Jessica Esseltine: 20Q20 interview

Jessica Esseltine, PhD

Assistant Professor of Cancer and Development, Faculty of Medicine, Memorial University of Newfoundland

20 questions with Jessica Esseltine

1. Where were you born? Where did you grow up?
I was born and raised in St. Thomas, Ontario. It is a small town, just south of London. Its claim to fame is that it was where Jumbo the Elephant died in a train accident. Visitors to St. Thomas are still greeted by a giant elephant rear end when they enter the city.

2. Where did you go to school?
I did all of my education at the University of Western Ontario in London. My undergrad degree was in genetics in the Department of Biology and then I did my PhD at the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry in Physiology and Pharmacology.

In my PhD I studied G protein-coupled receptors, which is somewhat different than what I’m doing now.

I did a postdoc at the University of Washington in Seattle, WA, where I looked at protein kinase A and protein dynamics. I followed that up with a second postdoc back at Western, again in the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, where I studied gap junctions. And that was when I discovered stem cells.

Read the full interview here.

Published May 2021.