Home Institution USA: Pomona College

Aden Cicourel

Aden Cicourel is a recent graduate of Pomona College, where he studied Middle Eastern and South Asian history. His work examines historical relationships between sound, music, and modernity. In 2025, he received the Humanities Studio Fellowship, which supported archival research in London and Mumbai for his senior thesis on jazz music in colonial Bombay. Beyond his studies, Aden played guitar in the Pomona College Jazz Ensemble, taught volunteer music lessons through the Draper Center for Community Partnerships, and helped lead the Musicians’ Coalition.

Aden’s Fulbright-Nehru project is exploring the intertwined history of jazz and Hindustani music in the middle of the 20th century. Following India’s Independence, the increase in urbanization, proliferation of acoustic technologies, and the formation of national identity created new musical spaces for cultural exchange and connection between India and the U.S. Relying on archival research, photographs, radio broadcasts, vinyl records, oral histories, literary accounts, and concert footage, the project is uncovering how fusion genres such as raga jazz and Indo-jazz emerged from this period as nuanced symbols of fluid cosmopolitanism and national pride.

Elijah Roggen

Elijah Roggen is a 2025 graduate of Pomona College, where he received his BA in politics and religious studies. At Pomona, he won the Stauffacher Thesis Prize in Religious Studies. He is especially interested in the confluence of religious and modern political narratives in the Jewish context. Elijah has spent time as a summer camp counselor and programming director, as a reading tutor, a disaster relief volunteer, and as an elementary school classroom assistant. He grew up in Arlington, Virginia.

Elijah’s Fulbright-Nehru project is exploring the nuances of political identity among India’s Jewish communities, particularly the Bene Israel community in the decades preceding and following Indian independence. The project emerges from an interest in family history – Elijah’s grandfather is a Bene Israel Jew born in Fort Kochi and raised in Mumbai. Through interviews and archival work, the project is seeking to fill a gap in the literature by considering the seemingly opposed political positions of Bene Israel individuals in the late colonial era and various forms of political dissent.

Trisha Gongalore

Trisha Gongalore is a dedicated multidisciplinary scholar who recently completed her BA in neuroscience from Pomona College, where she engaged deeply with coursework spanning neurobiology, biochemistry, genetics, and public health. Her academic and research interests lie at the intersection of molecular neuroscience, neurodegeneration, and health equity, with a specific focus on Parkinson’s Disease (PD). She has conducted research across five laboratories, mastering techniques such as electrophysiology, immunohistochemistry, and molecular cloning. Notably, she has investigated alpha-synuclein aggregation in fruit flies, heteroplasmy in mouse myoblasts, and cholinergic signaling in C. elegans. Her work has been shared at the International Congress of Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders and the Genetics Society of America’s 66th Drosophila Research Conference. A paper that she co-authored is currently under review to be published in peer-reviewed journals like Developmental Biology.

Trisha’s commitment to health equity is embodied by her leadership in the student-run organization, Health Bridges, at the Draper Center for Community Partnerships in Pomona College, where she organized health fairs and gathered and analyzed uniquely disaggregated data for the Tongan American populations in the Inland Empire. She has also studied abroad in Argentina, where she learned about public health issues on an international scale and worked with dementia patients to explore the benefits of community-based, non-pharmaceutical interventions.

Trisha’s Fulbright-Nehru research at NIMHANS under Dr. Indrani Datta is investigating the mechanism behind exosome-mediated delivery of a neuroprotective drug to midbrain organoids derived from sporadic PD patients in India. Addressing the limitations of current PD therapies, the treatment aims to reduce oxidative stress and support neuronal regeneration using mesenchymal stromal cell-derived exosomes that cross the blood-brain barrier. Leveraging NIMHANS’ expertise in the LRRK2-I1371V mutation, more common in the Eastern Hemisphere PD populations, Trisha is evaluating treatment efficacy through advanced imaging, electrophysiology, and biochemical assays. The study aims to develop more effective, non-invasive therapeutic approaches tailored for the PD population in India.

Riaan Dhankhar

Riaan Dhankhar studies international relations, focusing on South Asia and European affairs. He graduated with a BA in international relations from Pomona College in 2025. As an undergraduate, he interned at the Wilson Center, the U.S. Department of State, and the U.S. Congress. During his time at the State Department, Riaan served as a liaison officer at the 75th Anniversary NATO Summit which helped him develop a keen interest in studying how states, especially in the Indo-Pacific, can develop closer ties through strategic security-driven multilateral cooperation.

He was born in Mumbai and grew up in New Jersey.

Riaan’s Fulbright-Nehru project, “India’s Centrality to a Resurgent QUAD”, is investigating Indo-U.S. military engagement within the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) forum. Conducted in affiliation with Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, his research is analyzing historical dynamics, contemporary policies, and future strategic scenarios shaping QUAD relations.