Ashley Kirby
Graduate Student
Email: aekirby@clemson.edu
Biosketch
I am originally from Gainesville, Georgia. I attended the University of North Georgia, graduating in 2018 with dual bachelor’s degrees in biology and psychology. As an undergraduate, I conducted research investigating molecular recognition and selective uptake of nutritive particles during phagocytosis in Tetrahymena pyriformis. After graduation, I worked at UNG as a microbiology lab technician, and later as an academic advisor. Currently, I am a PhD candidate in the department of Genetics and Biochemistry and a member of Dr. Miriam Konkel’s lab, where we study the genomic impact of transposable elements.
Research
My research in Dr. Konkel’s lab focuses on SINE-variable number tandem repeat-Alu (SVA) elements, an ape-specific family of transposable elements, or “jumping genes,” that mobilize in the genome via a “copy-and-paste” mechanism and have been implicated in human genetic disorders. The overall goal of my project is to leverage high quality, long-read genomic data and computational approaches to better characterize SVA elements, identify putative source elements generating new insertions, and understand overall SVA evolution.