UHCOP faculty, alumni and students earned national leadership honors, scholarships and research recognition at the 2026 APhA Annual Meeting & Exposition in Los Angeles, highlighting Cougar pharmacy excellence on the national stage.
Pharm.D. student Rebeca Pelayo Carvajal is helping close critical language gaps in patient care. Through Spanish-language counseling, leadership across multiple student organizations and a passion for improving outcomes in Hispanic communities, she is using pharmacy as a powerful tool for advocacy, access and impact.
For Ying Xu, a Ph.D. candidate in Pharmaceutical Sciences at UHCOP, cardiovascular research is both scientific and personal. Inspired by her family’s history of heart disease and hypertension, Xu studies the molecular drivers of cardiac dysfunction. With support from a predoctoral fellowship from the American Heart Association, Xu is investigating how disrupted signaling inside heart muscle cells contributes to heart failure.
Luqi Zhao, M.D., University of Houston College of Pharmacy postdoctoral fellow, is working to uncover a new mechanism in left ventricular non-compaction with the help of a two-year, $163,864 American Heart Association postdoctoral fellowship award.
UHCOP faculty, alumni and students earned national leadership honors, scholarships and research recognition at the 2026 APhA Annual Meeting & Exposition in Los Angeles, highlighting Cougar pharmacy excellence on the national stage.
From blood donation drives to vaccine education and global pharmacy discussions, UHCOP Pharm.D. students turned local service into international recognition with the National Outstanding IPSF Activity Award.
Pharm.D. student Rebeca Pelayo Carvajal is helping close critical language gaps in patient care. Through Spanish-language counseling, leadership across multiple student organizations and a passion for improving outcomes in Hispanic communities, she is using pharmacy as a powerful tool for advocacy, access and impact.
Selected from student pharmacists across the country, UHCOP Pharm.D. student Jeremy Ninan received one of just 12 national Student Leadership Awards from the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists.
Lyn Yuen Choo’s research poster, "Improving Access to Buprenorphine: A Pilot Multi-Component Pharmacy Intervention,” was selected as one of only 10 “Featured Research and Science Posters” at the American Pharmacists Association (APhA) 2026 Annual Meeting & Exposition March 27-30.
UHCOP Pharm.D. students Gabriela Gaytán and Rebeca Pelayo Carvajal were awarded two of 28 national scholarships from the APhA Foundation, the research and philanthropic arm of the American Pharmacists Association.