IDRR Scholars
Allison Speer, MD, FACS
Allison Speer, MD, FACS
UT Health
Dr. Allison Speer is an Assistant Professor Pediatric Surgery at McGovern Medical School at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) and the Surgical Director of the Short bowel syndrome Therapy and Rehabilitation (STAR) team at UTHealth and Children’s Memorial Hermann Hospital. Dr. Speer graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry from the University of Southern California (USC) and received her medical degree from the Keck School of Medicine at USC. She completed her general surgery residency training at Los Angeles County + USC Medical Center in Los Angeles, CA. During residency, she completed a 3 year research fellowship investigating tissue-engineered intestine as a solution for short bowel syndrome at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles in the laboratory of Dr. Tracy Grikscheit, a pediatric surgeon. After residency, she completed fellowship training in Pediatric Surgery at Children’s National Medical Center/George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Dr. Speer was then recruited to join the Program in Children’s Regenerative Medicine within the Department of Pediatric Surgery at UTHealth. Dr. Speer’s clinical interests include intestinal failure and rehabilitation, advanced minimally invasive surgery, and thoracic/foregut surgery. She is also a basic-translational scientist focused on developing novel regenerative medicine strategies for intestinal failure such as tissue-engineered intestine and cell-based therapies. Dr. Speer recently received a career development K08 award from the NIH/NIDDK in 2022. Her current research is focused on investigating enteric nervous system development and function within human intestinal organoids.
Dan Harrington, PhD
Dan Harrington, PhD
UT Health
Matthew Hogan, PhD
Matthew Hogan, PhD
HMRI
Matt’s research focuses on activity associated plasticity in the brain and spinal cord, particularly after injury. He has helped to develop and deploy a novel spinal stimulation system to deliver electrical patterns which may promote recovery. Prior to joining Dr. Horner’s lab, Matt completed his PhD in biomedical engineering at the University of Houston in cardiovascular tissue engineering. He also deployed several novel bioreactors for the conditioning and maintenance of in vitro tissue mimetic cultures. Matt enjoys woodworking, guitar, coding, cooking and sports. Most weekends he can be found tinkering in his workshop at home or being forcibly cultured by his more sophisticated significant other.
