Photo Courtesy: Thomas R. Klein School of Law

A panel of three experts in the healthcare field gathered Nov. 6 in the Thomas R. Kline School of Law to discuss “Obamacare After the Election: Apocalypse or Resurrection” with about 25 students and professors, who were scattered comfortably in the lecture room. Public health-care law played an important role in the midterm Congressional elections, especially, after both the House and the Senate gained a substantial Republican majority.

These panelists were recruited by professor of law and health care management policy Robert Field to discuss the future of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) now that the Republicans have taken the House and the Senate.

“The question is what’s likely to happen — what are the Republicans likely to do in the new congress?” Field asked while mediating the discussion.

Mark Pauly, who sat behind a name card that read “What would the Republicans do?” was the first to offer insight on three aspects of the act that Republicans would like to see gone.

“The sense that the government can only get things done by raising taxes or increasing control of the economy or interfering in peoples’ lives is something that Republicans don’t accept,” Pauly said. He went on to say that he identified more with the Republican party because as an economist he was in strong favor of market reforms.

“[President Barack Obama] has said he’d be interested in modifications as long as they don’t go to the core of the legislations. The most obvious ones are some of the taxes, particularly the medical device tax,” Pauly continued.

He elaborated that this tax, which is levied , does not actually raise much money and is one that the Democrats have even expressed skepticism about.

“The second thing they would like to get rid of is the employer mandate. It’s a mandate for firms to provide coverage to their full time workers,” Pauly explained, “The third one is individual mandate — people have to buy health insurance even when they don’t want to.”

As the director of the Pennsylvania Health Access Network and fellow panelist, Antoinette Kraus helps such people without healthcare find affordable providers.

She spoke on what the midterms brought to Pennsylvania’s healthcare reform in the area of Medicaid with the election of

“What’s going to happen in Pennsylvania now that we’ve got Governor-elect Wolf?” Kraus asked, “Well, we’ve seen the Wolf administration make comments that they are for a full Medicaid expansion.” She went on to say that if Wolf moves quickly, the national legislature shouldn’t intervene since the initiative has already been approved.

Healthcare consultant Paula Stillman, the third panelist, chimed in that although she had been unable to find much information about Wolf’s position on health care reform, she understood several factors of it. “The main points are that he supports freedom of choice for women, he would like to expand the state Medicaid plan and he’d like Pennsylvania to develop its own state exchange rather than using federal exchange.”

Mediator Field then brought up the issue of public health, which has become a major issue within the last year due to the Ebola outbreak. “It was kind of an implicit issue in the election with just the sense that the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are] not doing what it should be doing. Is public health now more on the national consciousness? Is this going to be more of a political debate going forward?” he asked the panelists.

“I think access is only one piece of the public health puzzle,” Kraus spoke addressing the fact that mandating health care would not solve the public health problem, “I think what we’re seeing is just because people have health insurance coverage that doesn’t make them necessarily healthier. It’s educating folks about the importance of going to your primary care doctor.”

“We actually followed up with about three hundred folks that we enrolled last year and in July, 60 percent of folks had still not visited their primary care physician or even thought about choosing one,” Kraus continued.

“I don’t think the Affordable Care Act will [repealed], but I think the thing we have to concentrate on now is improving access to care, quality of that care and figuring out how to measure outcomes of that care,” Stillman chimed in.

Field’s final question of the night was if the panelists saw healthcare and the ACA being a national issue in the upcoming 2016 elections.

“If we look at the percentage of the gross national product health care has to be an issue because healthcare consumes,” Stillman said, “and there are many indications that the quality is not that high so we’re paying for health care that might not be optimal so it’s got to be a political issue. In order to make meaningful change in the way people get healthcare, we have to follow the money and look at who determines the costs. It could be the patient, it could be the primary health care physician [or] it could be the health system.”

Evan Gooberman, a second-year master of public health student, attended the panel because the topics discussed pertain to his future career.

“I think the most pressing issue here is the continued polarization between the two parties and the lack of ability to not just compromise but to work together,” Gooberman said, “Healthcare is a huge issue because like they were saying at the end everyone needs healthcare at some point — multiple points during their lives and for our country to be so divided and not be able to come to conclusions about it is very troubling.”

The three panelists currently work for The Field Clinic, a blog that Field runs. Further predictions and stipulations of theirs can be found at http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/fieldclinic/

The post Panel talks on Obamacare after Republican take over appeared first on The Triangle.

