People
Mary Beth Brown, PT, PhD
Lab Principal Investigator
Dr. Brown began her career in research as faculty in the Doctor of Physical Therapy program at Indiana University where she was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure. She transitioned to a new faculty position in Rehabilitation Medicine at UW in December 2018. Prior to academia, Dr. Brown practiced for almost a decade as a licensed physical therapist, primarily in a hospital-based outpatient setting as a staff therapist and as clinic director.
Education and Training
- Postdoctoral fellowship: Pulmonary and Critical Care, Indiana University School of Medicine, IN
- PhD: Applied Physiology, Georgia Institute of Technology, GA
- Masters: Physical Therapy, University of Miami School of Medicine, FL
- Undergraduate: Exercise Science, Lenoir-Rhyne College, NC
Areas of Research Expertise
- Exercise interventions and functional measures for patients and rodent models
- Physiological responses to acute and chronic exercise in patients and in rodent models
- Exercise hemodynamics
- Intravital microscopy of the rodent lung
- Exocrine sweat gland physiology and human thermoregulation
Current Members of the Dr. Brown’s Research Team
Jason Chan, BS
UW DPT student class of 2024
Meet Jason!
Jason is a second year DPT student who grew up in Seattle and graduated from the UW with a B.S. in Biology-Physiology and a minor in Global Health in 2021. He is excited to be a part of the Brown Lab and begin working on the DMD rat exercise study. In the future, Jason hopes to become a neurologic physical therapist while continuing to be involved in clinical research.
Marion Paetznick
UW DPT student class of 2024
Meet Marion!
Marion received her BS in Teacher Education from Valparaiso University and previously worked as a high school teacher, volleyball coach and fitness instructor before changing careers. Marion enthusiastically joined the Brown lab her first year as a DPT student and currently assists with IPF qualitative research.
Eliseo Veras-Tobos
UW DPT student class of 2024
Meet Eliseo!
Eliseo was born and raised in Massachusetts and received a B.S. in Biochemistry at Boston College in 2015. Having worked in biotech for 5 years, he switched careers to join the UW DPT program. His research focuses on the effects of exercise on physical activity, muscle strength, endurance, and quality of life for people with Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis. Eliseo enjoys cooking, hiking, and playing Dungeons and Dragons with his wife and friends.
Helen O’Meara
UW DPT student class of 2024
Brenna Lanton
UW DPT student class of 2024
Meet Brenna!
Brenna is a second year DPT student who grew up in Portland, Oregon and received a B.S in Biology from the University of Washington in 2011. Before coming back to graduate school, she explored many different passions including clinical research in gynecological oncology at the U.C San Diego Moores Cancer Center; traveling internationally and starting/running a worker-owned, organic produce farm in rural Northern California. Brenna is interested in pelvic health rehabilitation and her current research is investigating the incidence and impact of urinary incontinence in women with lymphangioleiomyomatosis (LAM).
Zoe Moon
UW DPT student class of 2024
Meet Zoe!
Zoe is a second-year student at UW from Issaquah, WA, and is majoring in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology. She joined the lab in July 2022 and assists with rodent exercise testing as part of the Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy research study. She plans to pursue a degree in medicine.
Daniel Cai
UW DPT student class of 2023
Meet Daniel!
Daniel Haotian Cai is a first year DPT student at UW who grew up in China and Sweden. He graduated from University of Pittsburgh with B.S. in rehabilitation science in 2019. His previously researched on electrical stimulation in restoring bladder function, and population risk factors with esophagus cancer. Daniel wants to be a sports physical therapist, clinical researcher, and anatomy teacher.
Claire Child, PT, DPT, MPH, CCS
PhD Student
Meet Claire!
