My Next Trip: The Independent Research Project! by Laasya Malneedi

Hi everyone, it’s been a while! Time is definitely flying by, these past 5 weeks have been so incredible. We have all learned and grown so much in the lab together, whether that was making fly food, grape plates, micropipetting, collecting data, and of course, my favorite part, working with the flies!

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To start, my first task in the lab was my kickoff experiment, in which I focused on studying the effects of Rhodiola and head trauma on fruit fly anxiety. I hypothesized that head trauma, because it can cause cognitive impairments and increase stress, would make flies more anxious. I also hypothesized that Rhodiola, a natural adaptogenic herb with stress-reducing and anti-inflammatory properties, would help stabilize anxiety levels. Using the centrophobism assay, I measured anxiety-like behavior by recording how often flies crossed the center of the agar plate and how long they spent there. Since flies naturally avoid the center as prey animals, I was able to associate flies spending more time in the center as being less anxious, while those near the edges were more anxious. My results showed that head trauma increased anxiety and that Rhodiola showed reduced anxiety levels compared to the control. I was able to see that Rhodiola did have a protective effect, as predicted by my hypothesis! Surprisingly, the group that experienced both head trauma and Rhodiola supplementation showed even lower anxiety levels than the control alone, making me wonder about Rhodiola’s ability to reduce cautious behavior in injured flies, causing them to spend more time in the center. Overall, presenting my project to TRIP peers and Dr. Austria, Dr. Valdes, and Dr. Maskalenko was a really valuable experience, and I greatly appreciate them helping me learn how to clearly communicate my results and improve experimental design. This kickoff experiment gave me a strong preview of what my independent project will involve, and receiving and giving feedback on presentations was incredibly helpful in thinking more critically about my work and inspiring future experiment ideas!

For my independent project, I decided to study the effects of NSAID exposure on anxiety and behavior, and whether these commonly used pain medications impact gut health, affecting areas beyond their intended role in pain relief. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like ibuprofen are very widely used to reduce pain and inflammation, but their potential effects on anxiety and social behavior are less widely known. I think many people commonly use these painkillers regularly without considering possible long-term side effects, whether that’s for chronic illness, headaches,  or menstrual cramps, etc. I picked this research question because I find the gut-brain axis really fascinating and am interested in how changes in gut health can affect function and behavior. I think it would be really cool  to see if exposure to commonly used NSAIDs can cause changes in social behavior or anxiety, and whether that might be an indirect effect or occur in conjunction with changes in gut health. To answer my research question, I plan to create four conditions: a control, a normal-dose ibuprofen group, a heightened-dose group, and a group modeling excessive use. I’m interested in seeing if these effects are dose-dependent, as I believe this is a very relevant question given that NSAIDs are commonly overused, with around 20% of users exceeding recommended dosages as they underestimate the risks of misuse. I will be performing a microbiome assay to examine gut health and a centrophobism assay to measure anxiety levels.

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I’m SO excited to be starting this process next week and am so grateful for all the support I’ve received from everyone at TRIP. I’ve made a ton of great memories, and I can’t wait to continue this journey and share what I discover from my independent project! Thank you for taking this trip with me! :)