I forget how lucky we are here to have the 
colleagues we do and the resources we do
until I talk to people of 
other places and they say things like,
"Wow! people are so friendly they're so collaborative."
My name is Yelena Wu and I'm an 
assistant professor in the Department of Dermatology
and an investigator at the Huntsman Cancer Institute.
The work that my team and I 
are doing is focused on skin cancer prevention,
especially in children and in families, 
many of whom are at higher risk for skin cancer,
including melanoma the deadliest form of skin cancer.
A lot of what we do is trying to help children and their families think about how they change their behaviors.
So we know that things like using sunscreen and using protective clothing is helpful for preventing skin cancer,
but it's one thing to tell people to do those things 
and a whole other thing to get them to actually do it.
So we try to help people understand, 
what is their risk for skin cancer,
and then how can we make it 
easier for them to implement these
preventive behaviors like sunscreen use?
I grew up playing the cello and so I spent probably
my entire Saturdays at a
conservatory and a prep program
taking lessons, playing chamber music, 
taking theory classes, participating in orchestra.
It was really challenging at times,
I hated having to practice every day 
and have my Saturdays basically be gone.
But I also loved meeting other kids 
who are not from my school, and as a result
I got to travel internationally with my 
orchestras and have some really cool experiences.
I started rock climbing in college.
I think I was a freshman in college,
and there was an outdoor club 
and they offered to take new people for free.
And so I just started doing it then and then 
I joined a climbing gym, and ever since then
many of my friends have been climbers,
I met my husband through climbing, and it's 
become a way to both travel and get exercise,
get social interaction and really help me 
de-stress too from other things going on in my life.
As I started to go to school more and things like that,
I realized that I really love both working with families
but also being able to be really intellectually stimulated,
and contribute to sort of the 
research side of the literature and how we can
improve things for children that way.
I think over time this is probably sort of my dream job.
Especially now that I also get to do some clinical 
work in my role here at Huntsman Cancer Institute.
It really is melding all of my big interests.
