Dr. Diedrich earned his BS in Zoology from Michigan State University and his PhD in Cancer Biology from Wayne State University, where he studied the links between obesity, metabolism, and cancer. He then completed postdoctoral training at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. There, he focused on pharmacogenomics, integrating multi-omic approaches and functional CRISPR screens to identify genes and regulatory elements associated with drug response and resistance in pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia. His work helped show that genetically distinct subtypes of leukemia are wired differently at the level of chromatin and gene regulation, and that these differences can shape how patients respond to treatment.

He is currently an Assistant Professor at Michigan State University, where he is applying this expertise to pancreatic cancer. He is building a multi-omic and functional atlas of KRAS mutations in pancreatic cancer in collaboration with Dr. Thomas McFall of the Medical College of Wisconsin, a close friend from his graduate school cohort at Wayne State. Together, they aim to understand how each mutation changes cancer cell behavior and to find mutation-specific therapeutic vulnerabilities. Having grown up in Michigan, Dr. Diedrich is proud to return to his alma mater and is driven by a commitment to ensuring that advances in precision medicine reach every patient with pancreatic cancer.

Dr. Brittany Hartwell is an Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Minnesota. Her lab's research in immunoengineering combines perspectives from biomolecular engineering, drug delivery, and immunology to develop molecular platforms that can target specific cells and tissues of the immune system to direct the immune response, with a particular focus on targeting and "tuning" mucosal immunity. This work has broad applications ranging from the development of antigen-specific immunotherapies that induce immune tolerance against autoimmune and chronic inflammatory diseases, to development of targeted vaccines that activate immune protection against cancer and infectious diseases.

For this work she was selected as one of four researchers worldwide to receive a 2022 Michelson Prize, awarded to early career investigators in human immunology and vaccine research. She also received a PhRMA Foundation Faculty Starter Grant in Drug Delivery in 2025. Prior to starting her faculty position at the University of Minnesota in fall 2021, she completed postdoctoral training with Dr. Darrell Irvine at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (2021) in immunoengineering, where she worked on developing targeted mucosal vaccines against HIV and COVID. Hartwell received her PhD in biomolecular engineering with Dr. Cory Berkland at the University of Kansas (2016), where she worked on developing multivalent antigen-specific immunotherapy platforms for autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis. She received her B.S. in chemical and biological engineering from Iowa State University (2011).

Priyanga Jayakrishnan completed her Ph.D. in India, where she investigated the molecular mechanisms underlying centrosomal abnormalities and genomic instability in breast cancer. She started as a postdoctoral fellow in the Lytle Lab in 2024, where her research has expanded to understand how therapy-induced tissue injury and tumor-microenvironment interactions influence cancer progression and metastasis.

Her work focuses on both breast and pancreatic cancer and integrates mouse models, CRISPR-based approaches, organoid systems, and single-cell and bulk transcriptomics. Her current research investigates how chemotherapy-induced injury alters mammary epithelial cell states and may contribute to the development of second primary breast cancer. In pancreatic cancer, she studies how tumor- and microenvironment-derived signaling promotes tumor progression and liver metastasis.

Dr. Jeffrey Klomp is an assistant professor with the Department of Medicine, within the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine. He is interested in systems biology of cancer adaptations, focusing on the frequently mutated oncogene KRAS and a critical signaling enzyme, ERK. His laboratory is located within the MSU biomedical research complex in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Dr. Klomp is a Michigan native and has trained at the Van Andel Research Institute, University of Chicago, and University of Illinois. His most recent work was with the University of North Carolina, where he produced pivotal research under the mentorship of Dr. Channing Der, a pioneer in the discoveries of the human RAS gene. He currently collaborates with labs at MSU, including that of Dr. Jennifer Klomp, as well as members of the HFH+MSU Pancreatic Cancer Center.

Dr. Mills is from the San Francisco Bay Area and completed her undergraduate studies at California State University, Chico. She then matriculated to the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, earning her MD and PhD in cancer biology.

Dr. Mills completed her Residency in Internal Medicine and Fellowship in Hematology & Oncology at the University of Michigan, where she is now faculty specializing in the treatment of pancreatic and other GI malignancies. She is part of a research team studying various aspects of pancreatic cancer biology with the goal of translating laboratory findings efficiently into clinical trials, where discoveries can benefit patients with pancreatic cancer.