Cole Beatty, PhD candidate in Daniel Saban’s lab, is the 28th Cora Verhagen winner for his presentation entitled “Severity of meibomian gland dysfunction is distinguishable in patients by tear leukocyte changes: an observational study using 36-color flow cytometry”. Meibomian Gland Dysfunction (MGD) is when the oil glands of the eye become dysfunctional, which leads to manifestations of ocular surface disease, such as dry eye disease. We are trying to understand how the immune system, specifically a cell type called neutrophils, plays a role in causing MGD in animal models and in patients.
The Cora Verhagen Award was instituted in 1995 to honor the memory and scientific contributions of Cora Verhagen. It awards the best ocular immunology poster or paper presented by graduate students and post-doctoral fellows at annual meeting of The Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology, Inc. (ARVO).
This work was done in collaboration with Dr. Victor Perez’s lab in the Duke Eye Center.