Stories that connect art and discovery

bacpac is an aerosol mural artist originally from New York City. My art is usually focused on engineering and machines, not nature. I painted on movie sets, rock videos and custom cars before coming to Arizona.

Day-to-day, you’ll find me working as a digital design strategist at Mayo Clinic, in support of our care teams and patients. Sometimes I also teach user-centered design at my alma mater, the University of Arizona School of Art. When I’m not at a desk, I’m in motion—running, cycling, swimming, surfing, or gardening in the Sonoran desert I call home.

Dr. Johanna DiStefano is a Professor and Head of the Diabetes and Fibrotic Disease Unit where she leads research in the molecular mechanisms of chronic, progressive metabolic diseases. For more than twenty years, Dr. DiStefano has investigated molecular mechanisms underlying type 2 diabetes and related hepatic and renal complications. During this time, she has led many successful NIH-funded studies to identify genetic and molecular factors associated with the development and progression of diabetic kidney disease, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), and diabetic dyslipidemia, all of which contribute significantly to morbidity and mortality in patients with diabetes. She currently has major efforts in the investigation of epigenetic mechanisms underlying the development and progression of NAFLD and the role of extracellular vesicle content in mediating metabolic derangements in obesity and improvements in metabolic parameters associated with bariatric surgery and lifestyle interventions. Her team works with ethnically diverse patient populations using state-of-the-art laboratory approaches to address important gaps in our understanding of disease pathogenesis and directly impact unmet clinical needs.

I have been a Physical Therapist since 1989 practicing almost exclusively in orthopedic and outpatient musculoskeletal settings. I have advanced skills in manual therapy, clinical assessment, and chronic pain conditions including complex regional pain syndrome. I graduated from Texas Tech University Health Science Center on August 15th, 2020 with a Doctor of Science Degree.

Dr. Lifshitz is a neuroscientist with specific subject matter expertise in traumatic brain injury. He is a Research Professor at the University of Arizona College of Medicine-Phoenix. He has a passion for creative studies to understand how the brain injury dismantles, repairs, and regenerates circuits in the brain, with a focus on inflammation and rehabilitation. He takes immense pride in mentoring and training others in the scientific processes that generate evidence to inform clinical decisions. In the community, he raises awareness and develops services for traumatic brain injury in the context of domestic violence.

Dr. Kamel Lahouel develops mathematical and statistical models for biology, focusing on machine learning with cell-free DNA signals for cancer detection. His work includes stochastic processes, non-parametric statistics, and pattern recognition in latent dynamical systems. He joined TGen in 2022 after a Ph.D. and postdoc at Johns Hopkins University.