Dr. Manel Jordana
Principal Investigator, MD, PhD
Born and raised in Barcelona, Spain, Dr. Manel Jordana completed his medical training at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona and continued with a residency and clinical fellowship at Hospital de Sant Pau in the same city. Dr. Jordana quickly developed a passion for scientific research, and pursued this path with determination. After graduating with a PhD at McMaster University, he embarked on post-doctoral studies. He joined the faculty of McMaster University in 1988, and has since supervised over 75 trainees, and co-authored 160 scientific papers, reviews and book chapters.
Dr. Susan Waserman
Principal Investigator
Dr. Waserman obtained her MSc and medical degree from McGill University. She specialized in Internal Medicine, followed by subspecialty training in Allergy/Clinical Immunology. She then completed a fellowship in Pulmonary Immunology at the Meakins Christie Laboratories at McGill University. She is extensively involved in medical education in both academic and community settings, and has an active hospital based clinical practice in adult and pediatric allergy/immunology. Research interests and activities include mechanisms and treatment of peanut allergy and food related anaphylaxis, as well as urticaria.
Tina Walker
Research Technician
Tina finished her B.Sc. in animal biology at the University of Guelph. She worked at the McMaster central animal facility for nine years before joining the Jordana lab in 2002. Her duties include maintaining breeding colonies, animal work, ELISAs, purchasing as well as various lab management tasks.
Jianping Wen
Research Technician
Jianping graduated from West China University of Medical Sciences, China and worked in the same university as a lecturer for a few years. Then, she continued to study molecular biology in Witten/Hedreke University, Germany. Here, as a research technician, she has a key role in the management of the lab, she assisted and worked with all graduate and undergraduate students for their projects bringing her knowledge and experience in the fields of animal work, cell culture, blood process and functional assay, as well as molecular biology.
Joshua Koenig
Research Associate
Josh received his undergraduate degree from the Bachelor of Health Sciences program at McMaster University in 2015. He entered the Master's of Medical Sciences program under the supervision of Dr. Jordana and transferred into the PhD program in January 2017. His project focuses on the generation of high avidity IgE antibodies in food allergy. Josh's graduate research is made possible through the scholarships: Ontario Graduate Scholarship-PhD and the Eva Eugenia Lillian Cope Scholarship.
![IMG_2630[1]_edited.jpg](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/4a7ff5_4ad8f89190bc429a8fe0d04bcc2f5f3e~mv2.jpg/v1/crop/x_145,y_108,w_557,h_557/fill/w_220,h_220,al_c,q_80,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_auto/IMG_2630%5B1%5D_edited.jpg)
Kelly Bruton
PhD Candidiate
Kelly received her B.Sc. in Medical Sciences and joined the Jordana lab in the summer of 2016. Her project involves the development of a pre-clinical humanized mouse model using PBMCs from allergic patients to study the role of memory cells in the longevity of food allergy.
Allyssa Phelps
PhD Candidate
Bio coming soon!
Emily Grydziuszko
Masters Student
Emily received her B.H.Sc. from McMaster and originally joined the Jordana lab as an undergraduate student before becoming a Master’s student in May 2021. She works on a project with Josh and Hannah to investigate the role of allergen-specific CD4+ T cells in the incipient phases of food allergy. Alongside Allyssa, Atai, and Brendan, she also investigates allergen immunotherapy in mouse models of food allergy.
Olivia Mann-Delany
Undergraduate Student
Olivia is a third year student in the Biomedical Research Specialization of the Bachelors in Honours Biochemistry program. Her major interests in the field of immunology include phenotyping allergen-specific T and B cell populations and investigating the origins of allergy in the gastrointestinal tract. In her spare time, Olivia is on the McMaster Science Society exec team organizing Quantum Leap, a Science Careers Conference Series. She also volunteers with the campus radio station and loves to go on long runs.
Jake Colautti
Undergraduate Student
Jake is a third year student in the Honours Bachelor of Health Sciences Program. His work focuses on developing highly multiplexed immunofluorescence microscopy tools to phenotype immune cells in situ. With others in the lab, he is using these tools to understand the localization of allergen-specific CD4 T cells and IgE-secreting plasma cells in the intestines of an mouse model of food allergy.
Atai Ariaz
Undergraduate Student
Bio coming soon!
Hannah Silverman
Undergraduate Student
Hannah is a third year student in the Bachelor of Health Sciences Program. Together with Emily and Josh, she works on a project that investigates the role and kinetics of CD4+ T cells in the early phases of food allergy using a mouse model.
Brendan Lee
Undergraduate Student
Brendan is a third year student in the Biomedical Research Specialization of the Honours Biochemistry program and is pursuing a minor in Chemical Biology. He is working with Allyssa, Emily and Atai to optimize models of immunotherapy for mouse models of allergy and to elucidate the cellular events.
Vitoria Olyntho
Undergraduate Student
Vitoria is a second-year student in the Honours Bachelor of Health Sciences program and pursuing a concurrent certificate in Immunology, Microbiology, and Virology. She is working with Jake and Josh on a project involving the imaging of tissues using immunofluorescence microscopy to investigate the generation and localization of Th2-polarized cells in a mouse model of food allergy. She plans on pursuing her interests further in graduate school.
