Emily Bulley ’13’s Scripps career began with “great interest but very little experience or confidence in the sciences,” but after two classes with the encouraging and enthusiastic faculty of the W.M. Keck Science Department, she pursued a neuroscience major with a cellular and molecular emphasis. In her sophomore year, she started conducting molecular biology research in Dr. Emily Wiley’s lab and has been part of this supportive, collaborative, and fun team ever since.
Based on their research accomplishments, Dr. Wiley invited Emily and Scripps sophomores Amy Chang and Jessica Ng to present at the Southern California American Society for Microbiology Annual Meeting in La Jolla on November 3. This is the first conference at which Emily has presented, and though simply hoping to gain experience, she won the competition for best undergraduate research and presentation. In the poster session, Emily discussed her thesis research (background, experiments, findings, and models) on how regions of a cell’s genome get compacted into structures that regulate gene expression.
“These conferences have given me a much greater appreciation for the rapidly advancing fields of genomics and microbiology and the promise they each hold for the medical field,” Emily says. “They have been an important supplement to my science education.”
For her win, the Microbiology Society is paying her way to attend and present at the national American Society for Microbiology Conference, a prize worth $1800. The conference will be held in Denver in May 2013.
Emily will finish her molecular biology thesis this semester and is currently applying to medical school to become a primary care physician.
At Scripps, Emily has received an exceptional science education and has become equipped to communicate complex ideas clearly and efficiently. “I’m grateful everyday for the education I’ve received,” she says, confident these skills will be of the utmost importance in her upcoming education and future career.