Kristen Ott
Ph.D. Candidate, Graduate Program in Genetics and Genomics, BUSM
Education
2008 B.S. Biotechnology, Bay Path College, Longmeadow, Massachusetts
Research
Kristen is a PhD Candidate in the Graduate Program in Genetics and Genomics at Boston University. Her research focuses on understanding how the piRNA pathway functions during Drosophila oogenesis.
During oogenesis, the piRNA pathway is responsible for silencing selfish elements (i.e., retrotransposons and repetitive elements). This silencing is imperative to proper oocyte patterning and development. My research focuses on how proteins that function in the piRNA pathway interact with one another to maintain genome stability and achieve efficient silencing of retrotransposable elements. In addition to understanding how the piRNA pathway functions to silence retrotransposons, I am also interested in understanding the consequence of aberrant retrotransposon expression to germline development.