Postdoctoral Fellows
Dr. SHAMBHU P. ADHIKARI
Supervisor: Dr. Paul van Donkelaar
Email: shambhu.adhikari@ubc.ca
Dr. Adhikari holds a CIHR-NWHRI Postdoctoral Research Fellowship. He obtained his Ph.D. in Physical Therapy from the Faculty of Physical Therapy at Mahidol University, Thailand. His research focuses on characterizing brain injury due to intimate partner violence. His initial project has just been completed, which examined the feasibility and effectiveness of a Community Support Network (CSN) rehabilitation intervention for survivors who have suffered brain injuries due to intimate partner violence. The ongoing project develops a clinical questionnaire (Clinical decision-making tool for Brain Injury in Violence – CBIV) aimed at identifying brain injuries resulting from intimate partner violence and examines its validity. He is a clinical researcher with a strong interest in applying research on neuroplasticity to real-world situations.
DR. JULIA KATHRIN BAUMGART
Supervisor: Dr. Kathleen Martin Ginis
Email: julia.baumgart@ubc.ca
Dr. Julia Kathrin Baumgart is a Marie Curie Global Research Fellow, affiliated with both the SCI Action Canada Lab at the University of British Columbia (Okanagan) in Kelowna, Canada, and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) in Trondheim, Norway.
Her research sits at the nexus of disability, health, and technology, with a particular emphasis on wearable device-based tracking of physical behavior— encompassing physical activity, sedentary behavior, and sleep—in wheelchair users. Dr. Baumgart’s work includes validating commercially available wearable devices and developing advanced algorithms to better assess physical behavior in wheelchair users. Her lived experiences as a person with a disability profoundly shape her research and advocacy efforts. Dr. Baumgart serves on the executive board and leads the EDI committee of the International Society for the Measurement of Physical Behavior. She also leads the staff network for employees with a disability at NTNU.
DR. JESSICA BOURNE
Supervisor: Dr. Mary Jung | Diabetes Prevention Research Group
Email: j.e.bourne@ubc.ca
Dr. Bourne is a Michael Smith Health Research Fellow. Her research focuses on designing, implementing and evaluating physical activity interventions in a range of populations, including individuals diagnosed with cancer and those with or at risk of type 2 diabetes. She is particularly interested in the role of active travel, especially the use of electrically assisted bicycles, as a means of increasing physical activity behaviour and reducing motorized vehicle use. Jessica has shared her research findings with policy makers, community partners and the public through a variety of knowledge translation activities.
DR. L. MADDEN BREWSTER
Supervisor: Dr. Phil Ainslie
Email: madden.brewster@ubc.ca
Dr. Brewster is a WorkSafeBC Ralph McGinn Postdoctoral Fellow. She completed her BA (2018) and PhD (2022) in Integrative Physiology at the University of Colorado Boulder, where her doctoral work examined extracellular vesicles as mediators of vascular dysfunction in disease and environmental stress.
Her current research investigates the vascular and respiratory effects of wildfire suppression from the cellular to organismal level. Conducted in collaboration with the BC Wildfire Service, this longitudinal study examines the acute and chronic impacts of wildfire smoke, heat, and occupational exertion on cardiorespiratory health. Dr. Brewster is also working on similar aims in other critical outdoor workers in British Columbia, such as tree planters, to better understand how combined environmental and occupational exposures influence respiratory and vascular health. By integrating physiological, biochemical, and environmental monitoring, her research aims to identify mechanisms linking exposure to long-term health outcomes and to inform strategies that protect vulnerable populations in a changing climate.
