SRI Blogs

I remember the first time I saw the human brain. It was nothing like anything I’ve ever seen before. The grooves and intricacies were fascinating. How could this small object do so much? It can control how our body moves, how we communicate, and even how we breathe. I didn’t think I would ever get to do a study on the brain in depth, especially when in high school, but I was wrong. 

When I was accepted into The Schiff Family Science Research Institute (SRI) at The Summit my sophomore year, I could not have predicted that I would get the chance to do research on the brain, specifically the brain of fetuses. Not many people my age can say that they work with a mentor to research fetal brains. My mentor, Dr. Charu Venkatesan, is a neurologist at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital whospecializes in fetal neurology; the research project I assisted with investigated fetal cerebellar hemorrhages. 

Originally, I did not know a lot about cerebellar hemorrhages in adults much less fetal cerebellar hemorrhages. I did not understand how a fetus could even attain a bleed in their brain. This was because I always associated brain bleeds resulting from a force to the head. I soon learned that most people suffer from hemorrhages in their brain due to strokes. There are two different types of stroke: ischemic and hemorrhagic. Ischemic strokes are caused by a blockage of an artery which results in a loss of necessary oxygen to the brain, while hemorrhagic strokes are caused by a ruptured artery that may or may not be due to impact to the head.

Within the realm of strokes and hemorrhages in the fetal cerebellum, there is very little published literature on the topic. The technology to observe and diagnose a fetus while in utero is relatively new so gaps exist in the knowledge on fetal brain hemorrhages. Advancements in the field of fetal imaging will rapidly improve treatment options and health outcomes as well as patient counseling. Our goal is to gather observations on the outcomes of patients diagnosed with a fetal cerebellar hemorrhage to improve counseling for families in the future. 

The study began with evaluating which patients could be included in the study. First, a broad search through Cincinnati Children’s Hospital charts was performed by my mentor to find any patient that was diagnosed with a hemorrhage in their cerebellum as a fetus. From there, my mentor and I evaluated deidentified data, starting with the fetus’s echocardiogram and MRI of the body and brain. Because our study is based on finding outcomes of cerebellar hemorrhages, we excluded any patient with severe body and/or heart malformations that could confound patient outcomes. Then, we looked at patient status and evaluations of those who were able to go back to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital after they were born. After analyzing clinical outcomes of these patients, we found that none of the patients had any severe health problems due to the hemorrhage in the cerebellum as a fetus. The major limitation to the study is the number of patients that we could include, it is a beginning to filling the gap in the knowledge.

This research project has been a transformative one for many reasons. First, it opened my eyes to how much effort and time goes into a research study. There are many variables that you have to evaluate, and you have to be very adaptable. It has also taught me the importance of doing research in fields that have not been thoroughly studied in the past. When one group initiates research in a field, it opens the door to many more ideas, many more projects and hopefully allows for doors to open in terms of greater understanding about a topic. From this project, I have also realized how lucky and fortunate I am for my health. Many of the patient charts I observed showed many challenges the patient was facing which can cause a lot of pain to families. Improving patient outcomes and minimizing family stress will positively impact society. Hopefully, the research I had the privilege of doing helps bring families comfort and hope for their baby’s future. I am very grateful for this experience and can’t wait to present my findings at the annual Schiff Family Science Research Institute Colloquium in January. 

Megan Marburger is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

 

 

“What is working in a lab like?”

This is the main question I had when going to work on the first day of my Schiff Family Research Institute internship at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. I was given the opportunity to experience life in the lab through the Waggoner Lab, which is in the Human Genetics Department and specifically explores immunology. I was mentored by Dr. Waggoner, the PI of the lab, as well as MD/ PhD student Nora Lakes '15, a Summit alum, in the fourth year of their degree program at the University of Cincinnati. They, along with the rest of the lab members, gave me a great experience. I felt very welcome coming into the group and, by the time I finished at the end of the summer, felt like I was really able to capture the lab environment experience.

The Waggoner immunology lab studies a type of immune cell called a NK (natural killer) cell, however, each project focused on different aspects of NK cells. An NK cell is an innate type of lymphoid cell, meaning that it is part of your natural immune system and is a specific type of white blood cell whose main purpose is to kill infected and diseased cells. My research focused on exploring the relationship between these NK cells and a type of antibody called Immunoglobulin A (IgA). My job in this project required performing a lab technique called ELISAs. The ELISA would allow us to measure the amount of IgA in the mouse samples collected from a unique set of experiments. The ELISA results will be added on a timeline to help understand bigger picture of this ongoing project to help support their hypothesis about the relationship between NK cells and IgA.

While my part in this project was seemingly small in the grand scheme of things, I gained so much valuable experience from my time working in this lab. I met great people that I will be able to keep in touch with for years to come as friends, colleagues or mentors. I became great friends with Kate, Saketh and Keeland, who all live in different states and were a senior, sophomore and junior, respectively, in college. Working with them allowed me to have help when I needed it but also allowed me to experience the fun, social aspects of working in a lab group which included attending seminars and the annual SURF poster session. I also experienced what working in a lab is like, with my own cubicle space and learning to collect and analyze data. Much time was spent reading research articles, and I learned how to compile relevant parts of those articles into usable information for my own project information for my own project that will help to propel my research forward. 

Furthermore, I experienced the reality of working in a lab. Before my summer internship, I expected to be constantly doing lab work and analyzing data because I thought there would always be something experimental to do. However, I learned that this is not always true because after I performed two protein assays and two ELISAs, I was unable to run any more tests on the samples relevant to my project. This happened because the rest of the samples had to be digested, meaning the protein and DNA had to be separated out of them, which is a long process that couldn’t be completed in the two-and-a-half months that I was working there. This taught me that lab work takes time, and there will busier periods of time than others. During the downtime, I read more articles, shadowed physicians in other parts of the hospital such as the PICU and Oncology Department, and I worked on putting together all my notes into a comprehensible project to understand my work. 

