Upcoming Exams

Defences held in person have locations listed with the date below. Zoom information for virtual exams is not listed; if you are interested in attending one of these  defences, please contact the candidate's department or graduate.doctoral@ubc.ca. Zoom links are available one week prior to the defence.

Monday, 17 March 2025 - 9:00am - 1330, Life Sciences Institute, 2350 Health Sciences Mall

Wenjun Deng
Department: Cell & Developmental Biology
Analysis of Talin-Mediated Linkage to Actin in Cell-ECM Adhesion in Mice

Monday, 17 March 2025 - 9:00am - 226, Michael Smith Laboratories, 2185 E Mall

Djihane Damoo
Department: Microbiology and Immunology
Unravelling the Ustilago Maydis-Maize Interaction: Insights into Nutrient Acquisition and Effector Function

Monday, 17 March 2025 - 9:30am - Zoom

Bethany Ee
Department: Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education
An Exploration of Parents with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and Their Experiences with Raising Children with ADHD

Monday, 17 March 2025 - 11:00am - D324, Buchanan Building Block D, 1866 Main Mall

Steven Diggin
Department: Philosophy
How to Improvise: A Philosophical Account of the Nature, Scope and Limits of Improvisational Agency

Monday, 17 March 2025 - 1:00pm - Zoom

Md Belal Hossain
Department: Population and Public Health
Harnessing the Power of Causal Inference and Predictive Analytics for Survival Outcomes with Health Administrative Data: Applications to Tuberculosis Research

Monday, 17 March 2025 - 2:00pm - 1312, Life Sciences Institute, 2350 Health Sciences Mall

Sarah Dada
Department: Bioinformatics
Use of Long-Read Sequencing for Variant Detection and Diagnosis of Neurodevelopmental Disorders

Tuesday, 18 March 2025 - 9:00am - 1220/1230, Blusson Spinal Cord Centre, 818 W10th Ave

Katlyn Richardson
Department: Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
Granzyme K: A Novel Therapeutic Target for Psoriasis

Tuesday, 18 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

BENJAMIN HERTWIG
Department: English Language and Literatures
Twenty Years of War: Memory, Militarism, Remembrance, and Two Suicide Bombings

Tuesday, 18 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 203

Jiaying Zhu
Department: Forestry
Understanding and Exploration of Cellulose Nanofibrils-Water Interaction for the Application in Smart Responsive Materials

Tuesday, 18 March 2025 - 2:30pm - 108, West Mall Swing Space (SWNG), 2175 West Mall

Sean Vanbergen
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Studies of Ultracold Neutron Dynamics and Systematic Effects for the TUCAN EDM Experiment

Tuesday, 18 March 2025 - 4:00pm - 1312, Life Sciences Institute, 2350 Health Sciences Mall

Colton Strong
Department: Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Development of Genetically Modified Platelets for Therapeutic and Research Applications

Tuesday, 18 March 2025 - 4:00pm - Zoom

Bowornnan Chantapakul
Department: Food, Nutrition & Health
A Bacteriophage-Based Control System for Stem Gall Disease of Highbush Blueberry (Vaccinium Corymbosum) Caused by Agrobacterium Tumefaciens

Wednesday, 19 March 2025 - 9:00am - 121, Totem Fields Studios, 2613 West Mall

Gloria Mellesmoen
Department: Linguistics
The Grammar of Salish Reduplication

Wednesday, 19 March 2025 - 9:00am - Room 200

Sun Ryung Park
Department: Political Science
Race to Go Green: Three Pathways in Green Industrial Revolution

Wednesday, 19 March 2025 - 9:00am - 3200, Biological Sciences Building. 6270 University Boulevard

Yi Xue Na
Department: Botany
The Diversity and Evolution of Apicomplexan and Apicomplexan-Like Parasites

Wednesday, 19 March 2025 - 10:00am - 101, Michael Smith Laboratories, 2185 East Mall

Jennifer Kim
Department: Neuroscience
Harnessing Novel Tools to Explore Transcriptomic Patterns that Shape Microgilal Morphology

Wednesday, 19 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Xueya Lu
Department: Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences
The Detection and Quantification of Reactivity in Ultramafic Rocks, Minerals, and Mine Waste for Carbon Dioxide Removal via Carbon Mineralization

Wednesday, 19 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 203

Loay Al-Salehi
Department: Mechanical Engineering
Neck Muscle and Intervertebral Dynamics During Impending Headfirst Impacts in Rollover Crashes