Photo Credit: Allison Liu

It’s difficult to avoid the cost of housing at college but Drexel’s prices are more expensive than most. On Oct. 20, Business Insider shared eCollegeFinder’s compiled list of the country’s most expensive room and board at universities, and Drexel came out at number four.

According to data from the National Center for Education Statistics, one solid year of room and board costs the average student here about $14,415 per year — that’s just over $1,200 per month. Nationwide, the campus sits pretty behind three other city-based universities — the New York School of Interior Design, The Boston Conservatory and the University of California, Berkeley. However, it claims the title of most expensive housing in the state.

City-based universities typically have more expensive housing than suburban schools. The real estate in West Philadelphia in particular is highly sought and students have to compete for housing with fellow city residents. Factors such as proximity, curb-appeal and safety contribute to the cost of some housing facilities close to campus.

In addition to this, the quarter system means that Drexel students need to be on campus for a longer time period than most students at semester schools.

“Drexel’s quarter system (fall, winter, spring) is 234 days while the average number of days for semester schools is 214 — resulting in an additional 20 days of services provided at Drexel,” Christopher Heasley, executive director of university housing at Drexel, explained in an email, suggesting what might make Drexel more expensive than other Philadelphian higher education establishments such as University of Pennsylvania and Temple University.

In fact, staying on campus for three terms at Drexel means that students have to live on campus nearly a month longer than their semester contemporaries. The difference becomes even more significant when considering that many students stay the full year in Philadelphia due to co-op programs.

“This factor certainly impacts the cost differential between Drexel University and semester-term schools,” Heasely wrote.

Further, the University’s two-year residency program that President John A. Fry enacted in 2012 mandates that students remain Drexel’s nine dorms span prices between $6,000 and $13,500 per year. Rather high, but competitive with surrounding affiliated housing complexes which drove the average cost of Drexel housing up to $14,415 per year.

Sanjay Patel, a pre-junior business administration student, currently lives in Evo — an apartment building close to campus on 29th and Chestnut Streets priced at $1,550 per month ($18,600 per year). He was drawn to the pricier housing option by the lavish amenities and convenience the complex offers.

“It’s not too far from campus which helped a lot that there was not much walking to do for classes,” Patel said.

“One other thing is that there are no other expenses on my part besides rent. Internet, cable TV and all the utilities are included in the monthly rent so I wouldn’t have to worry about so many different bills each month,” Patel went on.

Evo is one of several more costly affiliated housing establishments on campus. Students agree that complexes like these provide safety and put one in a comfortable vicinity of the school.

“As long as the housing is on the campus, the different buildings can afford to charge more because of the location. Since it’s on campus, people don’t have to walk far and parents know that it’s in a safe area so they can have some peace of mind,” Patel said.

However, some students go the opposite route and move into houses after their freshman year to try to save money.

“I think that on campus, [places] like Chestnut Square and University Crossings are really overpriced. I lived in Chestnut last year and it was great because everything was all-inclusive but I honestly paid so much money for it and I was kind of dissatisfied with the furniture,” Rebecca McCool, pre-junior health science major, stated.

McCool currently lives in the Powelton Village area, where rent can be as low as $500 dollars per month. Her housing includes no amenities or furniture.

The two-year housing initiative allows students to live off-campus if they submit an application to the Office of University Housing, where Heasley works. As long as their housing meets all the zoning requirements for the city of Philadelphia it should be approved.

“I think most students chose to live in off-campus apartments because it’s cheaper for the most part, you don’t have to deal with the security — so you don’t have to always sign people in, sign people out. It’s just more like [with] your own space, you feel more adult,” McCool explained.

“Some disadvantages are the safety I guess, like I know a lot of people where I live get bikes stolen all the time and things like that,” McCool said.

Zaid Salman, sophomore biology major, described the process of finding housing at Drexel as a game. “It’s like monopoly, kind of. For two years you have to live on-campus.”

Salaman currently lives in University Crossings, an affiliated housing complex that costs $3,300 per term or $13,200 for the full year.

“[Freshmen] have to live in the dorms, [sophomores] have to stay on campus. After the dorms, students either stay in their Drexel housing or go to houses around campus. That’s what my roommates and I are going to do for next year,” Salman said.

Another downside of Drexel dorms seems to be their age and the overlooked upkeep.

“I lived in Towers my freshman year and University Crossings my sophomore year. Both of those places were not the nicest places to live and were more on the older side of buildings,” Patel recalled.

“When I lived in Myers, the bathrooms were always breaking, everything’s old, the carpet smells. So we pay them so much for this housing, but Drexel doesn’t really renew them,” Salman said.

