Raymond Lam
Neural Prosthetics is a newly emerging field with many potential applications for patients who have lost one of their five senses. At the core of this technology, electrical microstimulation of neurons is used to artificially generate and restore lost senses. For my project, I will be targeting the visual cortex, and developing a rodent visual model for microstimulation in order to explore stimulation patterns that mimic natural neural activity. The goal of this project is to develop a more safe and effective way to elicit visual response and perception in […]
Alexander Parisky
This summer, I will find the precise location of a gene known as rmr4 in the Zea mays genome. This process is known as mapping, and will require me to spend time at the lab bench, in the greenhouse, and on the internet. I will use bioinformatics tools available online to design specialized markers in order to determine the recombination frequencies between known loci and my gene, enabling me to identify exactly where the gene resides. I will employ DNA extraction methods, PCR, and gel electrophoresis in order to gather […]
Paolo Solano Manzanillo
Baber Khan
Frontotemporal Dementia patients suffer behavioral disturbances which mimic primary psychiatric illnesses such as bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. Unfortunately, awareness of this neurodegenerative disease is limited in the psychiatric world and often demented patients are misdiagnosed. The Memory and Aging Center (MAC) at the University of California San Francisco conducts one of the largest investigations into the frontal variant dementias in the nation. I plan to systematically review 450 patients research charts at the MAC in order to precisely quantify the rate of psychiatric misdiagnosis for each of the dementia subtypes. […]
Hai Le
It is essential that the cell preserves the integrity of its DNA by initiating a proper response when there is damage to its genome. As a fellow of the Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships, I am utilizing this summer and the senior academic year to study the DNA repair pathway in heterochromatin. Using Drosophila melanogaster as a model system, I propose to fluorescently tag different DNA repair proteins and conduct experiments to understand the kinetics of these proteins following DNA damage induced by X-ray treatment. This research is promising: knowledge of […]
Albert Yu
In the human body, the liver is the only organ that can regenerate following substantial damage. But if all cells contain the same genetic information, how is this function unique to the liver? This summer I will study regeneration in the wing imaginal discs of developing Drosophila larvae. My goal is to develop a system that introduces localized cell death in these discs. Following cell death, I will visualize the amount and location of cell proliferation in the remaining cells. With this system, I can assess the ability of mutant […]
Elliot Miles Asher Cohen
Brandon Endo
There are forms of the gecko species, Heteronotia binoei, that reproduce sexually that gave rise to forms that reproduce asexually through the process of parthenogenesis. Parthenogens have sections of duplicated genes in their mitochondrial genome while sexual forms do not. My project is to sequence and compare the mitochondrial genes of the sexual and parthenogenic forms to characterize their evolution since their divergence. I will also compare duplicated gene copies to one another within the parthenogenic individuals to characterize evolution of each gene since the duplication event. Gene duplication and […]
Abhiram Gande
My research will focus on the effects of stress on neurogenesis (the birth of new neurons) in the dentate gyrus (DG) of the adult rat hippocampus. The hippocampus is essential for memory and learning function. Interestingly, chronic stress has been shown to decrease cell proliferation in the DG and reduce the effectiveness of hippocampuss memory function. My project will investigate one potential factor that may prevent stress-induced reduction of neurogenesis: controllability. Studies have shown that animals that can control the onset/offset of stress do not show many negative effects of […]
Isabela Le Bras
This summer I will be working in ion trap quantum computing. Quantum computing is an alternate form of computation that uses a quantum bit, called a “qubit”, in place of the binary system. My professor, Hartmut Haeffner, isolates ions in radio frequency traps to create qubits. This trapping must take place in an ultra high vacuum so that air molecules do not interfere with the ion. My project entails building RC filters for the ion trap that are compatible with the vacuum. These filters need to remove any radio frequency […]