Faculty
Dr. Joe Wiemels
Dr. Joe Wiemels joined the Center of Genetic Epidemiology at USC in 2018.
Dr. Wiemels received his doctorate in Environmental Health Sciences at UC Berkeley in 1997, where he worked on the toxicology of benzene and butadiene with Martyn T. Smith. He then went to the Institute of Cancer Research, UK for postdoctoral work with Mel F. Greaves where he studied the molecular origins of childhood leukemia.
Returning to California in the year 2000, he worked with John Wiencke and Margaret Wrensch (UCSF) and Pat Buffler (UCB) on the molecular epidemiology of childhood leukemia and brain cancer for the past 18 years, continuing this work to this day with primary collaborators Adam de Smith (USC), Catherine Metayer (UCB), Xiaomei Ma (Yale), Scott Kogan (UCSF), Steve Francis (UNR), Charleston Chiang (USC), Nick Mancuso (USC).
Dr. Wiemels believes in a disease-focused research program, utilizing a variety of disciplines that can assess intrinsic and extrinsic causes off cancer starting at population level disparities in the burden of cancer but then focusing right down to molecular mechanisms so that we can develop cancer prevention measures. Disciplines in the laboratory include epidemiology and genetics, immunology, toxicology, statistics, and developmental biology to understand the origins of cancer.
Dr. Wiemels enjoys spending time with family, dabbling in home improvement projects, gardening, and running.
See Dr. Joe Wiemels profile on UC Berkeley CIRCLE
Dr. Adam de Smith
Dr. Adam de Smith joined the Center for Genetic Epidemiology, USC Keck School of Medicine, as an Assistant Professor in 2018.
He is a genetic epidemiologist with a research focus on identifying the causes of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), the most common childhood cancer.
After graduating from the University of Bristol with a BSc in Zoology, Dr. de Smith decided to pursue his interest in genetics and obtained an MSc and PhD in Human Molecular Genetics from Imperial College London.
In 2011, Dr. de Smith joined Dr. Wiemels lab at UCSF as a postdoc to research the genetic and immunologic causes of childhood ALL. In 2014, he received an Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation ‘A’ award to study the epidemiology of ALL in children with Down syndrome.
To this end, Dr. de Smith initiated the International Study of Down Syndrome Acute Leukemia (IS-DSAL), a multi-institutional collaboration investigating the role of genetics and epigenetics in the increased risk of leukemia in children with Down syndrome.
Dr. de Smith also leads studies investigating the role of common and rare germline genetic variants in ALL risk, with a particular interest in elucidating the increased risk of ALL in children of Hispanic/Latino ethnicity. In addition, Dr. de Smith utilizes whole genome sequencing of tumors to examine potential causative agents, i.e. DNA mutational signatures as molecular footprints of environmental exposures.
Dr. de Smith is a member of the Children’s Oncology Group (COG), the Childhood Leukemia International Consortium (CLIC), the Center for Integrative Research on Childhood Leukemia and the Environment (CIRCLE), and a collaborator with the California Childhood Leukemia Study (CCLS).
In his spare time, Adam enjoys playing and watching soccer (KTBFFH!), road cycling, and karaoke.
Clinical Instructor
Dr. Eric Nickels
Dr. Eric Nickels first joined the team as a clinical research fellow in Pediatric Hematology-Oncology in the summer of 2019. Originally from Wisconsin, he obtained a Bachelor of Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and later his Doctor of Medicine from the University of Chicago.
He completed both his residency training in General Pediatrics and fellowship in Pediatric Hematology-Oncology at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. He additionally obtained a master’s degree in clinical, Biomedical and Translational Investigations at the Keck School of Medicine in 2021. During medical school, his research interests focused on identifying germline predispositions to hematologic malignancies in adult patients. His current research involves investigating DNA methylation at birth as markers of risk for childhood hematologic malignancies, with a focus on acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
During his free time, he enjoys running, cooking and baking, and walking his dog, Ziggy.
Graduate Students
Soyoung Jeon
Soyoung Jeon joined the group as a Ph.D candidate in July 2018.
Before joining the group, she received her Bachelor’s degree in Molecular and Cell Biology, with Medical Biology and Physiology track from University of California, Berkeley in 2017.
She is currently investigating the correlation between ancestry and the risk of childhood Leukemia. She is interested in understanding how human population history contributes to variations in susceptibility to disease and response to therapy.
When not at work, she enjoys hiking, traveling, and working out.
Dr. Mark Shiroishi
Dr. Mark Shiroishi, MD, MS is an academic neuroradiologist and Assistant Professor in the USC Department of Radiology.
