Summer… How I longed for it’s coming during the academic year. It’s because during summer, as an undergraduate researcher, I could focus more energy towards making research progress instead of expending it on course loads, club duties, and the common stressors of everyday life. This summer, I had been fortunate enough to be involved in the Summer Training Academy for Researchers in the Sciences (STARS) program at the University of California, San Diego, through my participation in the University of California Leadership Excellence through Advanced DegreeS (UCLEADS) program. The transition from Santa Barbara to San Diego was smooth, as both had world class researchers, a beautiful campus surrounded by a breathtaking beach, and good, warm sun. Besides the recreational activities, which was fuel to work extra hard for the beauty that life had to offer, I was able to work on a project which could potentially make an impact.

I had been accepted into Professor Ratneshwar Lal’s group in the bioengineering department working on micro- and nano-scale vehicles for drug delivery for the duration of the program. My research involved designing a hierarchical template and fabricating a nano-janus particle which could be used for drug delivery. Micro- and nano-scale particles are of interest because of their tendency to accumulate within inflamed regions of the body. Furthermore, the nano-particles can accumulate without being noticed by P-glycoprotein, the protein that is responsible for multi-drug resistance. We were able to fabricate nano-particles as small as 200 nm, which is small enough to cross the blood brain barrier.

With the end of my summer research program came the calm before the storm. The brief moment of tranquility before the hair-pulling commotion which is graduate school applications. The fun is over now, it’s time to get serious. Step one was to study and sit for the graduate record examination (GRE). This was difficult in itself, because I felt that an exam which primarily measured the speed of which someone can do simple maths, or know ambiguous vocabulary words was irrelevant to graduate school success. Regardless, it had to be done. Once preparation began, it was simple enough to continue until exam day came. Afterwards, checking that box on my graduate school applications to-do list was a great relief alone.

Step one was over, and many steps remained: the statement of purpose, contacting potential faculty advisers, the application itself… but those are only the physical steps. There is one step that will continue until the very end. That step is the step where all applicants wonder-am I good enough, am I reaching too high, and why do I even bother?

Even though these thoughts linger on our minds, we proceed anyways, with slivers of hope to see the words “congratulations” in an official letter of acceptance. It’s in these words that we reconcile with ourselves and break into our happy dance. It’s these words that make every moment of unrest that was involved in the graduate school application worthwhile.

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Unlike the rest of my friends living in Santa Barbara, I was unable to enjoy the ocean breeze while tanning on the beach because I was engaged in my research for the last eight weeks. However, I am not disappointed by this because the long lasting memories and friendships I made in the Mitragotri lab have made up for the lack of time I had to soak in the summer sun. Before I discuss my experience in the lab, I would like to talk about me and the research I conducted in the summer.

Like most undergraduates, I entered UCSB unsure about my career path. I always knew that my ultimate goal is to pursue my interest in bioengineering and use the knowledge I gain to help treat diseases. However, the path to achieving my end goal had been unclear until I joined the Mitragotri lab. So what does the Mitragotri lab research? We focus on using nanoparticles as tools for drug delivery, and this summer, I was assigned to see how different shaped nanoparticles can be used to treat neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. For my project, I had two objectives: engineering and categorizing nanoparticles of various shapes (spheres, rods, disks), and identifying the mechanisms these various shaped nanoparticles undergo as they are internalized by the blood brain barrier surrounding the brain. So why is achieving these goals worth bragging about? It’s because by knowing the mechanism of how the nanoparticles are internalized, in the future, we can attach drugs to the nanoparticles along with targeting molecules to treat disease-specific sites in the brain. Through this, we will be able to treat the neurodegenerative diseases more efficiently and effectively. This research has been important for me as it allows me to explore various aspects of bioengineering. The knowledge I am gaining while working in lab is allowing me to be a master in my field of interest so that, eventually, I will make an everlasting contribution to our community.

