Medicine

The medical field, even as a child has always intrigued me, I remember roaming the halls of my grandfathers’ small clinic in my native country of Venezuela. It was always hard to describe exactly what, but there was something about it that I always loved. As I child I couldn’t wait to visit the clinic and ask my grandfather about his patients and to converse with the nurses so that I could learn about all kinds of different diseases. That curiosity stuck with me all the way throughout high school and greatly influenced which major I decided to take on as I was applying for college. As an undergraduate student at the Florida State University, I majored in Biomedical Engineering. Initially, I was drawn to this field because of its strong focus in the medical sciences and because of its rigorous course load. I quickly realized that this was the right decision for me as I immediately started to fall in love with all of the classes I was taking. I began to appreciate the daily challenges I faced with my engineering curriculum and thoroughly enjoyed the critical thinking aspects that each class had to offer. In particular I began to genuinely enjoy my Sophomore Organic Chemistry course.

Therefore, I decided to take a bold step and ask my organic chemistry professor for a research opportunity in his lab. His lab was currently working on developing different types DNA cleaving molecules that would attack a cancer cells’ DNA directly, rendering the cells useless and face apoptosis. The process involved pairing different amino acid conjugates to a DNA cleaver that was named “TFP” (Tetrafluoro pyridine) this cleaver would then undergo a photo-dynamically induced radical reaction that effectively cleaves the double stranded DNA of a...

... middle of paper ...

...er my knowledge in the medical as well as teach me how to apply my engineering skills in a medical setting, so that I can come up with new and innovative ways to take on different types of diseases.

Hopefully, with the help of this research opportunity at Church Lab I will obtain the necessary research experience to have a more in depth understanding of the field of biotechnology that will further fuel my passion for medicine. With the plethora of new experiences and knowledge that I plan to obtain from this program, I will be better prepared to take on my dream of helping out those in need and embark on a never ending quest for knowledge in the medical field to further improve treatment of different types of diseases. Like the great Hippocrates once said, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food,” and I will always be hungry for more knowledge.