How do neuroinflammatory biomarkers
related to stress in the brain increase vulnerability to traumatic brain injury
(TBI)? Furthermore, how does this all occur in the context of a war zone?!
Sounds complicated, doesn’t it? I thought so too when I first started my
project in Dr. Lipsky’s lab at the Krasnow Institute. However, as I learned about the nuances of my
project, I became fascinated with the opportunity to apply my classroom
knowledge in Neuroscience to real-world situations.
I first became
interested in this project because I wanted to understand how big of an impact
stress could have on the human body. For example, the emotional stress in PTSD,
a mental disorder, could manifest as physical damage in the form of TBI.
My interest
escalated when I realized that my work could actually help the veteran
population. Having heard accounts from the military doctors
in my family further opened my eyes to the struggles that veterans with TBI and
PTSD face because of their illness. Their life of fear and uncertainty after
having sacrificed so much to defend our country compels me to help the
situation, and this research offers me a chance to contribute in a small way to
a bigger problem. This, coupled
with my ambition to become a pediatric neurologist, was enough to motivate me
to pursue research in one of the most exciting topics in Neuroscience.
My role in this
project is to identify inflammatory proteins in rat brains. Inflammation is
characteristic of brain injury and is usually a common physical reaction to
stress. Every week, I perform ELISA tests on 3 different brain regions; frontal
cortex, cerebellum and hippocampus. ELISA consists of a 96-well plate coated
with antibodies that can capture these specific proteins, or antigens. The
wells change color to confirm their presence.
This past week,
we discovered interesting changes in the frontal cortex, particularly in IFNy
and TNFα proteins as shown by the increasing trend
in the column data below. This suggests the presence of an inter-connected inflammatory
pathway between stress and TBI in this region.
While I’ve finished the ELISA tests for now,
the next steps involve analyzing the data and writing the manuscript to be sent
for publication. But of course, my journey doesn’t end there. I plan to
continue researching throughout undergrad, med school and beyond! Research has
transformed my critical thinking, observation and communication skills and
changed the way I view scientific information. It’s amazing how discoveries
made in the lab can help prevent illnesses miles away, and I want to continue
contributing to society through my work. This project and OSCAR have inspired
me to do just that.
