Adam Session
Class of 2009
Genetics, Genomics, and Development
When it came time for graduate school, I applied around the country, but no school had a comparable number of faculty with awesome research projects, plus the graduate students here seemed way happier than other schools.
My path to research began when I started college. I had never studied biology until my freshman year, and really loved the problem solving aspect of genetics, and chose that (and Classical humanities), as my undergraduate concentration. I first came to Berkeley as an undergraduate with the 2008 Amgen Scholars Program, worked for Rachel Brem and loved genomics (even though I had pretty much no programming experience). When it came time for graduate school, I applied around the country, but no school had a comparable number of faculty with awesome research projects, plus the graduate students here seemed way happier than other schools.
Also a factor in my decision was the large amount of things to do in the Bay Area. I grew up in Houston, but spent the latter half of my grade school years in small New England towns, and really could not stand not having a city nearby. The advantage of Berkeley is that you have the conveniences of a city, while not actually having to pay SF-level rent. Additionally with such great public transportation, it is easy to live in Oakland (or even SF) and commute to school easily. Recently I've started doing improv comedy, which is a great way to unwind at the end of a long day of science and meet new people. With a large number of art shows, comedy clubs, and educational opportunities, the Bay offers a lot to do with the little amount of free time that being a graduate student offers.
During my time as a graduate student at Berkeley I rotated in a number of labs before finding one that fit me well, working on development, evolution, genetics, cell biology, and genomics. I joined the Rokhsar lab, and am now working on the assembly/analysis of the genome of the paleotetraploid frog Xenopus laevis. Due to its whole genome duplication ~40 million years ago, X. laevis is an excellent model system to study hypothesis concerning the evolution of vertebrate gene regulation, as all vertebrates share two rounds of whole genome duplication at the base of their radiation. Additionally, X. laevis is a classical developmental model system, and assembly of its genome will allow for greater understanding of vertebrate development. So the best part of being a graduate student at Cal is training as a scientist and working on an important project at the same time as living in an area that offers ample opportunity to grow outside of the laboratory as well.
Undergraduate University: Rutgers University
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