The Robinson lab in the School of Medicine, Department of Biological Structure, is looking for student volunteers to help in our lab for the summer and into the next school year. We are a neuroscience primate research lab working on vision-related research. Your position will include learning to handle primates safely, immunohistochemistry of brain sections, prep and processing of brain tissue, helping set-up experiments, data analysis, and other basic lab duties.
In the Robinson Lab, we are a small group that studies the role of the cerebellum in voluntary eye movements called saccades. We record extracellularly from neurons in the caudal part of the most medial cerebellar nucleus, the fastigial nucleus. We record saccade-related activity of cerebellar neurons in awake non-human primates (rhesus macaques). We use the recording to work out the roles of different cerebellar neurons in eye movements. We also do anatomical experiments. Currently we use immunohistochemistry to identify different proteins expressed by neurons that produce eye movements. We plan to use data from these experiments to develop therapies for eye movement abnormalities.
The Neitz and Robinson labs collaborate to use monkey eye movements to investigate color vision. The Neitz group uses rhesus monkeys as a model of human color vision. Like humans, rhesus monkeys have three types of color photoreceptors in the retina: S, M, and L cones. This means they probably see colors almost exactly like we do. The goal of this experiment is to enhance cone sensitivity to a certain wavelength of light via gene therapy. If successful, we are a big step closer to a therapy for people with color blindness.
Please contact me if you are interested in applying and include a resume and short paragraph about your experience (with animals / animal training, research, programming, etc…) and interest in the working in the lab. Minimum commitment of at least six months is required. No prior experience is okay.
-Nicole Mattson
