By: Sarah Sharman, PhD
Marshae Scott Simpson grew up in a small town called East St. Louis, Illinois, often confused with the much larger St. Louis, Missouri. Once a bustling industrial hub, much of the city’s population deserted the town when businesses left for the next great metropolis in the 1960s. Marshae exudes a strong spirit of hope, driving her to search for new opportunities and leave her small town after graduating high school.
After graduation, she packed up and moved to North Alabama to attend Alabama A&M University, a Historically Black College and University (HBCU). In 2021, she became the first person in her family to earn a college degree. Marshae did not stop there, earning her Master’s in Molecular Biology & Genetics from Alabama A&M University in the spring of 2023.
Now, Marshae is paving her own path to becoming a physician specializing in neuroscience. Her dream was sparked after reading the unlikely story of Phineas Gage, a man who survived a seemingly unsurvivable traumatic brain injury. To help boost her competitiveness in medical school applications and gain more experience in the research field, Marshae applied to a training program at the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology. The National Science Foundation-funded program called BRIDGES (Boosting Retention, Interest, and Diversity through Guided Experiences in STEM) provides laboratory training for recent graduates of Alabama’s HBCUs whose studies were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
I sat down with Marshae to learn more about her educational journey and experiences so far in the BRIDGES program.
Sarah Sharman: What led you here to HudsonAlpha?
Marshae Scott: I already knew about HudsonAlpha before I applied to the BRIDGES program. I was interested in the research being done here. When my advisor mentioned the BRIDGES program, I knew it would be a nice program to apply to because I didn’t get a lot of research experience in college. I knew I wanted to go further with a career in STEM, and I would benefit from research experience and working in a lab.
Sarah: Which HudsonAlpha lab are you working in, and what will you be researching?
Marshae: I am working in the Myers lab under the mentorship of Dr. Chris Partridge. My project focuses on a mutation in a transcription factor that we are hypothesizing is the causative agent of some varying neurodevelopmental symptoms in patients in the clinic. We will introduce that mutation into adult human stem cells, differentiate them into neurons, observe the biological changes, and hopefully prove that the mutation is the cause of the symptoms. The end goal is to develop some therapies or marker tests that could help geneticists and doctors connect symptoms to a genetic cause in their patients.
Sarah: What made you interested in biology and the STEM field?
Marshae: Probably the main thing is just having the opportunity to keep learning more every day. Originally, I became interested in STEM because of the intersection of history and science. It is intriguing to learn about the technology we use today and realize we didn’t have much of it hundreds of years ago. But discoveries made in the past still influence what we do today. Having the opportunity to add to that knowledge and contribute to the advancement of the field excites me.
Sarah: You graduated with a master’s degree last year and have about six months left in the BRIDGES program. What’s next for you? Do you have any long-term goals or plans?
Marshae: I want to go to medical school to become a physician. Since I decided I wanted to become a doctor, I’ve known that I wanted to do neuroscience or something in a neuro specialty. But since I was exposed to genetics in my undergrad, and then I went on to get a Master’s in genetics, now I want to incorporate some genetics in that. I’ve been looking at neurogenetics as a field and different surgical neurology fields. So, I do know I want to be a physician. I do know I want to be in a neuro specialty. I’m just still finding my niche and where I really want to go in my medical school training.
Sarah: Have you had any mentors throughout your training so far that really stood out and inspired you?
Marshae: My undergraduate advisor, Dr. Farmer. She was the one who mentioned this program to me. She’s been probably the most influential person in my entire academic journey. It was her genetics class that pushed me to get a master’s degree in genetics. And then, as I was getting my master’s, she helped guide me through that whole process, and now she’s helping me apply to medical school. She was always encouraging me and telling me, ‘do this and do that.’ She put me in the right direction to get the most beneficial experiences during undergraduate and graduate school.
Sarah: How important was it to you that you had a female mentor you could look up to?
Marshae: It was very big, mainly because I’m a first generation everything in my family. So, for many things in undergrad, I was doing trial and error, winging it. I didn’t really know what I was doing. I didn’t have anyone in my family to turn to for questions because they hadn’t been through it. Having her help navigate those unknowns was major. Being able to see all the things that she did and went through to get to her amazing career was definitely encouraging and motivating to me because she was a female that I could relate to.
Sarah: So, outside of the lab, what do you like to do?
Marshae: Outside of the lab, I like to bake a lot. It’s funny because my favorite scent of candles is anything that is a baked good, like a cinnamon roll or something. But I’m always baking, so my apartment always smells like something sweet anyway. I love to put a little twist on traditional desserts that everybody likes. Outside of baking, I really enjoy exploring Huntsville. It’s growing so fast, and I like to go out to all the restaurants that are opening, farmer’s markets, holiday markets, all the things that we have to do. And also getting out in nature with all the great parks and hiking trails around the area.
Sarah: What is the most unusual dessert twist you’ve done?
Marshae: Probably a sweet potato cheesecake. It’s a mix between a really good sweet potato filling and cheesecake filling, and you put it in a deep dish pie crust. It was really good!
