D. Ph.

"CBASS cyclases are thought to be ancient ancestors of cGAS," says co-first author Dalton Banh, an M.D.-Ph.D student in Marraffini's lab.

Now bound for an M.D.-Ph.D program at The University of Texas in Houston, she was president of Howard’s chapter of the National Council of Negro Women, started by Mary McLeod Bethune — a civil rights activist whose footsteps she hopes to follow.

“We wanted them to do so well that they’d be excited about going to graduate school and becoming Ph.D.s and M.D./Ph.D.s and M.D.s,” says Hrabowski, a mathematician who notes that he was often the only black student in his math classes.

To date, 312 Meyerhoff scholars have earned Ph.D.s, 59 have joint M.D./Ph.D.s, 141 have been awarded M.D.s, and some 40 now hold tenured or tenure-track positions.

M.D.-Ph.D.s can act as mentors, instructors and leaders in academic medicine by elucidating pharmaceutical innovations, defining new treatment protocols and teaching the next generation of clinicians.