Najafian Lab Location

Najafian Lab (D-528/D-532)
Magnuson Health Science Building
1959 NE Pacific St.
Seattle, WA 98195

E-mail: najafian@uw.edu
Phone: 206.897.5596
Fax: 206.598.3503

News

2024

David Smerkous, PhD(c) presented "Automated Assessment of Podocyte Injury Using Deep Learning", at 8th Update on Fabry Disease, Hamburg Germany, https://www.fabryupdate.com/program
Alex Ali Amedson, BSc, presented a poster "Quantification of Globotriaosylceramide in Kidney Peritubular Capillary Endothelial Cells in Kidney Biopsies from Fabry Patients Using Machine Learning" at 8th Update on Fabry Disease, Hamburg Germany, https://www.fabryupdate.com/program
Frank Dastvan, presented a poster "In-vitro Comparison of Chloroquine-induced Iatrogenic Phospholipidosis and Fabry Disease" at 8th Update on Fabry Disease, Hamburg Germany, https://www.fabryupdate.com/program

2023

David Smerkous, PhD(c), received a young investigator award for his work, “Automated quantification of podocyte foot process width using deep learning” at World Symposium 2023, Orlando, FL. Congratulations to David!
Mahin Asr, M.D. presented her poster “Mesangial endothelial protrusions in human kidney biopsies” at USCAP 2023, New Orleans, LA.
Alireza Ayoubi, M.D. presented his poster “Localization of Globotriaosylceramide (Gl3) Inclusions in Fabry Podocytes” at USCAP 2023, New Orleans, LA.
Ritika Bhatt, M.D. presented her poster “Podocyturia correlates with renal function across a wide range of disease phenotype in Fabry disease” at World Symposium 2023, Orlando, FL.
Hajar Rezanejad, PhD, received a LSD fellowship awarded, starting July 1, 2023. Congratulations to Hajar.

2022

David Smerkous who has been leading our machine learning project for the past few years was accepted to the PhD program of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the Ohio State University (OSU). He will still be involved in our ongoing projects. Congratulations David!
Andy Wang joined the lab. He is working on our machine learning project. Andy is a student at Redmond High school.
Yu Fang was graduated with BSc from UW Computer Science and is now hired as a research scientist at Dr. Jin Lee’s Lab at Stanford. Congratulations, Yu Fang!
Najafian Lab has received a mentor-based fellowship award from Sanofi. This fellowship is intended to promote education and research in the field of Lysosomal Storage Disease (LSD).

2021

Forough Sargolzaeiaval was accepted to the Pathology residency program and UCSD. Congratulations, Forough!
Maryam Asif, one of our alumni accepted a faculty position as an Assistant Professor of Transfusion Medicine at UC Davis. Congratulations, Maryam!
Tian Qiu (Sky) was accepted to the Biostatistics PhD program at UC Berkeley. Congratulations, Sky!
Tina Masoum was accepted to the Nursing School at UW. Congratulations, Tina! Tina will keep working on her project in our lab.
Alireza Ayoubi received the Sanofi Lysosomal Disease fellowship and starts his post-doc in our lab. His work will be focused on urine flow cytometry standardization. Congratulations, Alireza!

2020

Dr. Najafian gave a digital Presentation "Reversal of Diabetic Nephropathy After 10 Years of Pancreas Transplantation Occurs Despite Parallel Podocyte Loss" at ASN KIDNEY WEEK 2020, DIGITAL MEETING / OCTOBER 19 - 25, https://www.asn-online.org/education/kidneyweek/archives/KW20Abstracts.pdf
Dr. Najafian gave a platform presentation “6 month treatment with Migalastat reduces GL3 content of podocytes in females with Fabry disease and amenable GLA mutation” at WORLD symposium, Orlando, FL.
Dr. Najafian receives funding (principal investigator) from Amicus Therapeutics to study cross-correction between Fabry and non-Fabry podocytes.
Dr. Najafian gave a talk on “pathophysiology of Fabry nephropathy” at the National Kidney Foundation summer meeting.

2019

Dr. Najafian gave a talk on “Factors affecting heterogeneity of Fabry nephropathy” at the 6th Fabry Update meeting”, Prague, Czech Republic, https://www.fabryupdate.com/
Dr. Najafian co-chaired the Pathology Working Group at the 6th Fabry Update meeting”, Prague, Czech Republic, https://www.fabryupdate.com/
Frank Dastvan presented a poster “A CRISPR/Cas9 GLA (alpha galactosidase enzyme) knock out model of Fabry Podocytopathy Closely Mimics in-vivo Pathology and Shows Substantial Increase in Globotriaosylceramide and Globotriaosylsphingosine Productions” at the 6th Fabry Update meeting, Prague, Czech Republic, https://www.fabryupdate.com/
Frank Dastvan presented a poster "Low Level α-galactosidase A Transfer from Non-Fabry to Fabry Podocytes in-vitro", at the 6th Fabry Update meeting”, Prague, Czech Republic, https://www.fabryupdate.com/
Payam Khastkhodai presented a poster “Serial Block Face Scanning Electron Microscopy (SBFSEM) Reveals Numerous Connections Among Globotriaosylceramide (GL3) Inclusions in Podocytes and Presence of Enzyme-independent Mechanisms for GL3 Extrusion in Fabry Disease” at the 6th Fabry Update meeting, Prague, Czech Republic, https://www.fabryupdate.com/
David Smerkous presented a poster “Podocyte Foot Process Width Estimation in Fabry Disease Using Deep Learning” at the 6th Fabry Update meeting, Prague, Czech Republic, https://www.fabryupdate.com/
Dr. Najafian receives funding (co-investigator) from NIH (NCATS/RDCRN) to study arterial smooth muscle cell and cardiomyocyte injury in Fabry disease
Dr. Najafian receives funding (principal investigator) from Sanofi to study podocyte injury in patients with late onset/cardiac variant of Fabry disease
Dr. Najafian gave a talk on “Podocyte injury in Fabry nephropathy: old concepts and new paradigms” at … add info for the Romania meeting

2018

Najafian Lab receives support from NIH/NIDDK to study subpodocyte space using Serial Block Face Scanning Electron Microscopy (SBFSEM).

Najafian's Lab receives an award (P.I. Najafian) from Amicus Therapeutics to study the effect of Migalastat on clearance of podocytes from GL-3 inclusions in female patients with Fabry disease.

Dr. Najafian and Dr. Mariya Sweetwyne receive an award for Basic/Clinical partnership (ABC) from department of Pathology to study aging in podocytes.

2017

Najafian's Lab receives an award (P.I. Najafian) from NIH/NIDDK Diabetes Complication Consortium (Diacomp) to study diabetic kidney disease using Serial Block Face Scanning Electron Microscopy (SBFSEM).

Najafian's Lab receives an award (P.I. Najafian) from Amicus Therapeutics to deveop a mathematical model to estimate volume of GL-3 inclusions in podocytes in female patients with Fabry disease independent of mosaicism.

Vaughan's Lab in collaboration with Najafian's Lab receives an award (P.I. Vaughan) from NIH/NIDDK Diabetes Complication Consortium (Diacomp) to study diabetic kidney disease using expansion microscopy.

Kretzler's Lab in collaboration with Najafian's Lab receives an award (P.I. Kretzler) from Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International (JDRF) to study tissue based integrative biology of diabetic nephropathy in participants of the PERL-study.