Kelly Cochran ’16: Extraordinary Researcher

Throughout his teaching career at Missouri Western, Dr. Todd Eckdahl, professor of biology and department chair, conducted research with too many students to count, and has helped many of them publish the results of their research. But Dr. Eckdahl says a recent alumna’s accomplishments stand out.

Kelly Cochran ’16, a native of Buckner, Missouri, spent two summers conducting research at a biomedical research institution in Maine and co-authored an article that was published in Science.

“Kelly achieved an undergraduate research publication record that is not only among the best in the history of Missouri Western, but among undergraduates throughout the country,” Dr. Eckdahl said.

He calls Science “the most prestigious science research journal in the country.”

Cochran, who graduated in spring 2016 with a B.S. in Biology with a health science concentration, says her accomplishments all started with her synthetic biology research as an undergraduate with Dr. Eckdahl in 2014.

“I started out very timid in the lab, checking all of my work with Dr. Eckdahl and asking his permission before every move I made. By the end of the summer, I was walking in and telling him what my plans for the day were and briefing him later,” she said. “I grew so much as a researcher and found an independence and creativity that I had never encountered before. I felt so much joy in the lab and in the process that I craved another experience the next summer.”

That experience came about when Cochran was accepted into the Jackson Laboratory’s Summer Student Program in Bar Harbor, Maine, where she worked with Dr. Pete Williams on eye research. The program was her top choice and the most competitive program among her applications.

Although she no longer qualified for the laboratory’s research program the following summer, Dr. Williams and his wife invited her to stay with them and continue the research. The article in Science, “Vitamin B₃ modulates mitochondrial vulnerability and prevents glaucoma in aged mice,” described their findings.

“Those were some of the best summers of my life, and I made lifelong friends of my boss and his wife,” Cochran says.

Before her initial summer of research, Cochran said the John Lab at Jackson Laboratory had used RNA sequencing to find the pathways that were injured in a mouse model of glaucoma. Their findings, she said, pointed to mitochondrial dysfunction as a major cause of retinal cell and optic nerve death, hallmarks of glaucoma.

When the John Lab analyzed the RNA sequencing data, researchers found a drug known to intercept the pathways harmed by glaucoma, a vitamin B3-derivative, nicotinamide. After a series of preliminary experiments, they decided there was enough evidence to put their mice affected by glaucoma on nicotinamide. The drug worked; it protected retinal cells and the optic nerve from glaucoma and restored retinal cell mitochondrial health.

“One of the most exciting findings is that mice given the drug after they started showing signs of glaucoma ended up being just as protected as mice who were given early treatments before showing damage,” Cochran said. “This means that if clinically translatable to humans, nicotinamide should protect glaucoma patients after they’ve just found out their diagnosis. We won’t know this until the drug is tested in humans, but it worked for mice.”

Cochran said she conducted many of the experiments and took many of the pictures for the figures in the article.

Because of her Science publication, she was overwhelmed with research offers this past summer.

“My research experience at Missouri Western changed the way I approach my education,” Cochran said. “I’ve learned to be critical and question everything. I’m not satisfied with rote memorization, but in figuring out why something works and how we can make it better.”

She is currently pursuing a Doctorate of Optometry at the University of Missouri-St. Louis College of Optometry and is assisting Dr. Edward Jarka in dry eye research.

“I pour myself into my studies so that I can eventually become the best doctor and vision researcher I can be.”

“I’d love to find myself encouraging my future glaucoma patients to try vitamin B3 (nicotinamide) as a treatment option, knowing I was an integral part of finding the evidence for that discovery.”