Supervisors: Dr. Hadley Bergstrom, Dr. Lori Newman-Work an average of 10 hours a week assisting the students and professor in lab procedures, statistical analyses, and lab write-ups-Dr. Bergstrom’s lab investigated if anxiety-like behavior is correlated with a generalized fear response in C57BL/6 mice; an open field test and elevated zero maze measured levels of anxiety; fear response was determined with a fear behavioral paradigm that consisted of auditory cued fear conditioning, generalization, and extinction protocols; dorsal hippocampal area and dentate gyrus c-fos activation were measured; results demonstrated fear generalization is associated with anxiety-like behavior in mice-Appointed this position by the Dean of Studies due to “high level of achievement at the college”

Supervisor: Dr. Lori Newman-Studied the association between astrocytic activity in the medial prefrontal cortex and spatial working memory in Long Evans rats-Injected an astrocyte-specific adeno-associated virus that fluoresces in the presence of calcium-Implanted a gradient refractive index lens probe so the calcium waves can be seen in vivo-Attached a baseplate to hold a miniature microscope (“miniscope”) that records calcium increases when the rat completes a spontaneous alternation task-Collected brain slices and performed immunohistochemistry to visualize viral expression

Supervisor: Dr. Lori Newman -Continued the “miniscope” project -Collaborated with Joseph McQuail’s lab from the University of South Carolina to study if the ketogenic diet maintains cognition and the functioning of hippocampal formation astrocytes in aged rats-Sectioned rat brains, performed immunohistochemistry, imaged the perirhinal cortex and striatum, and analyzed images for the ketogenic diet project-Attended weekly workshops for STEM career development and practiced presenting study findings

Supervisor: Dr. Claudia Carrara-Augustenborg -Devised and implemented an experiment using a modified Stroop task that involved trivia questions to measure unconscious inhibition when higher cognition is required-Surveyed relevant literature, created the experiment with E-prime, recruited participants, collected and analyzed data, and wrote a final manuscript of the findings-Attended weekly meetings to present project updates and assist other groups with lab difficulties-Results demonstrated participants have longer response times and lower accuracy on trivia questions when having to inhibit a primed color

Supervisor: Dr. Sarah Haigh-Investigated how different light frequencies affect reading abilities to determine if workspace lighting conditions negatively impact performance-Reviewed related literature, designed and created the experiment, recruited participants, collected data, created descriptive graphs, and wrote a scientific report

Supervisor: Dr. Sarah Haigh -Analyzed how sensory sensitivity changes during the cycle of a migraine to identify biomarkers that predict a migraine episode-Refined the questionnaire content, enrolled study participants, input and organized data in Excel, and created graphical representations of the study data for a grant proposal