New in neurobiology (brain implantable microscopes) from a company perspective
By Adora Idemudia UA’28 Jim Stellar
In this blog, we (really AI) interviewed Dr. Rebecca Fallon of Inscopix. She is a Sales Development Manager there with a PhD degree in neuroscience from The Johns Hopkins University. The questions we will ask are about what is new in neurobiology. It is this combination of technology and medicine into which AI wants to go when she graduates. Also, truth-be-told, Dr. Fallon is JS’ niece.
First, we want to note the tremendous advances in neuroscience techniques, one of which involves this company. They make and sell tiny microscopes that even mice can wear comfortably on their heads. The idea is to be able to couple that with advances in molecular genetics where scientists can make neurons fluoresce when they become active. This microscope lets you see many hundreds of them doing what looks like twinkling as if they were stars. This method gives a new neural population-level insight into brain function that is leading to new discoveries that are helping the field to better understand normal function and disease. In turn, that could lead to models of important human pathologies, and the hope is that those insights will lead to new treatments.
From speaking to Dr. Fallon, AI noted that she wanted to succeed while remaining true to her identity and interests in people, and to maintaining the important connection between science and humanity, despite her advanced degree (PhD) from one of the country’s leading institutions.
Thinking about her own career (AI) asked how Dr. Fallon got interested in neuroscience. As AI has paraphrased (italics), Dr. Fallon said:
Her family has a history in neuroscience, with her grandfather (Eliot Stellar) and uncle (JS) being neuroscientists. Furthermore, Dr. Fallon explains that her older sister’s neurological birth defect, spina bifida, gave her a personal exposure that piqued her curiosity. Past her familiarity with the field, Dr. Fallon said her interest in neuroscience correlates with her interest in humanity and decision making. She wanted to know why people behave the way they do, on a biological level, zooming on the brain as it is the ultimate “behavior and decision making tool.” And with that thought, creating some similarities between humans regardless of our many differences. Overall she attributes the choice to stay in science and neuroscience to her wanting to answer her questions around human nature and the brain’s specific role in the divergence from human nature into individuality.
Curious about Dr. Fallon’s academic career, AI then asks Dr. Fallon about her transition from University at Rochester to John Hopkins University. She said:
Both are high level schools with similar professors, hinting at a small difference in rigor. However, she explains the difference in funding for research, stating that top schools get more money to go after larger topics and questions, whereas even slightly lower schools get less money, giving them less freedom. On this topic, AI asks Dr. Fallon how she got research experience during her undergraduate. She explains how she was on the swim team for three years and decided to drop it her senior year to join a lab as science was a great passion of hers already.
Speaking about how she (AI) has thought about emailing professors to join labs for undergraduate research experience, AI asked Dr. Fallon how she got her undergraduate research experience?
She said:
She did exactly what AI had brought up. She looked at different professors, labs, and job listings on the university website and was able to find a job in the behavioral core facility. Elaborating on core facilities, she explained that some universities, such as her own, would find commonality among different labs and create a space that holds resources that can be borrowed by different labs–similar to a library. Making it so that labs are not restricted by funds and have necessary resources for smooth conduction. She continued speaking of her experience in the behavioral core facility, recounting learning of different types of behaviors and interacting with different equipment. She worked there for a year, encountering learning models taught in class such as classical and operant conditioning, and being able to implement them in person. She worked on about 7-8 projects around the area, specializing in those behavior methods. She was then able to get a job using her behavioral neuroscience specialty and used that to develop different skills, including microscopy. After developing and refining those skills for four years, that is how she was able to decide her PhD focus.
AI asked Dr. Fallon to elaborate about her thought process surrounding her PhD. She said:
As previously spoken about, she was already versed in behavior and behavioral neuroscience. From experience, she also became versed in addiction and addiction neuroscience. But there were still things she was not good at. She explained how at the University at Rochester, majors did not have a defined pathway, and were instead full of individually chosen classes that fell into the category and fulfilled requirements but still aligned with individual interests. So she had never taken college level chemistry, physics, biology, although she had taken AP Biology. However, even in high school classes like AP Biology Dr.Fallon excelled through memorization rather than base knowledge. Nonetheless, not letting her lack of experience in biology deter her, Dr. Fallon picked a biology related PhD program. She wanted to ask deeper questions, outside of her specialty, that would help her grow academically while contributing to medical and scientific advancement.
Lastly, Dr. Fallon went a bit more in depth about the brain implantable microscopes. She said:
Miniature microscopes are a piece of hardware that requires things like engineering and optics to be able to know the kind of glass to use and the distance needed between different parts to properly create images. Most neuroscientists do not know these specifics and the process that goes into determining them, only how to utilize the tool. Understanding this, an electrical engineer doing a PhD at Stanford University was in a lab with two mentors, one in engineering and one in neuroscience. The neuroscientist wanted a tool that did miniature imaging microscopy and needed an electrical engineer to build it. He had influence from both sides to be able to create the first miniature microscope as a piece of hardware but wanted to make it so that tool could actually be used. So Inscopix continued that with a small group that collects data from using the microscopes to test them and receive quick feedback. The company’s research and development team has both engineers and neuroscientists that collaborate to be able to make a really functional product once the company has one application or two applications that are popular and it’s going to be successful at.
AI is currently a sophomore and continues in a mentoring relationship with JS, including writing this blog. We plan to continue that interaction and discuss more lessons in blogs like this one about how an undergraduate pursues a career first in our university as a Honors Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Student and then after graduation wherever that takes her.
