Internship Takes Students Beyond the Books

The El Paso campus recently opened its first Summer Accelerated Biomedical Research (SABR) internship program for students interested in gaining research experience before entering graduate school.

“In its inaugural year, the SABR program was a tremendous success,” said Charles Miller, Ph.D., associate dean for research with the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. “All of the students had engaging projects and their presentations at the capstone symposium in Lubbock were very well received.”

The 10-week opportunity was open to undergraduate students majoring in biology, chemistry and engineering; students between junior and senior years; and current graduates without graduate course work.

Six University of Texas at El Paso undergraduate students were recruited and paired with a TTUHSC El Paso researcher. Students were given a $3,800 stipend to work on a research project that was then presented to fellow SABR interns at the final research symposium in Lubbock.

SABR participant and Johnathan Salim Abou-Fadel researcher Huanyu Dou, Ph.D., and took on cancer with his research project titled, “Therapeutic Efficacy of Nano-Formulated Paclitaxel on Glioblastomas”.

“The techniques that I learned were above and beyond anything I could have learned in a two-month period," said Salim Abou-Fadel. "This internship gave me the feel of what it is like to work in the lab under very strict aseptic conditions while working under a very strict time-frame. I learned techniques that I will carry with me for the rest of my life.”

Other SABR students included Gabriel Espinoza, Spoorthi Lawson, Cynthia Gabaldon, Oliver Servin and Sylvia Mejia.

SABR originated at the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in Lubbock. The school has faculty involved in research using state-of-the art labs and equipment.

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