Overall, through my summer research experience, I learned many lessons. I learned about the social aspect of the lab, what working through slow periods is like, what working with new lab equipment is like, and all about the overall lab experience. I couldn’t be more thankful to the Waggoner Lab for the opportunity. 

Lilly Sievering is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

 

 

Across the street from UC Medical Center on MLK Boulevard is the Stetson Building. This unassuming building houses the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience.

This past summer, the Stetson Building was a weekly destination as I assisted Dr. Jeffrey Strawn with one of his research projects. Dr. Strawn is a psychiatrist who specializes in pediatric anxiety and most of his studies concern children and young adults with anxiety. In medicine, patients are often evaluated for a variety of subjective measurements, such as pain assessment or treatment side effects, using rating scales or checklists. In Dr. Strawn’s study, pediatric anxiety patients completed a scale evaluating antidepressant medication side effects at three different points during treatment. We wanted to validate a new scale – that means making sure it’s consistent with other rating scales and with the expected and tested effect of the medication.  

In psychiatry, there’s a lack of optimal and specific rating scales for patients. Existing scales are either very generalized, or lengthy and tedious to complete. This study was important to test the validity of a new, improved scale. The scale should be consistent and reliable, measuring what it’s supposed to be measuring – antidepressant side effects.  

I really enjoyed my experience with Dr. Strawn. The workplace was professional, and everyone within the department was extremely helpful and understanding. I took away a lot of skills from the experience. The biggest component of my project was the use of R and R Studio. R is a coding language often used in scientific and medical research to analyze and graph data. For the study, we were using it to process the rating scale responses into various graphs. At first, I was completely lost when using R. With Dr. Strawn’s guidance, and several books and videos he provided, I challenged myself and learned how to code in R and create graphs in R Studio.  

Despite the challenges, my work with Dr. Strawn was incredibly rewarding. The CDC reports that in the United States between 2016 and 2019, approximately 9.4 percent of children between the ages of 3 and 17 were found to be diagnosed with anxiety. That’s almost 1 in 10 children! To optimize treatment outcomes, it is critical that rating scales are designed well for children to measure accurately the side effects they are experiencing. I appreciated the opportunity to contribute to potentially improving childhood anxiety treatment through working on this project. And I had fun along the way. 

Sophia Nery is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

Have you ever had a common cold, the flu or Covid? If so, you know the annoyance of waiting for it to go away and trying to reduce the symptoms with various, mediocre, home remedies, as antibiotics are ineffective for treating viruses.

Similarly, even some of the harshest human diseases, including epilepsy, can fail to benefit from treatment. Around 50 million people worldwide suffer from epilepsy. Among that, approximately one-third are resistant to treatment. Living with constant seizures with no effective treatment can be debilitating in every area of life. Unfortunately, there is little research and few alternatives to fix this problem, making it crucial to find new ways to reduce seizure susceptibility in epilepsy. 

This summer I was able to contribute to the work investigating drug refractory epilepsy and possible life-changing treatment options while working in the Gross lab at the  Cincinnati Children’s Hospital’s Neuroscience Department. I am thankful for the opportunity to work with Dr. Nina Gross, as well as the graduate and undergraduate students in her group. Our research aims are to understand the inner workings of epilepsy, expand knowledge on why sex differences in epilepsy exist, and hopefully help the lives of millions of people worldwide.  

Epilepsy is a chronic brain disorder that causes repeated, unprovoked seizures when neurons send abnormal signals, and it affects how the brain works. Stopping the development of epilepsy requires controlling certain pathways in the brain, and in my research’s case, the RISC, or RNA-induced silencing complex, pathway. MicroRNAs are small, non-coding RNA molecules bound to the RISC and can regulate protein translation of many genes by “silencing” the transcribed mRNA. Researchers believe that by understanding how microRNAs and RISC are involved in making the brain epileptic, they can find a way to inhibit this process. AGO2 (Argonaute 2) is a core protein of the RISC that binds to the microRNA molecules and uses it as a guide to find complementary sequences on target mRNAs. GW-182 is another important protein in the RISC that interacts with AGO2 and is involved in repressing the translation of the target mRNA. In summary, RISC, with the help of AGO2 and GW-182, can effectively silence specific genes by preventing their translation into proteins. This is crucial for controlling gene expression and defending against unwanted RNA, such as those that may trigger epilepsy. The research could pave the way for new treatments that target microRNAs and RISC to prevent or reduce the severity of epilepsy. 

However, the Gross lab found in previous research that although microRNA-induced silencing reduces seizure susceptibility in males, it does not do so in females. It was found that silencing of specific genes is correlated with female ovarian hormones. I contributed to helping understand this process better by researching how the RISC is altered by ovarian hormones and the estrous cycle in their mouse model.  

Most days of research started out with suiting up in scrubs, shoe covers, hairnets, facemasks, gloves and aprons to prepare for entering the mouse-house. Then, we would step foot into a “human vacuum” to suck any contaminants off us. Working with live mice was extremely interesting, and I do not think I will ever forget the smell of the mouse-house. I helped in collecting cell cytology samples from wild-type mice. I was taught how to use light microscopes to identify types of cells present, and eventually determine the murine estrous stages. This is crucial for verifying that the mice are currently cycling and mature. After, brain tissue and specific neurons were collected; I lysed the brain tissue and did a Bradford Assay to determine total protein concentration. I then performed a Western Blot to detect and quantify proteins such as GW-182 and understand how they play a role in the RISC. Protein quantities of GW-182 in males versus females are compared to see how they changed with estrous cycle stage and blood levels of estradiol and progesterone.  

My experience working in a research lab this summer was like nothing I had ever done before. I was extremely nervous for my first day in the lab, however everyone was welcoming and open to answering any questions. Going in with little knowledge of different lab equipment was intimidating at first, but the lab's environment made it quick to learn. I learned techniques such as gel electrophoresis that will benefit me later in life, and in potential future research opportunities. Although I have many ideas for future careers, this experience has helped me find interest in topics that I otherwise would not have known about. I am considering majoring in neuroscience and am hopeful to expand my knowledge on the functions and developments of the nervous system and brain.  

