Lema is a junior studying biology and biotechnology on the premedical track.

Lema wanted to join TBR to explore the various resources that Tufts University provides for students who want to engage in research opportunities, and in time, expand her leadership in the club to explore ways to enhance accessibility to these opportunities. Lema believes that TBR truly provides a collaborative space in which students are able to connect over their passion for and dedication to research.

Since joining TBR, Lema has been onboarded as a research assistant at the Mother Infant Research Institute of Tufts Medical Center. Working with Dr. Perrie O’Tierney-Ginn, she has explored various topics with a central focus on how the maternal environment during pregnancy affects infant outcomes. In April, she presented her research on the effects of physical fitness during pregnancy at the 2022 ASBMB conference in Philadelphia. Her current project involves investigating fetal lipid profiles in first trimester placentas.

This past summer, Lema was an intern at the Tufts Institute for Global Obesity Research, where she was mentored by Dr. O'Tierney-Ginn to research implications of maternal obesity on fetal fat accrual and lipid profiles, and investigate how these outcomes relate to reducing the prevalence of obesity in national populations.

Outside of TBR, Lema serves as a campaign member of the National Arab American Women’s Association. She is a published children’s book author of Eric’s Brain Elementary and Embrace Your Brace. She is an active volunteer with elementary school students, and enjoys scrubbing in on operations. Lema’s hopes to be a pediatric orthopedic surgeon and continue her mission of providing educational resources to elementary school students to become confident with their health and bodies through her children’s books.