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As you read this article, your eyes capture the light and your brain deciphers it into bits of tangible information – such as colors, outlines, words, and ideas.
At the same time, other regions of the brain reflexively use light-derived information to control other visual functions, such as biological clock programming, eye muscle movement control during reading, and even reading. influence of your mood. Much of this non-imaging activity occurs in a small, yet poorly understood, section of the middle brain, called the thalamus, in structures such as the ventral lateral geniculate nucleus (vLGN).
Ubadah Sabbagh, a Virginia Tech graduate student in translational biology, medicine and health at VTC's Fralin Biomedical Research Institute, will create the first atlas of cellular and molecular features of the vLGN.
VLGN is a remarkably unexplored area of the brain. To improve our understanding, I generate the first complete description of the spatial distribution and molecular signatures of vLGN primary cells. I hope that by unmasking the landscape of this part of the brain, we will begin to better understand the role it plays in the treatment of visual information. "
Ubadah Sabbagh, a graduate student in translational biology, medicine and health from Virginia Tech, a member of the Society for Neuroscience
From there, Sabbagh will use a collection of benign viruses designed to cross void spaces between neurons, drawing tracing circuits between the eye and the vLGN. This will allow him to rank the very first cells to receive visual input into this area of the brain.
To support its research, the National Institutes of Health awarded Sabbagh a $ 390,000 diversity promotion award in the Neuroscience Postgraduate Master Plan (D-SPAN). Designed to support outstanding doctoral students from neuroscience research and under-represented, the D-SPAN program was awarded to only 18 students from across the country in 2018.
Sabbagh's remaining tuition fees, travel to conferences, post-doctoral salary and research expenses will be covered for the next six years.
"Ubadah is a delightful graduate student to have in our program.He has this rare combination of ambition, pbadion for science, intellectual curiosity and a burning desire to change the world through the discovery that makes the world better, "Friedlander said. , executive director of the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute and vice president of health sciences and technology at Virginia Tech. "The many forms of recognition that he has received testify to his hard work and the exceptional mentorship provided by his thesis supervisor at the institute, Dr. Michael Fox."
Last year, one of the results of Sabbagh and Fox was published in the Journal of Neurochemistry. They discovered the presence of two new perineuronal network populations in the vLGN with distinct protein markers.
"This is a wonderful award that recognizes Ubadah's potential as a future scientist and helps to recognize the hard work he has devoted to not only researching his thesis but also popular science, advocacy and education, "Fox said.
Earlier this month, Sabbagh received the first Ben Barres Fellowship presented by the Cold Spring Harbor Lab. This award, named in honor of the late Stanford professor, a giant among neuroscientists, annually recognizes an outstanding graduate student.
Sabbagh immigrated to the United States at the age of 16 when he began studying biology at Longview Community College in Kansas City, Missouri. He earned a B.Sc. in Biology with Honors in Bioinformatics from the University of Missouri – Kansas City, where he researched potential biomarkers of nighttime eating syndrome using computer tools. He hopes to finish his doctorate in 2021.
By using his expertise in the neurobiology of visual system development, Sabbagh hopes to one day end up with a permanent position that will allow him to develop treatments to restore vision in the diseases of blindness.
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