Julie Ann Ahringer is an American/British

Professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professors ...

Genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...

and Genomics, Director of the

Gurdon Institute The Gurdon Institute (officially the Wellcome/Cancer Research UK Gurdon Institute) is a research facility at the University of Cambridge, specialising in developmental biology and cancer biology. History The Institute was founded in 1989 to prov ...

and a member of the Department of Genetics at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

. She leads a research lab investigating the control of gene expression. Her laboratory carried out the first systematic inactivation of the majority of genes in an animal through constructing and screening a genome-wide RNA interference library for the nematode worm '' Caenorhabditis elegans''. Research in Ahringer's lab investigates the control of gene expression and genome architecture in development, using ''C. elegans'' as a model system.

Education

Ahringer is from

Miami, Florida Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

and was educated at

Lafayette College Lafayette College is a private liberal arts college in Easton, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1826 by James Madison Porter and other citizens in Easton, the college first held classes in 1832. The founders voted to name the college after General Laf ...

Easton, Pennsylvania Easton is a city in, and the county seat of, Northampton County, Pennsylvania, United States. The city's population was 28,127 as of the 2020 census. Easton is located at the confluence of the Lehigh River, a river that joins the Delaware R ...

where she was awarded a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...

degree in Chemistry in 1984.Julie Ahringer She completed her PhD at the

University of Wisconsin–Madison A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...

while working with Judith Kimble.

Research and career

After her Phd, she carried out

postdoctoral research A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to pu ...

at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB) in Cambridge with John Graham White. Ahringer became a group leader in the department of

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...

in Cambridge in 1996, before moving to the

in 1998. Her laboratory carried out the first systematic inactivation of the majority of genes in any animal by constructing and screening a genome-wide

RNAi RNA interference (RNAi) is a biological process in which RNA molecules are involved in sequence-specific suppression of gene expression by double-stranded RNA, through translational or transcriptional repression. Historically, RNAi was known by ...

library for '' Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans)''. Ahringer's research group studies the regulation of chromatin structure and function in gene expression and genome organization using the nematode ''

C. elegans ''Caenorhabditis elegans'' () is a free-living transparent nematode about 1 mm in length that lives in temperate soil environments. It is the type species of its genus. The name is a blend of the Greek ''caeno-'' (recent), ''rhabditis'' (r ...

'' as a model to understand development and disease. The Ahringer Lab research is funded by the

Wellcome Trust The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome (founder of one of the predecessors of Glaxo ...

Honors and awards

Ahringer was elected to the

EMBO Membership Membership of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) is an award granted by the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) in recognition of "research excellence and the outstanding achievements made by a life scientist". , 88 EMB ...

in 2003 and a

Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences Fellowship of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) is an award for medical scientists who are judged by the UK Academy of Medical Sciences for the "excellence of their science, their contribution to medicine and society and the range of th ...

(FMedSci) in 2007. She delivered the Francis Crick lecture prize of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

in 2004. In 2020 she was awarded the George W. Beadle Award of the Genetics Society of America for outstanding contributions to genetics. She was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathemat ...

in 2021. She serves as a member of the scientific advisory board of the Medical Research Council (MRC) along with many other eminent scientists.

Personal life

Ahringer married Richard Durbin in 1996, with whom she has two children.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ahringer, Julie Ann University of Wisconsin–Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences alumni Academics of the University of Cambridge Members of the European Molecular Biology Organization Living people American geneticists American women geneticists Fellows of the Academy of Medical Sciences (United Kingdom) Year of birth missing (living people) Fellows of the Royal Society