Claire Child is a physical therapist and a teaching associate in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine. She is an ABPTS board-certified clinical specialist in cardiovascular and pulmonary physical therapy (CCS) with specific clinical interests in advanced heart and lung diseases, transplantation, and adoptive cell therapy for hematologic malignancies. Her research interests are in health systems innovations and the use of technology and behavioral economics to augment physical activity in at risk populations. Claire has 10 years of clinical experience in large urban academic medical centers and critical care settings. She previously taught as a clinical assistant professor in the Doctor of Physical Therapy program at Alvernia University in Reading, PA. Claire received her DPT from the MGH Institute of Health Professions and an MPH in Health Care Policy and Management from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Hunter Furutani
UW undergraduate student class of 2022
Meet Hunter!
Hunter was raised in Redmond, WA, where he attended Redmond High School. Following in the footsteps of much of his family, Hunter decided to continue his education at the University of Washington, where he is pursuing an undergraduate degree in Biology-Physiology. Hunter currently serves as a research assistant in the DMD rat exercise study, helping out Dr. Brown and SiWei with exercising the rats daily. He loves the teamwork that comes with being a part of the lab as well as the applications to clinical settings. He is appreciative of Dr. Brown for giving him the opportunity to work in her lab and witness how exercise can be utilized as a type of medicine. He is planning on pursuing PT school in the future.
Barbara Gordon
UW undergraduate student class of 2023
Meet Barbara!
Barbara graduated from Colby College with a BA in American Studies. Her emphasis in undergraduate was on the success she had as a women’s ice hockey player. Her jersey number is retired, she was awarded the honor for student athlete who contributed most to the school’s enrichment, and she was also selected to play for the United States Women’s National Ice Hockey Team right of school where she traveled to Sweden and Finland to represent her country.
Barbara began in physical therapy years later, after going back to school for her AAS, as a PTA where she worked 6 years in a variety of settings including outpatient, skilled nursing facilities, and hospital acute care. During her practice as a PTA, she saw a wide variety of patients with pulmonary dysfunction and became interested in how exercise affects lung function, physical fitness, and overall well being. Throughout her studies at UW, Barbara has found her niche working in Dr. Brown’s lab with the IPF team in order to further her knowledge and contribute to research affecting the course of rehabilitation for these patients.
Tim Gray
UW DPT student class of 2023
Meet Tim!
Tim is a second-year DPT student from Dearborn, MI. He attended the University of Michigan and completed his B.S in Chemical Engineering in 2010. After working for 10 years in the automotive and aerospace industries, he set out to pursue a career in physical therapy. Tim’s research focuses on the impact of a mobile health exercise program on exercise tolerance and physical function in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.
Paul Kim, BS
UW DPT student class of 2022
Meet Paul!
Paul Kim grew up in Irvine, California and completed a B.S. in human biology from the University of California, San Diego. His research focuses on the impacts of a mobile health exercise program on skeletal muscle profiles of power, strength, and endurance in patient who have lympahangioleiomyomatosis (LAM).
Thy Le
Undergraduate at UW Dept. of Biology
Meet Thy!
Thy grew up in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and moved to New York in 2016 for high school and is currently in her third year as undergraduate student at UW majoring in Molecular Biology. Thy is involved in the lab as a student research assistant with Hunter for the DMD exercise research. Outside of the lab, Thy works as a clinical intern and as a freelance English tutor for students in rural areas in Vietnam. On campus, she is part of the leadership team for the International Student Mentorship Program to help promote and provide mentoring service to other international students here at the university.
SiWei Luo, PhD
Senior Post-Doctoral Fellow
Meet SiWei!
SiWei received her PhD in Psychology from Cornell University, prior to that she received a B.S. in Biology; a Minor in Aquatic and Fishery Sciences; and a B.S. in Psychology from the University of Washington. SiWei joined the lab in August 2019, in a shared position with the David Mack laboratory. In her research, she will be examining the role of exercise on Duchene Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) rats and the effect of gene therapy with AAV6-microdystrophin. DMD is a rare genetic disease caused by mutations in the gene that produces and regulates dystrophin, and is associated with muscle degeneration/atrophy (and is eventually fatal). She will be incorporating a panel of exercise protocols to characterize the behavioral and physiological phenotypes following various exercise parameters and types. Outside of the laboratory, SiWei loves cooking, exploring local restaurants, and photography.
