Researchers of Emory

  Daniel Prettel   was a Spring 2017 Conference Grant recipient. He is a rising Senior majoring in Biology. I still cannot believe I attended the Society of Surgical Oncology Annual Cancer Symposium 2017 to present a poster! Needless to say, I am an undergraduate student. So, you might be wondering, how in the world did I end up presenting a poster at a professional surgical oncology conference? Well, lets start by saying I was extremely fortunate to take part in some clinical research at the local hospital back home in South Carolina ( Greenville Memorial Hospital, Greenville, SC ).

Emily Winokur is a recent graduate who majored in Neuroscience and Behavioral Biology and minored in Sociology. She was awarded a Fall 2015 Independent Grant which she used to conduct research on sensory perception under Dr. Gary Miller. The protein vesicular monoamine transporter 2 (VMAT2) is critical for dopaminergic neuronal survival because of its role in packaging monoamines into synaptic vesicles. Neurodegenerative diseases, such as Parkinson’s disease (PD), are thought to be caused by disruption of the usual functioning of vesicular release and uptake of monoamines including dopamine in the nigrostriatal system. This leads to dopaminergic cell death, impaired movement and increased anxiety- and depressive-like symptoms (Pifl, 2014). Our laboratory developed transgenic mice which express 5% of normal levels of VMAT2 (VMAT2-Lo) and mice with a threefold increase VMAT2 protein level (VMAT2-Hi). VMAT2-Lo mice recapitulate many aspects of human PD including olfactory def...

Dalila Vasquez Herrera is a 2016 graduate who majored in Biology and Spanish. She was awarded a Spring 2016 Independent Grant which she used to conduct research on language and healthcare communication in Oaxaca and Huajuapan de Leon, Mexico. Read more about her project in the Emory Report . “ They’re Mexican, so they speak Spanish. ” These words appeared an article in The New York Times about a hospital official in New York who called a Mexican organization to help her understand some Mexican patients. The quote above is what the hospital official responded when the person at the Mexican organization asked her if she had asked what language the family spoke. The hospital official just assumed they spoke Spanish, but the family actually spoke Mixtec, one of the many indigenous languages spoken within the borders of the Mexican nation-state and across Central America . This situation is not surprising to me because I’ve experienced this linguistic and cultural d...

Aspen Ono  received a Fall 2016 Conference Grant to attend the 2016 Conference on Earth System Governance. She is a rising Senior majoring in Environmental Science and International Studies. Sustainability, climate change, and environmental justice are global issues that implicate every single country, community, and human being. Yet the international dialogue, particularly that occurring at scientific conferences, that focuses on global issues tends to be dominated by a few key countries and institutions. This existing disparity in academic interaction not only hinders inclusive collaboration and communication, but also marginalizes many key voices that could contribute unique ideas and solutions to the global conversation. The annual Earth Systems Governance Conference attempted to overcome this obstacle this year by choosing to be held at the University of Nairobi in Kenya. This conference represents an initial step towards global inclusivity in an interdisciplinary e...