Raghavi Sudharsan is a vision scientist with 10 years of experience in cell and molecular biology applied to the field of inherited retinal diseases. She joined Dr. William Beltran’s laboratory at Penn Vet in 2012 as a postdoctoral researcher immediately after completion of her PhD in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology from University of Kansas. She was promoted to the rank of Research Associate in 2017, and then to Senior Research Investigator in 2019. In January 2022, she joined the Department of Clinical Sciences & Advanced Medicine as an Assistant Professor, Research Track, within the Division of Experimental Retinal Therapies. Her research focus has been aimed at understanding the mechanisms of disease for inherited retinal degenerations and identifying common degenerative pathways that can be targeted for developing gene-agnostic therapies. She is also developing next generation promoters and AAV vectors for Penn Vet's retinal gene therapy program.
Caroline Sobotyk is an Assistant Professor of Clinical Parasitology in the Department of Pathobiology. Dr. Sobotyk is originally from Porto Alegre, Brazil. She completed her DVM in 2013 at the Universidade Federal de Santa Maria (UFSM) in Santa Maria, RS, Brazil and earned a MSc (2015) and PhD (2019) degree in Veterinary Parasitology from the same institution. In 2019, Dr. Sobotyk accepted a postdoctoral position at Texas A&M University (TAMU), while also undertaking her veterinary clinical parasitology residency with the National Center for Veterinary Parasitology. Her research focuses on the improvement and development of conventional and molecular diagnostic techniques for detecting parasitic infections with the aim to improve the general health and well-being of domestic and wild animals and better understand treatment and prevention strategies.