Lili Liu, MS, G3
Research Mentor: Wei Zheng, M.D., Ph.D.
Thesis Topic: Cancer Epidemiology
Biography
Originally from China, I received my BS in nursing from the Peking University in 2018. During my undergraduate time, I spent the last year doing clinical rotations at Peking University 2nd hospital. This experience strengthened my knowledge of clinical medicine, but more importantly, made me realize how evidence derived from population-based cohort studies can greatly improve diagnosis, affect clinical decision-making, and impact health promotion. For these reasons, I pursued my further passion in public health, and got my MPH degree in epidemiology and biostatistics from Peking University in 2021. During my MPH, I had the opportunity to complete several projects in different fields, including meta-analyses, health promotion on rare and chronic diseases, and this allowed me to better explore my research interest. Finally, I became interested in cancer epidemiology and decided to pursue my PhD degree in this field. Here at Vanderbilt, I feel it a great honor to work with Dr. Wei Zheng on cancer epidemiology in Southern community cohort study. We are currently using the data to evaluate poverty, built environment and lifestyle factors to better understand the risk and mortality of cancer.
Why Vanderbilt?
I chose Vanderbilt to pursue my PhD training in cancer epidemiology because of its great reputation in this field and its curriculum design. Also, during the interview, I was deeply impressed by the kindness from the faculty members who are always willing to help you accomplish your goals. What’s more, there are a lot of national and international collaborations, as well as top-level resources in this program. I have no doubt that all these factors together can help me achieve my academic goals in cancer epidemiology.