Dr. Bethany Janowski received her B.S. degree from the University of Wisconsin in 1988 and a M.S. degree in Biological Sciences, with an emphasis in neuroendocrinology in 1990. Dr. Janowski moved to Dallas in 1993 to attend graduate school at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. She joined the lab of Dr. Mangelsdorf in the Department of Pharmacology. While in graduate school, Dr. Janowski discovered that oxidized cholesterol was the ligand for the "orphan" nuclear hormone receptor, LXR. This discovery correctly suggested that LXR was a key regulator of cholesterol homeostasis. Her identification and extensive study of these oxidized cholesterol ligands for the LXR receptor became the foundation for medicinal chemistry/drug development for LXR. In 1998 she was awarded the Alfred Gilman Award in Pharmacology and received her Ph.D. degree in Cell and Molecular Biology in 1999. Postdoctoral training included further study in cholesterol regulation in the Department of Molecular Genetics, and developing new strategies for silencing gene expression in the Center for Biomedical Inventions at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. Dr. Janowski joined the faculty in the Department of Pharmacology in 2004. In 2005 she discovered that RNA silences endogenous genes at the level of the chromosome. In 2007 she discovered that RNA can specifically activate gene expression inside cells. Her current research focuses on studying how endogenous regulatory RNAs regulate nuclear hormone receptor gene expression inside cells.
