Health Sciences – Page 15 – UROP Spring Symposium 2021

Health Sciences

Modeling cardiac aging with stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes carrying a mutation for advanced aging

Using various images taken through a confocal microscope, the area of the nuclei in the heart cells of mice were measured in an effort to compare two varieties of cells. Those that were extracted from mice suffering from Hutchinson Gilford Progeria Syndrome (HGPS), a severe and rare cardiovascular disease. Comparing these two types of cells provided a better idea of the meaningful ways in which cell morphology is different in regards to the presence of HGPS. Differences reflecting statistical significance were identified between the heart cells of “healthy” mice and those afflicted with HGPS. This data collection helps build upon the foundation and overarching goal of the lab which is to model cardiac aging through the use of stem cell derived cardiomyocytes.

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The genetic impacts of radiation on long-lived trees: A Chernobyl Perspective.

Since nuclear radiation was discovered, researchers have long-known that creatures who have been exposed to high levels through nuclear bombings or nuclear disasters will either be killed instantly or suffer damage to their genetic material. In plants, these genetic accidents can then be passed on to their offspring through mutations that are carried through generations through somatic mutations. Despite our best efforts as a species, humans have accidentally, and intentionally caused several nuclear disasters throughout the world including Chernobyl (1986), Three Mile Island (1979), Fukushima (2011), Hiroshima (1945) and Nagasaki (1945) to name a few. Unlike our expectations, that these areas would be deserted and useless, nature has rebounded and succeeded incredibly well within each of these areas. Things have gone so well, in fact, that there has been a recent call to investigate the effect of radiation on plants exposed to these levels of radiation to try to gain insight into this phenomena. Our team aims to examine the genetic makeup of trees that have withstood these high levels of nuclear exposure. We plan to sequence the genomes of trees that lived before, and then survived these nuclear disasters. We will sample the oldest branches (bottom of the trees) in addition to the youngest branches (tops of the trees) to try and detect any genetic changes that resulted from the radiation exposure (ex. Increased mutation rates, etc.). Those somatic mutations would, ideally, allow us to quantify genetic changes that have likely helped the tree to survive these adverse conditions, and allow us to determine what genes can help trees survive such extreme changes in the environment.

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Towards a comprehensive taxonomy of the cells of the retrosplenial cortex

The retrosplenial cortex (RSC) is critical for both navigation & memory but impaired in Alzheimer’s disease. Despite this important role in health and disease, the cellular correlates that enable the RSC to perform these functions are not well understood. Recently, our lab has identified two types of principal neurons in the superficial layers of the RSC: low rheobase (LR) and regular spiking (RS) neurons. LR cells are believed to be important for navigational processing, while RS cells are thought to be involved in the processing of fear memories, among other functions. However, a detailed and extensive morphological analysis of different cell types across all RSC layers is still lacking. Here, we bridge this gap by defining morphological profiles of retrosplenial cells based on high resolution confocal images of individually-labeled neurons. This morphological analysis is then tied to the physiological properties of each labeled cell. Our data reveal important morphophysiological differences across cell types that can shape the specific computations each type of neuron can perform to support the distinct functions of the retrosplenial cortex.

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Developing computational tools for next generation sequencing applications to assess aneuploidy in human embryos

Less than 35% of infertility cases across all maternal ages are successfully treated. Furthermore, miscarriages, infertility, and birth defects continue to affect families despite the great advances being made in the medical field. One of the leading causes of these tragedies is human embryo aneuploidy. Aneuploidy occurs when the embryo has missing or extra chromosomes. In order to treat infertility, the use of preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploidy (PGT-A) is key. However, there are still many unknowns about PGT-A. As a result, we will isolate single cells from IRB-approved/consented/donated human embryos used for human embryonic stem cell derivation.

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A Comprehensive Review of Forms of Sexual Education and Analysis of an mHealth Comprehensive Sexual Education

The US has some of the highest rates of teen pregnancy among developing countries with approximately 200,000 babies born to teens aged 15 to 19 in 2016 (1,2). Additionally, nearly 50% of diagnosed STIs are seen in people under the age of 25 (3). These high rates of teen pregnancy and STIs may be due to abstinence-only sex education in schools, which some studies show have minimal effectiveness in preventing STIs and teen pregnancy (4). Michigan state policy requires an emphasis on abstinence, and some schools choose not to provide information on contraceptives at all (5). The purpose of this study was to assess whether abstinence-only sexual education provides the same teen level of education as comprehensive sexual education using a review of relevant literature to compare the two.