The high price to pay for living closer to campus seems to lean towards the safety and proximity aspects. The $14,415 per year average rate suggests that students are choosing closer, pricier options placing their safety and convenience before their wallets.

With the assistance of 3-D glasses and a projection screen, biologists are now able to study their slides as if they were standing directly on the

Photo Courtesy: Eric Wait

glass itself. Associate professor of electrical and computer engineering Andrew Cohen led the development of the innovative software that makes this possible.

The software was crafted to analyze data biologists have collected using 3-D microscopes. Using the same type of 3-D gaming hardware many use recreationally, Cohen and his team created a cutting edge visual program that allows biologists to see what they’re studying in five dimensions: The x, y and z planes, plus color and time.

“We want to find the knobs and switches that control how the cells behave, ideally, and although it sounds like a biology problem, I think of it very much as an engineering problem,”  Cohen said.

The team uses a software program they developed called LEVER — Lineage Editing and Validation program — to track and tag the cells they are interested in. After the equations have been performed on the cell images, the user can identify the exact point the cells are dividing and zoom in on their area of interest, obtaining a spatial understanding not possible looking through a microscope.

“Now you can watch the cells’ movement over and over again, inside the space,” Eric Wait, a doctoral researcher in Cohen’s lab, said.

The software enables scientists to look at cells more comprehensively. Slipping on the 3-D glasses allows one to see how close the cells exist in relation to each other and exactly where they touch and divide. Think of it as the biological kin to the added clarity software maps allow when zooming in on a specific geographic location.

The new visual perspective has been helping biologists in Albany, New York, at the Neural Stem Cell Institute that Cohen has been collaborating with since 2005. Chris Bjornsson, a research scientist at the institute, provides Cohen’s lab with the data the institute collects. He is part of a project that studies neurogenesis — using this 3-D software to study how the stem cells’ environments impact their growth, development and aging.

“Stem cells have a lot of promise for practical application for spinal cord injuries, for neurodegenerative disease, but in order to use them as a treatment you really would like to understand how they work,” Cohen said.

“Really there’s no way to visualize these cells or get any quantitative data out of our studies without using the software these guys have developed,” Bjornsson said.

The program is still in its beginning stages but holds the potential to lead to great therapeutic advancements.

“Many of the same mathematical techniques we use to characterize a computer will also characterize exactly how stem cells work,” Cohen continued.

“The idea would be, once we have our tools sharpened and we can get data accurately, then we can do some problematic analysis,” Wait said. “Now that we know we can get this data, let’s take a bunch of different tests and start discovering why these things happen. Is it actually something the stem cells do? Or is it something that the environment does instead? Once we figure that out then it would go to therapeutics.”

Though the program thus far has been most specifically adapted to study stem cells, the software became free and open source Oct. 10 and many local institutes are currently beginning the process toward using LEVER for their own studies.

“We should be able to extend this tool more generally without much trouble,” Wait said.

Currently, Thomas Jefferson University is also beginning to utilize the program to better study clathrin, a protein that acts as a gateway between a cell and its environment and is often responsible for the admittance of pathogens into the cell.

James Keen, professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at Thomas Jefferson, will work with the programmers to collect data for his research on clathrin.

“The tools that they have developed are very powerful,” Keen said. “We’re trying to follow the clathrin inside the cell. If we can understand that we can understand a lot about not [only] how viruses are processed in cells, but also how viruses respond to growth signals or misrespond to growth signals.”

The time tracking feature would serve other research as well as Keen’s. For instance, biologists at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia are interested in using the program to study scratch assays, which are used to research the wound healing process. Also in the Philadelphia community, the University of Pennsylvania wants to use the spatially advanced program to better understand how melanoma cells divide and replicate.

Cohen’s lab is working on making LEVER even more interactive. Undergraduate Drexel student Micheal Koerner is currently utilizing his second co-op to develop a haptic interactive glove that would give the user the ability to touch the data, comprehending the size, shape and texture of the cells with added understanding.

“We can basically create a virtual reality environment where you’re interacting with this data and you’re feeling force feedback as you move your hand with this volume,” Koerner said.

The haptic glove would also serve as a tool with which the user could zoom, pan and scan over the visual data moving in front of them.

“We hope that this new technology will kind of give the biologists a new way of interacting with the data — a more synergistic approach to comprehending it. Allowing them to quantitatively and qualitatively comprehend this data that they have better,” Koerner said.

Cutting-edge software such as LEVER yields the potential to take scientists inside the cells themselves and analyze research in a much more thorough and clerical manner.

