Karen Steel facts for kids
Karen Penelope Steel is a British scientist who studies why people and animals become deaf. She uses tiny mice to understand which genes cause deafness. Her work helps scientists learn how hearing works and what goes wrong when someone loses their hearing. She is a professor at King's College London.
She played a big part in finding Myo7a, the first gene linked to deafness in both mice and humans. More recently, she led the discovery of Mir-96 microRNA, which is connected to hearing loss that gets worse over time in mice and people.
Together with Professor Christine Petit, Karen Steel won the Royal Society Brain Prize in 2012. They received this award for their important work on the genetics of hearing and deafness.
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Early Life and Inspiration
When Karen Steel was young, she first wanted to study English. But in sixth grade, something amazing happened. She heard a famous scientist named Dorothy Hodgkin speak about insulin at Bristol University. This was the first time she saw a woman working in science. This experience made her very interested in biology and genetics, which is the study of how traits are passed down.
Education and Early Career
Karen Steel went to Leeds University for her first degree. After that, she earned her PhD from University College London. Her PhD research focused on the inner ear of deaf mice. She then helped start a research program about mouse genetics and deafness in Nottingham. This program was at the new MRC Institute of Hearing Research. After doing more research in Munich, she returned to Nottingham to lead mouse genetics studies.
Understanding Deafness: Karen Steel's Research
Karen Steel's research mainly focuses on the genes behind deafness. She uses mice to find these genes and to understand how they affect hearing at a tiny level. This includes looking at the cells and how the body works.
Finding Genes for Hearing Loss
She developed a special way to check mutant mice that have problems with hearing or balance. This method helped her find and understand the specific genes involved in these issues. These problems are often caused by changes in the tiny hair cells inside the ear or other parts of the auditory system.
Studying Mouse Genes
Karen Steel's team also studies genes that haven't been looked at much before. They remove these genes in mice to see if they are important for hearing. Her research group has described the effects of over 80 different mouse mutants.
Research on Progressive Hearing Loss
Currently, her research looks at hearing loss that gets worse over time. She uses mouse models to map out how hearing loss progresses in humans. She also searches for specific mutated genes that are known to cause hearing loss. This helps her find genes that could be targets for future treatments. As of 2014, her team found genes involved in progressive hearing loss and is identifying the pathways these genes are part of.
Awards and Special Recognition
Karen Steel has received many awards for her important work:
- In 1998, she won the Kresge-Mirmelstein prize for excellent hearing research in New Orleans.
- In 2004, she was chosen as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in London.
- She was elected to the Council of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology (2004–2008).
- She was elected President of the International Mammalian Genome Society (2007–2012).
- In 2008, she gave the Edith Whetnall lecture at the Royal Society of Medicine in London.
- In 2009, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in London.
- In 2012, she received the Grete Lundbeck European Brain Research Prize.
- In February 2013, she received the Award of Merit from the Association for Research in Otolaryngology in Baltimore.
An asteroid called 24734 Kareness was named after Karen Steel. Her brother, who discovered the asteroid, named it in her honor.
See also
In Spanish: Karen Steel para niños