Dr. Mark Shiroishi completed college, medical school and a Diagnostic Radiology Residency at UCLA. Subsequently, he completed a 2-year neuroradiology fellowship, including a dedicated year in pediatric neuroradiology, at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and the Keck School of Medicine of USC.
His academic and clinical interest lie in neuro-oncology imaging, and particularly perfusion imaging techniques of brain tumors and ultra-high field 7T MRI.
In his spare time, Mark enjoys spending time with his family, playing competitive tennis and basketball and (very slowly) learning guitar and drums.
Michaela Ince
Michaela Ince joined the group as a Ph.D. student in June 2022. Before joining the group, she received her Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Pomona College in May 2018.
She is interested in learning bioinformatics techniques to analyze epigenetic drivers for childhood cancer. She is currently working on backtracking ALL genetic alterations and comparing mutations acquired in utero with those seen in tumor samples.
In her free time, she likes reading, baking, playing video games, watching anime, and playing with her dog, Pippen.
Anmol Pardeshi
Anmol is an epidemiology student and joined the lab in August 2022.
He has a master’s degree in Biomedical Engineering from USC. He worked in the Ophthalmology department gaining experience in patient research, data analyses & epidemiology. The main focus of his research was on angle closure Glaucoma in Chinese Americans and the various socio-demographic & biometric risk factors contributing towards the disease.
Within epidemiology his interest lies in various study designs, agnostics studies and aspires to work with methylation & GIS data.
In his leisure time, he likes to cook, go out with his telescope or write poems (in Hindi). He was also a competitive swimmer in India with several medals!
Tanxin Liu
Tanxin Liu joined the group as an epidemiology student.
She completed her master’s degree in Epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University, and bachelor’s degree in biomedical (sciences) English with a minor in psychology from Peking University.
She would like to learn more about prevention strategies to improve the outcomes of childhood cancer.
She likes watching movies and animated sitcoms, playing video games, cooking, and hiking.
Laboratory Technicians
Amy Yee
Amy Yee is the Project Manager at USC. She holds a Masters in Public Health in Epidemiology from UCLA and a B.S. from UCSD in Microbiology. Prior to being at USC, she worked at the County of Los Angeles, Department of Public Health as Chief of the Data Collection & Analysis Unit, overseeing state-mandated programs such as birth and death registration and communicable disease reporting.
Amy joined the group in April 2018 and is currently working on an analysis of familial patterns and lymphoid malignancies. In her spare time, she enjoys baking, reading, crafting, traveling and spending time with her family.
Swe Swe Myint
“I am originally from Myanmar and move to Singapore where I received another BSc Degree of Biomedical Sciences at University of Bradford, MDIS, SG.
I worked previously at the National Cancer Centre, SG, then at University of Southern California since July 2018.
My primary goal is to keep the lab running smoothly to ensure a higher level of science.
I am currently focus on sample arranging, organizing, DNA isolation and quantification.
Outside the lab, I enjoy traveling and watching thriller movie. Cooking is not my favorites chapter but I do love eating.”
Lab Alumni
| Name | Time and Position | Next Position |
Dr. Shaobo (Sebastian) Li  | 2019 – 2022 PhD Student Advisor: Dr Joseph Wiemels 05/2022 – 11/2022 Postdoctoral Researcher | Research Scientist, Computational Biology at Kite Pharma / Gilead |
Katti Arroyo  | 2018-2022 Research lab technician | Senior Research Associate at Kite Pharma / Gilead |
Dr. Charlie Zhong  | 2018-2019 PhD Student 2019-2022 Post-doctoral research fellow | Principal Scientist at American Cancer Society |
Dr. Rachel Gallant  | 2019-2022 Post-doctoral clinical fellow | Assistant Professor at Oklahoma Children’s Hospital |
Dr. Qianxi (Senkei) Feng  | 2018-2022 PhD Student Advisor: Dr Joseph Wiemels | Data Scientist at Meta |
Dr. Keren Xu  | 2018-2022 PhD Student Advisor: Dr Adam de Smith | Bioinformatics Scientist at Tempus |
Priyatama Pandey  | 2019-2021 Biostatistician | Staff Scientist at City of Hope |
Dr. Ivo Muskens  | 2018-2020 Postdoctoral Fellow | Strategist at Gupta Strategists |
Anahit Nargizyan  | 2019-2020 Laboratory Technician | Biostatistician at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) |
Peleg Winer  | 2018-2019 Bioinformatician | Bioinformatics Application Specialist at Ultima Genomics |
Dr. Francianne Andrade  | 2018-2019 Postdoctoral Fellow | Postdoctoral Fellow at National Cancer Institute, Brazil |