Dr. Rasa Valiauga (she/her) was born in Lithuania and immigrated to the United States at age nine, settling in Wisconsin. She attended the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where she dual majored in Neurobiology and Languages and Cultures of Asia and earned a certificate in Religious Studies. After graduation, she remained at UW–Madison to continue her research career, building on experience across five laboratories since high school, with roles ranging from intern to lab manager.
Her work has spanned synaptic trafficking, primate models of presbyopia, murine neurodegeneration, and stem cell–based modeling of retinal disease. In 2018, Rasa matriculated into the MD/PhD program at Loyola Stritch School of Medicine, where her dissertation focused on the effects of diet on caspase-1–mediated neuroinflammation in the mouse brain.
She plans to pursue combined anatomic and neuropathology (AP/NP) training and will work with Dr. Julia Kofler during her PIRRT year to study mechanisms of Alzheimer’s disease, advancing her goal of becoming a physician-scientist leading a funded research program.
Outside of medicine, Rasa is passionate about advocacy for marginalized and underrepresented groups, medical education, and institutional growth. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her husband and dog, Koko, cooking and baking, reading, and exploring the outdoors.
Anderson TL*, Valiauga R*, Tallo C, Hong CB, Manoranjithan S, Domingo C, Paudel M, Untaroiu A, Barr S, Goldhaber K. Contributing Factors to the Rise in Adolescent Anxiety and Associated Mental Health Disorders: A Narrative Review of Current Literature. J Child Adolesc Psychiatr Nurs. 2025 Feb;38(1):e70009. doi: 10.1111/jcap.70009. PMID: 39739929; PMCID: PMC11683866. *Contributed equally.
Talley S, Nguyen T, Van Ye L, Valiauga R, DeCarlo J, Mustafa J, Cook B, White FA, Campbell EM. Characterization of age-associated inflammasome activation reveals tissue specific differences in transcriptional and post-translational inflammatory responses. Immun Ageing. 2024 Sep 10;21(1):60. doi: 10.1186/s12979-024-00462-z. PMID: 39256821.
Valiauga R, Talley S, Khemmani M, Fontes Noronha M, Gogliotti R, Wolfe AJ, Campbell E. Sex-dependent effects of carbohydrate source and quantity on caspase-1 activity in the mouse central nervous system. J Neuroinflammation. 2024 Jun 5;21(1):151. doi: 10.1186/s12974-024-03140-5. PMID: 38840215; PMCID: PMC11155082.
Talley S, Valiauga R, Anderson L, Cannon AR, Choudhry MA, Campbell EM. DSS-induced inflammation in the colon drives a proinflammatory signature in the brain that is ameliorated by prophylactic treatment with the S100A9 inhibitor paquinimod. J Neuroinflammation. 2021 Nov 10;18(1):263. doi: 10.1186/s12974-021-02317-6. PMID: 34758843; PMCID: PMC8578918.
Sinha D, Steyer B, Shahi PK, Mueller KP, Valiauga R, Edwards KL, Bacig C, Steltzer SS, Srinivasan S, Abdeen A, Cory E, Periyasamy V, Siahpirani AF, Stone EM, Tucker BA, Roy S, Pattnaik BR, Saha K, Gamm DM. Human iPSC Modeling Reveals Mutation-Specific Responses to Gene Therapy in a Genotypically Diverse Dominant Maculopathy. Am J Hum Genet. 2020 Aug 6;107(2):278-292. doi: 10.1016/j.ajhg.2020.06.011. Epub 2020 Jul 23. PMID: 32707085; PMCID: PMC7413860.
Capowski EE, Samimi K, Mayerl SJ, Phillips MJ, Pinilla I, Howden SE, Saha J, Jansen AD, Edwards KL, Jager LD, Barlow K, Valiauga R, Erlichman Z, Hagstrom A, Sinha D, Sluch VM, Chamling X, Zack DJ, Skala MC, Gamm DM. Reproducibility and staging of 3D human retinal organoids across multiple pluripotent stem cell lines. Development. 2019 Jan 9;146(1):dev171686. doi: 10.1242/dev.171686. PMID: 30567931; PMCID: PMC6340149.
Derkac I, Januleviciene I, Sepetiene R, Valiauga R, Velickiene D. The Association of CEP135 rs4865047 and NPY2R rs1902491 Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) with Rapid Progression of Proliferative Diabetic Retinopathy in Patients with Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus. Med Sci Monit. 2018 Dec 8;24:8891-8898. doi: 10.12659/MSM.909803. PMID: 30531682; PMCID: PMC6295137.