member

Pongpat Putthinun, PhD

Postdoctoral Fellow

Pongpat Putthinun is a health economist and postdoctoral scholar in the UCSF Memory and Aging Center. He joined the Decision Lab team, led by Dr. Winston Chiong, and is currently working on a project aimed at understanding how genetic predispositions to frontotemporal dementia influence decision-making in the pre-symptomatic phase. Through neuroeconomic methods, the research seeks to identify incidents of early impaired judgment that could lead to early intervention strategies to decelerate the onset of frontotemporal dementia.

Sana Desai, BS

Care Team Navigator

Sana graduated from UC Berkeley in May 2023 with a major in Integrative Human Biology and a minor in English. During college, Sana founded BioethiCAL, a club where students explored ethical dilemmas in biomedicine. As an Honors Fellow in the Fung Fellowship for Health + Innovation, she co-designed an app to support people living with multiple sclerosis. As a Patient Support Corps intern at UCSF, Sana worked as a COVID Hotline Healthcare Navigator helping patients navigate testing, vaccines, antivirals and care during the pandemic.

Annie Ye, BS

Care Team Navigator

Annie completed a Bachelor of Science degree with honors in Biology at the University of California, Los Angeles, in 2023. As an undergraduate, Annie was a part of Dr. Andreas Schwingshackl’s lab, where she investigated the regulation of cell potentials with novel pharmacological drugs in mediating lung injuries and was awarded the 2023 Dean’s Prize for Research and Creativity. She founded the Language Interpretation in Healthcare Project at UCLA to promote health literacy and aid low-English proficiency communities in accessing adequate healthcare.

Erica Gutmann, MS, SLP

Research Speech-Language Pathologist

Erica is a pediatric speech-language pathologist in the UCSF Dyslexia Center. She has a BS degree in Human Development from UC Davis and an MS degree in Speech-Language Pathology from Boston University. Erica has worked with students with language-based learning disorders in both outpatient and school settings. Her research interests in developmental language and reading disorders are at the intersection of neurocognition, education, and clinical practice.

Janet Allen-Williams

Academic Assistant

Janet Allen-Williams joined the UCSF Department of Neurology in 2015. Since April 2023, Janet has been serving as an Academic Assistant for the Memory and Aging Center, providing Academic Core Team services for the education team.
 

Maya Desai

Assistant Clinical Research Coordinator

Maya graduated from UC San Diego in 2023 with a degree in Cognitive Science, Specializing in Neuroscience. As an undergraduate, she worked at the Center for Healthy Eating and Activity Research and the Zeidan Lab. At the UCSF Memory and Aging Center she works on the Frontotemporal Dementia: Genes, Images and Emotions study.

Carina Lo

Assistant Clinical Research Coordinator

Carina is a research coordinator in Dr. Joel Kramer’s lab working primarily on Dr. Kramer’s Healthy Aging studies. She graduated with a BS degree in Biology from Tufts University in May 2023.

Aaron Colverson, PhD

Postdoctoral Scholar

Aaron Colverson is a Doctor of Philosophy in Ethnomusicology, with partnering research in Neuropsychology. He graduated from Berklee College of Music with a BM degree in Professional Music focused on jazz violin performance after which, he moved to Nairobi, Kenya for two years, embedding himself in East African musical traditions and cultures. He received a fellowship to study music and prosocial interaction in Alzheimer’s disease and endeavors to build cross-disciplinary competency between ethnomusicology and neuropsychology in the context of gerontology.

Emily Paolillo, PhD

Assistant Adjunct Professor

Emily Paolillo, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at the UCSF Memory and Aging Center. She obtained her PhD degree in Clinical Psychology (emphasis in Neuropsychology) from the SDSU/UCSD Joint Doctoral Program in 2021, which included a predoctoral clinical internship at VA Palo Alto Health Care System. Her research interests include evaluating digital health tools for early detection and monitoring of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.

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