Wednesday, 19 March 2025 - 4:00pm - Room 200

Adrian Grzedowski
Department: Chemistry
Surface Engineering of DNA SAMs and Nano-Structures for FRET Based DNA Biosensors

Thursday, 20 March 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Mrinmoy Chakraborty
Department: Mechanical Engineering
An Integrated Indoor-Outdoor Assessment of the Sources and Impacts of Air Pollution in Rural India: Linking Low-Cost Measurement, Modelling and Impact Assessment

Thursday, 20 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Nicholas Michelson
Department: Neuroscience
Methods to Evaluate Mouse Dorsal Cortical Function during Social and Innate Behaviors

Thursday, 20 March 2025 - 4:00pm - Room 203

Jialing Zhang
Department: Mathematics
Partial Differential Equations with Combined Nonlinearities and Partial Differential Equations on Conical Singular Manifolds

Friday, 21 March 2025 - 9:00am - 5104, Earth Sciences Building, 2207 Main Mall

Yayla Sezginer
Department: Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences
Autonomous Measurement of Phytoplankton Physiology and Productivity Using Fast Repetition Rate Fluorometry

Friday, 21 March 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Roger John
Department: Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education
Exploring Indigenous Concepts of Well-Being with Indigenous Knowledge Keepers

Friday, 21 March 2025 - 9:30am - 226, Michael Smith Laboratories, 2185 E Mall

Braydon Black
Department: Microbiology and Immunology
Glutathione Metabolism Modulates Redox Homeostasis and Virulence in the Pathogenic Fungus Cryptococcus Neoformans

Friday, 21 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Zoom

Morgan Westcott
Department: Educational Studies
Polytechnic Instructors as First Responders to Student Crises: Centring Faculty Voices

Friday, 21 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Keila Stark
Department: Zoology
From Metabolic Scaling to Metacommunities: Conceptual and Empirical Advances in Community Thermal Ecology

Friday, 21 March 2025 - 1:30pm - 226, Michael Smith Laboratories, 2185 E Mall

Katherine Donald
Department: Microbiology and Immunology
The Role of Breastmilk IgA in Infant Gut Microbiota and Immune Development

Monday, 24 March 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Mobina Mobaraki
Department: Electrical & Computer Engineering
Vision-Based Seam Tracking and Multi-Modal Defect Detection in GMAW Fillet Welding Using Artificial Intelligence

Monday, 24 March 2025 - 11:00am - 6124, Pharmaceutical Sciences Building, 2405 Wesbrook Mall

Ndeye Khady Thiombane
Department: Pharmaceutical Sciences
Chemogenomic Screening of Topoisomerase Inhibitors: Mechanistic Insights and Cellular Interactions

Monday, 24 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Xinglong Li
Department: Statistics
Approximate Prosterior Inference for Bayesian Nonparametrics with Guarantees

Monday, 24 March 2025 - 12:30pm - 5108, Earth Sciences Building, 2207 Main Mall

Lindsey Abdale
Department: Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences
Carbonatitic Magmatism and Metamorphic Processes in the Monashee Complex, British Columbia, Canada: Thermotectonic Evolution of the Western North Americann Margin from the Neoproterozic to the Paleogene

Monday, 24 March 2025 - 1:00pm - Room 203

Sharon Engbrecht
Department: English Language and Literatures
Challenging Romance's Story of Gender and Sexuality in Twentieth Century Women's Critical-Romance Novels

Monday, 24 March 2025 - 4:00pm - Zoom

Naoki Takemura
Department: Curriculum and Pedagogy
Male Understanding of Motherhood in Japan—Rereading Okonogi Keigo’s Ajase Complex Theory

Tuesday, 25 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

David Black
Department: Electrical & Computer Engineering
Bilateral Human Teleoperation: A Mixed Reality System for Remote Ultrasound

Wednesday, 26 March 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Xiaoxu Ding
Department: Rehabilitation Sciences
Understanding the Use of Mobile Health (mHealth) to Increase Mental Health Care Service Access for Youth

Wednesday, 26 March 2025 - 9:30am - Room 203

Jun Jie Zhu
Department: Mathematics
On Applications of Oscillatory Integrals

Thursday, 27 March 2025 - 9:00am - Room 200

Timothy Wong
Department: Cell & Developmental Biology
Applying Super Resolution Microscopy to Investigate Caveolin and Clathrin Endocytosis

Thursday, 27 March 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Kristen Blowes
Department: Civil Engineering
Post-earthquake Recovery Performance of Modern Buildings and the Development of Recovery-Based Seismic Design Provisions

