Can we grow human ears in the lab? Does chronic consumption of aspartame, an artificial sweetener, cause an abnormal response to sugar in some people? Can we make cancer drugs fluorescent in order to monitor their delivery to brain tumors?
These are just a few of the fascinating questions investigated by the forty-nine medical students who presented posters about their research at the 14th annual Medical Student Research Day on October 14. Organized by second-year students Rebecca Chen, Kunal Garg and Christopher Marnell, the day kicked off with four oral presentations. Aditi Gupta, Umberto Tosi, Yoshiko Toyoda, and Lisa Zhang gave short talks on their research in radiotherapy, fluorescent drugs, tissue engineering, and gut bacteria in kidney transplant patients to an audience of peers and faculty.
Most of the students got a taste of research during the summer between their first and second years of medical school. Under the new curriculum launched in 2014, research will play a larger role throughout their education, with a full six months dedicated to individual projects in the third and fourth years. The students' enthusiastic embrace of this bench-to-bedside approach indicates that this next generation of physicians, scientists and healthcare leaders will be poised to take on any challenge in their field.
Medical student Jaime Bernstein presents her research at Medical Student Research Day.
Medical student Christopher Marnell explains his research on finding drugs to treat a fatal type of pediatric brain tumor.
Photo Credit: Patricia Kuharic