Hilleary B. Osheroff

B.A., Reed College
Dividing the Preplate: Characterization of the Earliest Neuronal Populations of the Cerebral Cortex
presented by Mary E. Hatten

Hilleary’s doctoral thesis concerns early phases of cortical development. In her research, Hilleary has harnessed the tools of molecular biology, mouse genetics and live cell imaging to study cells thought to provide the scaffolding for the assembly of neuronal layers in the brain. Understanding the rudimentary steps required to build the cortex is expected to provide insights into what goes wrong in developmental diseases such as autism, epilepsy or mental retardation.

As a student in my lab, Hilleary has held the highest standards. Her faculty advisory committee had to try and convince her that her experiments were not boring, rather to be written up as her thesis. In addition to her talents at the bench, Hilleary is a wonderful writer; her thesis was accepted without revision — that is the first time I have heard of that happening, let alone experienced it with one of my students. In addition to her research in my lab, Hilleary has taken the initiative to volunteer as an after-school tutor and teacher outside of her thesis research project. For the last three years, she has devoted several hours a week to working with children from New York City public schools. She is keenly interested in developing new ways to bridge science and secondary education.