Lab News

June 2025:

  • The lab welcomed Meaghan Grogan to our team. Meaghan is joining us as a graduate student through the Immunology program. She will be working on neonatal T cell contributions to health and disease.

  • Meaghan, Fayrouz and Saskia all took the scenic drive up to Charlottesville, VA to attend the 2025 Southeastern Immunology Symposium (SIS). A beautiful venue, fantastic science, and some pictures to prove it!

October 2025:

  • Lab lunch to mark the end of Meaghan’s lab rotation and to welcome Gabriella Torres for her rotation with delicious food from Lime and Lemon in Durham.

  • We also celebrated Saskia becoming a citizen with a delicious homemade cake (courtesy of Meaghan and Gabriella) decorated to fit the occasion!

March 2024:

  • Many reasons to have a celebratory lab lunch with delicious Indian food, but first and foremost a massive CONGRATULATIONS to Fayrouz for passing her prelim exam! You gave a fantastic presentation and impressed your committee. We also finally managed to take a lab picture that includes all current members (photo credit to Alex Dittmar).

January 2024:

  • The lab welcomed Tingting Liu to our team. Tingting is joining us as a Senior Research Associate and will be working on unraveling how CD4 T cells contribute to layered immunity.

  • We also said goodbye to Aamna Abbasi, a first-year graduate student in the Immunology program who had joined the lab for her second rotation and said hello to Alex Dittmar, her classmate, that will be working with us during his third rotation.

September 2023:

  • Lab outing! We went to see the Duke Football team play Lafayette College. The game was fun and we stayed mostly dry during a massive downpour during the second half. It was a win for the team 42-7 and Fayrouz’s first Football game.

  • Fayrouz ElWesmi was recently awarded the Chancellor’s International Award to support her research during her second year at Duke. A massive congratulations on this fantastic achievement! (We also celebrated with a lab lunch but are bad at remembering to take pictures…)

August 2023:

  • With the start of the new semester, we are welcoming our newest cohort of graduate students to Duke. We are excited that Courtney Covolo, an incoming graduate student in the Immunology program, has chosen our lab for her first rotation! Welcome Courtney!

  • The lab hosted Benae Clardy for a quick rotation in early August. Benae Clardy is one of our amazing PRIME-PREP fellows that will spend a year at Duke for an immersive research experience. Benae is interested in exploring immunology (after focusing on chemistry during her undergraduate research) during her yearlong stay at Duke. It was a pleasure to host you in the lab - our doors are always open!

July 2023:

  • The Hemmers lab has its first graduate student! Fayrouz ElWesmi has officially joined the lab! Fayrouz is part of the CMB graduate program. We are excited to join you on your PhD journey and are so happy that you chose us!