This profile is part of a series to highlight the researchers who will be honored at a ceremony for UNMC’s 2018 Scientist Laureate, Distinguished Scientist, Research Leadership and New Investigator Award recipients.
The New Investigator Award
New Investigator Awards go to outstanding UNMC scientists who in the past two years have secured their first funding from the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense or other national sources.
New Investigators also had to demonstrate scholarly activity such as publishing their research and/or presenting their findings at national conventions.
- Name: Caroline Ng, Ph.D.
- Title: Assistant professor, UNMC Department of Pathology and Microbiology
- Joined UNMC: Sept. 15, 2017
- Hometown: Petaling Jaya, Malaysia
Research focus:
Malaria and drug resistance.
The goal of my research is: To understand the role of ubiquitin in malaria parasite drug responses.
My research will make a difference because: Malaria poses a significant global health burden: it is the most prevalent vector-borne infectious disease, killing nearly half a million each year, 90 percent of whom are children younger than five. The past 20 years has seen significant decreases in malaria morbidity and mortality due to a combination of antimalarial drug administration and mosquito control. These gains are threatened by parasite resistance to artemisinin, currently the most potent antimalarial and the cornerstone of artemisinin-based combination therapies. Understanding the mechanisms of these drug responses and developing drugs that are uncompromised by existing drug resistance mechanisms is paramount to controlling and eradicating this disease.
The best advice I’ve ever been given is:
Do the best you can, and if at first you fail, try and try again.
Three things you may not know about me are:
- My other scientific interest is in neurobiology, specifically learning and memory.
- I enjoy classical music and visual arts as much as I enjoy science and would like to combine these interests into a cohesive project someday.
- I find spiders fascinating.