Allyson Morton, B.S. 2012

Director, SSI Strategy – Remote

2012 Major: Biology (concentration in Cell & Molecular Biology); minor in Chemistry

How has being a Biology graduate from Duke helped shape you personally and/or professionally?

"I am very thankful for Duke Biology for many reasons. The coursework was challenging and I did not always excel in it, but professors were very helpful after class and during office hours. The jewel of my experience at Duke was doing undergraduate research in Dr. Gerard Blobe's laboratory in the Department of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology. I started the summer after my freshman year thanks to the Howard Hughes Research Fellow program and continued through senior year. At the Duke Marine Lab, I was encouraged by Dr. Richard Forward to apply for summer research programs at other universities, and received a lot of support during the application process from my advisor Dr. Alec Motten... eventually landing me at Harvard, where I would go on to complete a Ph.D. in Nutritional biochemistry, doing very different research from what I did at Duke. Duke Biology paved the way for me to become the scientist I am today, where I work in drug safety and clinical research as a safety scientist."

What advice would you give students in Duke's Biology programs? 

"Connect with professors and do research! Even if you wind up in a different field of study from where you started, the skills you learn from becoming a scientist will stay with you. Also - sit in the front row during lecture, it will keep you awake and more engaged."

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