Let me tell you a little bit about my BSc Neuroscience project, which I'll be working on for the next two months. I'll be investigating the role played by a protein, p35, on the development of the hippocampus, a part of the brain involved in learning and memory formation. p35 is an important neuronal-specific activator of Cdk5, which plays a critical role in neuronal migration and brain development, and has many neurocytoskeletal substrates. Click here for an abstract of a review paper. Mice lacking Cdk5 or p35 expression demonstrate marked cortical abnormalities, but the effect of p35 loss on the hippocampus has not been extensively investigated. Hippocampal tissue extracts from Cdk5 knockout mice show significantly decreased axonal outgrowth and axonal growth cone morphology, and my short project will investigate whether similar effects are observed in hippocampal tissue from p35 knockout mice. I won't discuss the methods I'll use here as they're quite technical and boring to read through, but please send me a message if you're interested and I'd be happy to tell you about them.
Oh, and Happy Valentine's Day!
Moc
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