Harvard Medical School grad finds the answers
Benyam Kinde, Ph.D. ’16, M.D., ’18, holds his parents responsible — but in a good way. They encouraged Benyam and his older brother, Isaac, to ask and seek answers to their own questions. It helped that Kinde was born with a desire to learn. “I enjoy asking questions,” he said. Scientific questions This spirit of inquiry brought Kinde to Harvard Medical School (HMS), where he led investigations that uncovered a novel role of the MECP2 protein — which when mutated leads to the devastating neurodevelopmental disorder Rett syndrome — in regulating gene expression in the developing brain. By understanding the mechanisms behind the disorder, Kinde and fellow researchers hoped to develop therapies to reverse the symptoms of this debilitating disease. These investigations were published in Nature and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Kinde was already interested in molecular neuroscience when he came to HMS. He knew he wanted to work in the lab of...