Michelle Ozaki is an ARCS scholar alum and ARCS Oregon member. Work to finalize her PhD in cancer biology at OHSU continues with a big boost, via a fellowship from the National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health. Ozaki has been awarded a F99/KOO fellowship that will fund the rest of her PhD years and post-doc.  

The fellowship, known as the “Predoctoral to Postdoctoral Fellow Transition Award,” supports outstanding PhD candidates to complete their dissertation research training and transition in a timely manner to mentored, cancer-focused postdoctoral career development research positions. 

Ozaki’s research in Pepper Schedin's lab at OHSU focuses on postpartum breast cancer (PPBC), which is breast cancer diagnosed within 10 years of a mother’s last pregnancy. Ozaki studies specifically how remodeling of the liver post-pregnancy contributes to liver metastasis in PPBC. Those patients have an increased risk of developing liver metastasis, a prognosis with a median survival rate of only 15 months.  

Ozaki is a Member at Large on the ARCS Oregon Board.  

She grew up in Los Angeles and earned her B.A. in Molecular Biology at Scripps College. She then did a post-bac at the National Institutes of Health in Washington D.C. where she studied ovarian cancer. 

Her ARCS Oregon scholar award was given by the Bechen Family Foundation.