Photo Courtesy: Drexel Food Lab

Every Friday morning in the Paul Peck Problem Solving and Research Center, a small group of about seven students gather to make up the Drexel Food Lab.

The Food Lab started in the spring term of 2014 when Director of the Center for Hospitality and Sport Management Jonathan Deutsch and a small group of students committed to doing recipe development for a small nonprofit called “Cook for Your Life.” All previous experimentation had been informal.

“That really changed us from being a really sort of impromptu, ad hoc, that worked whenever we had a project, to something with a steady schedule. So we started meeting weekly and started paying students, and really formalizing our process,” Deutsch said.

The mission of the Food Lab is to get culinary students to apply their cooking skills to solve real world problems. To do this, the lab works with industries, projects for non-profits, and it even develops its own products.

Their most recent work with the anti-poverty Bethesda Project, “My Brother’s House,” included creating low-cost and low-budget recipes from canned ingredients the homeless shelter gets on a regular basis. The shelter normally has a budget of only $600 a month.

“They’ve been doing recipe development for our canned vegetables because they’re kind of the hardest to work with,” Larry Russock, program coordinator of My Brother’s House, said.

According to Ally Zeitz, senior culinary arts major and Drexel Food Lab manager, “The challenge is working with the quality of the canned substances and making a recipe easy enough that [people] can multitask while doing it — which happens in a busy environment like a homeless shelter.”

The house employees have to take care of all 20 men that live there and do chores around the entire house — not just the kitchen. Their culinary skills vary, and often the “cooking” involves heating the canned food up and serving it as it comes.

“They don’t know what to do with the cans; they just open them and put them out. Which, the men don’t eat it — and then it’s waste,” Zeitz said.

“They shouldn’t be wasting food because they don’t have a lot of food, so they wanted us to make them some easy recipes with the cans,” she continued.

“You know, just because you’re in a bad situation financially doesn’t mean you’re going to compromise on good-tasting food,” Peter Schoemer explained. The culinary arts has worked in the Food Lab since its opening.

Using canned ingredients they picked up from the shelter itself, the lab created quick and simple recipes for the shelter’s employees.

For example, “Smooth Alaskan Peas,” one of the many foods the shelter receives produced for quantity rather than quality, comes out of the cans completely soggy and waterlogged. Zeitz came up with simple recipes like shepherd’s pie and pea soup — transforming the peas into something more appetizing.

“Just pour the can of peas into the pot, add a couple more things and then it becomes something that is recognizable, from these peas that don’t look appetizing,” Zeitz explained.

Canned spinach, another difficult ingredient, was transformed into things like spinach pie, spinach strata, and even saag paneer — an Indian dish with spinach and cheese.

“I like being given an ingredient and then getting to play around with it,” Schoemer said.

Through their work with My Brother’s House and other industries and organizations, the Food Lab is trying to establish itself as a valuable resource for industries and non-profits.

“I want students to apply what they’re learning and to solve real world problems and that’s not done at most culinary schools so I’m really proud of the work these students are doing,” Deutsch explained.

“We’re exposing these students far beyond anything they would get at a typical culinary hospitality education,” he continued.

The lab has also worked with Cook For Your Life (a website developed to help people with cancer find nutritious recipes), the Environmental Protection Agency (helping to create simple and healthy school lunches for kids), different industries that want recipes for their products — like onions, tomatoes or olive oil — and they even have an “Allan Kalish Food Innovation Fund” that supports students in developing their own recipes.

Photo Courtesy: Kelly & Massey

President John A. Fry announced Sept. 17 that the Drexel University School of Law would be rechristened the Thomas R. Kline School of Law, in honor of a local Philadelphia litigator Thomas Kline, who has donated $50 million toward the expansion and development of the school. This large amount of money, along with the conveyance of the former Beneficial Saving Fund Society building, located on 12th and Chestnut streets, marks the largest gift Drexel has ever received.

“I don’t look at this in terms of the amount of money or the accolade. What I view this as is an opportunity to elevate to a very high level a law school within a university which is growing yearly in stature and reputation nationally,” Kline said.

Kline’s most famous cases include his representation of Victim No. 5 in the Jerry Sandusky trials, victims in the Pier 34 collapse and of a Philadelphia boy whose foot was  ripped off by a SEPTA escalator.

Due to Kline’s expertise and intriguing repertoire in law, he was sought out by Fry about serving on the Law School Board. Discussions about donating to the law school arose within the last year, after Earle Mack, the original naming sponsor of the law school, stepped aside to make way for other benefactors who could financially support the budding law school.

