I’m a student Veterinary Medicine from Utrecht University, currently finishing my 6th and last year of the studies. Also, I am doing a PhD on canine intervertebral disc disease at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, and I expect to defend my thesis in January of next year. I am working in the Schaffer-Nishimura lab as a 3-month summer student, as a part of the Cornell Leadership program for Veterinary students. I am working under Prof. Schaffer and Dr. Nishimura on a mouse model used to study the effects of cerebral microhemorrhages, which are considered a causative factor for cognitive disease such as dementia, on neurons of the brain. In this particular study, we are employing mice in which the somatostasin inhibitory neurons of the brain are labeled with green fluorescent protein (GFP). The neurons and the effects of the microhemorrhages are studied by way of in vivo imaging through a surgically made window in the top of the skull using two photon excited fluorescent microscopy.