I am amazed by the hard work and passion the scientists in the Gross lab put into their work. It requires much persistence, as you may not get your desired results after complex experiments. The Gross lab has been researching drug-refractory epilepsy for multiple years, expanding their knowledge on every aspect possible, and going through countless trials and errors. Now, I understand the excitement of getting results, and I found in the lab many hours would go by without realizing it, and my focus would be interrupted by the rumbling hunger in my stomach. I am beyond happy to have contributed to this research and assisted the lab this summer. 

Daisy Doran is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

If you have ever looked up into the night sky and wondered, “How can I get involved in studying the stars?” Then this project may be the answer for you.

I considered most astrophysics as being too advanced to get involved in, but that was not the case with Citizen ASAS-SN, a citizen science astrophysics project. While doing my Schiff Family Science Research Institute research this summer, I learned astrophysics projects were available on most websites which are considered citizen science search engines. Getting involved as a citizen in science is very easy, and we did it through Zooniverse, a website with various other citizen science-based projects in multiple subjects.

In my case, I dealt with classifying variable stars for a research team centered at Ohio State University. The brightness of most stars remains constant. However, variable stars are stars that undergo fluctuations in brightness, occurring either irregularly or regularly. Dr. Jessica Replogle, the head of the Schiff Family Research Institute, provided support and guidance as I classified the variable stars into their respective groups and gathered information on the different types of variable stars we perceive in our universe. 

The variable stars are classified as pulsating, eclipsing, and rotational types. Light curves, images of light levels over a period, were primarily used to classify the stars. The light curves in this project were gathered by the All-Sky Automated Survey for SuperNovae (ASAS_SN). ASAS-SN consists of a wide-field photometric survey that monitors the night sky with 20 telescopes around the world hosted by the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope network. A g-band filter is utilized to reduce the number of photos captured and corresponds to the teal part of the visible spectrum (480 nm). Each type of variable star has unique characteristics which make them identifiable by their light curve. 

My goal this summer on the Citizen ASAS-SN Zooniverse project was to analyze the light curves and identify the characteristics which classify the variable star into pulsating, eclipsing or rotational. To be consistent in my classification process, I used a decision tree, to determine the classification. Since there were multiple pathways to determine a variable star’s classification, I created two different decision trees and named them Method 1 and Method 2. One part of my project was to compare how these different methods correlated with my ability to classify the variable star light curves. The classification methods were based upon instructions given to each citizen scientist as they joined Citizen ASAS-SN. The team at Ohio State University would then compare the aggregated results of classifications from the volunteers to the machine learning to improve their machine learning classification process. 

This research is part of a bigger project which has been going on before 2021. There was a data release on Nov. 3, 2021, which compared the results of machine learning to the citizen scientists and took a broader analysis of the ability of each to classify the variable stars by their light curves. The machine learning in this first data set was only able to classify the light curves as pulsating, eclipsing and rotational. A limitation of the first study was identifying junk data which is addressed in the new data set, the one I was a part of, which included a new “junk” classification option. The OSU research group will compare the results of the new machine learning capabilities with a junk option to the citizen scientists’ classifications to examine the similarities and differences.

This project has taught me the importance of all kinds of research, no matter the size or recognition, because it can help further our understanding of cosmology. Studies on variable stars are critical for calculating cosmological distances and stellar properties which could further our understanding of the universe, and studies, like the project I conducted this summer, are pivotal.

Johnathan Breazeale is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

Over the course of this summer, I spent my time in the TriHealth genetic counseling offices at the Good Samaritan and Bethesda North Hospitals. I had the opportunity to work with two mentors, Ms. Elise Bendik and Ms. Karen Huelsman, on two separate projects.

Ms. Bendik is a genetic counselor at TriHealth. I was able to shadow her meetings with patients looking to determine their risks of developing cancer. She would go through the patient’s family history and make a pedigree to model their family’s cancer history. After that, she would explain the patient’s risk of developing cancer and suggest appropriate genetic testing. It was interesting for me to see all the factors considered in determining risks, and it was really nice for me to engage with the patients. Ms. Bendik and I worked together on quality improvement for the TriHealth registry of cancer patients. We organized the data in an Excel spreadsheet and filtered it for our needs. I then went through the different cancer types and determined the referral rates to genetic counseling as well as the percentage of people that actually attended genetic counseling. Additionally, lab test results were reviewed, and I recorded whether a patient was positive or negative for any mutations associated with cancer risk. Our analysis of this counseling process helps the organization identify areas for improvement in their ongoing effort to enhance patient care and outcomes.

I also had the opportunity to work with Ms. Huelsman in the Precision Medicine Institute at TriHealth. Together we worked on a project involving a specific mutation of a gene called KRAS G12C, which is a common mutation identified in lung cancer tissue. With Ms. Huelsman I became an expert at navigating through the electronic health records to find important information about the cancer patients who tested positive for the KRAS mutation. I helped collect and organize all the data on whether a patient was living or deceased, the stage of their cancer, any secondary locations of their cancer, the date of diagnosis, and the cancer histology. To find all the necessary information, I navigated through official reports, office visits, lab tests. Then, I looked to see if any of the KRAS patients were put on the newly approved targeted therapies, sotorasib and adagrasib. These targeted therapies are important because they are more effective than traditional chemotherapy by binding specifically to the mutated KRAS protein and traps it in an “off” state. One main goal of my project was to ensure that the work done at TriHealth is completed with health equity. I compared data for social determinants of health, such as race and gender, the proportions of patients that were not put on therapies with those that were put on the targeted therapies. My analysis found that the proportions of gender and race were very similar for both groups, which is the equitable treatment offerings that we wanted to observe.

