PhD Success for Alena Shmakova November 24, 2016 Congratulations to Alena Shmakova from Sonia Rocha’s lab who successfully defended her PhD on Monday. Her thesis was entitled ‘Role of PBRM1 in the regulation of HIF pathway’. Her examiners were Vicky Cowling (internal) and David Robert Mole, Leicester (external). Alena’s PhD studentship was funded by the Wellcome Trust.