Molecular Biologist & Artist
Kristin Baldwin is interested in using stem cell technology and genetic engineering to understand the brain and the causes of neurological disease.
Her work on cloning began while a postdoctoral fellow at Columbia University working in the laboratory of Nobel Laureate Dr. Richard Axel, where she cloned an entire mouse from a single neuron from its nose. The experiment pays homage to Woody Allen's film, Sleeper, a slapstick comedy in which scientists attempt to clone a dead dictator using only his nose.
In collaboration with artist Amy Chase Gulden, Dr. Baldwin genetically engineers living, growing paintings using E. coli bacteria as paint, offering a new way to study perception – in this case of art and beauty. The team’s work was recently exhibited at the Serrano Contemporary gallery in Chelsea in a show entitled Growing Impressions.
Dr. Baldwin was selected as a 2007 Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences and has been awarded grants from the Whitehall Foundation, The O’Keefe Foundation and the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine. She received her undergraduate degree in Economics from Duke University and a Ph.D. in Immunology from Stanford University. She is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Cell Biology at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California.