Ultimately, my research experience was very positive. Everyone in the genetic counseling department was very friendly and helpful throughout the course of my project. I had the opportunity to shadow in the radiation oncology department which was a very insightful experience. I observed radiation treatment, looked through patient scans, and met with cancer patients as they discussed further treatment options with their doctors. One of the main highlights of my summer research experience at TriHealth came when I had the opportunity to give flowers to cancer patients in the infusion center.  My mentor and I assembled flowers in vases and presented them to the patients. It was such a great feeling to be able to bring smiles to some of the patients at the hospital. I learned so much about the application of genetics through precision medicine, and I am super grateful that I experienced everyday activities in a hospital setting.

Ben Dobelhoff is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

 

In 1951, a BBC broadcasting unit visited Alan Turing’s Computer Machine Laboratory in Manchester, England. While there, the broadcast unit used a portable disc cutter to record three different melodies played by a computer. That recording is the first known recording of computer music, and it set the stage for a whole new world of sounds. 

My experience with the Schiff Family Science Research Institute has allowed me to explore the realm of computer music. Through the College Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati, I have worked with Dr. Mara Helmuth, the director of the university’s Center for Computer Music, and Kieran, a graduate student, to create a program for machine improvisation. 

Machine improvisation is a type of computer music that uses algorithmic composition to create improvisations. Algorithmic composition is exactly what it sounds like: using algorithms to create music. To create my unique program of algorithmic composition, I am using Markov chains, which is a stochastic model that incorporates algorithmic composition. The Markov chains read user-input data, which in this case are musician selected pitches represented by integers. By using machine learning, the program learns how to improvise coherently.  

To create my program, I am using Max, also known as Max/MSP/Jitter, which is a visual programming language for music. Although I wanted to jump right to working on machine improvisation, I had to spend a lot of time becoming familiar with the program and its functions since Max was a new coding language to me. By creating this solid foundation in the new coding language, the process of creating my program using Max was much easier than if I had not fully familiarized myself with the coding language.  

My research project is very different relative to other projects of the Science Research Institute in that the end result is a final product instead of conclusions drawn from data. Furthermore, my “research” is more of an engineering design process as opposed to concrete data collection. While I did have to do some actual research about computer music and machine improvisation, the majority of my time was spent identifying the criteria I wanted my program to meet, identifying the constraints I was working under in the Max environment, creating the code, testing the code and then improving it. My end product is a Max/MSP/Jitter program using Markov chains that successfully incorporates a user-input element to modify pitch and rhythm. 

My research experience has also been very unique. Instead of working in a wet lab like some students, I have been working from home on my computer, and I use Zoom to have meetings with both of my mentors. Although there are advantages and drawbacks to both methods, I have really liked the freedom that has come with working at home, as I have been able to create a program specific to my interests. Also, since I have created the code independently, I have a very thorough understanding of not only my program, but also machine improvisation in general.  

The main reason why I wanted to be a part of the Science Research Institute was to explore and further my understanding of two of my main interests: music and STEM. Through this project, I have been able to do just that. Additionally, this project has given me a deeper understanding of the difference between the scientific method and engineering design process as well as very valuable experience in coding and proficiently using Max. Research on computer improvisation may help to develop new interfaces for computer music, and it may also allow for a deeper understanding of the process of human improvisation. 

Tarek Hasan is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

If an average person found out their cancer treatment was being administered using ChatGPT, they’d probably immediately change their oncologist, file a volley of complaints pertaining to HIPAA violations, and never visit that medical association again. The patient would probably ask themselves, “What in the world does a website high school students use to cheat on their English papers possibly have to offer for cancer?” 

Turns out not much now, according to the research I worked on. However, a much more fruitful aspect of the work I did during my remote internship over the summer was the discovery of new peptides which show promise for having anti-cancer properties. 

Anti-cancer peptides (small, typically helical shaped segments of protein molecules) are incredibly effective therapeutics that, unlike traditional cancer therapies like chemotherapy and radiation treatments, do not inflict much damage to your body and are less likely to cause drug resistance. These peptides work by taking advantage of a special characteristic unique to cancer cells, their electrical charge. Typical non-cancerous cells have a charge that is relatively neutral. Cancer cells have an overall charge that tends to be shifted highly towards the negative side of the spectrum which makes them incredibly attracted to its oppositely charged peptides. Once a anti-cancer peptide electrostatically “sticks” to a cancer cell, it uses its helical shape to “corkscrew” through the outer layer, the cell membrane. Once inside, the peptide disrupts key parts of the cell’s "machinery” it uses to stay alive, euthanizing the cell from the inside. 

This process makes sense theoretically but finding practical peptides that can perform these tasks requires extensive sorting. The process I used, adopted from the method developed by my mentor, Dr. Somchai Chutipongtanate at the University of Cincinnati’s College of Medicine, was able to isolate 109 potential anti-cancer peptides from a list of 82,940. 

First, I started with a list of 7 proteins. Using the program given to me by Dr. Somchai, I sliced the proteins into segments, giving me the aforementioned 82,940 peptides for sorting. After slicing the proteins, I took the peptides and converted their sequence into a format called FASTA using a program I coded in R. FASTA files make it easier for a computer to read. When the peptides were all in FASTA format, I put each into 3 separate machine learning algorithms which determined the anti-cancer potential of each peptide. The 3rd algorithm broke, unfortunately, so I was only able to use two algorithms. 

When all the peptides had been assigned a score from each machine learning website predicting its likelihood to possess anti-cancer properties, I sorted them in an excel sheet from highest calculated score to the lowest. Then, an estimated charge of each peptide was calculated. I then sorted the peptides so that the ones with the most positive charge and highest anti-cancer score appeared at the top, as well as a separate sorting ranked by highest anti-cancer score and then by having a charge greater than 0. 

