Amber Gillis '06 already knows what she wants to do 10 years from now. After earning a master's degree in her years after Hamilton, Gillis would like to be a high school teacher in biology and chemistry. However, Amber knows that most high school teachers lose the opportunity to do their own in-depth research. "I knew that I wanted to do research this summer, especially because as a high school teacher, I won't be doing research to this degree," she says.
For that reason, Amber is taking advantage of the opportunity to spend her summer conducting research in the Hamilton College science department. Working with Winslow Professor of Chemistry George Shields, Gillis continues the cancer research she began two summers ago as an incoming first-year student with a two-part project titled "Enzyme Inhibition Directed toward Drug Design." Gillis hypothesizes that the inhibition of particular enzymes is a "promising potential therapy" for several forms of cancer.
Summer Research 2004 |
The first part of Gillis' project deals exclusively with an enzyme called Glutathione S-transferase. Gillis explains that this enzyme, found in cancer cell lines, "has shown resistance to anti-cancer treatments such as chemotherapy." A cancer treatment may be developed from the inhibition of this enzyme. The second part of her project examines a specific kind of thyroid cancer, medullary thyroid cancer, or MTC. Gillis' long-term goal is finding possible inhibitors that may be therapeutic for cancer patients.
To prepare for her summer work, Gillis reviewed a great quantity of literature on the subject. "Literature searching is a never-ending process," Gillis admitted, "In searching you will continuously find new and potentially useful information." Gillis is truly enjoying her project, commenting that, "All of the professors that I've had contact with are very welcome to talking to students about their work, and it's definitely an amazing experience that no science student should miss out on."
When asked if all students should apply for summer research grants, her answer was quick and emphatic: "Do it!" Gillis' advice to those students interested in doing summer research is to "find professors that are researching something that interests you and start talking to them."
Before her first year at Hamilton, Gillis took advantage of the opportunity to do summer research with other incoming students. Gillis did cancer research with Professor Shields and worked on a project involving Enediynes, which she describes as "a natural class of antibiotics that have been found to have anti-cancer properties."
Gillis is a rising junior from Clifton Park, N.Y. who is majoring in biochemistry/molecular biology. Her project this summer is funded by the MERCK/AAAS Undergraduate Science Research Program.
-- by Emily Lemanczyk '05
Posted July 9, 2004