Recognition for undergraduate researchers

Four medical technology students have been awarded research scholarships to assist with projects at the University and abroad.

Alia Sommerville, CHNS '05, received a Fogarty International Center and National Institutes of Health Minority International Research Training summer internship in Lancaster, England. The internship offers international research training opportunities to qualified minority undergraduate, graduate and medical students who are underrepresented in biomedical and behavioral research careers.

Three other medical technology students--Claire Zelinskas and Apoorva Srivastava, both CHNS'05, and Dara Missan, CHNS'06--have been named Howard Hughes Medical Institute Undergraduate Research Scholars. The scholarships fund apprenticeships with faculty mentors that allow undergraduates a chance to see and take part in the latest in scientific research at the University.

The three students are assisting either Mary Ann McLane or Mary Beth Miele, associate professors of medical technology, with cancer research. Miele uses cell and molecular biology techniques to seek to identify the genes or gene products that determine how cancer metastasizes or spreads. McLane is working with eristostatin, a type of protein found in snake venom, and exploring what type of mechanism enables the substance to inhibit cancer metastasis.

"I knew when I entered college as a freshman that I wanted to do research, so I started looking around for a faculty member who worked with undergraduate assistants," Zelinskas, who hopes to go on to medical school and a career as a pediatric neurosurgeon, says. "I thought that doing research would be interesting and also excellent experience for the future."