The final step was taking the top ten peptides from each sorting method from each protein (7 proteins * 20 top 10 peptides = 140 total to be tested) and modelling their 3D structure. If the structure was predicted to be a helical shape, it meant it was more likely to have anti-cancer properties. After all the sorting was completed, I sent Dr. Somchai the peptides which had a predicted helical structure, positive charge, and high anti-cancer prediction scores. These peptides will be synthesized and tested in vitro for their effectiveness against cancer cells. 

During the remainder of my internship with Dr. Somchai, he wanted to explore the viability of Artificial Intelligence in predicting anti-cancer peptides. To do this, I asked ChatGPT questions about generating potential therapeutic peptides derived from a protein called Alpha-lactalbumin. The chatbot gave peptides with very low anti-cancer scores, and most of these peptides had sequences that were not even part of the original protein. However, when I plugged some of the A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) generated peptides into the machine learning models, a few of the ChatGPT-generated peptides had anti-cancer properties. The chatbot also generated novel peptides that were not found in peptide databases. 

The therapeutic peptides I identified with Dr. Somchai could help pave the way for future cancer treatments. I had a lot of fun getting to know him, and it was clear he had an intense passion and enthusiasm for his work. Although the lack of immediate results from ChatGPT was disheartening, its ability to generate new peptides in conjunction with the rapid growth of artificial intelligence technology over the past few decades shows much promise in its future use for accelerating the development of new medical technologies. 

At its current state however, ChatGPT is most certainly not ready for use in the medical field, and if you find your clinician using it to offer remedial treatments to their patients at its current state, I suggest you change physicians. 

Ethan Lam is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

If you are using melatonin supplements to help fall asleep and are taking it as you go to bed, did you know that you are probably not using melatonin correctly? I didn’t either until a few weeks ago. While doing my Schiff Family Science Research Institute research this summer, I learned that me and most people I know aren’t using melatonin correctly. Melatonin is a drug that our body naturally produces to regulate our internal clock. Taking melatonin right before you go to sleep won’t influence your sleep cycle. I learned this while working with Dr. Thomas Dye, a neurologist at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center who specializes in sleep disorder, as I assisted on his project studying the effects of a medication called Clonidine and melatonin when used in conjunction. 

Melatonin can be a very effective sleep aid when used correctly. If taken at the proper time, before our bodies produce it naturally at night, it can move up the timing of our sleep schedule. Some patients, even though using melatonin, can still have trouble sleeping. This project’s aim is to evaluate the use of melatonin in conjunction with clonidine. Clonidine is typically prescribed an antihypertensive drug used to lower blood pressure, but the sleep disorder community has seen some use for it to aid people with persistent sleep problems such as insomnia and restless leg syndrome. 

My goal this summer at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital was to review a set of patient data and identify patients who were ever on this medication combination. If they were on this combination of clonidine and melatonin, I reviewed their visit notes and would record if their symptoms improved or did not improve while on this combination. The pediatric patient population included in this study were deidentified patients who my mentor and other doctors working in his department had seen at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital for a persistent sleep problem. The data that I collected and organized will be passed onto a biostatistician and evaluated to see if there were any significant findings and if there was enough data collected to determine if this treatment combination was in any way effective.  

This study could reveal a more effective way to treat patients with sleep problems. Sleeping issues in pediatric patients can cause learning problems, difficulty in school, developmental issues and increased risk of mental illness. Therefore, it is so important for kids to be getting proper sleep and this medication combination could potentially help to achieve improved sleep outcomes in pediatric populations with diagnosed sleep disorders. This project has taught me so much about the complexity of the sleep cycles and how easily someone’s sleep cycle can be altered, in negative and positive ways. It is so critical for people to know how over the counter sleep medications like melatonin affect our circadian rhythms, and why studies like the one I did this summer are so important.  

Teresa Tarnowski is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

Everyone can remember the Canadian wildfires and the smoky haze that descended upon Cincinnati this summer, making the air unsafe. Beyond the obvious coughing and sore throats, inside the smoke was a carcinogenetic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon called Benzo[a]pyrene or BAP. It is produced from the burning of organic materials and can be found in cigarettes, charred meat, and in smoke. Certain genotypes in our population are more susceptible to the toxic effects of BAP. This summer at the Northern Kentucky University Biology Department, Dr. Curran’s neuroscience lab used a mice model to investigate the effects of gestational and lactational exposure of BAP on the learning and developmental behavior of the offspring. We also investigated which genotypes are more susceptible to BAP exposure (which genotypes are worse at metabolizing the BAP).  

When entering the lab for the first time, I was very excited to get hands on experience with lab equipment and protocols. As I was getting trained by the lab manager, I was told the basic protocol of the experiments. The dams, or mothers, would be fed BAP infused corn oil on top of Captain Crunch Cereal. Later when their pups are born, we allow the mother to feed them until postpartum day 25 when they are separated. During their first few days of life, we tested their reflexes, like how you would test those of a newborn. After their separation, the BAP exposed mice are put through a series of behavioral and physiological tests. These tests investigated if the early BAP exposure would change their behavior or health: basically, did the BAP make them hyperactive, more anxious, less active, etc.  

One of my favorite behavioral tests was the Morris Water Maze. This test focused on the learning and memory of the mice over four weeks. The Morris Water Maze is a big tub full of opaque water with a slightly immersed platform inside of it. On the four walls around the maze are four distinct shapes: a square, triangle, star, and circle. Each week the platform is moved, and the mice learn how to navigate towards it using the walls. During the first week, the walls are covered, and the mice find the platform by a bright orange Ping-Pong ball above the platform. This week focuses mostly on training the mice to find the platform by looking up- they usually fail the most this week. After this week the walls are uncovered, and the mice are forced to navigate using the symbols on the walls. It was very impressive seeing the mice go from finding the platform in 60 seconds to 3 seconds as the week went on.  

