Sarah E. Fitzpatrick

Sarah was born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio and attended Ohio State University (OSU) as an Eminence Fellow with a major in Neuroscience. Sarah has been interested in brain development and neurodevelopmental disorders since high school when she worked with children with autism at Camp Stepping Stones every summer. She then spent 5 years working on clinical trials and conducting translational and basic research on autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and fragile X syndrome (FXS) at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, OSU, and the UC Davis MIND Institute.

After graduation, she worked at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital for two years in Dr. Craig Erickson’s lab studying FXS before leaving the Midwest for Yale’s MD-PhD program in 2018. After two years of medical school, she is now an 8th year in the program and a PhD candidate in Dr. Ellen Hoffman’s lab, where she studies the roles of ASD-associated chromatin modifier genes in early brain development using zebrafish. She was awarded an NRSA F30 training grant for her work from the NIMH. She was also the student director of the Wednesday Evening Clinic where she has served as a primary care provider for 3.5 years to stay connected to clinical medicine while in graduate school. Additionally, she is co-chair of the MD-PhD student council, a PASS mentor, and was a Davenport graduate affiliate.

When not in the lab, she is the director of the Yale Salsa Society and teaches salsa and bachata classes every week. Her hobbies include salsa dancing, biking for commute and fun, seeing theater productions, and spending quality time with her husband and dog, friends, and family.

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