Bring Science to Life: Healing, Health and High-tech

Sharon Grayson, MD

Sharon Grayson, MD started her college career at BCC and continued it by earning her Bachelor of Science in Human Ecology from Cornell. She did post-bachelor work at Harvard and earned her medical degree from Albany Medical College. Her work experience includes Kaplong Hospital in Sotik, Kenya and several years of working with children and adults with developmental and physical disabilities in recreational programs for the city of Bellevue. She is currently a physician at Community Health.

Theresa Britschgi

Theresa Britschgi joined Seattle Biomedical Research Institute in 2004, as the Director of the new BioQuest science education outreach program. Prior to joining SBRI, Britschgi was a 12-year veteran of the biotechnology/pharmaceutical industry-a versatile researcher, with an established publication and patent record in the fields of functional mammalian genomics and molecular diagnostics, and an active member of the local science education outreach community. She holds an M.S. in Microbiology from Oregon State University and graduated from the University of Washington with a B.S. in Microbiology.

Jennifer Koop

Jennifer Ihle Koop,  is a research technician at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in the Galloway Laboratory, Cancer Biology Division. Her area of research is infection with high risk types of Human PapillomaVirus (HPV), a sexually transmitted virus, is the leading risk factor in the development of cervical cancer, the second most common type of cancer worldwide.  Research at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center has been instrumental in the ground-breaking new cancer vaccines by Merck and Glaxo-SmithKline to prevent cervical cancer.  Jennifer's work at "The Hutch" spans 11 years and two labs (McDougall and Galloway) that have specialized in the study of HPV’s and the molecular and epidemeologic progression to cancer.  She has worked on many different studies including HPV 16 oncogene E6 activation of telomerase and chromosome instability, and immortalization of epithelial cells with hTERT and H-Ras.  Most recently Jennifer has conducted a study of HPV 16 molecular variants and their relation to cervical cancer survival rates.  Her research data was presented at the 23rd International HPV Conference in Prague, Czechoslovakia in September 2006. 

Jennifer has a B.S. from the University of Puget Sound.  Jennifer believes that there are many exciting opportunities in the field of biology at the Bachelor's Degree level and that laboratory experience and internships during your college years provide a valuable advantage in the workplace.

Alex Tustian

Alex Tustian is Associate Director, Formulation and Product Development, at Sonus Pharmaceuticals, where he develops new formulations of anticancer drugs for clinical development and the manufacturing processes used to make them. He has worked at Sonus since 1998. Alex has worked in new dosage form design and production in the pharmaceutical industry for 16 years, holding a variety of research and development positions at Shire Laboratories, Affinity Biotech, and Zeneca Pharmaceuticals prior to joining Sonus. He holds a BA in Biology from the University of Delaware.