Women in Science: Dzvinka Yarish, Junior Research Fellow of Bioinformatics

From 10-16 February 2025, the University of Tartu will host a themed week to celebrate the "Women in Science" day. During this week, we aim to highlight the work and achievements of our researchers and have invited them to answer three questions. This time, Dzvinka Yarish, Junior Research Fellow of Bioinformatics shares her thoughts.

Please describe briefly your field of research

My field of research is lucky to have a very short name: bioinformatics. To be more specific, I’m using machine learning to decipher the molecular mechanisms via which genome mutations affect complex traits, i.e., diseases.

What do you especially like about being a scientist?

First of all, I like asking questions to which nobody knows the answer, so I can be the first to find that answer. On top of that, the propensity to always dig deeper (or the annoying habit to ask too many ‘why’ questions) is truly appreciated and celebrated only in the science field. Anywhere else it’s often dismissed or considered a nuisance.

Besides, I love the fact that academia usually attracts a very specific type of people – dreamers and idealists who are definitely not here because of money (although, running a startup born out of scientific research is ‘the dream’ for many of my colleagues).

It’s also true that academia offers a lot of flexibility (so you have total control over which 15 hours in a day you will work 🙂).

Finally, on a more philosophical level, creating, validating and sharing new knowledge is a pretty decent answer to the ageless meaning-of-life question.

Why would you recommend that young people study IT and consider a career as a researcher?

Studying IT arms you with a universal set of tools which then can be applied in any field that sparks your interest. IT people often blame scientists for writing so called ‘bad research code’ which is impossible to scale and maintain. But if you have an IT background, then you can break this curse and write good clean code, which then can be used by other scientists or common users.

It’s true that science career is more slow paced than the industry one. However, it gives you a chance to learn strong fundamentals and then get a deep understanding of a particular subject instead of running ahead of yourself, trying to keep up with the latest technological trends and quirks.