From the physiological perspective, we also investigated the effect of BAP on two neurotransmitters, dopamine and serotonin, in the brain. Using HPLC, a liquid chromatography tool that separates small molecules based on their chemical properties, we determined the concentration of these neurotransmitters in the hippocampus, prefrontal cortex, hypothalamus, and the striatum. This investigation was very interesting to me because I got to experience a wet laboratory setting and interact with laboratory equipment which I have not used in a high school setting. 

Mice were used in this lab not just because of how cute they are, but because they share a lot of genes in common with humans. Any abnormal behavior found in the BAP mice could be mirrored in human children. Childhood exposure to BAP has already been linked to learning disorders, hyperactivity, and delayed social checkpoints. By studying the effect of gestational exposure on mouse pups, we are studying how exposure in the womb could adversely affect children. This is especially important to communities who live near factories or wildfires. The pregnant women could be unknowingly exposing their children to neurotoxic BAP. It could also be critical to certain genotypes who are worse at metabolizing the BAP. 

Overall, I really enjoyed the research opportunity I was granted by Dr. Curran, NKU and Summit. I can’t wait to go to college and be a part of more labs and studies.  

Sofia Ramirez is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

Over the summer, I had the privilege of working in the Schiff Family Science Research Institute lab at the Summit Country Day School with my mentor Dr. Jessica Replogle. Before starting this project, Dr. Replogle came to me one afternoon with the opportunity to help a young patient and her parents evaluate medical treatments for a possible ADHD diagnosis while accommodating the patient’s various 22Q Deletion Syndrome features. I immediately was drawn in and accepted the offer without hesitation. My project is unique as my research did not involve going to a lab and observing chemical reactions; instead, I would sit at one of my designated locations, Dr. Replogle’s Lab at The Summit Country Day, the University of Cincinnati Langsam Library, or my bedroom desk, and surf Google Scholar and PubMed for hours identifying articles for my literature search and review. The key was searching for terms that aligned with 22Q Deletion Syndrome, adolescence, and ADHD or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. 

22Q Deletion Syndrome, or DiGeorge Syndrome, is a microdeletion disorder on the q portion of the 22nd chromosome. DiGeorge Syndrome is the most common microdeletion syndrome in humans, with an estimated prevalence of 1 in 2148 live births and 1 in 992 pregnancies. The syndrome is possessed by fewer than 200,000 individuals in the United States of America and its outlying territories. 22Q Deletion Syndrome is caused by hemizygous deletions from the chromosome 22q11.2 with phenotypic features including palatal abnormalities, cardiac defects, learning and behavioral problems, and immune deficiency. The patient I was helping possesses features including Tetralogy of Fallot, pharyngeal flap, malformations in the kidney, migraines with aura, Hashimoto’s disease, and weight gaining issues.  

With the female patient’s possible ADHD diagnosis, the family is unsure how to properly treat their daughter with respect to the other 22Q Deletion features. When treating ADHD, most people tend to medicate for their symptoms. Although ADHD medication can increase attention span, reduce hyperactivity, control impulsive behavior, and manage executive function, it has been commonly known to cause side effects including loss of appetite, trouble sleeping, fast heart rate, and high blood pressure. These side effects could exacerbate the patient of interest’s current 22Q Deletions symptoms. My objective during the summer was to search and review research articles that involved ADHD treatments for 22Q patients and determine treatment options for the female patient in this study. The process to understand what medication would best suit my patient was conducted by researching published literature, connecting my patient’s symptoms/health issues with the research participants, and recording data from the published studies, of which there were only a handful.  

Our research is significant because it allows youth who possess the 22Q deletion and ADHD to better understand what ADHD treatments would suit their complex health conditions the best. This research would help bring recognition to the issue and underscores the need for studies on the complex medical conditions facing these patients. Additionally, it provides a real example of a patient searching for optimal treatments and gives hope to others struggling with ADHD and 22Q Deletion Syndrome that their symptoms can be minimized. Research surrounding 22Q Deletion Syndrome, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and children is already very minimal, and this research will bring awareness to this microdeletion. 

McKinley Kramer is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

Are you vaccinated? Less than half of adults in America are fully vaccinated against the Human Papillomavirus (HPV)! The most recent estimates of adolescents 13-15 years of age reveal that 58.5% of this population has received 2 to 3 doses of the HPV vaccine. Although the trend has shown a steady increase from 2008 to 2021, it is below the Department of Health and Human Services goal of 80% of adolescents receiving the recommended HPV vaccinations. To increase the rate of HPV vaccination, I took part in a research project to help improve this statistic.  

For my summer project, I worked with Dr. Catherine DeFoor from St. Elizabeth’s Pediatrics to design a research study to improve HPV vaccination rates in her pediatric center. HPV is a common STD (sexually transmitted disease). Most HPV infections last around 2 years, however, some infections can last much longer. These longer lasting infections can lead to several types of cancer, such as cervical, vulvar, and throat and mouth. The HPV vaccine protects against several strains of HPV, but specifically against strains 16 and 18.  These strains cause most of the HPV-related cancers. Our goal was to find an effective, efficient, and low-cost solution to the low initiation and completion rates of the HPV vaccine.  

The tool we used to evaluate what changes could impact vaccine outcomes was a program that created a simulated pediatric center. The tool created a qualitative study using simulated data, allowing us to input our ideas, and get back ratios of the typical number of patients that would be applicable for our study. We first decided what “changes” we would make to our simulated pediatric center. We chose to create a script for the pediatrician to say to the guardian of the child eligible for the vaccine. We then chose to offer the vaccine not only at the child’s annual checkup, but also when they would come in for their flu vaccine. Once we determined our changes to the protocol, we plugged them into the simulation software. The simulation software predicted patient responses and calculated the percentages of the number of children receiving the vaccine with and without the protocol changes. 

We found that our largest increase in the percentage of children receiving the vaccine resulted from providing the pediatrician a script to read to the parents. This script includes details about HPV, why the vaccine is recommended to be initiated at age 9 and draw backs from receiving the vaccine. Dr. DeFoor found after reading other scientific papers that doctors recommend the vaccine at this age because of the vaccine’s inability to protect against HPV once the person has contacted it. Because the HPV vaccine includes 2 doses, starting the vaccine at  age 9 gives a person the best chance at receiving both vaccine doses and being completely protected against the virus before ever encountering it. 

