Student Profiles

Rahul graduated magna cum laude with highest honors in his field from Harvard University in 2023, where he double majored in Biomedical Engineering and Physics, completing coursework ranging from tissue engineering and fluid mechanics to quantum mechanics and particle physics. He carried out his undergraduate research in the lab of Prof. William Shih at the Harvard Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, where he designed and built DNA origami nanostructures that mimicked the cellular protein clathrin. These nanostructures mimicked both the monomer- and polymer-level structure and behavior of clathrin, and could be applied to improving nucleic acid diagnostics or nanofabrication of large-scale lattice structures. This research culminated in his senior thesis, which won highest honors from the Biomedical Engineering department, and sparked his interest in shedding light on complex biological systems using simple yet powerful engineered models. To gain a better understanding of the clinical applications of research, Rahul worked as a surgical technician in a skin cancer clinic for a year after graduating. In May 2024, in recognition of his passion for and achievements in research, he was awarded a graduate fellowship from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the University of Southern California to help support his graduate studies.

Rahul will continue his research as an NIH Oxford Scholar in the labs of Dr. Manu Platt at NIBIB and Prof. Dame Molly Stevens at Oxford, where he will work on drug delivery methods to treat arterial blockages in patients with sickle cell disease, as well as 3D bioprinting patient-specific models of arteries affected by sickle cell disease to better understand fluid flow, blockage formation and treatment possibilities.