Thursday, 27 March 2025 - 12:00pm - Zoom

Evelyn Arriagada Oyarzun
Department: Resources, Environment and Sustainability
Performing Gender through Contested Waters: Women+ Water Activists in Chilean Hydrosocial Struggles

Thursday, 27 March 2025 - 1:00pm - Zoom

Elaheh Shenasa
Department: Oncology
Tissue-Based Methods to Assess Immune Biomarkers within the Tumor Microenvironment on Formalin Fixed Paraffin Embedded Clinical Materials

Thursday, 27 March 2025 - 1:00pm - 237, Michael Smith Laboratories, 2185 E Mall

Anne-Sophie Sack
Department: Neuroscience
T-Type Calcium Channel CAV3.2 Modulates Dentate Gyrus Granule Cell Excitability and Plasticity in a Maturational Stage Dependent Manner

Thursday, 27 March 2025 - 4:00pm - Room 203

Caleb Suan
Department: Mathematics
Deformations of Special Structures in Dimensions 6 and 7

Friday, 28 March 2025 - 9:00am - 354, Friedman Building, 2177 Westbrook Mall

Tanvi Puri
Department: Neuroscience
Past Reproductive Experience and Estradiol Affect Brain Health in Middle-Aged Females

Friday, 28 March 2025 - 9:00am - Room 200

Samira Shirvani
Department: Chemical and Biological Engineering
Thermo-catalytic Applications of Two-Dimensional Metal Carbides: (De) Hydrogenation of Liquid Hydrogen Carriers, CH4 Dry Reforming, and CO2 Hydrogenation

Friday, 28 March 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Carlos Colin Moreno
Department: Interdisciplinary Studies Graduate Program
Barroco Cuántico. Transcendencia Barrosa y Obsesión Barroca

Friday, 28 March 2025 - 9:00am - Room 203

Arvin Tashakori
Department: Electrical & Computer Engineering
Secure and Scalable Human Motion Understanding Using Machine Learning-Powered Smart Sensing Textile

Friday, 28 March 2025 - 4:00pm - A4-187, BC Children's Hospital Research Institute, W 28th Ave

Phyu Mar Soe
Department: Population and Public Health
COVID-19 Vaccine Safety in Special Populations

Monday, 31 March 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Spencer Anderson
Department: Medical Genetics
Pharmacogenomic and Machine Learning Insights for the Prediction of L-Asparaginase-Induced Hypersensitivity in Pediatric Cancer

Monday, 31 March 2025 - 10:30am - Zoom

Vinoth Ganapathiraman
Department: Civil Engineering
A Laboratory Study of Internal Instability in Widely Graded Sand and Gravel

Monday, 31 March 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Alexandra Jewell
Department: Philosophy
A New Framework for Self-Disorders: Anxiety as a Case Study

Monday, 31 March 2025 - 12:30pm - 121, Liu Institute for Global Issues, 6476 NW Marine Drive

Benjamin Cox
Department: Mining Engineering
Natural Capital Optimization of Carbon, Water, and Tailings in Mining and Metals

Monday, 31 March 2025 - 1:00pm - Room 203

Kinley Gillette
Department: Philosophy
A Political Approach to Scientific Authority

Monday, 31 March 2025 - 1:00pm - ANGU 335, Henry Angus Building, 2053 Main Mall

Fernanda Brito
Department: Chemical and Biological Engineering
Clean Energy: An Alternative Proton Exchange Membrane Using Sustainable and Earth-Friendly Components

Monday, 31 March 2025 - 3:30pm - 5104, Earth Sciences Building, 2207 Main Mall

Katrin Steinthorsdottir
Department: Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences
Feasibility of in-situ Carbon Mineralization in Serpentinite via Shallow Injection, British Columbia, Canada

Tuesday, 1 April 2025 - 12:00pm - Zoom

Steffen Lahrsen
Department: Forestry
Digital Transformation in Timber Harvesting: An Automated Framework for Productivity and Performance Monitoring in Whole-Tree Harvesting

Tuesday, 1 April 2025 - 1:00pm - 14th floor meeting room, BC Cancer Research Centre, 675 W 10th Ave

Afsaneh Panahi
Department: Oncology
Exploring the Role of APOBEC3B Cytidine Deaminase in High-Risk Multiple Myeloma

Wednesday, 2 April 2025 - 9:00am - SHY F414, Shaughnessy Building, BC Children’s Hospital and BC Women’s Hospital, 4500 Oak Street

