Last week, in response to this recent post circulating social media, we asked our students:

What is the topic of your thesis, in 20 words or less?

Here are the responses!

New students reciting the Graduate Student Oath at their white coat ceremony (2011).

I make mutant viruses and utilize drugs to study how herpes simplex virus spreads from the mouth into neurons. –Jillian Carmichael, 4th-year Biomedical Sciences Ph.D. student

Patients with vascular disease in their legs also have less blood going to the heart. –Amanda Ross, 3rd-year Neuroscience Ph.D. student

I try to stop glaucoma by making cells less energetic. –Daniel Hass, 3rd-year Neuroscience Ph.D. student

This muscle protein is found in the inner ear. Necessary? Apparently, since otherwise, you go deaf. –Lina Jamis, graduate, Anatomy Master’s program

Studying poop to see how changes in bacteria can lead to disease in patients without a colon. Poop donations accepted! –Katie Schieffer, 4th-year Biomedical Sciences Ph.D. student

A lot of people with sleep apnea have metabolic syndrome. Which comes first? Dunno. Let’s study kids! –Jordan Gaines Lewis, 5th-year Neuroscience Ph.D. student

Figuring out which genes make the body stretchy. –Erin Sproul, graduate, Biomedical Engineering Ph.D. program