Genomics for Everyone
Not so long ago, no one had heard of genomics, the use of large sets
of genetic data to analyze genome relationships, patterns of gene
expression and gene function. Now genomics is moving the research of
scientists like Sarah Elgin forward farther and faster than they had
dreamed possible. Elgin wants to share the magic, with undergraduates
and even younger students.
Elgin is a professor of biology at Washington University in St.
Louis, where her research focuses on the role that chromatin
structure—the packaging of the DNA in the nucleus of a
cell—plays in gene regulation in fruit flies. She has chaired the
international Gordon Research Conference on Nuclear Proteins, Chromatin
Structure and Gene Regulation, served on the editorial board of several
journals and served on the National Advisory General Medical Sciences
Council of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), but Elgin considers
her role as a teacher equally important. Recently she agreed to serve
as co-editor in chief of a new electronic journal, Cell Biology
Education.
"My interest in education spans K-25 (kindergarten through
postgraduate training)," she says. Since 1992 she has headed an
HHMI-supported program at Washington University that provides summer
research opportunities for undergraduates, supports curriculum
innovation and does science outreach in the St. Louis schools.
Elgin believes that research experience is a critical part of an
undergraduate education in science. "Undergraduate research
opportunities were very important to me," she recalls. At Pomona
College in southern California, Elgin received NIH support for
undergraduate study in interdisciplinary sciences such as biochemistry
and biophysics. This introduced her to current research the summer
before her freshman year. She later spent a summer working on chemical
kinetics at Pomona, the next summer at the University of Leeds in
England, exploring a protein structure problem, and another summer at
the California Institute of Technology, investigating chromatin
structure.
Now Elgin wants to introduce undergraduates and school teachers to
the hot new field of genomics. As an HHMI Professor, she will design
hands-on genomic investigations for sophomores and a research-based
genomics laboratory course for juniors and seniors. She also plans to
work with groups of science teachers to find ways to modify and design
genomics lessons appropriate for middle and high school classrooms.
"We're trying to create informed consumers of genomic information,
particularly as it relates to health," Elgin explains. "If we want to
make students aware of DNA and their own unique genome, middle school
is the right place to start," she adds. "I want to help teachers lay a
useful foundation for every child."
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