South Florida scientist Melanie Fernandez was first inspired to work on Alzheimer’s research when her grandfather contracted the disease. He fled to the U.S. from Cuba and always taught her to value the transformative power of education.
“He taught me everything I know,” she said. “We had the same stack of books on our bookshelf … he very much fostered that spirit in me. So … it was very sad to see him decline like that.”
In her time working in a lab at the University of Miami, Melanie helped identify genetic variations among different demographic groups and studied how they affect people's likelihood to develop Alzheimer’s.
“Finding such a specific pattern amongst such a volume of research was … a very big accomplishment,” she said.
Melanie hopes to continue that work — once she goes off to Vanderbilt University in the fall.
“I wish you understood the imposter syndrome I felt sometimes when I’m like 17 sitting in a lab,” Melanie said, with a laugh.
Here’s the thing: Melanie just graduated high school from Miami Lakes Educational Center. But she’s already racked up hundreds of hours in labs at UM and Florida International University — and she’s just getting started.
Falling in love with the creativity of science
Researchers who have welcomed Melanie into their labs say what sets her apart is her passion for scientific discovery. Even at a young age, they say her dedication — and her hunger for knowledge — are clear.
“What people don't really consider as much [in science] ... is how creative you need to be,” she said. “How much grit you need to have when something fails over and over and over again, you just have to keep going … And playing with science rules in your head —and exceptions — to create these like new ideas that don't exist yet. I fell in love with that aspect of it.”
Even though she just got her high school diploma, Melanie already has her sights set on earning a doctoral level degree, which is still a rare accomplishment for Latinas in the U.S.
According to an analysis by the National Science Foundation, roughly 7% of doctorates are earned by Latinos.
Melanie says her world opened up when she got to start working in actual labs — blasting crystals with x-rays, studying samples of human brains, and being selected for a research internship for high schoolers at UM, where she focused on Alzheimer’s.
“We found that variant only to African Americans, so it was not seen anywhere else,” she said. “All these patients had passed away due to Alzheimer's and all of them carried this specific variant. So what does this mean? Do they have an increased chance? Were they protected against it? Did that single nucleotide polymorphism work in combination with another gene in the overlap of the microglia?”
Got all that?
Melanie started the JJ Vance Memorial Summer Internship in June and by August she was presenting the lab’s research to a room full of PhDs, family and friends.
“The official title was ‘Utilizing Cell-Specific Chromatin Interactions to Evaluate Ancestry-Specific Genetic Risk for Alzheimer's Disease’,” Melanie said. “And I know it's a mouthful.”
Facing an audience full of postdocs, Melanie said she was probably more nervous about presenting in front of her parents.
“Standing there talking about research I had worked on over the past two months was very scary,” Melanie acknowledged. “But I also needed to trust that all the hours I put into this work … I knew I needed to trust the findings and trust the science of what it was showing.”
Melanie says having a better understanding of how our genetic makeup can translate to varying risks for different groups of people can ultimately help alleviate the suffering of patients like her grandfather.
“The more we learn about the genetic makeup of different ethnic groups, the better we're able to serve the people and have a more equitable health care system,” she added.
Pushing boundaries and finding balance
It’s a lot for a high schooler to take on.
At times Melanie says she’s struggled to find a balance — reading research papers on the way to school, rushing to the lab, then off to cross country practice, and still finding time to just hang out with her friends.
“My parents were very protective of my childhood, as they'd call it,” Melanie said. “My parents very much were... 'These are the four years that you're supposed to tell your children about. And when you tell them, you're not going to tell them that you did all these cool things and stayed after school for math club. You're gonna tell them that you went to go get fries and like a slurpee with your friends at like two o'clock in the morning. Or you went to homecoming and somebody split their pants on the dance floor.'”
“Memories like that will last you forever,” she said. “I think I'm very grateful that I've created that sense of balance for myself.”
On the day Melanie spoke with WLRN, she had a hard deadline to wrap up the interview — because she was headed off to Grad Bash with her friends.
“I am so excited,” she said. “It's like 10 hours in a park with all your best friends [and] braiding your hair on the bus ride over there.”
She was not going to miss that bus.
