Hometown: Enumclaw, Washington
Faculty mentor: Nitin Karandikar, MD, PhD, professor, Department of Pathology, Carver College of Medicine

The Karandikar lab studies multiple sclerosis (MS), a disorder where the body’s immune system attacks the coating around nerves, causing progressive neurologic damage. While many MS treatments exist, they often do not provide results for patients or they cause intolerable side effects. Kai Rogers is working to apply extracorporeal photopheresis (ECP), a poorly understood but well-tolerated therapy, to MS and other autoimmune disorders. If effective, it would expand treatment options available to MS patients, especially those who have failed at other treatments, and potentially expand the reach of ECP to treat other, similar disorders.

Rogers plans to continue pursuing research, hopefully as the principal investigator of a lab, while also practicing transfusion medicine.

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