Dwayne Tucker
Department: Obstetrics and Gynaecology
Clinical and Biomarker Predictors of Pain-Related Outcomes After Endometriosis Surgery

Wednesday, 2 April 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Christine Yu
Department: Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education
The Help-Seeking Process for Parents of Children with Anxiety: A Grounded Theory

Wednesday, 2 April 2025 - 10:00am - 3113, BC Children's Hospital Research Institute, 950 West 28th Avenue

Enes Ergin
Department: Bioinformatics
Computational Interrogation of Proteoform Dynamics in Pediatric Cancer

Wednesday, 2 April 2025 - 12:30pm - 1346, Life Sciences Institute, 2350 Health Sciences Mall

Adel Yavarinasab
Department: Biomedical Engineering
Electrochemical Insights into Bacterial Physiology: Electron Transfer and Metabolite Detection

Wednesday, 2 April 2025 - 1:00pm - Zoom

Juliane Dmyterko
Department: Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education
Neurodiversity-Affirming Practice Through the Lens of Lived Autistic Experience

Wednesday, 2 April 2025 - 2:00pm - Dorothy Lam Boardroom, BC Cancer Research Institute, 675 West 10th Avenue

JUNBUM IM
Department: Oncology
Targeting O-GLCNAC Transferase (OGT) as a Novel Therapeutic Strategy for EVI1-Acute Myeloid Leukemia: Enhancing Mitochondrial Priming for Improved Outcomes

Wednesday, 2 April 2025 - 3:00pm - 107, Aquatic Ecosystems Research Laboratory, 2202 Main Mall

Natasha Klasios
Department: Zoology
Ecological Impacts of Microplastic Pollution to Temperate Freshwater Zooplankton Under Realistic Exposure Scenarios

Thursday, 3 April 2025 - 9:00am - 2004, Civil and Mechanical Engineering, 6250 Applied Science Lane

Sina Tavasoli
Department: Civil Engineering
Autonomous Indoor Post-Disaster Inspections Using Micro Aerial Vehicles

Thursday, 3 April 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Lee Iskander
Department: Curriculum and Pedagogy
Gender Normativity in Teacher Education: A Critical Participatory Action Research Study with Trans and Gender Nonconforming Preservice Teachers in Canada

Thursday, 3 April 2025 - 1:00pm - 1346, Life Sciences Institute, 2350 Health Sciences Mall

Jinfang Li
Department: Neuroscience
Organization and Processing of Gustatory Information in the Drosophila Brain

Friday, 4 April 2025 - 10:30am - Zoom

Sarah Lynch
Department: Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education
Unpacking the Grammar of Test and Measures: The Hidden Complexity in Psychological Test Items and its Association with Item Responses

Friday, 4 April 2025 - 10:30am - 604, Asian Centre, 1871 West Mall

Kiran Sunar
Department: Asian Studies
The River between Sohni and Mahiwal: Fluid Ecologies of Genre, Land, and Gender in a Punjabi Narrative Tradition

Friday, 4 April 2025 - 1:00pm - Zoom

Faramarz Jabbarvaziri
Department: Electrical & Computer Engineering
Advanced Grant-Free NOMA and Hybrid Beamforming Techniques for 5G and Beyond

Friday, 4 April 2025 - 4:00pm - Room 203

Juan Carlos Hernaiz Leonardo
Department: Population and Public Health
Design and Validation of a Sinonasal Endoscopic Score (SiNES) for Chronic Rhinosinusitis Outcome Assessment

Monday, 7 April 2025 - 9:00am - Room 200

Christopher Lee
Department: Microbiology and Immunology
Understanding, Stability, Regulation, and Recognition within the Cryptococcus Neoformans Capsule

Monday, 7 April 2025 - 9:00am - Room 203

Verena Rossa-Roccor
Department: Resources, Environment and Sustainability
Academics as Activists: Exploring and Building Political Knowledge Mobilization Capacities to Influence Climate Policy

Tuesday, 8 April 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Ariel Hoi Ching Ko
Department: Psychology
The Effects of Maladaptive Parenting and Insecure Attachment on the Development of Perfectionism in Children and Adolescents: A 2-Year Longitudinal Mediation Analysis

Tuesday, 8 April 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Laura Trainini
Department: Music
Music Embodiment in Flute Practice and Performance

Tuesday, 8 April 2025 - 4:00pm - 2020, Fred Kaiser, 2332 Main Mall

Hany Abdelraheem
Department: Electrical & Computer Engineering
Interference Cancellation Circuits for Full-Duplex Low-Power Radios

