Post Doctoral Fellows
Fatemeh (Leila) Vahedi

Ph.D. Students
Alexa Mansour
Amin Soukhaklari

MSc. Students
Maddie Read
Alyssa Mark

Undergraduate Students
Emilia Berg
Tristan Larche
Selina Sun
Farhan Moinuddin
Rita Gergis
Ana Pivanenka

Past Lab Members

Alexa Mansour

PhD Student      

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Alexa graduated with a Bachelor of Health Science in Biochemistry at McMaster University in 2023. After starting her master's degree in the Ashkar lab, she transferred to the Medical Sciences PhD program in 2025. Her project focuses on understanding how host metabolism shapes the immune response during viral infection and in the context of neuroinflammation. 

 

While immune responses are critical to host defense, dysregulated inflammation can also be a central driver of disease. Thus, it is important to understand mechanisms of immune regulation. Immune cells rely on metabolic programs for survival and function. However, these metabolic pathways are not merely supportive processes that provide energy for immune cells but actively regulate immune cell activation and function. The goal of Alexa's research is to understand how specific metabolic pathways, such as glucose metabolism, play a role in regulating inflammation and influence disease outcomes. We hope to be able to apply this knowledge to develop strategies to mitigate immune-mediated damage in acute viral infections and a wide range of inflammatory conditions. ​

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Outside of the lab she is an avid traveller, skier and she loves to bake!

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Email: mansoa19@mcmaster.ca