Janet Young, PhD
Janet Young is a staff scientist who has worked in the lab of Dr. Harmit Malik at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center since 2011. She previously worked as a staff scientist in the labs of Dr. Stephen Tapscott and Dr. Barb Trask at Fred Hutch. She is also a musician and outdoor enthusiast.
What is a Staff Scientist?
Staff scientists play an important role in scientific research labs. They conduct independent research projects, support the lab’s administrative duties, mentor graduate students, publish research findings, and help the lab’s Principle Investigator write grant proposals. The staff scientist role provides an alternative for scientists who want to conduct scientific research but not lead a lab as a faculty member.
What is Basic Science Research?
Basic science researchers ask fundamental questions and make foundational discoveries about biology and diseases such as cancer.
The Malik Lab is within the Basic Sciences Division at Fred Hutch. The Malik Lab is focused on evolutionary studies of genetic conflict, which is the relationship between different genetic entities that make up an organism’s genome. The Malik Lab currently runs studies focused on Drosophila (common fruit flies), primates, yeast, other organisms, and viruses.
Video: Malik Lab
Watch evolutionary biologist Dr. Harmit Malik explain his lab's research focus in the short video.
“I’ve always been fascinated by science, and I especially love genetics and evolution – the logic of it appeals to me, and it helps me make sense of the natural world around me.”
— Dr. Janet Young
Dr. Young's Story
Growing up in the small coastal town of Seaford in East Sussex, England (population ~23,000), Dr. Young knew she wanted to be a scientist from a young age. Dr. Young’s mother had worked as a social geography researcher before starting a family. Her father was a chemistry professor and researcher, and she remembered wanting to be like her dad. Coming from an academic family, Dr. Young reflected that “it came very naturally to my parents to support my career choices,” noting that “I know a lot of people don’t have such easy access to people in the research field, and I hope we can change that by us scientists getting more involved with cool high school projects like this [career profiles project]!” Dr. Young described herself as “lucky” for having good mentors throughout her life, including supportive parents, teachers at school and college, and lab directors.
Dr. Young’s education as a scientist started in England and eventually led her to Seattle. She studied molecular biology and natural sciences in college and graduate school, and then achieved a PhD in Genetics. After completing her doctoral studies, Dr. Young moved to Seattle in 1998 to take a post-doctoral research fellowship. She was jointly mentored by Drs. Barbara Trask and Leroy Hood at the University of Washington. Dr. Young only planned to stay in Seattle for a few years to finish her post-doctoral training, but once she was promoted to a staff scientist position, the fantastic research community and the call of the Pacific Northwest mountains and trails were too strong.
Educational Pathway
Milestones along Dr. Young’s educational pathway include:
- Undergraduate: Natural Sciences at Clare College at the University of Cambridge in the UK, with a focus on disease biology.
- Doctorate: PhD in Genetics from University College London, working with supervising professor Dr. Sue Povey of the Medical Research Council’s Human Biochemical Genetics Unit.
- Post-doctoral Training: Post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Molecular Biotechnology at the University of Washington, jointly mentored by Drs. Barbara Trask and Leroy Hood at Fred Hutch.
Outside Work
Outside of work, Dr. Young keeps busy with time in nature and making music. She feels the call of nature year round and loves to hike, camp, and ski in the mountains around Seattle. She’s been a musician since age five and plays the trumpet in a community orchestra.
A Day in the Life
Dr. Young is currently engaged in a project that examines which genes are turned on in the placentas of an amazing species of bat, the Jamaican fruit bat (Artibeus jamaicensis). Dr. Young explained, “together with researchers at New Mexico State University, we are trying to understand how and why these bats have two different types of pregnancies each year: the springtime pregnancy lasts for less than four months, whereas the second pregnancy lasts 6-7 months, so that babies are born after the rainy season finishes.” Dr. Young commented, “weirdly, the embryos in the second pregnancy put their development on hold for a few months.” Why is this important? She explained, “the more we understand the basic biology of questions like this, the more we will understand how things go wrong in human pregnancies and birth – studying different animal species can tell us a lot about human biology and the amazing diversity of life on earth.”
Bioinformatic tools and genome databases are critical resources in Dr. Young’s research. She explained, “sometimes I use these tools and databases online, and sometimes I download them to the Fred Hutch computing cluster (hundreds of shared computers connected together).” She continued, “the downloaded versions allow us to use the tools and databases in a more powerful way."
Dr. Young and her research team use these tools and databases in a variety of ways. She shared, “one example is that we want to understand how genes are evolving.” To answer these kinds of questions, she explained, “we would take the sequence of the human version of the gene, and perform database searches through NCBI and/or UCSC, and obtain the sequence of that same gene in lots of other species, often lots of different primate species.” Dr. Young continued, “then we compare all those sequences with each other to see which parts of the gene have stayed the same during evolution, and which parts of the gene are changing rapidly across species.” The Malik Lab, she explained, is particularly interested “in rapidly changing sequences - they are often found in genes that encode antiviral proteins.” Importantly, she shared, “this pattern of rapid evolution can indicate that interacting virus and host proteins are in an evolutionary 'arms race' with each other, whereby the virus can acquire genetic changes helping it to escape the host antiviral protein, which in turn evolves to recognize the altered viral protein.”
“I’ve always sought out people who care about me as a person, not only how productive I am as a scientist: that’s been very important to me.”
— Dr. Janet Young
Advice for Students
Dr. Young’s advice to high school students: look for research opportunities and mentors. She recommended that young people with an interest in careers in scientific research look for hands-on research opportunities and find good mentors. She advised, “don’t be shy to contact researchers directly if you are enthusiastic to learn more about their research – we love it when people are excited about what we do!” High school and undergraduate students who are interested in a particular researcher’s work can contact them directly to see if there are internships available in their lab. This approach has worked for Dr. Young. She explained, “the last couple of times I was looking for a job, I didn’t wait for it to be advertised – I contacted people and told them I’d love to work with them, and we managed to create a position.” Of course, it doesn’t always work out this way, but she urged, “it doesn’t hurt to try!”
Mentorship is critically important for scientists as they train for their careers and continue to develop their knowledge and skills. For Dr. Young, one of her most valuable mentorship relationships was with her post-doctoral mentor Dr. Barbara Trask. As she recalled, Dr. Trask was “always excited to hear what I was up to, full of energy about science and the rest of life.” Dr. Young remembered one quality in particular that made Dr. Trask a great role model: she “treated everyone she met with equal respect, whether they were eminent professors or the cleaning staff.
U.S. Wage Information
According to the 2023 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, the mean wage for biological scientists in the U.S. is $99,060.
Additional Resources
Credit: Thank you to Dr. Young for graciously sharing her story as part of the Elephants & Cancer curriculum unit. Career profile written by Dr. Kristen Clapper Bergsman.