Tor Olson
UW DPT student class of 2023
Meet Tor!
Tor grew up in the San Francisco/Bay Area and received a B.A. in video and animation production at UC Davis in 2013. He currently attends the Doctorate of Physical Therapy program at UW and is involved in LAM and IPF research. When not working in the lab, Tor enjoys gardening, martial arts, and playing music.
Kate Traylor
Undergraduate at Whitman College
Meet Kate!
Kate grew up in Seattle, WA and is currently in her final year of undergraduate studies at Whitman College in Walla Walla, WA, earning a B.A. in Biology, and minoring in Chemistry. On campus she also works as a student athletic trainer and a tour guide. After a summer internship in the Brown Lab, Kate is continuing her work remotely with the Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF) exercise study focusing her senior capstone research on the correlation between subjects’ quality-of-life questionnaire data and the self-limiting of their routine physical activity at baseline. Outside of the lab, Kate loves climbing, playing ultimate frisbee, and baking.
Alumni of the Brown Lab
Maryam Fayazi, PT, PhD
PhD Student
Meet Maryam!
Maryam is a doctoral candidate in the Rehabilitation Science program at University of Washington. She earned a B.S and a M.S degrees in Physical Therapy from Shiraz University of Medical Sciences and Tehran University of Medical Sciences, respectively.
Regenerative rehabilitation is the area of her research interest. Under the supervision of Dr. Mack and Dr. Brown at UW, her dissertation research is to investigate the effects of eccentric contraction-induced injury on skeletal muscle regeneration in the in vitro DMD rat model.
Marissa Garvin, BS
UW DPT student class of 2021
Meet Missy!
Marissa Garvin grew up on the Kitsap Peninsula and has lived in Seattle for the last 5 years. She graduated from Scripps College in Claremont, CA in 2010 with a degree in Environment, Economics, and Political studies. Her research project focuses on the impact of mobile health on physical activity in patients with LAM.
Julia Guilliams, BS, DPT
UW DPT student class of 2021
Meet Julia!
Julia grew up in Redmond, Washington and chose the University of Montana to pursue her Health & Human Performance bachelor’s degree. She is currently working on my research in the Brown lab focusing on the lung function in patients with lymphangioleiomyomatosis (LAM) during a mobile health intervention. Her background of research experience is in exercise physiology, fitness interventions and neurological conditions.
Morgan Lea Kelly, PT
Study Coordinator
Meet Morgan!
Morgan Kelly is from Princeton, NJ and completed a B.S. in Neuroscience and a B.A. in Dance at Duke University. She went on to earn her Doctorate in Physical Therapy from Columbia and then completed an acute care PT residency at the University of Washington. She now works as a physical therapist at the UW medical center, is a teaching assistant in the UW DPT program, and is serving as the study coordinator for the lymphangioleiomyomatosis (LAM) Exercise Trial in the Brown Lab. She loves being a part of the Brown Lab for its emphasis on translational research and wonderful collaboration between basic scientists and clinical practitioners.
Gary Long, MS, PhD
Gary obtained his PhD from Indiana University in 2019 after having worked with Dr. Brown as his primary thesis advisor from 2016. Gary’s PhD thesis was titled: “BEETing Skeletal Muscle Dysfunction and Exercise Intolerance in Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension”
Gary obtained his PhD from Indiana University in 2019 after having worked with Dr. Brown as his primary thesis advisor from 2016. Gary’s PhD thesis was titled: “BEETing Skeletal Muscle Dysfunction and Exercise Intolerance in Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension”
Haley Sizelove, BS, DPT
UW DPT student class of 2021
Meet Haley!
Haley is from Woodinville, WA and completed her undergraduate degree at the University of Portland (OR) in 2018. For her current work in the Brown Lab, she is looking at oxygen saturation levels during exercise in women with lymphangioleiomyomatosis and whether oxygen desaturation improves during/after the completion of a mobile health exercise program.