Transitions – Christina becomes an undergraduate neuroscientist at Cornell University
By Christina Cheng and Jim Stellar
Christina graduated high school and went to Cornell University after working some at the University Albany in a neuroscience laboratory while still in high school and after writing a previous blog with Jim. She has been at Cornell for a year and a half, and we are now reflecting on what such a transition means and how that college experience is itself an example of learning from cognitive-emotional integration, not unlike the classic experiential education activities of an internship like she did at UAlbany, but much more serious.
I’ve spent one year already as a student at Cornell, in the humble yet vibrant town of Ithaca. I have met people who aren’t accustomed to the mustard yellow license plates of New York, who’ve never worn green shirts to get free ice cream at Stewart’s on St Patrick’s Day, who’ve never experienced weather below 30 degrees. Likewise, I learn about new things – the infamous Wawa in Pennsylvania, San Francisco’s hills, a “renowned” buffet in Alabama.
During my first semester, I enjoyed studying in Temple of Zeus. It’s a cafe in the Arts and Sciences building, where many people come to do coffee chats, agonize over classes, munch on hazelnut croissants and bean soup, and meander through as they go to their discussions in Goldwin Smith, the humanities building adjacent (and frankly, connected).
So, how are you adapting in terms of your studies?
I always thought I could only study in quiet spaces. But Zeus bustles with lively energy. Maybe I do enjoy slight eavesdropping on finance people and the scratch of chalk on the blackboards adjacent to the tables. There is a part of my brain that feels satisfied when I sit at the marble tables.
That is great. Now tell us about your emergence as a neuroscience student.
I am a neurobiology and behavior major. That means taking classes that delve into the anatomy and function of the brain, neural mechanisms underlying human and animal behaviors like decision making, memory consolidation, etc. Last year, in my spring semester, I took a class called “How the Brain Makes the Mind”. It discussed multiple concepts from cognitive neuroscience, such as how the brain is made up of modules, but also contains numerous networks that work together in order to do something. How we think is the product of these biological processes and interactions between different regions.
This is why I think the intersection of neuroscience and medicine is so fascinating.
Now tell us about that work you are doing in a neurobiology research laboratory.
I am part of a lab in the neurobiology and behavior department that studies “how previously acquired memories guide future decisions.” I administer behavior tasks, do electrophysiology, and work at the lab bench to use immunohistochemistry to visualize the rat brain in action. Our team has a maze where we allow the rat to run a certain task in which they must find the reward which is constantly changing. In this maze, the reward is sugar water that is ejected from small ports when the rat approaches. After a period of time of running the tasks, the rat is implanted with electrodes to conduct neural recordings of brain waves during the task. Eventually, the brain is also sliced, mounted and stained to visualize which parts of the brain are implicated in navigational learning and decision making.
My work makes me often ponder my own navigation as a college student. On any given day, how do I decide to take the path behind the space sciences building to get to Kennedy Hall for class, or to take a stroll down Tower Road? How do I know how to get to Bethe Dining from Stocking Hall, a path I have never taken before? When I see certain people, how does the location in which I reside contribute to what I know about that person? How do I move around the dining hall deciding what food to get?
I often think about what happens when one’s brain deteriorates. This could be due to age, or environmental factors like upbringing, or stressors, or lifestyle choices. I am fascinated by neurodegenerative diseases that involve memory decline in older people. Similarly, I often wonder how people’s perception of themselves and the world play into the development of mental disorders, such as those treated by psychiatry.
What about the example of memory in Alzheimer’s disease? Networking. “Dog” ? family dog, big dogs, small dogs. In Alzheimer’s, nodes of that cognitive network get weaker and thinner and the patient ends up with a concept of a dog that is just a generic dog with all the richness and nuance lost.
That is really interesting. I had a conversation with two of my friends who described how when they think of the word “apple” or “cow”, they cannot picture it in their head, as in they cannot form an image of the object in blank space. I would say I cannot see every single detail on the object, but I can definitely form an image in my mind of what an apple would look like, whether it is sitting on a table or just suspended in mid air. Is this an intrinsic genetic difference amongst people, or is the way we describe our capability to envision the object just different between people? This may possibly be related to the cognitive network that deteriorates in neurodegenerative diseases.
I’ve been pondering lately over how to have intentional memory. That is, the idea that each conversation we have can strengthen our memories. At college, I find many conversations easily remain shallow. We talk about exams, the weather, and plans for the next few days. We don’t recall the past. Or even the life we have at home. It is easy to learn at one moment that a friend owns a black cat and lives in a ranch style home and doesn’t have a drivers license and has this particular odd tradition for Thanksgiving, and remember this information. Conversely, how often do we inquire about cultural differences of growing up in an urban California environment versus a suburban Albany town? Do we have similar Asian food markets nearby and did we enjoy the same Meiji snacks from them?
I too am sometimes guilty of forgetting where a person is from. Not that it is a horrible thing to do, but it should make us value the worth of one conversation much more, and never take for granted the opportunity for a second. After all, I now confidently believe that conversations can be vehicles for memory consolidation.
By intentionally fostering conversations that are enriching, we are more likely to remember other details about people that we would otherwise forget. Pictures are of great worth, but even the deep laughter of a simple conversation that brings back memories is more to cherish.
What I find interesting about the above paragraphs is the idea of intentionality. It is clear that it enhances memory. In fact one of the theories I teach in my introductory psychology class is that moving from a very short form of sensory storage of information to short-term memory requires attention. For example, we all have the experience of someone telling us something at a social gathering when we were not paying attention. Then you ask “What did you say?” And when you pay that attention, then you know what they said. At that point you either have to listen to them tell you again or contradict yourself and say you now know what they said. To me here, intentionality is being present, paying attention, letting the experience become part of you, and growing from it. Isn’t that how you grow in general as well as form friendships. Isn’t that what college is all about in general and why one should not “blow it off” but should be intentional about it?
This blog is part of a series between two neuroscientists at opposite ends of the age-spectrum. Yet it not only illustrates that such an interaction is possible, but that it is based on what is in our brains that does not change with age. We each have a planning, thinking, speaking neocortex that imagines us being neuroscientists and doing things to execute that. We both have a limbic system that is doing a running evaluation of that plan or mental program, in Jim’s case with plenty of back-story. But that limbic system also is part of our interaction, based on trust developed over years. Together, this heart-head interaction (limbic system – neocortex) is what drives these blogs. Stay tuned to see where this interaction leads in our next blog.
