URSP Student Nisha Kapani Researches if Normal and Traumatic Brain Injured Research Subjects Use Virtual Tools in Similar Ways

Seeing that I am a neuroscience major and premedical student, the comparison between traumatic brain injured (TBI) patients and normal subjects provides an interesting comparison. Haptics technology is increasingly applied to help understand problems of movement and possible treatments.  Thanks to the Office of Student Scholarship, Creative Activities, and Research, I have been funded to study “Do normal and traumatic brain injured research subjects use virtual tools in a similar fashion?” in the upcoming spring 2015 semester.

I was first introduced to haptic devices in my Introduction to Clinical Research class in spring 2014. Another student was analyzing the motor and cognitive differences between research subjects with and without TBI in a virtual environment using haptic technology. During the summer of 2014, I volunteered in the lab and began analyzing the differences between the two groups (normal and TBI subjects).

A haptic device is one that senses body’s movements and involves physical contact between the computer and the user, usually through an input/output device, such as a joystick or data gloves.  Haptic technology makes it possible to investigate components of movement and determine relative contributions of touch and position sense (proprioception) to better understand how people learn and improve their motor activity. Human movement is, in part a result of what happens in the pre-motor cortex and the motor cortex, how these signals are transmitted into the periphery, and how the person experiences the final interaction.

When I am in the lab, I time the specific movements and calculate both efficiency and accuracy from the data of each subject.  Then, I analyze the differences between the two subject groups and seek a comparison to see if one group performs the tasks more accurately and efficiently. This week in the lab I finally obtained the distance data I need to compare to the timed movements.  This project ultimately seeks to determine if there are fine motor performance and sensory (proprioceptive) differences between people with TBI and those without TBI. This will be measured using haptic devices in virtual environments. Haptic devices can capture position and force data while subjects are performing functional tasks. The main goal of my research is to figure out how to measure proprioception, which is a complex sensation. Proprioception provides us with position sense and knowledge of where we are in space. People with TBI often have difficulty with motor function and coordination.  Loss of proprioception may contribute to this problem. My lab has a haptic device that measures the interaction between movement and objects in virtual space: the Phantom OMNI. This device has a stylus, held by the subject and provides force feedback when in the virtual environment, just like most video game controllers. Movement of the stylus can be recorded in real time so that its positon, and the position of the hand and virtual object, can be tracked in real time.

I expect to be able to differentiate the motor differences between the two patient groups and find what, if any, aspect of this experiment shows a proprioceptive deficit. This study will also help answer the question of how sensitive the haptic is for identifying differences between the two groups. In addition, I hope to learn more about how haptics can contribute to patients with motor deficiencies such as Parkinson’s, make a contribution to the field of haptics, and further our understanding of brain function. 

URSP Student My-Linh Huynh Researches Nonsmokers Perceptions on E-Cigarettes

My name is Linh Huynh and I am a student researcher in the Communication field. My interests vary between multitudes of topics, but regarding academia I am passionate about health and communication. People oftentimes do not realize how they arrive at their perceptions or attitudes about a particular subject. I wish to explore more in depth about how nonsmokers develop their attitudes about electronic cigarettes (e-cigs/vapes). I am always interested in how people think and how they communicate, or convey their thoughts and feelings to others. Originally my interest in my topic stemmed from my own personal life, as I used to be a smoker. Furthermore, electronic cigarettes are a rising trend, especially among young adults and teenagers. However, the lack of knowledge surrounding e-cigs is concerning.

My research project relates to my long-term career goals since I wish to pursue a career in health communications. Many people lack knowledge in a variety of topics that concern their own health, and I want to change that. My investigation has given me the opportunity to thrive in research and facilitate my learning at a graduate level, in order to become more prepared for a higher education.

On a weekly basis I enjoy immersing myself in reading and staying up-to-date on current events and news, particularly news that pertains to health and/or communication. More so, I enjoy perusing the Internet for health-related blogs and learning new information. Additionally, as a communication major and an extrovert I love to interact with as many people as I can.

Learning about interpersonal and intrapersonal communication is something that I have always been interested in. While surveying students for my research this week, I learned that while many people would prefer using e-cigs over cigarettes, they are not actually informed about e-cigs. This only enforced my original belief that an increase in knowledge nationwide with regard to health is crucial to our growth as a nation.