This research is important because it reveals possible issues on clarity when vaccines are offered to children. Properly educating the child and guardian can help increase these vaccine rates and clear up misunderstandings on what the vaccine does. This information is also applicable towards slowing the decline in administration of several vaccines in the Unites States. Several routine childhood vaccines, such as polio, diphtheria, and measles, have seen a decline in vaccination rates in children. Hopefully, this study can help slow or reverse this decrease in childhood vaccinations. 

This was a great first experience working on a research project with a mentor. Having someone guide me through the steps that any other researcher would complete was extremely helpful. Although we did not use real patients, I saw how the simulation tool and data analysis can be an important part of research as well. My favorite memory was working with Dr. DeFoor on reviewing the research papers that I found that had related studies to the research we were conducting. If I did not understand something in the paper, she would help explain it to me and show me additional examples, or if I thought one article was particularly helpful to our research, she would help me search for any related studies that we could find. 

I am excited to continue to do research, whether that be expanding on this project, or joining a new lab. I hope that my experience can show people that there is so much more to science than laboratory experiments. Any experiment can help further science, whether this be discovering a new element, or doing data analysis behind computer screen. Not all cancers can be prevented, however, it would be amazing to know that my contributions to this research will lead to increases in HPV vaccination rates and subsequent decreases in cervical, vulvar, throat and mouth cancers. 

Maddie Sumnar is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

As a child, I would often come home from school with a splitting headache. This would leave me wondering what triggered the onset of my headaches. As I continued to suffer from the headaches, I figured out, with the help of my family, that they were in fact migraines that had plagued me for years. In the past few years, I have luckily outgrown these migraines for the most part. These years of dealing with migraines and their effects on my life drew me into research about migraines. 

This past summer I was able to continue my fascination with migraines. Over the last few months, I have collaborated with a neurologist, Dr. Marielle Samaha, from The Headache Center at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center on a research project concerned with the effect of nutraceuticals (primarily vitamins) in treating pediatric migraines. The objective of my work was to research the published literature for studies on the effectiveness of folic acid (Vitamin B9) supplementation on migraine disability and frequency in pediatric patients.  

In the field of neurology and migraine treatment, several nutraceuticals or vitamins have been proven to help relieve symptoms or prevent migraines. Only in recent years has research on folic acid and its effectiveness of migraine prevention been tested. My work was to summarize and analyze the published research to provide a link between folic acid and decreased migraine characteristics. 

On top of the research on folic acid that I did, I also researched how antiepileptic drugs treat migraines. Antiepileptics are often prescribed to patients who do not have epilepsy as a way to treat their migraines. A common side effect of the antiepileptic drug treatment for migraine patients is a decrease in folic acid levels. So, my research on folic acid and antiepileptics go hand in hand in migraine prevention. 

In my research, I reviewed the published data from many recent studies performed on folic acid supplementation and migraines. I analyzed the collective data and found that an abundant amount of the conclusions point toward folic acid supplementation greatly decreasing or totally eliminating migraine symptoms or onset. With these summarized results and the results that antiepileptics often lower folic acid levels, my conclusion was that pediatric migraine patients that have been or are treated with antiepileptics should receive folic acid supplementation. 

As folic acid becomes a more prominently used way to treat migraines and more well known to those suffering from migraines, it will become an additional safe and cost-effective nutraceutical that can help sufferers’ symptoms be assuaged. I am eager to share the results from my summer research project with the headache community to spread information to anyone who could benefit from the knowledge. Communicating this project is still a work in progress as I will start writing a scientific paper on this topic and creating a presentation to communicate my findings more effectively. 

My summer research project was a great learning process and gave me abundant experience in researching topics in the medical field. My project differs from other research projects I have done in the past for school because this summer’s project was a meta-analysis of the data and conclusions of many articles already published. Organizing a meta-analysis, although at times tedious, was a wonderful thing to be introduced to this early in my path toward the medical field. The project served as a great first impression of what I am to experience and expect from a science-filled life in the future.  

Although I am not sure what kind of specialty I want to pursue later in life, collaborating with a neurologist from Children’s gave me a taste of what neurology is all about. I am very grateful for the experience I received, and I look forward to sharing my findings with the community at the 10th Annual Schiff Family Science Research Institute Colloquium in the winter. Now, present me knows a little more about why past me suffered greatly from migraines through the research I was able to do in the last few months. 

Lorenzo Rose is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

Throughout my time at Summit, I have participated in MAPS (Modeling a Protein Story) team. Through this club, we select a protein, model it, and then present our findings in the form of a scientific poster. However, proteins remained this abstract concept since we never had the chance to work with our protein beyond reading scientific literature and computer modeling. This summer though, my research project provided me the chance to gain hands on experience with a protein in a lab setting. Now, I can say I have not only researched and modeled a protein, but have purified, experimented on, and crystallized one as well. 

Over the course of this summer, I spent my time in the Kovall Lab at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine's Department of Molecular Biology with my mentor, Dr. Gagliani, a new professor at Xavier University. She performed her doctoral research in Dr. Kovall’s lab and returned to her old lab for the summer to prepare for launching her independent research at Xavier University. Together, we continued the lab's work with the homeodomain protein, ALX4. ALX4 is a transcription factor that binds to DNA to influence gene expression. Point mutations of this protein have recently been connected to disruptions in normal embryonic development in humans. 

