American obstetrician-gynecologist and reproductive biologist
Carmen J. Williams is an American obstetrician-gynecologist and reproductive biologist. She has served as the deputy chief of the reproductive developmental biology laboratory at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences since 2017.
Life
Williams earned a B.S.E., magna cum laude, in electrical engineering from Duke University in 1981.[1] From 1981 to 1982, she was an engineer in the computer graphics design division at the IBM in Poughkeepsie, New York.[1] She completed an M.D. from the Duke University School of Medicine in 1986.[1] She conducted a residency in obstetrics and gynecology at the Pennsylvania Hospital from 1986 to 1990.[1] Williams completed a clinical fellowship in reproductive endocrinology and infertility at the University of Pennsylvania from 1990 to 1992.[1] She earned a Ph.D. in molecular and cell biology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1997.[1] From 1997 to 2000, she was a postdoctoral fellow in the department of biology under Richard M. Schultz at the University of Pennsylvania.[1]
From 2000 to 2007, Williams was an assistant professor the division of reproductive endocrinology and infertility in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Pennsylvania.[1] In 2007, she became a tenure-track clinical investigator in the reproductive medicine group in the reproductive developmental biology laboratory at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.[1] She was promoted to senior investigator in 2016 and deputy chief of the laboratory the following year.[1] The focus of Williams' research is on the basic reproductive biology of embryo development and how the environment impacts reproduction.[2] Among her most important research accomplishments is the discovery of mechanisms that control how well calcium signaling works in very early embryos just after fertilization.[2][3] In 2022, Williams was elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.[2][4]
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