“It led to a period of, something like six months, which culminated in my gift to the law school,” Kline disclosed.

The litigator now hopes to heighten the education of Drexel law students with an addition of a new freestanding branch of the law school in the 24,000 square foot historical Beneficial Bank Building to be opened in 2016, dubbed The Kline Institute of Trial Advocacy.

The new trial advocacy institute will attract students to Drexel’s law school and help the new School of Law become a nationally renowned education facility. The donation funds will also be put toward hiring a new wave of staff.

“Having a great facility and an expanded program will dramatically move an already highly regarded program to the level of unparalleled excellence,” Kline said, explaining the importance.

The location of this building at the corner of 12th and Chestnut streets and its special focus will put Drexel students mere blocks from some of Philadelphia’s most prestigious law firms and will allow students to explicitly study a principle at the heart of the judicial system.

Drexel’s presence in Center City will also draw more people and businesses to this part of town, which is located in the core of the legislative district of Philadelphia.

“Within arm’s reach of 12th and Chestnut streets are City Hall, the Criminal Justice Center, the new family court building and the federal court,” Kline continued.

The building itself has been vacant since 2001 and will require a great deal of renovation, which will utilize part of the $50 million.

Kline bought the building as a birthday gift for himself wishing to preserve its historical beauty but without definite intentions for its future. During the past year as he was talking with Fry, however, he decided on its fate.

“At the end of the day, I was holding the building at the time that our talks developed and so it became for me … to become an institute of trial advocacy, which is my principal interest in the practice of law,” Kline said.

“The challenge will be finding an architect who can respect this classic old building, but put a set of modern educational roots inside that building,” Roger Dennis, founding dean of the School of Law, explained, stating that Drexel was still deciding on an architect to renovate the building.

Although Kline never attended Drexel, he spent much time as a young lawyer in Philadelphia with The Beasley Firm — his late role model being James Beasley himself, who Kline watched found a law school for Temple University in the late ‘90s. Kline stated this was an act of philanthropy he wanted to emulate.

“Having worked in Jim’s law office for 15 years, I view myself as having attended the real Beasley School of Law,” Kline joked.

Kline came from a humble upbringing and wants to be able to give back to students that were once just like him.

“A lot of the kids that are going to come to Drexel’s law school are kids that are pretty similar to Tom was when he started. Modest means. Small town Pennsylvania. Trying to make something out of their lives and do good for people,” Paul Davies explained, as a journalist of publications like Philly.com and Philadelphia magazine and friend of Kline’s who has followed the lawyer’s career for years.

Kline received his undergraduate education from Albright College and his law degree from Duquesne University. Although Drexel is not Kline’s alma mater, he feels strongly that Drexel’s law school is the perfect choice to emulate his principles and do his name and legacy proud.

“I wanted to have a law school which would benefit from me, which would be an integral part of the city that I came to and I’ve grown to love, and Drexel is the perfect fit for that purpose,” Kline stated.

“All I ask in return is a large group of accomplished trial lawyers, a good number of judges, a few United States senators and one president of the United States,” Kline jokingly said to the crowd at the announcement on Thursday.

“We’re really trying to implement being one of the most committed schools to experiential education for our students and having a faculty that has a scholarly impact that’s really superb. If we can pull both those things off simultaneously, it will be one heck of a good law school,” Dennis said.

Kline hopes that with this gift he has given the law school the opportunity to emulate the philosophies and principles that have guided his personal practice.

President John A. Fry presented the first vehicle in the A.J. Drexel Autism Institute’s Mobile Resources and Education for Autism and Community Health program, May 29 in the Drexel quad. About 50 professors, students and associates of the Autism Institute showed up to celebrate the mobile unit’s premiere.

Photo Credit: A.J. Drexel Autism Institute

A little larger than the average food truck, the van is custom-designed to provide a mobile clinic for patients of all ages to receive neuropsychological and psychosocial behavioral evaluations for autism assessment to the Philadelphia community, starting fall 2014.

“Obviously this vehicle is going to have a major impact on the way in which we do our work with autistic children and their families,” Fry said in his opening address.

He continued, “If we can meet clients that are dealing with autism where they live in their neighborhoods, then we can broaden our impact and expand the amount of information that we can gather together, which will give us, of course, ways in which we can work more effectively [to treat autism].”

The van represents not just a public health movement in the community, but also the collaborative efforts of the school of Public Health and Education and the Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts & Design that made the creation of this program possible.

