From Research to Readiness: Physician-Scientist Candidates Join the Ranks at Uniformed Services University

Three first-year students join USU’s MD/PhD program to advance precision care and force protection.

From left: Army 2nd Lt. Aidan Batchelor, Army 2nd Lt. Mikayla Bridges, and Navy Ensign Andrew Hall, the three first-year physician-scientist candidates who joined the Uniformed Services University's MD/PhD program this year. (Photo credit: Tom Balfour, USU)

September 15, 2026 by Hadiyah Brendel

Military operational medicine happens both in the field, where clinicians care for service members in challenging and often austere environments, and in the laboratory, where scientists study the pathogens, diseases and other threats that can affect the health and readiness of the force. At the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USU), three first-year physician-scientist candidates are poised to connect those two worlds from day one.  

Army 2nd Lt. Aidan Batchelor, Army 2nd Lt. Mikayla Bridges, and Navy Ensign Andrew Hall joined USU’s MD/PhD program, pairing full-time research with medical education. Under an updated program structure, candidates now commission as military officers at the start of their degree program. This shift allows candidates to complete military officer training alongside their School of Medicine classmates before entering pre-clerkship coursework.

Army 2nd Lt. Aidan Batchelor, a University of San Francisco biochemistry graduate, is focusing his graduate studies on emerging infectious diseases and medical countermeasure development. (Photo credit: Tom Balfour, USU)

2nd Lt. Aidan Batchelor: Countering Emerging Infectious Threats

Batchelor, an Army officer and graduate of the University of San Francisco with a degree in biochemistry, is focusing his graduate studies at USU on emerging infectious diseases. His undergraduate research at included investigating metal-binding antimicrobial peptides at USF, developing analytical methods to measure steroid biomarkers as a fellow at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and researching small-molecule antiviral discovery at Emory University. 

His decision to pursue a physician-scientist career took root in 2020 while he was still in high school. Watching the CDC’s public health responses unfold near his hometown of Atlanta sparked his interest in medicine and research. Later, he had an opportunity to work with the CDC. There, a mentor from the Viral Special Pathogens Branch introduced Batchelor to high-consequence pathogens and medical countermeasures.

"I was always kind of obsessed with the end goal of research," Batchelor said. "No matter where I was in a lab, I wanted to know what the end goal we were working towards was, and I wanted to see that it was going to help people."

Batchelor aims to apply his education and training to medical countermeasure development and analyzing pathogen mechanics. His goal in the laboratory is to design targeted therapies that can translate into clinical settings during global outbreaks or high-consequence biological threats. To build a strong foundation for his work, Batchelor is prioritizing his initial 18 months of pre-clerkship coursework before transitioning to dedicated PhD laboratory research and clerkship rotations. 

Army 2nd Lt. Mikayla Bridges, a Washington University in St. Louis graduate, is pursuing research in the Molecular and Cell Biology program on nanoparticles engineered to cross the blood-brain barrier. (Photo credit: Tom Balfour, USU)

2nd Lt. Mikayla Bridges: Targeted Nanomedicine for Neurological Health

Bridges, an Army officer and graduate of Washington University in St. Louis, brings a research background that spans plant-based medicine, computer modeling of protein structures, disease sensors, and nanoparticle drug delivery. During her undergraduate studies, she conducted an independent project evaluating targeted nanoparticles for aggressive triple-negative breast cancer. Later, as a research technician, her work focused on biosensing–using specialized fluorescent materials to improve diagnostic sensitivity. 

In her graduate studies within the Molecular and Cell Biology program, Bridges hopes to pursue research into neuroscience by engineering precision nanoparticles designed to cross the blood-brain barrier to treat neurological conditions.

"A main thing with cancer is the effects of chemotherapy–those side effects, hair loss, damage to healthy cells, that can be limited when you have targeted nanoparticles," Bridges said. "I think that would be great not just for the military health system but for healthcare in general if we can get our treatments to be specific, and that would lead to more efficient care."

Her work aims to improve treatment efficiency and shorten patient recovery windows, potentially allowing service members access to targeted therapeutics while minimizing systemic organ toxicity. To maintain clinical momentum alongside her graduate studies, Bridges initiated early clinical exposure by shadowing in USU’s dermatology clinic. 

Navy Ensign Andrew Hall, who studied neuroscience and physiology at the University of California, San Diego, completed his first PhD research rotation analyzing sequenced human tumor datasets before starting medical coursework. (Photo credit: Tom Balfour, USU)

Ens. Andrew Hall: Translational Genomics and Precision Care

Hall, a Navy officer who studied neuroscience and physiology at the University of California, San Diego, began his research career at the Huntington’s Disease Clinical Research Center. Managing Phase 2 and 3 clinical trials, he observed stark variations in therapeutic responses. Some patients improved while others deteriorated under the same drug regimen. That observation led him to investigate responder versus non-responder genomics and earn a master’s degree in biomedical and translational sciences at the University of California, Irvine. 

There, Hall examined how circadian rhythm variations alter time-of-day gene expression for drug-metabolizing enzymes. His work aimed to translate these genomic signatures into clinical protocols, allowing providers to align medication dosing schedules with an individual patient’s biological clock to maximize drug efficacy and reduce toxicity.

"My MD/PhD path was really driven by both aspects — the clinical and the research – to ultimately bring genomics to the bedside," Hall said. "In order to do that, or to take questions from the bedside, go to the bench and then answer them... really required me having the training of a medical scientist."

Hall completed his first PhD research rotation, analyzing sequenced human tumor datasets, before starting medical coursework. That rotation gives him a foundation to carry genomic and computational methods into his pre-clerkship work and clerkship rotations.

Bridging Bench and Bedside

The seven-year dual-degree pathway prepares graduates to lead laboratories while maintaining active clinical practice. By grounding advanced biomedical research in the operational requirements of the Department of War, these physician-scientists aim to move a finding made at the bench to the service member in a clinic and the medic treating a casualty in the field.