DR. Hannah Caldwell
Supervisor: Dr. Phil Ainslie
Email: hannah.caldwell@ubc.ca
Dr. Caldwell is a Mitacs Accelerate Postdoctoral Research Fellow. She completed her BHK (2017) and MSc (2019) at UBCO and a dual-PhD between UBCO and the Univ. of Copenhagen (2023). Dr. Caldwell is working on the industry-sponsored initiative (UBCxlululemon) Project FURTHER, a first-of-its-kind 6-day female ultramarathon. Her research specializes in the physiological limits of human energy expenditure in the context of female ultra-endurance performance. Specifically, Dr. Caldwell is leading work on discovery-based metabol / lipid / prote -omics to characterize cardiovascular and metabolic strain in response to extreme exercise energy expenditure in recreational to world-class female athletes. The objective of this work is to identify new biomarkers related to ultramarathon-induced stress, recovery, and adaptation to provide insights for personalized monitoring of female athlete health / performance.
DR. Phuong (Lisa) HA
Supervisor: Dr. Glen Foster
Email: phuonglisa.ha@ubc.ca
A CIHR post-doctoral fellow, Lisa Ha’s research focuses on fatigue and neuromuscular physiology within the broader field of integrative human physiology. She investigates how interactions between the nervous system and skeletal muscle influence movement and performance, with particular emphasis on fatigue-induced mechanisms underlying potential sex-related differences. Her long-term goal is to extend these insights to better understand age-related changes in neuromuscular function across the lifespan. By bridging neurophysiological mechanisms with whole-body performance, Lisa aims to inform strategies that enhance exercise tolerance, improve rehabilitation outcomes, and promote inclusivity in physiological research. Complementing this work, she is exploring how short-term low oxygen therapy may improve cardiovascular stability in individuals living with chronic spinal cord injury.
DR. JODIE LAUREN kOEP
Supervisor: Dr. Ali McManus | Paediatric Exercise Research Laboratory
Email: Jodie.koep@ubc.ca
A Stober Foundation postdoctoral fellow, Jodie completed her PhD in Exercise and vascular physiology at the university of Queensland (Australia) and MSc by research in paediatric exercise physiology at the university of Exeter (UK). Her research focusses on cardiovascular and cerebrovascular responses to exercise in children and adolescents, and the modifying influences of sex, maturational development, and fitness. Jodie is leading an exercise training intervention to determine the feasibility of mobile health technologies for prescribing high intensity workouts in adolescents, and the resultant impacts on fitness and vascular health. She is also leading studies to determine the acute cardiovascular and cerebrovascular responses during exercise and acute physiological stressors in children and adolescents compared to adults, to identify the regulatory differences in factors controlling cerebral blood flow in youth and the developmental trajectories.
Dr. Kenneth Naguchi
Supervisor: Dr. Kathleen Martin Ginis
Email: kenny.noguchi@ubc.ca
Preferred pronouns: He, Him, His
Dr. Noguchi earned his PhD in Rehabilitation Sciences from McMaster University. As a Heart and Stroke Foundation (2025-2026), SSHRC (2026-2028), and Michael Smith Health Research BC (2026-2029) Postdoctoral Fellow, he has three main research interests: the development and effects of exercise-based stroke rehabilitation interventions, physical activity epidemiology and quality of exercise participation in people experiencing disability. Dr. Noguchi is currently leading a multi-site clinical trial on a novel power-focused strength training program in people with stroke. He also uses multivariate and survey methods to understand the interplay between quality participation in exercise, exercise adherence, and quality of life in people experiencing disability.
Dr. Alanna Shwed
Supervisor: Dr. Heather Gainforth | Applied Behaviour Change Lab
Email: alanna.shwed@ubc.ca
Dr. Alanna Shwed (she/her) is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Applied Behaviour Change Lab at UBC Okanagan, working in collaboration with the International Collaboration on Repair Discoveries (ICORD). Her research focuses on building institutional systems that support meaningful partnerships between researchers and people with lived experience. Drawing on behaviour change, implementation science, and systems thinking, her work aims to transform how research is conducted by embedding equity, collaboration, and accountability into the research process.
Alanna is a Michael Smith Health Research BC Postdoctoral Fellow and an award-winning science communicator, recognized for her Three Minute Thesis presentation, “Is the Research System Broken?”