Photo Credit: A.J. Drexel Autism Institute

Students from Westphal customized the interior of the van to include various utilities that may prove helpful in assessment, making the van both inviting and adaptable to the recommendations of autism experts. For instance, the interior of the van provides a comfortable environment for behavioral assessments, sporting LED lighting and warm colors. It also includes a small table, adjustable seating, a sink and two small refrigerators — one for storing biological specimens and one for food.

“When you can get Public Health, Westphal and the School of Education together thinking about their dimension of the problem, you’re going to get a much better approach as a result,” Fry said.

Mobile REACH is the first program of its kind to treat autism as a public health issue. With it, the A.J. Drexel Autism Institute aims to teach families how to better educate and nurture autistic children.

Director Craig Newschaffer explained the institute’s concentration in his own words, saying, “What we try to do is we try to focus on population-level science with the intent of preventing disability and promoting quality of life in children with autism and their families.”

“One of the things that’s central to this different wave of thinking about autism research is better ways to understand autism’s impact in our communities — how it affects individuals, how it affects families and the neighborhoods where they live,” he continued.

In order to do this, traveling into these communities using Mobile REACH is essential. Clinical assessment teams will take the vehicle out to evaluate certain children participating in both research studies and model programs.

Ana V. Diez Roux, dean of the School of Public Health, sees the creation of this van as a landmark for Drexel.

“I think new research centers like the Autism Institute show that Drexel is making the kinds of investments in talent and in facilities that will not only make Drexel a top research university, but will also make one that is committed to making the difference to solving the problems that we face in society,” Diez Roux said.

“[This program] focuses on groups in society that would otherwise be overlooked or underserved,” she continued, addressing the fact that this mobile unit will allow Drexel to reach families who would not be able to make it out to academic testing centers at Drexel, the University of Pennsylvania or even The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia normally.

James Connell, director of the clinical core for the institute, expanded on this point, “I think that Mobile REACH represents opportunity. Opportunity for families in their neighborhood to have screenings that perhaps lead to a diagnosis that would then tell them how to move forward with their caring obligation, with the development of their education plan, and what to do next.”

The Mobile REACH unit is supported by the Nancy Lurie Marks Family Foundation and the Philadelphia Eagles.

To get involved with volunteering with the Autism Institute or to find out more about Mobile REACH, email AutismInstitute@drexel.edu.

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Drexel graduate student Amrit Misra recently took part in research with graduate students at the University of Pennsylvania, “Microstimulation of the Human Substantia Nigra Alters Reinforcement Learning,” which was published May 14. The research concluded providing electrical rewards to a certain set of neurons in the brain could alter the process of human learning.

Misra is currently working on a graduate degree in neuroscience at Drexel and is a doctorate of medicine and of philosophy candidate. He was recruited to help complete this project at Penn because of his expertise with specific neuron signaling.

“What they wanted to do was see if that stimulation that was delivered assisted people in their ability to recall things that they’ve learned,” Misra explained.

In this study, 11 patients undergoing deep brain stimulation surgery for Parkinson’s disease treatment completed question and answer tasks.

When the patients were awake, they played a computerized reward game using a handheld controller where they chose between objects with distinct correct and incorrect answers.

“Half the time they were left to do the task on their own and the other half they were given positive feedback in the form of electrical stimulation during the encoding or remembering stage of the trial,” Misra said.

If their responses were correct, the researchers would send microstimulations to the dopaminergic cells in the substantia nigra region of the brain using the electrodes that had been planted in their brains for the treatment.

“If you change the expectation so that the reward is not delivered when it is expected, there is a discrepancy. That discrepancy is thought to be encoded in the dopaminergic neuron population of the midbrain,” Misra said.

This discrepancy that occurs when there is no electric impulse sent to the dopaminergic neurons was linked to the patients forgetting the correct answers more frequently.

“So they thought, ‘If this discrepancy is really what’s mediating the learning and impacting people’s ability to remember something, then stimulation of that region specifically when they gave a correct response should have a better likelihood of learning the path [quickly],’” Misra further explained.

The results indeed found that electrical stimulation when a patient got a correct answer increased the patient’s ability to learn the correct response. It is the first study to show that electrical stimulation near the neurons can alter the learning process of humans.

“I kind of gave them the confirmation that that yes, there is a substantia nigra and here is proof that they’re modifying dopaminergic neurons because here are the dopaminergic neurons that they’re modifying,” Misra said.

Misra hinted that this kind of research could eventually lead to a breakthrough in student learning.

“I could imagine a device where you have a long-term implanted electrode in this region which is connected to a battery and allows its communicator to interact with some educational software,” Misra said.

Misra went on to describe a hypothetical process that could make student learning much more efficient.