Although one might argue that I thoroughly enjoy working in my lab because I am conducting research in the area I have always been passionate about, I know that my experience in the lab has been delightful due to the people in the lab. I consider myself to be fortunate enough to have had the opportunity to join this particular lab as it provides me with a nurturing environment, which makes the prospect of continuing research even more exciting. I believe that my research experience in the Mitragotri lab is invaluable due to my mentor, Tyler Brown. For most undergraduates, the lack of a good mentorship drives the undergraduates away from continuing their research.

Me and my graduate student mentor, Tyler

However, characteristics like compassion, enthusiasm, and experience that are present in my mentor allows me to appreciate my current research. Through my experiences with my mentor, I have realized that learning the various techniques in lab is not as important as it is to have someone who will support you through your failures and successes. It is necessary to have someone who recognizes your potential and provides you with opportunities that will help pave the path towards the future, which is exactly what Tyler does. Also, the encouragement I receive from the rest of the members of the lab is priceless as well. Working alongside the graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and undergraduates has been fun since we all are a group of friends who tease each other but also look out for one another. The friendly atmosphere of the lab makes research entertaining and mentally satisfying. Overall, due to my mentor and the rest of the lab members, who all care about me and my future, I can call the Mitragotri lab my second family.

Mitragotri Lab

Without the pressure from the heavy course load during the school, summer has always been the perfect time for me to get more involved with research, reform my lifestyle to restore all the unfortunate damages that I did to my body during the school year due to irregular sleeping schedule or unhealthy diets, and check off my bucket list. Since research has been a major component of my summer, let’s talk about my experience in conducting theoretical research first.

It has been a very interesting experience transitioning from an experimental lab group to a purely theoretical group. Unlike what many people associate scientific research with – wearing a chemical spill proof and ski-mask-like goggles, while tweaking your cutting ledge laser optics setup or cultivating your biological samples in an advanced lab isolated from the rest of the civilization, my research group simply does not perform research in a traditional lab setting. My own “lab” has been my petite yet fully capable 11” laptop. To me, it really is a great privilege to be able to have great flexibility in terms of how and where I could work on pushing advances in my project. My comfortable apartment could immediately be turned into a lab as I wish, and so could a secluded coffee shop, or even a close by beach could be a lab if I really wanted to expose myself to some much needed vitamin D!

My lab has similar perks to this

Although as dreamy as it would sound to conduct “research” at any beautiful beach that Santa Barbara has to offer, I do appreciate very much that I have an office in our physics department’s main building Broida that my faculty advisor reserved for me. It is where I spent most of my time and having an office where I can concentrate without distraction has undeniably contributed to the progress that I’ve made in my project so far.

A sneak peak to the kind of data that I work with. Courtesy to the Human Connectome Project. Click on the picture to learn more about Human Connectome Project

Now without getting into the specifics of my own research on network neuroscience, which will be reserved for my final oral and poster presentations, I do want to touch on the new things that I learned regarding research in this summer. This is my third summer doing undergraduate research and, in my opinion and from past experiences, the hardest part in research is not necessary the lab work itself, which undoubtedly could be very tough in various aspects, but the process of bridging your knowledge and insights that you gained in your own project with the existing literature. Depending on your field, the literature could be incredibly rich or in the case of relatively new fields, a coherent and unified school of thoughts could be lacking. It then could be challenging, yet equally interesting at the same time, to form interpretations from your own data, and be able to confidently defend your own data and methods when it’s faced with different results from the literature. As a young student with relatively limited research experience, the process of improving experimental methods and advancing the understanding in the field based on the existing literature is something that I’m still learning. And it is needless to say that it truly is a privilege to be able to contribute new information to the general knowledge to certain scientific fields.

Saw the beautiful Milky Way when I hiked up to Lizard’s mouth at night

Besides research, I have had the time to be eating way healthier unprocessed food compared to my horrifically nutritionally deficient diets during the school year. Combined with better sleeping schedule and exercising habits, this summer has been a great one and I feel fully charged to take on another challenging, schedule packed fall quarter in a month!