Andrew Yee, Ph.D., thought he wanted to be a chemical engineer. At least, that’s what he received his Ph.D. in. Then he spent some time in a bioengineering lab looking at endothelial cells, and suddenly, “I wanted to learn about biology and genetics,” he says. “I wanted to work with animals.” This led him to a postdoctoral position with David Ginsburg, M.D., at the University of Michigan.
Yee immediately launched into a project to identify all of the genetic variants in von Willebrand factor (VWF) that caused bleeding disorders. Then Ginsburg told him about the JGP fellowship. He read about Pool’s discovery, which piqued his interest in factor VIII. Specifically, he wondered, how did it interact with VWF?
So, he applied for the JGP fellowship with a research proposal called “Fine Structure-Function Mapping VWF-FVIII Interaction.” It was one of the first grants he’d ever applied for and the first he won.
“I was elated when I got the news that I won,” says Yee, who is now an assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Division of Hematology-Oncology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. Not just because he now had funding to pursue his idea for two years, but because of the input he received from the reviewers. “Their suggestions made quite an impact on how I pursued the experiments,” he says.
Yee used his JGP award to develop reagents required for the complex studies in animal models he conducted to explore VWF and FVIII interactions — work that continues today. An added benefit of the award was being able to work with other JGP awardees. “We’re a small community,” he says. “It’s an incredible honor to be a JGP award recipient.”
