By Mariam Melkumyan With Thanksgiving a few days away, it seems very hard to find things to be grateful about this year. 2020 gave us COVID-19, environmental issues, political and human rights movements, terrorist attacks and hostility all over the world, including a war in my home country Armenia, and a crazy, stressful period of … Continue reading The Neuroscience Behind Gratitude

By Gaelyn Lyons Photo Credit: American Red Cross In the US, someone needs blood every two seconds (American Red Cross, n.d.-a). To put in perspective how much blood is needed, someone involved in a car accident may need up to 100 units of blood, which is about 100 pints. Importantly, blood isn’t only given to … Continue reading Short on Blood: How the COVID-19 Pandemic Led to a Blood Shortage

By Elizabeth Lesko (Paris Catacombs – By Vlastula at the English language Wikipedia) If you’re anything like me, you love a good museum. Most cities in the world have at least a local history museum to their name, and an afternoon spent wandering through one can be a great way to learn about a culture. … Continue reading Morbid Museums: The Ethics of Displaying Human Remains

By Rebecca Fleeman We are consistently told that throughout our lives we should “eat right and exercise”. Ask anyone why diet and physical activity are important, and they will likely respond with answers on disease prevention and longevity. The general public is largely aware that a bad diet can lead to weight gain, and that … Continue reading Food for Thought: How Diet Can Affect Your Brain

By Olivia Marx Did you know that there are more genetic differences between populations of Africa than there are between Africans and Eurasians?1 Despite the worldwide diversity of genetic sequences, most of the thousands of genomes that have been recorded have been from people of European background. Even with the decades of time and effort … Continue reading Disparities in Genetic Testing Widens the Gap in Medical Treatment for Minorities

By Julia Simpson Setting the scene for November 21st, 1975: The Vietnam War had ended in April1 and the success of the US-Soviet Apollo-Soyuz mission in July offered hope of geopolitical stability2. NASA’s Venera 9 mission departed Earth for Venus in June, and in October, it beamed back the first-ever images of another planet’s surface3. … Continue reading How Brian May Genetically Recombined Rock Music with Astrophysics in 1975

By Stephanie Baringer Many trainees enter graduate school because they truly enjoy performing experiments. They live off the feeling of when an assay finally works after months of optimization. For some, the highs of success outweigh the lows of failed experiments. However, the thought of becoming a principal investigator (PI) and running your own lab, … Continue reading Benchwork Outside of Academia: A Career Interview with an Industry Scientist

By Joseph Cirilo Have you ever experienced one of those days where you come home after a long day of work, sit down to relax to some Netflix or Hulu, and then whatever you decide to watch throws work right back into your face? Well, I recently had this experience while watching the TV show … Continue reading Heart to Heart: How a Single Nucleotide Change Can Restructure the Heart

By Elizabeth Lesko The history of medical science is long and strenuous, full of great leaps followed by dark ages, brilliant minds tempered by the mores of their time. While we would all like to believe that we live in an enlightened time, full of people who trust the best practices of medical professionals, the … Continue reading A Brief History of Anatomy as Told Through Art

By Rebecca Fleeman Photo Credit: PxHere As a Florida girl, born and raised, I am often asked why I chose to attend graduate school in Pennsylvania, a state with cold and snowy winters. Family, friends, and colleagues immediately ask, why I would leave such “vacation-type” weather, then quickly follow up with “so, do you plan … Continue reading How Does Summer Turn to Fall?