Dr. Charisse Winston-Gray
Postdoctoral Fellow University of California, San Diego
Adjunct Faculty Southwestern College
PhD in Neuroscience Georgetown University
Blood and broken bones; as a student paramedic, Dr. Charisse Winston-Gray witnessed many grisly scenes. While other pre-med students were stimulated by these moments, gory sights didn’t sit well with Charisse. Although she grew up with dreams of becoming a doctor, she quickly realized that practicing medicine wasn’t the right path for her. While pursuing her bachelor’s degree in chemistry on a pre-med track, Charisse became accustomed to the scientific lab environment and realized she wanted to stay in science. Even after deciding not to pursue medicine, Charisse would go on to make important contributions to the medical field as a postdoctoral researcher studying biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease.
With a plan to pursue a scientific career in industry, Charisse knew she needed a graduate degree to excel. While pursuing a master’s at Georgetown University, she honed the skill of growing neurons in vitro. One of Charisse’s professors was impressed with her expertise and hired her to work in his lab at the NIH after she completed her degree. Even though she enjoyed the work, the lab environment filled with older scientists lacked communication and collaboration. Charisse soon realized the effect the lab dynamic was having on her own happiness and productivity. “If I’m unhappy in [a] position, I’m not going to be successful,” she says. As an energetic young scientist, she felt she needed a lab that matched and fostered that spirit. After working at the NIH for one year, Charisse was eager to move on and applied for graduate school and jobs at the same time, letting destiny take the lead.
Destiny came in the form of the late Dr. Karen Gale, renowned for her staunch advocacy for women in science and all trainees at Georgetown. Having already earned her master’s from Georgetown, Charisse quickly got on Dr. Gale’s radar in the small and tight knit community. After a one-on-one conversation with Dr. Gale about her future goals and what she wanted from science, Charisse applied to the Interdisciplinary Program in Neuroscience PhD program at Georgetown.
Armed with the insight gained from her time at the NIH, she deliberately searched for a PhD lab with a positive environment, interesting research projects, and mentorship style that fit her own needs. Dr. Mark Burns’ lab ended up striking the right balance for Charisse, and just so happened to study one of the “hot” topics in neuroscience at the time— traumatic brain injury, or TBI.
In order to investigate TBI in mice, scientists give mice mild head injuries and examine how the brain changes after recovery. Connection sites between cells in the brain, called dendrites, are damaged after TBI. The lab also studied Amyloid-β, a toxic molecule commonly associated with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) that also accumulates in the brain after TBI. During her PhD, Charisse showed that a single brain injury in mice damaged dendrites, even in areas far away from the injury site, and that this loss was not due to Amyloid-β.
Charisse never planned on staying in academia after getting her PhD. She emphatically told her mentors and thesis committee, “I’m getting out of here. Good luck to y’all.” Charisse applied to an academic postdoctoral position solely to increase her publication record and better her chances at landing a top industry job. Now nearing the end of her postdoc, however, Charisse is no longer chasing that industry position. “I’m shocked I’m still here,” she says. “I just applied to my first major grant as a PI, and hopefully I’ll get that to stay in academia. I’d love to stay in this field.”
Charisse is in her fourth year as a postdoctoral scholar and a Neuroplasticity of Aging Fellow in Dr. Robert Rissman’s laboratory at UCSD. Her research focuses on biomarker discovery for AD, which she hopes will help to identify patients for early intervention before AD starts. “By the time someone shows signs of dementia, it’s too late,” Charisse says. “Your brain has been deteriorating for forty to fifty years.” Specifically, Charisse is looking in people's blood for what she thinks could hold powerful biomarkers: exosomes. Every organ in the body packages proteins into exosomes, which are sent into the bloodstream. “[They] are part of a shuttle system that helps cells communicate,” she explains. “They are also thought to be waste removal or trash cans of the cell that can traffic to the blood.” Charisse looks at protein markers inside the exosomes that are shared across patients with AD, which could then be used to identify other patients who do not yet exhibit clinical symptoms of the disease. Studying exosomes in cancer research is common, but using this technique to investigate AD is relatively novel.
Charisse’s passion for biomarker discovery is matched by her drive to cultivate a new generation of future scientists. In addition to her research, Charisse teaches at Southwestern College as an Adjunct Faculty member and Work Based Learning Coordinator. The challenges she faced during her time as a student shape her teaching and mentoring philosophy. After a difficult transition from high school to college in which she often struggled to achieve good grades, she found that jumping into the PhD program wasn’t any easier. She had never studied foundational neuroscience before her PhD and was one of the oldest students in the program. “Everything was very very new to me, and I felt behind.”
The largest obstacle came in the second year of her PhD when she didn’t pass her medical school anatomy class. “It was the first time I’d actually failed a class. I felt isolated. I had self-doubt. I was contemplating maybe this isn’t for me… maybe I just can’t do it.” But Charisse didn’t give up. She passed the class the following year by buckling down and building a support network with a friend who also failed the course. Now on the other side of the classroom as a professor, Charisse makes sure to meet each student where they are. Her experience with failure and uncertainty drives her to pay attention to students as individuals, picking up on who is struggling and taking the initiative to reach out to them on a regular basis. Reflecting on her past, Charisse says, “I would’ve wanted somebody to do that for me.”
Throughout her training, Charisse’s open mind has given her the ability to thrive in unexpected environments. Her path has shifted from doctor, to industry, and settled on tenure track faculty. This flexibility and drive primes Charisse to be a leader as a neuroscience researcher and mentor. As she pursues a faculty position to continue her work on exosomes and AD biomarkers, her focus on training young scientists never goes out of focus. Charisse sees her trajectory as the perfect example of what's possible if someone is given the support and opportunity to grow as a scientist. Her career’s unexpected path motivates Charisse to mentor future students and help them move the field forward as they go on to their own research careers.
Check out Nancy’s full interview with Charisse on March 3rd, 2020 below or wherever you get your podcasts!
