Jessica is the Associate Director of Research Development in the central VPR office at Michigan Technological University. She assists faculty across career stages on proposals ranging from seed research to team proposals. Jess has a background in fine art, design, and marketing. The transition to research development has been a welcome change to offer support that makes a real impact. She’s always on the lookout for opportunities to use her visual design skills to amplify research ideas. Jess works with research faculty on figures, illustrations, and other visualizations. She has employed Strategic Doing rules to help institutes on her university campus identify opportunities for impact and funding.

Martina serves as the coordinator for the University of Michigan Center for RNA Biomedicine. She graduated from Brown University in 1995 where she starred as a student athlete. After completing her undergraduate degree in Biology, Martina became the first women’s basketball player from Brown University to compete in the Olympics where she represented Canada in the 1996 Atlanta Summer Games. After her time as an Olympian, Martina traveled throughout Europe playing professionally in the Croatian, Slovenian and Irish Senior Basketball Leagues. In addition to playing professional basketball, Martina went on to receive her Masters in Public Health from Columbia University in 2000. Today, Martina leads a diverse group of students, faculty, and researchers to collaboratively work across disciplines, build community and generate innovative ideas to advance RNA research and education across the University of Michigan. Contact Martina directly at mjerant@umich.edu.