St. Petersburg Collegiate High School alumni Amy Rice, recent recipient of the prestigious Pritzker Research Fellowship at Chicago’s Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), is conducting research in the field of Computational Biophysics.
While she has experimental collaborators that she works with, her research is primarily computer based and does not happen in a traditional laboratory.
“My project specifically is looking at a class of antimicrobial peptides produced by most animals,” she explained. “It is thought that bacteria don’t really become resistant to them. Not a lot is known currently as to why they work so well, but are not harmful to human cells.”
What is Computational Biophysics?
In Computational Biophysics computerized simulations are used to enable researchers like Rice to explore actions and reactions that happen within cells in very short time frames – nanoseconds – and very short distances.
“It’s hard from the experimental side to figure out what is happening on such small time and distance scales,” she said.
She is currently working with a team of researchers led by Dr. Jeff Wereszczynski at IIT. The Wereszczynski Group also includes two postdoctoral researchers and another Ph.D. student. Learn more about her research with the Wereszczynski Group at IIT.
Rice plans to continue her career in the same general field of research by teaching, working with graduate students and doing research.
“I love computational work,” she said. “It is a big up and coming field – new in last 20-30 years. It’s exciting for me to think about where it will be in future when computers are even more powerful,” she said.
An early interest in study of biology
After earning her A.A. degree from St. Petersburg College in 2009, Rice transferred to IIT where she earned a Bachelor of Science in Molecular Biochemistry and Biophysics.
“Biology was my first love,” said Rice. “It’s what got me interested in science in the first place.”
Looking back to her time at SPC, she remembers loving her anatomy and physiology class.
“The professor had a way of making the class incredibly interesting and bringing in his outside knowledge to make it more real to us,” she said.
Her advice to other students is practical:
“Don’t be afraid to take risks and don’t be afraid to fail,” said Rice. “In science you fail a lot. I’ve had to start my research project over nine times now. The first eight times I failed. If you are not failing you are not at the cutting edge of your field.”
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