Our Faculty and Staff

Dr. Natarajan is an Associate Research Scientist with the Rumbaugh Goodwin Institute for Cancer Research at NSU since 2019. Prior to becoming a full-time scientist, Dr. Natarajan conducted her Ph.D. thesis research at RGI during the summer of 2017 and 2018. Dr. Natarajan’s research is focused on analyzing the Epigenetic Modifications in different types of cancers, including breast, prostate, ovarian, lung, osteosarcoma, glioblastoma, and neuroblastoma. Dr. Natarajan is trying to find epigenetic biomarkers that correlate with the aggressive growth abilities and drug resistance of cancers. Dr. Natarajan is also involved with another project that is aiming to enhance the delivery of anti-angiogenesis drugs F16 and JFD to the brain, for treating brain cancers such as glioblastoma.

In addition to conducting her research, she is also advising graduate students on their research projects and supervises medical, pharmacy, and undergraduate students in their research electives and independent research studies. Most of her undergraduate students have presented their research at various conferences such as the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students (ABRCMC), American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), Life Sciences South Florida (LSSF), STEM Undergraduate Research Symposium of FIU, Undergraduate Student Symposium (USS) of NSU, and the Health Professions Division Reach Day (HPDRD) at NSU. Some of these undergraduate students have received awards for their best research, oral, and poster presentations from ABRCMC, LSSF-STEMURS, USS, and HPDRD. Dr. Natarajan has published 14 peer-reviewed research papers and presented more than 20 papers in conferences.