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Kelley is recognized for innovative research into the use of electrical currents to detect DNA and more easily provide genetic information useful in medical diagnoses. An aim of her research is to make genetic testing as easy as taking a blood sample.
Kelley is developing methods to illuminate DNA with electricity, using instruments costing considerably less than those now used in DNA sequencing, a procedure currently difficult and quite expensive to conduct. “By making DNA detection cheaper and more foolproof, a doctor could routinely read the sequence of your genes, get information on how your cells work, and more easily diagnose you,” Kelley said. “A genetic test before prescribing drugs, for example, could gauge a patient’s predisposition to certain side effects. Medical diagnosis and treatment would not be as much of a guessing game,” she said.
Brad Taft, a fifth-year doctoral student in Kelley's lab stated, “I hope someday people will have an instrument, perhaps in a doctor's office, to allow them to take a blood sample and tell them if they’re infected with a pathogen, in a matter of minutes.” Such an advance would have significant applications in testing for bio-terror pathogens like anthrax, which could be quickly detected from a blood sample, lab researchers said.
The research is done on an infinitesimal scale. Kelley described what she does as placing 10,000 DNA sequences on the head of a pin and running a pulse of electricity through. Kelley stated, “If both ends of a particular DNA double-helix are present, an electrical connection is made and the DNA is illuminated, in a process comparable to screwing in the right bulb to coax a strand of nano-scale Christmas tree lights to glow.”
Being named to the TR100 is the latest laurel for Kelley, who previously this year has received a Career Award from the National Science Foundation and an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship. Since joining the Chemistry faculty at Boston College five years ago, she has also received a Research Innovation Award, a Dreyfus New Faculty Award, and a BC Research Incentive Award.
Kelley holds a Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology, and was a National Institute of Health Postdoctoral Fellow at Scripps Research Institute. She is a founding scientist and consultant at GeneOhm Sciences, a biotechnology company in La Jolla, CA, founded to develop a new platform for DNA-based clinical diagnostic devices.
Students are central to Kelley's success and she relies not only on graduate assistants to aid her research into DNA detection, but undergraduates as well. Three undergraduates currently work alongside ten graduate students in her laboratory. Of six previous undergraduate research assistants she’s had during her five years at BC, two have gone on to medical school–another is applying–and three have entered doctoral programs. Half of the ten papers her group has published in five years have been co-authored by undergraduates. “Because of the demands of running a research laboratory and teaching, I can't carry out any of my ideas by myself,” said Kelley. “The students who come and work with me are so precious, because they’re the ones who make the science happen. So I am dedicated to serving as a resource and mentor for them. Watching them become accomplished scientists is incredibly fulfilling.”
The chemist who runs road races in her spare time and is preparing for a half-marathon in October is said to be a live wire in the laboratory. “I can't help but be influenced by Shana’s extreme excitement,” said Camille Asher ´05, an undergraduate research assistant who is considering medical or graduate school, and describes the Kelley lab as a very interactive place fueled by good intellectual conversation. “We all group together every week and discuss our results,” said Asher. “She’s incredibly involved in our research.”
Third-year graduate student Lisa Wittenhagen compared her boss to a chess champion who can play 100 games at once. “I’m on game 1, she’s on 99,” the aspiring biotech researcher said with a smile. “We’re not sure how she keeps everything straight in her mind.”
Fifth-year graduate student Brad Taft, who hopes to enter science journalism said, “It makes it a lot easier to put in all the work you do when you know how excited Shana is about everything you’re doing.”
A former undergraduate research assistant, Rodrigo Ortiz Meoz ´03, currently a second-year graduate student in the program in molecular biophysics at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine was among the first crop of scientists trained by Kelley. “Having Shana train you in lab techniques is very...interesting,” he writes. “It’s hard enough trying to learn to work with radioactivity as it is, but with your professor looking over your shoulder it’s quite a different experience. Shana was very, very interested in our experiments. One thing about my experience with Shana that I think has really helped me along in graduate school is that even though I was an undergrad, I was treated very much like a graduate student, with all the benefits and responsibilities that come with the title. Shana, I know, expects a lot out of all her students, not because she is demanding, but because she wants you to do better and succeed on your own merit. I can honestly say that if it weren’t for Shana I would not be doing what I am doing today. She gave me a chance in her lab when she had no obligation to and while I am grateful for all the science I learned, I am more grateful for the guidance she provided me during my years at BC.”
Kelley benefited similarly from teachers who took an interest in her own potential. After graduating from high school in Montclair, NJ, where her interest in chemistry had been sparked by a fantastic teacher in the subject, she took a job as a loan teller for a few years to save money for college. She enrolled at Seton Hall University with the idea of studying business, but a freshman advisor, noting her transcripts, suggested she focus on science. “Thank goodness someone was paying attention,” said Kelley, who would go on to earn a Ph.D. in chemistry from Cal Tech, found a biotech company, and win distinguished early-career awards as a member of the BC faculty. “I’m where I am today because a freshman advisory dean at Seton Hall suggested I pursue chemistry,” she said. “It’s really important I listen to the undergraduates I work with, and help guide them towards a career that excites them and is suited to their talents and interests. I feel so fortunate to have found a career that I am passionate about. Science is not work for me.”
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