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School of Dental Medicine Dean Dr. Steven Lepowsky delivered a welcome message to kick off the day\u2019s events.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis morning, we will showcase the incredible talents and the remarkable achievements of all of our students,\u201d said Lepowsky. \u201cEach year, we are thoroughly impressed by the quality and the rigor of the scholarly work presented by the students. I am confident that this year will be no different.\u201d<\/p>\n
Most of the one hundred student presenters at Research Day were participants in the UConn Summer Research Fellowship which awards a stipend, funded by generous donations, to support students over the summer. During the Research Day poster presentations, students showcased the culmination of their research with faculty, mentors and fellow classmates.<\/p>\n
One of the students, Gauri Sharma, mentored by Dr. Aditya Tadinada in the School of Dental Medicine, evaluated AI models in identifying different types of smile lines. In her research, Sharma asked both AI models and dentists to grade photos of different smile lines. With smile being a subjective topic, Sharma was not surprised to find that there was slight disagreement between the dentists. The two AI models tested, on the other hand, were on completely opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of agreement. However, Sharma concluded that with more training, AI can be a useful tool in dentistry.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n \u201cAI cannot fully replicate human judgment\u201d Sharma concluded from her research. \u201cAI is also what we think too, so the more that dental sees AI, and more, and the more we correct and train it, it does show promise.\u201d<\/p>\n Dr. Bruce T. Liang, dean of the School of Medicine, also shared some words with the students ahead of the keynote address.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is so important to the medical school that we really want to foster your lifelong learning and self-learning habit, and because you’re going to need this as you go through the rest of your medical career and dental career as well.\u201d<\/p>\n Liang continued, \u201cI saw some of your posters and they’re just so exciting. I hope that you continue your desire and motivation to discover, and to be the first one in the world to discover something\u2014which might not lead to something\u2014but in the overall scheme of things, it will add to scientific knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n The program continued with a keynote address, The Costs of Breast Cancer Care<\/em>, given by Dr. Rachel Adams Greenup, professor of surgery and chief of breast surgery at Yale School of Medicine. In her keynote address, Greenup defined value in healthcare and its role in personalized treatment planning, and recognized finances as a measure of social determinants of health.<\/p>\n Guertin said, “We would like to express our sincere appreciation for the generous donations from our many sponsors in support and recognition of the hard work of our medical and dental research students. Special thanks to our judges and expert reviewers for their review of the proposals, abstracts, posters and judging this event. Lastly, congratulations to our medical and dental student researchers and their faculty mentors!”<\/p>\n The winners of the 2026 Medical and Dental Research Day are listed below.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n School of Medicine<\/strong><\/p>\n Dr. and Mrs. Jeffrey Gross Award for Excellence in Research Achievement\u00a0<\/strong> John Shanley Memorial Global Health Award<\/strong> William M. Wadleigh Memorial Award for Cross-Cultural and<\/strong> International Health Research<\/strong> Dean\u2019s Award<\/strong> Peer Recognition Award for Excellence in Research<\/strong> Connecticut Academy of Family Practice<\/strong> Connecticut Holistic Health Association<\/strong> Lawrence G. Raisz Award for Excellence in Musculoskeletal Research<\/strong> Primary Care Excellence and Innovation Award<\/b> <\/p>\n School of Dental Medicine<\/strong><\/p>\n Dean\u2019s Award<\/strong> Associate Dean\u2019s Award<\/strong> Dentsply-Sirona Student Clinician Award <\/strong> Horace Wells Award for Innovation in Dentistry <\/strong> James and Ella Burr McManus Award for Excellence in Dental Research<\/strong> Dental Student Research Society Award <\/strong> Gustave Perl Memorial Award<\/strong> Connecticut Holistic Health Association <\/strong> Omicron Kappa Upsilon- Phi Chi Chapter Awards<\/strong><\/p>\n OKU-Basic Science Research Category<\/em><\/strong> OKU-Clinical Science Research Category<\/em><\/strong> Medical and Dental Student Research Day is the culmination of medical and dental students\u2019 projects for the year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":242203,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2166,1868,179],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2177],"class_list":["post-242189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sdm","category-meds","category-uconn-health"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-07 06:30:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/136"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242189"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":242235,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242189\/revisions\/242235"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/242203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242189"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=242189"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=242189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"woman](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/IMG_1686-scaled.jpg\")
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\nEve Cathcart
\nJosie Ford<\/p>\n
\nEllen Fuller<\/p>\n
\nCameron O\u2019Connell<\/p>\n
\nAwsam Bouabid
\nKevin Chudy<\/p>\n
\nZoe Barnett<\/p>\n
\nKyle Keegan<\/p>\n
\nMinna Holleck<\/p>\n
\nAndriy Grynyk<\/p>\n
\nSabina London<\/p>\n
\nMikaela Kutrolli
\nTed Olivier Pasquette<\/p>\n
\nCole Angell<\/p>\n
\nAnish Shah<\/p>\n
\nMadison Taylor McGee
\nJoseph Scott Nelson<\/p>\n
\nGauri Sharma
\nKatherine Hill Henderson<\/p>\n
\nFaith Ye
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