Tuesday, 8 April 2025 - 4:00pm - Zoom

Ryan Roemer
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Layer Dependent Electronic Structure and Magnetic Transition Evolution in Two-Dimensional Ferromagnetic van der Waals Films

Wednesday, 9 April 2025 - 9:00am - Room 200

Federico Ricca
Department: Vancouver School of Economics
Essays on Local Political Economy

Wednesday, 9 April 2025 - 9:00am -

Ace Chan
Department: Population and Public Health
Understanding Cancer-Causing Substance Use among Trans and Gender Diverse Communities in Canada

Thursday, 10 April 2025 - 9:00am - X836, ICICS, 2366 Main Mall

Vasileios Lioutas
Department: Computer Science
Towards Realistic Controllable Driving Simulators

Thursday, 10 April 2025 - 9:00am - Room 200

Gahyung Lee
Department: Statistics
Statistical Models that are Known or Suspected to be Partially Identified: Issues of Parameterization, Computation, and Software Development

Thursday, 10 April 2025 - 4:00pm - Zoom

Paolo Andre Sosa Villagarcia
Department: Political Science
Authoritarian Legacies and Far-Right Normalization: Peru in Comparative Perspective

Monday, 14 April 2025 - 9:00am - 350, HR MacMillan Building, 2357 Main Mall

Lexis Ly
Department: Applied Animal Biology
Investigation of Owner to Animal Shelters through Data Practices, Self-Rehoming Outcomes, and Community Surrender Pathways

Monday, 14 April 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Tingting Zhao
Department: Chemistry
Chemical Pattern Recognition in Metabolomics and Exposomics by Mass Spectrometry and Machine Learning

Monday, 14 April 2025 - 3:00pm - James Hogg Conference Centre, St Paul's Hospital, 1081 Burrard St

Firoozeh Vosoogh Gerayeli
Department: Experimental Medicine
Integrating Next-Generation Sequencing in Endophenotyping of Airway Diseases: A Path toward Personalized Medicine

Tuesday, 15 April 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Elliot Cheung
Department: Mathematics
Towards a Discretization of Chern-Simons Theory

Tuesday, 15 April 2025 - 4:00pm - Zoom

Jesse Donald Fox
Department: Neuroscience
Characterization of the Parkinson's Disease DNAJC13 p.N855S Mutation in a Knock-in Mouse Model

Wednesday, 16 April 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Taha Ahmadi Vostakolaei
Department: Educational Studies
The Future Folk: Reconceptualizations and Meditations on Culture, Psyche, and Revolt

Wednesday, 16 April 2025 - 9:00am - Room 200

Kelsea Perry
Department: Sociology
(Micro)bial Collectives: A More-Than-Human Sociology of COVID-19

Wednesday, 16 April 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Kaitlin Sullivan
Department: Neuroscience
Identifying and Manipulating Cell Types Involved in Rodent Fear Memory

Wednesday, 16 April 2025 - 2:00pm - Room 203

Kate Huang
Department: Experimental Medicine
Connecting the Clinic to the Bench: Modelling the Functional Effects of a Titin Variant Associated with Atrial and Ventricular Arrhythmias

Thursday, 17 April 2025 - 4:00pm - Zoom

Kirk King
Department: Music
Chasing the Ghost of Kadekaru

Wednesday, 23 April 2025 - 9:00am - Zoom

Mehmet Saglam
Department: Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education
Investigating Educators' Knowledge, Skills, Attitudes, and Agency in Constructing an Intelligence-Friendly Classroom

Wednesday, 23 April 2025 - 12:00pm - 224, Biodiversity Research Centre, 2212 Main Mall

Cassandra Elphinstone
Department: Botany
Arctic Plant Genomics: Biogeography, Comparative Genomics, DNA Methylation, Gene Expression, and Centromeres

Friday, 25 April 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Mirta Roncagalli
Department: French, Hispanic and Italian Studies
Neohumanismo: Una Propuesta de Regeneración Ética y Sociopolítica en el Ensayo Español del Siglo XXI

Thursday, 1 May 2025 - 3:00pm - Room 203

Adam Martens
Department: Mathematics
Ricci Flow: Curvature Concentration and Sobolev Bounds

Tuesday, 20 May 2025 - 12:30pm - Room 200

Lindsey Snyder
Department: Curriculum and Pedagogy
Unboxing Object-Based Learning: Exploring Teachers' Object-Based Pedagogies with Museum Kits in Elementary Classrooms