Graduate Student
Department of Neurobiology and Behavior
University of California, Irvine

Adoption goal: $35,000
Adoption type: Collective

Caitlin Suire is a promising young Alzheimer’s researcher pursuing her Ph.D. in the Interdepartmental Neuroscience Program at UC Irvine. Caitlin grew up in a small country town called Woodleaf, North Carolina, where she spent her time reading, playing the saxophone, and helping her family’s farming business. Upon graduation, she attended Wake Forest University, where she pursued a major of her own design, entitled Biology of Mind, investigating not only biology and neuroscience, but philosophy as well. Caitlin became interested in research at Wake Forest, working in a genetics lab and a psychology lab. Under Dr. Christian Waugh, she focused on understanding emotional recovery in stressful situations, and with Dr. Erik Johnson she investigated how dietary manipulations altered reproductive choices. Caitlin became a post-baccalaureate fellow at the National Institute on Aging (NIA) under Drs. Mark Mattson, Stephanie Studenski, and Erez Eitan, where her work primarily focused on understanding how exercise and dietary changes affect various proteins within the blood of humans, and more specifically small blood-borne particles called extracellular vesicles. Caitlin’s current work is focused on the discovery and development of novel pharmaceutical compounds with the potential for treating Alzheimer’s disease.