Jill Rau
B.S., Psychology
Duke University
Durham, NC
M.A., Psychology
University of Caterbury
Christchurch, New Zealand
I grew up in the Shenandoah Valley of VA (backwater Virginia). I migrated to NC for college and graduated in 1994 from Duke University with a B.S. in Psychology.  I received a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship (a great scholarship, I recommend investigating it for anyone considering doing graduate work overseas) to study at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. I stayed there for 5 years and in that time, I got my M.A. in the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (operant behavior, rats, pigeons, math, and computer simulations), taught in the Department of Psychology, worked as a Research Officer in 2 specialty Psychiatric clinics (public health care), and became a New Zealand citizen.

In the fall of 1999 I returned to NC and began working as a lab technician in the lab of Dr. Frank Church.  I started medical school here at UNC two years later with the intention of completing an MD-PhD in conjunction with the Department of Pathology.  I have now finished two years of medical school and four years of graduate school and have high hopes of defending my dissertation early in 2008.

My dissertation project in the Church Lab involves examining the role of heparin cofactor II (HCII) in atherosclerosis and combining structural motifs of multiple serpins, namely HCII, antithrombin and a-1 anti-trypsin to develop a preventative therapeutic for cardiovascular disease and stroke. 
In my spare time I like to travel, work on my house, play volleyball, and play on the computer.
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