Principal Investigator

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Dr. Albert L. Gonzales is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physiology and Cell Biology at the University of Nevada, Reno School of Medicine. After graduating from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona with a degree in Biology, he obtained his Ph.D. in Biomedical Science from Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado with Professor Scott Earley, Ph.D. He completed his postdoctoral training at the University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont under the mentorship of Mark. T. Nelson, the Chair and University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Pharmacology. In 2020, Dr. Gonzales joined the faculty of the University of Nevada, Reno School of Medicine.  Dr. Gonzales’ laboratory is focused on understanding the active role capillary networks play in sensing and responding to the metabolic needs of the tissue and the mechanisms insuring the point-to-point delivery of oxygen and nutrients and the removal of metabolic waste. Dr. Gonzales’ laboratory employs a broad range of modern experimental approaches and techniques, including: ex vivo pressurized vasculature tissue preparations; high-speed high-resolution Ca2+ imaging, and patch clamp electrophysiology. 

Ahmed received his medical degree at Mansoura University, School of Medicine, Egypt. He is interested in an academic career in neurosurgery. His postgraduate research focused on brain water homeostasis and neuro-immune axis. Before joining UNR, he worked as a research scholar at Mayo Clinic to study the immune landscape of stroke thrombi and aneurysm healing. In the Gonzales lab, Ahmed is exploring the role of pericyte biology in brain homeostatic functions and developing novel methods to characterize tissue pericytes.

Cristian received his Bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry at California State University Fullerton in 2020. His undergraduate thesis was on the Carbon Dioxide Reduction to Sodium Formate on Tin Plated Zinc for Fuel Cell. Currently, he is working towards his PhD in the Biochemistry program at the University of Nevada Reno. Within the Gonzales lab, he is working on the role of pericytes in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease and the development of novel laboratory procedures.

Elena is a graduated student from the university of Nevada, Reno. She works as a laboratory technician and manages our inventory. She hopes to gain more knowledge about research and experimentation later in the future.

Shipra earned her Bachelor of Science in Biotechnology from the University of Burdwan in West Bengal, India in collaboration with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, Jharkhand, India. Her graduate thesis was titled "Survey of Short Sequence Repeats Markers on Drought Quantitative Trait Locus 12.1 in Oryza Sativa (rice)," and she earned a master's degree in Environmental Sciences from the Central University of Gujarat, India, and the Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati, India. Her master's thesis focused on the preliminary phytochemical extraction of lipids in green algae and the antioxidant properties of the algae. She worked as a junior research fellow at the Indian Institute of Technology-Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad, India. She is currently a graduate student in Gonzales' lab, where she is developing novel methods for defining tissue pericytes.

Priscilla has a Penultimate year BSc Biomedical Science student from Queen's University Belfast, currently on the UNR International Undergraduate Research Program in the Gonzales lab. She hopes to gain more knowledge and experience in research.

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