Abhinav Grama, G2
Abhinav Grama comes from an engineering background. His undergraduate major was biotechnology, an amalgamation of chemical engineering and biology, which suited his desire to take an analytical approach to biology. During his undergraduate studies, he received summer fellowships at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, the European Neuroscience Institute Goettingen, and the University of Cambridge. His work in these internships varied from performing yeast two-hybrid screens to single-cell calcium imaging. At the end of his first internship, Abhinav knew that he wanted to continue studying science, and ENI Goettingen helped him settle on neuroscience. He applied to MCB because he appreciated the questions the faculty and students in neuroscience were researching as well as the approaches they were taking.
On his rotation, Abhinav is presently working in Professor Florian Engert’s lab. The Engert lab uses zebrafish to investigate the visual system and innate behavior. Abhinav employs in vivo calcium imaging in the optic tectum to check for the presence of recurrent excitation (i.e., cells) in the tectum activating other tectal cells via horizontal connections. Abhinav finds the science behind the experiments very interesting. As interesting, is his use of the Engert lab’s homemade two-photon microscope to look at the responses of the tectal cells. Abhinav had to learn the techniques and begin implementing them in under a week to acquire data. That was an exciting challenge, but now he’s on to another one, learning how to patch cells in the tectum in the next couple of weeks. Apart from the science, Abhinav has found the social atmosphere in Florian’s lab very welcoming. People take the time to talk, play fussball now and then, and share the occasional beer. Abhinav has found Profesor Engert to be extremely friendly as well as a patient teacher.
When he first arrived at MCB, Abhinav thought he would head for molecular neurobiology. But now, almost at the end of his rotations, he has decided to take up systems neuroscience. MCB has a number of people working in this system in different model organisms, asking a variety of questions. He finds that people are very friendly and approachable and there is a lot of interaction between the labs. Abhinav says his time at MCB has been “great,” and he looks forward to his coming years of research.
