O'Brien Lab, People | Division of Nutritional Sciences

Explore the O'Brien Lab

If you are interested in working in Professor O'Brien's lab, fill out the O'Brien Lab Application and e-mail it to Dr. Kimberly O'Brien, at koo4@cornell.edu.

Principal Investigator

Kimberly O. O’Brien, PhD

Professor, Cornell University, Division of Nutritional Sciences
Adjunct Professor, University of Rochester School of Medicine, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Rochester, NY

Graduate Students

Katherine Delaney

Degrees: BS, Biochemistry
Year Entered: 2016
Background: Before coming to Cornell, Katherine was a postbaccalaureate research fellow at the National Institutes of Health in a Molecular Genetics Laboratory. Her doctoral research aims to improve understanding of iron homeostasis during pregnancy and how maternal iron status and fetal iron accretion impacts fetal brain development.

Wanhui Kang

Degrees: BS, Nutritional Sciences; BE, Food Science
Year Entered: 2017
Background: Wanhui received a bachelor of science degree in nutritional sciences at Cornell and a bachelor of engineering degree in food science at China Agricultural University. Her research focuses on understanding how genetic components influence iron homeostasis in different racial groups.

Luisa Castillo

Degree: BS, Chemistry
Year Entered: 2019
Background: Before coming to Cornell, Luisa was an NIH-BUILDing Scholars Fellow at the University of Texas at El Paso. Throughout her undergraduate career, she performed cancer biology and nutritional research in several institutions (Arizona State University, University of Connecticut - Health Center, and UTEP). Her current project is to understand the effect of vitamin D supplementation on maternal and neonatal D status.

Alexa Barad, MS, RD

Degrees: BS, Nutritional Science; MS, Nutritional Science; RD
Year Entered: 2019
Background: Alexa is originally from Costa Rica. She completed her undergraduate degree at Texas A&M University and her Master of Science and Dietetic Internship at the University of Florida. Her doctoral research aims to improve understanding of genetic and biochemical variations in iron absorption and how these differences affect iron homeostasis across different ethnicities.