Graduate Research Assistant, Stony Brook University, Department of Biomedical Engineering 

PI: Richard A Clark, Ph.D.
Period: October 2019 – May 2021

The Clark laboratory has been investigating novel peptide fragments derived from within Fibronectin for their role in the acceleration of new tissue formation of cutaneous wounds. The main focus thus far has been the ability of these fragments to accelerate wound closure and reduce hypertrophic scarring in porcine burn models, and their ability to increase extracellular matrix deposition by fibroblasts. This research has provided the groundwork for the development of a therapy for burn injury progression, which is a clinically unmet need today. My work has been focused on the expansion of the scope of this research, seeing how else these peptides may be used to control cellular processes like senescence, metabolism, and proliferation.

More information can be found on Dr. Clark’s faculty page

 

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Stony Brook University, Department of Biomedical Engineering 

PI: Mei Lin Chan, Ph.D.
Period: October 2018 – June 2019

The accumulation of fat within the body -and more specifically within adipocytes- causes stress to these cell populations, which in return release signals that promote pro-inflammatory signaling throughout the body. Obesity has been known to lead to a state of widespread, chronic inflammation and has been implicated in many diseases that are a result of this inflammation (e.g. Type 1 Diabetes). Inflammatory signaling from adipocytes can be related to the stress placed on them and their plasma membrane as their internal lipid droplet swells to accommodate more fats, which offers a root target for potential therapies. Low-intensity vibration (LIV) treatments had been shown to decrease the size of the lipid droplet in favor of smaller droplets which placed less stress on the adipocyte (and thus contributed less to inflammation). My work in Dr. Chan’s lab was to help investigate the effects of LIV on other cell types -mainly fibroblasts. This included cell fixing, staining, and counting/imaging, but also necessitated the development of a new image-processing tool (via MatLab) to assess the effects of LIV on the cytoskeleton and its arrangement.