Meet Brianna Bibel ’16, ‘The Bumbling Biochemist’ on a 任务

As a postdoctoral researcher in biochemistry at UC San Francisco, Brianna Bibel ’16她每天都在研究肉眼看不见的东西. 她最频繁的合作者是蛋白质——用她的话说，是细胞的“分子工人”. By stripping away cell matter to study the proteins, Bibel可以更好地了解它们如何与抗生素协同工作. 这是, 当然, when she’s not mentoring grad students, attending courses, or posting high-energy, de-jargoned videos 和 blogs as “The Bumbling Biochemist,” her online alter-ego.

“It’s been a very busy day,” she admits on a Friday afternoon. But she’s still bright-eyed 和 expressive, 用感染力的热情描述RNA纯化等过程. 很容易理解为什么她在Instagram上赢得了成千上万的粉丝, 脸谱网, 和其他地方. “我喜欢科学的一点是，”她说，“每天都是公正的 完全 不同的.”

Bibel was recently honored with Saint Mary’s Emerging Leader Award, 每年颁发给在十年或更短时间内产生重大影响的校友. She was humbled by the award, 她说, 尤其是她没想到自己会走这条路. 直到她在圣玛丽大学的第二年，她都在计划成为一名医生. 但她在学院暑期研究项目的经历打开了她的世界, propelling her down the path she’s on today. 她热衷于利用科学传播使STEM成为一个更具包容性的空间，并希望有一天能在一所主要是本科生的大学任教. 

Before attending Saint Mary’s, Bibel说, “我没有意识到成为一名科学家实际上是一件你可以做的事情.” Now, she’s on a mission to bring others on the same journey. 

Lab at First Sight

当Bibel在2014年申请圣玛丽的暑期研究项目时, 她知道这段经历在纸上看起来会很棒:“我这样做是为了给我的医学院申请加分.” What she didn’t count on was falling in love with the lab. 

自1986年以来, 夏季研究项目为本科生提供了前所未有的机会和可观的津贴，让他们与理学院的教师一起解决现实世界的问题. Bibel was one of 14 students selected that year; she worked with 杰弗里·西格曼他是化学和生物化学教授，研究神经溶解素酶. 日复一日, Bibel subcloned, expressed—in other words, synthesized—和 purified the enzyme, 研究它是如何帮助大脑和全身传递化学信息的. 

Bibel found the whole experience invigorating. “我开始意识到，即使不成为一名医生，我仍然可以帮助人们，”她说. 

“我在圣玛丽中学得到了我所期望的最好的科学教育. You have the small class sizes, the one-on-我得到的一个启示是，我在那里获得的经验比在更大的机构要多得多.” 

看到比贝尔的潜力，西格曼鼓励她在第二年夏天申请外部奖学金. 她在格莱斯顿神经设计研究所获得了为期10周的奖学金, 加州大学旧金山分校, 在那里她进行了由美国亨廷顿舞蹈症协会资助的研究. 她说，这种对“更广阔的科学环境”的接触巩固了她的发展轨迹. After graduating from Saint Mary’s in 2016, 她直接进入长岛冷泉港实验室攻读博士学位, 纽约, where she studied the protein family Argonaute. Named after the genus of octopus its mutated form resembles, Argonaute蛋白参与基因调控和RNA沉默, 和, as Bibel’s thesis research suggested, could be used to mute cancer-causing genes.

自2022年春季完成博士和博士后工作以来, Bibel has returned to the Bay Area. She’s currently a postdoc in Danica Fujimorii’s lab at UCSF, 继续研究蛋白质如何抑制和操纵基因. 虽然她很感激能在世界上最大的研究机构之一工作, she sees Saint Mary’s as the reason she’s there at all. “我在圣玛丽中学得到了我所期望的最好的科学教育. You have the small class sizes, 一对一的指导——我在那里获得的经验比在更大的机构要多得多.” 

她也感谢西格曼和其他教授，他们鼓励她在十大正规网赌平台毕业后继续深造. “​​I was encouraged 和 supported every step of the way. And now, I just want to do that for other people 和 students.”

Pushing Electrons, Not People

One way Bibel is encouraging the next generation of scientists? She’s meeting them where they’re at—on social media.

It all happened by accident. The summer after graduating from Saint Mary’s in 2016, Bibel was helping out 西格曼, explaining some technical procedure to his student researchers, when she noticed their eyes glaze over. She realized: “It was all gobbledygook to them. But that wasn’t their fault.Bibel看到了一个分享她对科学的热情的机会，让生物化学变得容易理解和有趣.

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Bibel开始在脸谱网上为自己创建了一个挑战——#365天科学——她每天分享一张与科学相关的照片, accompanied by an explanation. 然后她也开始在Instagram上发帖，接着是Twitter，然后是博客. And now, five years later, she’s never really stopped. In 2018 she began producing videos: selfie-camera vlogs chock-full of terminology 和 puns; in most, she wears a labcoat tied around her neck like a cape. In any given post, Bibel could be giving a tour of her lab, explaining bacterial transformation using h和made props, or sharing the life stories of groundbreaking female scientists. 

目前, The Bumbling Biochemist Instagram page has more than 55,000的粉丝, a number that’s still growing. 比贝尔的影响在圣玛丽学校也能继续感受到，有时以令人惊讶的方式. In a recent video celebrating Bibel’s Emerging Leader Award,  西格曼分享说，他现在的一个学生实际上是在研究科学，因为比贝尔的博客. “我认为她不知道布里是十大正规网赌平台的毕业生，”他说. “I mentioned it, 和 she was amazed by that.”

她的帖子正在影响和激励他人，这让比贝尔感到鼓舞, at her alma mater 和 far beyond. “我得到消息几乎每天都从学生和教授们发现内容非常有用,她告诉我. “It just makes it all worth it.”

 “很多人没有我拥有的那种机会，而我现在仍然拥有. The least I can do is pay it forward.”

对她来说，这一切都是关于给予她同样的慷慨和支持. Speaking in her sixth-floor lab in downtown San Francisco, she recalls a younger version of herself, sitting in the office of Professor of Biochemistry Vidya Ch和rasekaran她对邀请西格曼担任她的暑期研究项目主管的前景感到恐惧. “I remember crying, saying, ‘No one's gonna want to work with me.但是博士. Ch和rasekaran was super duper sweet 和 encouraging. She put me into touch with Dr. 西格曼.”

“我非常感激他们给了我这个机会，”她微笑着告诉我. “他们看到的不仅仅是这个哭泣的没有自信的小女孩, but they saw someone who had potential.” She hopes to do the same for her future students. “很多人没有我拥有的那种机会，而我现在仍然拥有. The least I can do is pay it forward.”

Learn more about Saint Mary’s School of Science 和 opportunities through the Summer Research Program.

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海登·罗伊斯特是营销与传播办公室的特约撰稿人. 给他写.