Dr. Jeannine Gerhardt, an assistant professor of stem cell biology in obstetrics and gynecology and in reproductive medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine, has received a five-year, $2.1 million grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), part of the National Institutes of Health, for the study of repetitive DNA and RNA sequences and the mechanisms by which they cause cell dysfunction and diseases.
The NIGMS Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award is intended to support recipients’ research more broadly and flexibly than standard project grants, which must specify proposed research thoroughly in advance.
“This award is particularly nice because it gives us the flexibility to follow up on any surprising findings as we pursue our research interests,” said Dr. Gerhardt.
Repetitive DNA sequences, or DNA repeats, are patterns of nucleotides, the building blocks of DNA, that occur in multiple copies (such as CAGCAGCAGCAG...). Some are found only in a specific gene, whereas others occur at multiple sites across the genome. While DNA repeats are common, and most are not harmful, others clearly cause diseases.