“In the process of doing a homework assignment, if you answer correctly, you get positive reward stimulation which helps [you] remember those correct answers. If [you]’re remembering incorrectly, there is no stimulation and so you’re more likely to forget the incorrect answers,” he said.

According to Misra, the next step in the research process will be finding out how the dopaminergic cells are assisting in memory formation.

“All this says is that it is assisting in memory formation. The mechanisms of how would be the next area to kind of explore,” he said.

The full article can be found in The Journal of Neuroscience.

The post Study uses electrical stimulation to enhance learning appeared first on The Triangle.

Recent advancements in 3-D printing have allowed mechanical engineering professor Wei Sun and his team of researchers at both Drexel University and Tsinghua University in China to use biomaterial to print 3-D models of cancerous tumors.Sun said this technological advancement will assist doctors in developing more effective drugs to treat cancer as well as personalized medicine for cancer patients.

Sun directs the laboratory in the Bossone Research Center where the 3-D cancerous tumor models are printed. Eight of Drexel’s own students — including four Ph.D. students, two masters students and two undergraduate students — work under him, all involved to a certain degree with printing cancer cell models.

This study has three goals. “One is for research,” Sun said. “Physiologists can use this model to study how disease evolves and changes.”

“Second,” Sun continued, “individual patient treatment or therapy. [The] third one is to use for new drug development, instead of using animals.”

Photo Credit: Wei Sun

These tumor models eliminate other approaches used to test anticancer drugs previously used such as human and animal testing. It would also improve upon the conventional method of studying 2-D replicas of tumor cells grown on petri dishes. Sun explained that the petri dish method is not extremely effective.

“It cannot represent the 3-D structure. You know, physiology, environment, human body — all the cells in human body is in 3-D environment. It is not 2-D,” Sun said.

Using 3-D printing, Sun’s research can create life-like representations of patients’ tumors.

To do this, Sun and his researchers print out a gelatin grid structure, which is then layered with cervical cancer cells. The grid formation allows nutrients to pass around the cells and keep them alive and growing.

“Eventually those cells inside of the grid three-dimensional structure form their own obligate,” Sun continued.

This obligate will resemble a human tumor. They also add drugs to the nutrient solutions to observe how tumors grow, develop and spread.

Qudus Hamid, one of Sun’s top assistants and a mechanical engineering graduate student, explained that knowing how cancer develops will lead to more accurate medical treatment.

“Cancer mutates. At every stage of cancer you want to know in the body how would one cell affect the body. Because cancer starts one way and migrates to different parts of the body, you want to see how cancer treatment would affect that,” Hamid said.

Hamid worked with Sun on his senior project as a Drexel undergraduate. He decided to continue on to graduate school at Drexel and became involved with Sun’s research printing cancer cells in 2009.

Hamid said he enjoys working in the lab because it gives him the opportunity to impact the world.

“Whatever you do here changes not just, you know, your goals in life but everyone’s life. You change the health of everyone. We can potentially develop a functional tissue that … extends life in probably a couple of decades. Who knows?” Hamid said.

Sun also breamed at the fact that his work could tremendously impact the world for the better.

“If those physiologists could use this model to better understand the cancer, if a pharmaceutical company can use this model to make a new anticancer drug, think about the impact. Think about the cancer patient. You can use this model to find a better therapy treatment,” Sun said.

Sun is currently traveling across the globe presenting his research model. His project has also been featured in IOP’s publishing journal, Biofabrication. Sun said his next step is to work with biologists and pathologists, imploring them to use his model for their research.

The post 3D printing aids in removing tumors appeared first on The Triangle.

The eighth annual International Gala took place in the Recreation Center April 11, featuring the theme “Dragons Around the World.” Two hundred fifty Drexel students attended the sold-out event put on by the International Students Union.

The Filipino Intercultural Society of Drexel, Indonesian Students Association, Fuana — a Bollywood dance troop — and a Russian ballerina performed dance numbers throughout the night. The various forms of entertainment allowed attending students to learn about a wide range of cultures, customs and traditions.

Photo Credit: Danish Dhamani

A graduate electric engineering student, Rohini Joshi, said the gala initially captured her attention because of its unique premise and promise of entertainment. “There are actually performances and dances, and it is actually themed,” Joshi said.

“I thought the performances were interesting,” Vince Dunne, a sophomore graphic design major, said, adding that his personal favorite was the Bollywood routine.

The fun continued later as a dance instructor taught the student crowd the basics of swing dancing.

