RALEIGH, N.C. — Researchers at N.C. State now have a better way to understand what does and does not regulate our genes.

What You Need To Know

N.C. State researcher’s work, in the scholarly publication called ScienceDirect, creates a more efficient way to study gene expression in the human body

A lab program funded by a NSF grant encouraged women to enter industries in STEM

Alison Waldman is a Ph.D. candidate in N.C. State’s Chemical Engineering program

Waldman’s research utilized the surface of yeast cells to conduct billions of lab experiments at one time

Alison Waldman is leading that charge. Her influence in and on her field goes beyond scientific research and discovery. 

She’s also encouraging other women to pursue interests and careers in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) industries.

In an article published on ScienceDirect, Waldman and her colleagues developed a better way to study proteins playing an integral role in gene expression by using the surface of yeast cells.

While the heady findings are wondrous in scope and scale, it’s putting time in the lab that Waldman loves the most.

“I got a taste of it in undergrad and that’s kind of how I knew I wanted to go to grad school. I thought research was exciting and fun, so I continued,” Waldman said.

Currently she mentors curious undergraduates in lab research. Over the summer though, the Ph.D. candidate incorporated her own work into the fold.

In the outreach, which spanned June and July, nine women participated. According to the scientist in the N.C. State Chemical Engineering Department, their entire lab group was funded by a National Science Foundation grant to run a program specifically for women interested in STEM.

“It's cool to see them learning and they are all going to apply this in different ways, going into college and going into their first job,” Waldman said.

Waldman has come full circle. She participated in a summer internship at Duke when she was a sophomore at Virginia Tech. It was a good experience with high-level research, and it inspired her to pursue doing something more.

“I really enjoyed that summer, that time in the lab. That is one of the reasons I decided to go to grad school,” Waldman said.

Her inspiration is why she encourages other women to try out opportunities in STEM. Out of the nine women who were participants, three were recent high school graduates entering a four-year college, three earned four-year degrees with goals to continue lab research or enter the workforce and three were school teachers who will take what they’ve learned back to their own classrooms.

“It’s for everyone, even if you don’t think that it’s not for you. I am sure there is something we can find. Something you would enjoy in STEM,” Waldman said.

Waldman doesn’t use a classic textbook. She is teaching from her own published research on which proteins regulate gene expression in the human body.

“Just being able to see you are putting something into a tube and you make something actually happen, and if that is a new discovery then I think that is extra exciting,” Waldman said.

For her, it’s exciting to see the surface of yeast, which has billions of cells in a very small volume, be turned into different miniature experiments scientists can run at the same time. Just as science replicates quickly, so does Waldman's knowledge.

“I think it’s exciting and hopefully it will transition into the workforce too, to see more women come into biotech and STEM fields,” Waldman said.

Waldman said the long-term goal is accelerating research for epigenetics, the study of behaviors and how environment can cause changes that affect the way genes work.  

The work can be tedious and slow and anything that can speed it up and make it cheaper is helpful.