#WeAreEmoryEPI: Akshay Deverakonda

Welcome back to #WeAreEmoryEPI! This week, we heard from second-year EPI MSPH student Akshay Deverakonda. Read more below about his exciting and relevant work in infectious disease epidemiology!

Tell us about your academic history/where you went to school.

I graduated from The College of William & Mary in Virginia with a double major in Biology & Environmental Science. I worked for several years between undergraduate and graduate school so it took me a while to find my way to public health, but I feel I came to Rollins at the right time for me.

What are your primary research interests?

I’m interested in spatial epidemiology, vector-borne diseases, and using novel data streams (e.g. wastewater surveillance) for infectious diseases.

Are there any exciting projects that you are currently working on that you’d like to share with us? 

For my master’s thesis, I’m analyzing a dataset of several years of dengue cases in Mexico to understand what may influence hotspots of certain serotypes. It’s interesting and important because dengue has four serotypes; when you get infected with one serotype of dengue, you can still get infected by the other three serotypes with often worse outcomes in subsequent infections. Having national-level datasets of dengue where you know the serotype of each case is rare, so I’m fortunate to work on a research question that I think is really cool and relevant for infectious disease epidemiology.

What is your favorite part about earning your MPH at Emory?

It’s been really inspiring to be in a community where faculty, staff, and students all bring their own unique talents, skills, and abilities towards the common goal of uplifting everyone. I’ve learned so much both professionally and personally from my teachers and peers. 

When applying, what were you looking for in a public health school, and what factors drove you to pick Rollins?

I was looking for schools where I could either take classes or do research at the intersection of spatial epidemiology and infectious disease epidemiology. I chose Rollins for its emphasis on epidemiologic methods and conversations with multiple professors during my first visit that showed me I’d be able to pursue the aforementioned interests.

What has been your favorite class at Rollins thus far, and why?

Oooh, this is hard! I took a really cool class, BSHES 740, last fall semester. It was about using natural language processing and machine learning to examine trends in social media related to substance use disorders and drug-related harms. I felt I was pushed beyond what I thought I could do and the professor, Dr. Abeed Sarker, is a really good explainer/communicator. The class really helped me reinforce concepts in machine learning and I learned so much about how to analyze textual social media data. I want to apply the same methods to infectious disease epidemiology by learning how to analyze electronic health records as a novel form of disease surveillance.

What advice do you have for 1st years?

Learn how to say “no”! Rollins has a lot of great opportunities and it’s good to try different things out, but always ask yourself: (1) what your most important aims/goals are for graduate school and (2) what can you do to align your commitments and schedule with what you want to get out of school?

What are three fun facts that you want people to know about you?

1. I love German Shepherd dogs and hope to have one of my own someday.
2. My New Years’ Resolution last year was to avoid pizza until I met a personal health goal of losing 30 pounds; I met my goal in mid-December so I didn’t eat pizza for most of 2024.
3. I love learning bits and pieces of different languages.

How have you been spending your free time?