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A Comprehensive Review of Forms of Sexual Education and Analysis of an mHealth Comprehensive Sexual Education

The US has some of the highest rates of teen pregnancy among developing countries with approximately 200,000 babies born to teens aged 15 to 19 in 2016 (1,2). Additionally, nearly 50% of diagnosed STIs are seen in people under the age of 25 (3). These high rates of teen pregnancy and STIs may be due to abstinence-only sex education in schools, which some studies show have minimal effectiveness in preventing STIs and teen pregnancy (4). Michigan state policy requires an emphasis on abstinence, and some schools choose not to provide information on contraceptives at all (5). The purpose of this study was to assess whether abstinence-only sexual education provides the same teen level of education as comprehensive sexual education using a review of relevant literature to compare the two.

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The Impact of COVID19 virtual learning in Children Literacy

Changes in the school environment drastically affect children’s ability to learn. In the middle of March 2020, there was a nationwide closure of all schools due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This specific event caused most children to have a reduction in their classwork to accommodate for the new virtual school format. The decrease in schoolwork and the unstructured learning format can be compared to a similar educational phenomenon known as “summer slump”. Summer slump is known as the loss of student knowledge caused by the long summer break in between school years. In this study we are trying to explore how effective virtual learning is for the development of children’s reading skills. We are also looking at the impact of learning in a home setting, which is full of distractions . In order to assess this, we compared the results of children’s reading abilities before the pandemic and throughout it. We analyze the data of 69 participants. The study’s participants are from different backgrounds and are between the ages of six to ten. Each participant was recruited from southern Michigan and began online school at the end of September 2020.They were previously enrolled in another study where they were tested on their reading skills using Woodcock-Johnson IV. The raw scores from each participant were standardized to accurately compare the progress of the participants over time. We predict that there would be no change of a decrease in the children’s ability to read.The main purpose of this study was to bring awareness in the school systems and to the parents about the students progress in reading.

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Adolescent Eating Habits and Motivation at the Initiation of an mHealth Behavior Study

Background: In the United States, obesity is the most common chronic illness among adolescents, and it is especially prevalent in Black/African American and Hispanic/LatinX populations. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the prevalence of obesity for children aged 2 to 19 years old was 25.8% for Hispanic youth and 22% for non-Hispanic Black youth, compared to only 14.1% for non-Hispanic White youth. Excess weight has put millions of Black and Hispanic/LatinX adolescents in the US at risk for morbidity and premature mortality. However, communications technology offers a novel way to deliver tailored health behavior interventions for these youth. As part of a larger project to design an app to help adolescents make healthy choices at fast food restaurants (FFR), we assessed participants’ fast food eating habits and their willingness to consider making changes when eating out.

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CHEAR Research Project

Background: Obesity is prevalent among adolescents living in the United States, and Black/African American and Hispanic/LatinX adolescents are disproportionately affected. Between 2018-19, the prevalence of obesity for Caucasian youth aged 10-17 years old was 11.5%, while the prevalence for Hispanic youth was 20.7%, and for Black youth the prevalence was 22.9%. Recent studies have shown that fast food franchises target areas with a high density of minority youth, leading to increased fast food consumption. However, with the emerging use of technology, mobile applications can help encourage adolescents to make healthier food choices and improve daily health habits. Tailored app content including images that are viewed as appealing and personally relevant provide a promising way to increase the effectiveness of mHealth applications. Yet little is known about Hispanic/Latinx teens’ preferences regarding images to be used in a health promotion app.

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Simulation of intracardiac electrograms to aid in the study of cardiac arrhythmias

The main task of my project is to study the electrocardiogram(ECG) of human hearts, by building a model that can simulate the heart beats and then train it to be able to read in data from patients in real-life and give a diagnose through machine learning. The human heart Myocytes beats under the flow of ions(in-and-out and among cells) causing changes in voltages on cell membranes, which can be measured(through ECG). Under abnormal conditions, these regular changes will be disrupted, causing chaos in the electric flows in certain pattern(based on the specific illness). The change of voltage based on time can be expressed in mathematical ways using a set of differential equations. The features of the cells can be captured through object oriented programming: they all have periodic pulses but in different patterns due to their specific role in heart. After building such model, we can train it with data from real patients so that it will give a primary judgement on new patients. This tool is meant to help doctors, especially who works in emergency, with a relatively reliable suggestion which may improve the efficiency of giving a medical diagnose.

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