URSP Student Robert Graham Investigation of pattern recognition in cortical cultures

My research topic addresses the so-called decoy selection problem in protein structure prediction. We have algorithms spewing out hundreds of thousands of three-dimensional structures computed for a given protein sequence in a few days on one CPU. These structures are known as decoys. The challenge is how to determine which of them is the native structure. This is a crucial part of the de novo structure prediction problem, where for a given protein sequence, we want to know what its native structure is as the first step to understanding anything about the function of that protein. I became interested in the topic because the protein structure problem has a lot of useful applications. Once we know the relationship between the protein structure and their function, we are able produce our own protein to used in the field of medical science. My long-term goal is to do more research about bioinformatics, and probably apply for the graduate program in this field. I think this research experience is a very good practice chance for me to get familiar with it and also the way of doing research. I think it wil also be useful for me when I want to apply for graduate school. What I do on a weekly basis is achieve the alogrithm I have with computer code. Run the code to get the distance and do the cluster for it using WEKA, we want to see which algorithm give a best and quick approach to solve this problem. So after I got the data I perform analysis on it to compare them with each other. One thing I have discovered this week, is I found the Reducing the dimensionality of the protein-folding search algorithm provided George D. Chellapa and George D. Rose give us significantly reduce the running time than do the cluster for each phi and psi angle.

URSP Student Jane Garfinkel Researches Jewish Masculinity

While in my Sociology Research Methods class I was assigned the task of creating a research proposal on any topic of my choosing. I’ve always been interested in gender, and growing up Jewish I’ve observed how religion affects gender identity. I was particularly fascinated in how Jewish men perform masculinity, so I thought pursuing further research in a classroom setting would make sense. When I realized I would like to complete my own research, it made sense to continue with the proposal that I had just spent an entire semester working on. As well, this project is directly related to my long-term goals. I hope to continue with gender research, on masculinity as well as the broader effects of structural inequality. I am considering graduate work and perhaps a PHD in sociology, where I would continue to focus on gender.

My week to week work varied greatly depending on what step in the research I was. At the beginning I spent the majority of my time recruiting participants for my focus groups. This was much more challenging than expecting. I put up posters all around campus but this yielded no results. I had to talk to people individually and face-to-face to gain their participation. As volunteers signed up, I started holding focus groups. Having never led a focus group before I was nervous, but they ended up being a lot of fun. I really enjoyed hearing from participants and I was pleasantly surprised how open they were with me. Once the data was collected, a very large chunk of time was devoted to transcribing the audio recordings into a written script. This was tedious, but actually a great chance to think critically about the data. At this point, I am analyzing the script for patterns which will end up being the results of my research. One pattern that has stuck out to me this week is that for many participants other identities play a bigger role than Judaism, highlighting the importance of intersectionalism. This is probably the most fun aspect of my project as I’m seeing the outcomes of all this work.

URSP Student Samantha Brown Researches International Students, Their Living Situations, and Their Levels of Perceived Social Support and Stress

My research project has to do with the concepts of social support and mental stress among international students at George Mason University. Specifically, I am interested in the association (if any) between international students’ living situation and their levels of perceived social support and perceived stress. Students who befriend nationals of the country in which they are studying often adjust easier and undergo less acculturative stress. Because of this, my hypothesis is that international students at GMU who live with at least one American will experience more social support and less stress.

My involvement in the global community at Mason sparked my interest in this project. As I have participated in many international organizations and lived with exchange students, I have repeatedly watched my new shy, nervous friends become confident, outgoing people in a matter of months. I am interested in researching this process of change and why its seems so much easier for some than it does for others. This research project also relates to my long term goals as a Community Heath major and potential future health researcher. I am fascinated by research in this field as it constantly redefines our ideas of what is “good for us”.

 

So far, my week to week work with this project has been more logistical than I had originally imagined. Because I am surveying human subjects for my research, a large portion of my time has been dedicated to receiving approval from the Institutional Review Board- an organization whose existence I was not even aware of a few months ago. This includes a lengthy application and (in my case…) many revisions. But good news- my project was finally approved last week! This means I can begin to administer my survey and collect results in the months to come. This week I have learned just how to do that using the SurveyMonkey database. Though this was something I had originally planned on doing months ago, I am happy to be learning more about the unique process of research and am excited to hopefully begin seeing some results!