Nicole Barkley, a PhD candidate in the Biological Sciences Program will defend her PhD later this month and will begin a postdoctoral position in October at North Carolina Central with Dr.  Antonio Baines.  In this postdoctoral position Nicole will focus on teaching and research.  Nicole initially met Dr. Baines at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Meeting in Chicago in 2012 and again when he stopped by her poster  at the ABRCMS meeting in 2012 in San Jose, CA.  Hugo Tejeda, a PhD candidate in the Graduate Programs in Life Science (GPILS) Neuroscience Program at UMB will defend his PhD later this month and begin a postdoctoral position at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA).  Lola Brown, a PhD candidate in the Biochemistry and Molecular Biology program will defend her PhD later this semester and will begin a postdoctoral position at  Yale University with Dr. Anjelica Gonzalez whose research focuses on developing skin grafts for pediatric burn victims.   Malachi Tatum, a PhD candidate in Physics will defend his PhD later this semester and will immediately begin a 2-year postdoctoral position with NASA in Greenbelt, MD.  Samuel Haile, a PhD candidate in the Biological Sciences program will defend his PhD this fall and has already been offered 3 postdoctoral positions - two at the University of Pennsylvania and one at the NIH with Dr. Crystal Mackall in the Center for Cancer Research in the National Cancer Institute (NCI).  During our visit to NCI last spring, Samuel had the opportunity to meet with Dr. Mackall and the members of her laboratory.  Samuel interviewed for all three positions in July and was offered all of them “on the spot”.  Samuel will begin his postdoctoral position at NIH in January 2014.