The gala was originally created in an attempt to bring international students together and encourage awareness of ethnic diversity at Drexel.

Elizabeth Cahill, co-chair of the International Gala and international business major, explained how the event came to be.

“It was started and funded by the international admissions office, and it’s always been put on by a committee of students,” she said.

The international admissions office has always had the ISU plan the gala for them. However, due to budget cuts, different companies have sponsored the gala for the past few years.

“We’re hoping to keep the tradition alive,” Danielle Kot, the second co-chair of the event and operations and supply chain management major, said. The ISU hopes to keep admission for the gala free so that students from various countries can gather together for a night of collaborative fun.

“The point is to build friendships between domestic and international students of all backgrounds,” Cahill said.

The gala was catered by Cherry Hill, bringing guests an all-kosher international menu of Asian-oriented food. Center pieces portraying pictures of Drexel students studying abroad adorned the cloth tables along with summaries about different dragon myths from various countries.

Dunne suggested the event could take the international cuisine to a further level. “The food is good, but this is an international event, so I think they should incorporate food from other areas of the world,” he said.

The ISU will be holding other events around campus over the course of the remaining quarter.

Amin Zeiaee, a graduate mechanical engineering student, said he recently found himself frequenting the association’s events. “These events are very versatile,” Zeiaee said. “This is the third international event I’m attending. They’re all very different from each other.”

“We hold educational events and then we hold social events, but they’re all themed upon international cultures,” Cahill elaborated.

“We come up with maybe five to six events every quarter,” Kot said, referring to Valentine’s Day discussions about wedding ceremonies around the world, dialogues about different cultures’ superstitions and an international karaoke night.

The ISU is currently working to put together a “global race” with multiple international stations around campus — it would be the University’s own miniature version of “The Amazing Race” — May 17.

The post International gala celebrates culture appeared first on The Triangle.

The eighth annual International Gala took place in the Recreation Center April 11, featuring the theme “Dragons Around the World.” Two hundred fifty Drexel students attended the sold-out event put on by the International Students Union.

The Filipino Intercultural Society of Drexel, Indonesian Students Association, Fuana — a Bollywood dance troop — and a Russian ballerina performed dance numbers throughout the night. The various forms of entertainment allowed attending students to learn about a wide range of cultures, customs and traditions.

A graduate electric engineering student, Rohini Joshi, said the gala initially captured her attention because of its unique premise and promise of entertainment. “There are actually performances and dances, and it is actually themed,” Joshi said.

“I thought the performances were interesting,” Vince Dunne, a sophomore graphic design major, said, adding that his personal favorite was the Bollywood routine.

The fun continued later as a dance instructor taught the student crowd the basics of swing dancing.

The gala was originally created in an attempt to bring international students together and encourage awareness of ethnic diversity at Drexel.

Elizabeth Cahill, co-chair of the International Gala and international business major, explained how the event came to be.

“It was started and funded by the international admissions office, and it’s always been put on by a committee of students,” she said.

The international admissions office has always had the ISU plan the gala for them. However, due to budget cuts, different companies have sponsored the gala for the past few years.

“We’re hoping to keep the tradition alive,” Danielle Kot, the second co-chair of the event and operations and supply chain management major, said. The ISU hopes to keep admission for the gala free so that students from various countries can gather together for a night of collaborative fun.

Photo Credit: Danish Dhamani

“The point is to build friendships between domestic and international students of all backgrounds,” Cahill said.

The gala was catered by Cherry Hill,the catering company, bringing guests an all-kosher international menu of Asian-oriented food. Center pieces portraying pictures of Drexel students studying abroad adorned the cloth tables along with summaries about different dragon myths from various countries.

Dunne suggested the event could take the international cuisine to a further level. “The food is good, but this is an international event, so I think they should incorporate food from other areas of the world,” he said.

The ISU will be holding other events around campus over the course of the remaining quarter.

Amin Zeiaee, a graduate mechanical engineering student, said he recently found himself frequenting the association’s events. “These events are very versatile,” Zeiaee said. “This is the third international event I’m attending. They’re all very different from each other.”

“We hold educational events and then we hold social events, but they’re all themed upon international cultures,” Cahill elaborated.

“We come up with maybe five to six events every quarter,” Kot said, referring to Valentine’s Day discussions about wedding ceremonies around the world, dialogues about different cultures’ superstitions and an international karaoke night.

The ISU is currently working to put together a “global race” with multiple international stations around campus — it would be the University’s own miniature version of “The Amazing Race” — May 17.

The post ISU holds “Dragons Around the World” Gala appeared first on The Triangle.