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The Apprentices
The scientist: Yolanda Sanchez, Ph.D. (right)
Her title: Associate Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Joined the faculty: 2006
What qualities do you look for in undergrads for your lab?
Drive, curiosity, and maturity.
What are the benefits of having undergrads in your lab?
I really enjoy undergraduates. Training them is an
important part of our jobs—we're recruiting the
next generation of scientists. It's fun to see how
they view the world—they're blank slates, full of
ideas, and not cynical, which is nice. One of the
most appealing things to me about coming to
DMS was that there were mechanisms for undergraduates
to pursue research.
Did you work in a lab when you were an undergrad?
I did an honors thesis at the University of Texas
at El Paso. I had an undergraduate fellowship to
look at small organelles in water molds that were
a nuisance for ponds.
What are the challenges of having undergrads in your lab?
It takes time to train them, but it's one of the
most rewarding things we do.
Is there anything else you'd like to add?
I think that working in research labs is a very important
formative experience for students interested
in pursuing a career in science. We need
more young people to join the scientific community.
If nothing else, as voters, they'll be more informed
about where money for research is going.
The student: Rachael Labitt '11 (left)
Major and minor: Biology and Chinese
Hometown: Nashua, N.H.
Joined the Sanchez lab: Fall 2007
What are your career goals?
I'd like to take a few years off after graduating and
then apply to veterinary school.
What got you interested in science?
I've always been fascinated with living things—amazed by their complexity and by the fact that
despite the myriad layers of complexity everything
manages to work the way it's supposed to.
What drew you to the Sanchez lab?
I wanted to get experience in a laboratory

setting. I had never worked in a real lab. I found out about the position through Jobnet, which I guess you could say is Dartmouth's online classifieds. Then I looked at the lab's website, and although I could barely understand any of it, it looked cool and the people looked happy.
What's the most exciting aspect of the research process?
When things work. I'm looking forward to the
next couple of weeks, when we will start looking
at mouse tissues to see what effect the genes have
on the embryo's development.
What is the most difficult part of doing research as a student?
It takes up a lot of time. Also, you realize you
don't really know much of anything, though that
could be seen as a good thing, too. There's always
more to know, and you can never know everything.
But if you don't know things, you can always
learn. And as any institution of learning
would tell you, learning is not a bad thing.
What is the quality you most admire in people?
Perseverance.
What about you surprises others?
I've lived in New Hampshire my whole life but
have never been to Canada.
What are your interests outside of school and work?
I'm interested in dance. I did ballet and modern dance in high school. I also volunteer at a vet clinic on weekends, I started taking horseback riding lessons, and when the weather is warm I help out at the Dartmouth organic farm.
What kind of music is on your iPod (or CD player) right now?
A mix of things—Nirvana, Enya, Beatles, Bare
Naked Ladies, piano music, Toad the Wet
Sprocket (a great name), some Chinese classical
music, and the Lion King soundtrack.
Finish this sentence: If I had more time I would . . .
Take dance classes. Draw. And read and learn
things other than for my classes.
The laboratory: Sanchez has had "at least four" undergrads in her lab since coming to Dartmouth. She studies signaling pathways that regulate cell division, DNA repair, and cell death and their role in the origin and treatment of cancer. Labitt is investigating a protein that may be the Achilles heel of cells in the process of becoming cancerous. She is looking at a kinase (an enzyme) called Chk1 that stops cell division when DNA is damaged; some people have a mutation in Chk1. Part of her work involves "preparing and staining many, many slides to see if we can determine what exact effect the mutant Chk1 has" on cells.