Fatima El-ghazali began her journey to neurological surgery with a degree in neuroscience at the University of Washington. She returned to UW for medical school and is sticking around for residency here in hopes of continuing to serve the community in which she grew up. Her scholarly interests involve the intersection of genotype and phenotype as it pertains to neurological diseases and improving patient outcomes. Outside the hospital, Fatima enjoys dedicating time to loved ones, mentorship, service, traveling and portraiture.
Nick Hug was born in California’s Bay Area but spent most of his early years in Geneva, Switzerland. He attended Northwestern University where he founded the first neuroscience student organization and helped establish the Neuroscience major. He was one of the first students to graduate from Northwestern with a B.A. in Neuroscience. He then attended Stanford University for medical school where he studied the neurobiological impact of opioids on breathing and performed clinical research on peripheral nerve disorders. In his free time, Nick enjoys brewing and roasting coffee, trivia and crossword puzzles, music and concerts, running, skiing, and spending time outdoors.
Christine Park was born in South Korea but moved to Reno, NV when she was 8 years old. She attended Dartmouth College where she majored in chemistry. She graduated with high honors and completed her thesis on organic synthesis research, which focused on developing synthesis pathways to make optically active monomers to construct chiral and conformationally rigid synthetic oligomers that have potential therapeutic properties. Before matriculating into medical school, she worked as a sushi chef in Las Vegas and as a team host at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. She then attended Duke University for medical school during which she received her Master of Engineering in artificial intelligence from Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering. While in medical school, she primarily focused on research studying interneuron transplantation into human and mouse epileptic tissue as a novel therapy for epilepsy and applying machine learning (computer vision, natural language processing) and predictive modeling for patient outcomes. She served as the president of the Neurosurgery Interest Group, founder of Women in Neurosurgery, and president of Data Club through which she hosted various campus-wide events such as the Data Competition, AI Start-Up Competition, and the Duke Digital Venture Challenge. In her free time, Christine enjoys hosting sushi nights, translating books, hiking, running, golfing, playing tennis and piano, and building/designing nanoblocks.