Page 19 - Berkeley BPW Club Centennial Commemorative Booklet - May 21st 2022_Neat

GUEST SPEAKERS 19

Dr. Joanne M. Jensen, DDS, MS

Dr. Joanne Jensen has been practicing endo-
dontics in Contra Costa County since 2005.
She is a California native, growing up in Santa Cruz, CA,
graduating from Santa Catalina High School for girls.She at-
tended the University of California, Berkeley for her un-
dergraduate education, majoring in Biochemistry. As an un-
dergraduate, Dr. Jensen worked part-time for Chiron Corpo-
ration helping to engineer a novel DNA sequence.

Dr. Jensen then switched to a more academic re-
search laboratory at UC Berkeley, under the direction of
Prof. Jack Kirsch, investigating rate-limiting steps of enzyme
mechanisms. Upon graduation, Dr. Joanne Jensen was hired
at Genencor International, an industrial enzyme research
company. She worked for several years on protein engineer-
ing of proteases used in laundry detergent.

Her work resulted in 18 patents, including, a method
for assaying a preferred enzyme and/or preferred detergent
composition. This patent was for a novel detection method of
enzymatic activity. Working on this project has only
strengthened Dr. Jensen’s skills of meticulous and inventive
thinking when working on endodontic cases.

In 1999, Dr. Jensen began her journey into the dental
profession by entering the class of 2002 at the University
of the Pacific School of Dentistry. After graduating as a
member of the Omicron Kappa Upsilon Honor Society (the
Phi Beta Kappa of Dentistry), Dr. Jensen completed a gen-
eral practice residency (GPR) at the Ohio State University.