Her lab is located in Charleston on the MUSC campus where she is part of the joint Clemson-MUSC bioengineering program. She earned her Ph.D. in Genetics and Development from Columbia University in 2000 and started her faculty position at Clemson in August of 2013. Her background is in early embryonic development and cardiac regeneration. Her work is currently focused on using a tissue engineering approach to cardiac regeneration. Her group is using small molecules to direct cardiac differentiation of cardiac pacemaker cells from embryonic stem cells. Her teaching interests include regenerative medicine, tissue engineering and developmental biology.