Azra Jaferi, Ph.D.

Science Writer and Editor, Freelance

Azra Jaferi is a freelance science writer and editor. Prior to becoming a freelancer, she held in-house editorial roles at various science and technology companies, including IBM Watson Health, the New York Academy of Sciences and Medscape. Jaferi’s work as a writer and editor has been multidisciplinary, spanning topics in the basic, translational and clinical sciences. She has a B.A. in psychology from Barnard College of Columbia University and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from the University of Michigan, where her research focused on neural circuits underlying habituation to repeated stress. She did postdoctoral research in cellular neuroscience at the Brain and Mind Research Institute at Weill Cornell Medicine.

Latest Content Authored

A novel eye-tracking paradigm identifies an influence of perceptual load on social attention in autism

A study by Caroline Robertson and her colleagues found that reduced social attention was not a static omnipresent characteristic of autism; rather, it was magnified only under certain real-world conditions where sensory processing demands were high.

A new approach to analyzing genomic association data finds convergence of both rare and common genetic influences on autism at chromosome 16p

Elise Robinson and colleagues identified a large genomic region — chromosome 16p — where a rare 16p11.2 variant associated with autism functionally converges with common polygenic variation across 16p. Both rare and common genetic variation at 16p decreased expression of neuronally expressed genes, with relevance for increasing autism risk.

Two studies clarifying the role of FMRP in mRNA translation in fragile X syndrome

Studies by two different research teams — one led by Ethan Greenblatt and the other by Emily Osterweil — both suggest that FXS cells under-synthesize large proteins, findings that suggest a new point of view on a fundamental problem.