In general, this lab uses in vitro binding assays to determine binding affinities between a specific protein and DNA to better understand the mechanism of protein-DNA complexes that are crucial for replication, transcription and translation of DNA. The binding assays I utilized this summer were thermal shift assays, isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC), and electrophoretic mobility shift assays (EMSA). Before beginning our work with the binding assays, we had to purify large quantities of ALX4. What seems like a simple task, was actually a month-long, detailed process required to produce our protein at a desired purity and concentration. Though my purification process was only one month, it can take multiple years to optimize the purification of certain proteins. Focusing on methodology, we began by purifying the wild type ALX4 and purifying a monomeric strand of the DNA for our future binding experiments. Even though we used the mammalian ALX4 gene, we can transform bacteria with this mammalian gene and overexpress the protein using the bacterial system. We cultured 2 liters of bacteria, but sometimes the lab will grow up to 20 liters of bacteria to obtain a desired quantity of protein.  

Once we had reached a desired purity, high concentration, and large quantity of the protein, we began to experiment with a variety of different tests to compare binding affinity between the wild type (WT) protein and two different ALX4 mutant proteins containing point mutations at R216G and R218Q. The results of our comparisons between the WT and the two mutant proteins provided evidence that the binding was affected by these single point mutations and may contribute to human diseases.  

After our tests were complete, we took some time to model ALX4 with the WT ALX4 X-ray crystallography data rendered by another member of the lab. We used both JMOL, the program we use for MAPS team, as well as PYMOL, the program used by the Kovall lab. We tried many different techniques to model ALX4 in order to highlight certain parts of this protein and further support our binding studies with the mutant proteins in determining locations where a mutation would affect binding to DNA. 

Though our summer wrapped up before I had the chance to complete all the typical procedures when evaluating a new DNA binding protein in the Kovall Lab, two months in this lab offered me the opportunity to expand my class-based knowledge into real-world experience. The lab will continue working on ALX4 to solve the X-ray crystallography structures under different conditions. These crystals will then provide the lab with high resolution 3D models that are valuable representations of DNA-protein binding. Then, they will have completed the typical process they follow with each new protein they study to understand the essential life process of how genes are turned on and off: overexpression, purification, binding assays, and crystallography. 

Iris Katz is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.

Over the summer I worked in the Ross lab at the University of Cincinnati’s Chemistry Department. I worked closely with a 4th year graduate student working towards his PhD in Chemistry as well as many other post-docs, grad students, and undergraduate students. The Ross lab focuses on the study of microfluidics and electrochemistry.  

Many of the experiments taking place have applications in vivo (in mice and rats). However, I did not work with any live animals or animal tissue over the summer. Most days at UC started with suiting up in what might be described as a hazmat suit –although it wasn’t designed to protect you from hazardous materials, it serves as a barrier to prevent contaminants from coming in or going out of the clean room. The white coverall zipped up the front and had separate rubber “booties” to slide onto your feet. It had a headpiece that made you look like you were bald and a face mask with safety googles. I did this many times throughout the summer just to walk into the clean room (basically an incredibly sterile lab) in the basement of UC’s engineering building.  

The agenda when in the clean room was to plasma treat our graphene oxide microelectrodes. Plasma treating is where you shoot the plasma (the fourth state of matter) form of elements such as oxygen and nitrogen at a surface, and functional groups are added on the surface. Functional groups in this context are just a coating of an element on the surface of our electrode. We coat our electrodes in nitrogen and call them “nitrogen-doped graphene-oxide electrodes.”  

Graphene is a one-atom thick hexagonal lattice carbon structure. We then further modify this to graphene-oxide which differs in its molecular structure because one of the vertices in the hexagonal ring of carbon is replaced with an oxygen atom. This changes the polarity of the molecule and makes it a better conductor. We make fibers out of graphene-oxide by filling tiny tubes (1mm in diameter) with a graphene-oxide solution plus a little bit of ascorbic acid for fiber strength. These are then put into glass capillaries, melted in the middle, and then pulled to form two separate electrodes that have a sharp glass end. We etch the glass back and bevel the end to reveal a uniform surface. This is the point in the fabrication process that we plasma treat the electrodes with nitrogen to completely cover the exposed graphene-oxide fiber with nitrogen. We are required to run a ton of tests for each electrode because the electrodes aren’t always super reliable. We can go through 6 or 7 electrodes before we get a readable one. 

Our use of nitrogen is to increase the graphene-oxide electrode’s sensitivity to purines in the brain. Purines, which are small biomolecules, are notoriously hard to detect, but through the use of graphene-oxide surface functionalization with nitrogen, we have a greater ability to detect purines when using Fast-Scan Cyclic Voltammetry. Fast-Scan Cyclic Voltammetry, or FSCV, is a technique where we have our electrode in a solution of Tris buffer (a salt solution that mimics the salt composition of your brain) and a dispenser containing the purine. A unique purine is injected into the solution of Tris and a voltage is applied that causes the purine to oxidize. The oxidation and reduction reaction create a measurable current that can be seen through a false color plot. This is basically a three-dimensional depiction of the oxidation peaks of the purine which shows up as little lines of color that symbolize the oxidation peak. The peaks are individual to each purine and act as a type of individual fingerprint. For some purines, like adenosine, there are three oxidation peaks which are visualized as three specific ridges of color. Others, like guanosine, only have two.  

Purine monitoring is important because blood purine concentrations are an indication of tissue injury during stroke. Developing methods to quickly assess stroke can help reduce disability, death and other effects from types of ischemia  

Overall, it was a great experience where I learned about both electrochemistry and how research is done in general. I went in with a lot of expectations and was surprised by the attitude towards research. I was expecting a very high-pressure environment, but I was greeted with a welcoming and supportive group of scientists. Additionally, I was not expecting the research to be as accessible to me, a high school student, as it ended up being. Electrochemistry is notoriously complicated, but through the help of my mentors, I started to conceptually understand the research in a way I never thought possible. When going into a lab you also expect everything to look a certain way (super fancy and technical), but I found out not everything is a super high tech, and a lot of laboratory setups are engineered on the spot and hand made. Science becomes much more personal when you are able to immerse yourself in it.  

Haley Potter is a senior in The Summit Country Day School's Schiff Family Science Research Institute.