.D.

Executive Director of Main Campus Development, University of Toledo Foundation
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Brittanie Kuhr is the executive director of main campus development at the University of Toledo Foundation, where she leads fundraising initiatives for multiple university colleges and programs. She is spearheading the foundation's pioneering efforts in utilizing artificial intelligence for fundraising through a virtual engagement officer. Kuhr also chairs the University of Toledo’s strategic compliance committee for community engagement and strategic partnerships and is actively involved in the President’s Commission on Campus Design and the Environment and the foundation’s data governance committee. With over a decade of experience in higher education, she has held key advancement roles at institutions including Adrian College, Lourdes University, and Defiance College, as well as served as vice president of philanthropy at the Toledo Zoo and Aquarium.

Kuhr earned her M.Ed. and Ph.D. in higher education administration from the University of Toledo, focusing her research on defining the public value of four-year colleges in Ohio. She holds an executive certificate in nonprofit management from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. An active community member, she serves on boards like Girls on the Run of Northwest Ohio and West Side Montessori. Kuhr is deeply passionate about student success and diversity, equity, and inclusion, having contributed to related initiatives at various institutions. Married to Allison, a mental health counselor, they share a love for family adventures in northern Michigan, Toledo’s metroparks, and musical theatre.

Anna Marley, Ph.D.

Director of Curatorial Affairs, Toledo Museum of Art
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Anna O. Marley is the director of curatorial affairs at the Toledo Museum of Art. Marley is a scholar of art and material culture of the Americas and the British Atlantic world from the colonial era to 1945 and holds a B.A. in art history from Vassar College, an M.A. in museum studies from the University of Southern California and a Ph.D. from the University of Delaware. Before joining the Toledo Museum of Art in 2024 Marley was chief of curatorial affairs and the Kenneth R. Woodcock Curator of Historical American Art at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA).

At PAFA, Marley curated over 16 exhibitions, including Anatomy/Academy (2011); "A Mine of Beauty:" Landscapes by William Trost Richards, as well as the touring retrospective Henry Ossawa Tanner: Modern Spirit (both 2012), and editing the acclaimed accompanying catalog, published by the University of California Press; the five-venue nationally touring Artists Garden: American Impressionism and the Garden Movement, 1887-1920 (2015) and the accompanying catalog published by University of Pennsylvania Press; From the Schuylkill to the Hudson: Landscapes of the Early American Republic (2019); "Women in Motion: 150 Years of Women’s Artistic Networks at PAFA" (2021); and "Making American Artists: Stories From PAFA, 1776 - 1976" (2022) which is currently on a six-venue national tour, and has an accompanying catalog published by the University of Chicago Press.

Marley’s professional affiliations include serving as former chair of the Association of Historians of American Art (2014-2016); U.S. liaison, Association of Art Museum Curators Foundation Engagement Program for International Curators (2016-2018); visiting professor, Mellon Foundation Curatorial Track Ph.D., University of Delaware (2017); Center for Curatorial Leadership fellow (2020); advisory board member of the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College (2015-2020) and current advisory board member of the Smithsonian Archives of American Art Journal and University of Delaware Graduate College.

Dylan Neale, Ph.D.

Scientist, Investigative Toxicology, Sanofi
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Dylan Neale earned his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in chemical engineering after receiving his B.S. in materials science and engineering from the University of Florida. As a postbaccalaureate, Neale worked briefly for a medical device startup company. He developed a patented bi-phasic, micropatterned wound dressing technology composed of natural materials. He then joined the University of Michigan to pursue his Ph.D.. He was awarded the Cellular Biotechnology Training Program fellowship and served as the president. During his fellowship, he interned with Takeda, where he worked between drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics and investigative toxicology on a high-content imaging project of 3-D organoids to improve organ toxicity prediction. For his Ph.D. research, Neale developed protein-based 3-D cell culture technologies that mimicked native extracellular matrix. He and his colleagues utilized this technology to develop biomimetic cell migration models and as platforms for ex vivo tumor expansion. Following his defense, he was a postdoc in the University of Michigan’s BioInterfaces Institute to focus on pharmaceutical technology commercialization. As a capstone, he led the scale-up of his 3-D cell culture technology for tumor vaccines. He currently works within Sanofi’s investigative toxicology group, where he leverages his background in 3-D cell culture, microphysiological systems, imaging, and bioengineering to support preclinical safety studies at different stages of the discovery pipeline. Outside of his passion for science and drug development, Dylan enjoys playing his guitar, backpacking, cycling, snowboarding, cooking, and waterskiing.

April Solon, Ph.D.

Medical Writer, Amador Bioscience
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I graduated in 2022 with a Ph.D. from the cancer biology program at the University of Michigan. Since then, I have been working as a medical writer for Amador Bioscience, a small contract company that does pharmacometric analyses for pharmaceutical companies. I have worked with a variety of drugs and indications and gained experience writing technical reports and several other types of regulatory documents.

Chiamaka Ukachukwu, Ph.D.

Associate Director, Clinical Biomarker Strategist, Eli Lilly and Company
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