Garilyn Jentarra, PhD

Midwestern University

Dr. Garilyn Jentarra is a Professor at Midwestern University in Glendale, Arizona. She is also the Director of Midwestern’s Precision Medicine Program which educates students in all of the healthcare professions on the use of genetic, genomic, and biomarker technologies in medical practice. Dr. Jentarra completed her PhD at Arizona State University where she worked on developing a safer vaccinia virus strain for smallpox vaccination. Subsequently, she completed a post-doctoral fellowship in a neurogenetics laboratory at the Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix. While there, she studied neurogenetic disorders including Rett syndrome, tuberous sclerosis complex, and neurofibromatosis type 1. Upon joining Midwestern University, she also branched into Alzheimer’s disease research, which has since become her primary field of research. Dr. Jentarra works closely with the Arizona Alzheimer’s Consortium to support a broader Alzheimer’s disease research program at Midwestern.