Member Spotlight: Sinchana Basoor
This month’s member spotlight is Sinchana Basoor! Sinchana is a sophomore biology major with a biochemistry minor on the pre-medicine track. You might recognize her as one of our networking chairs who helps to put together some of the amazing outside opportunities for AED members. Her role is to reach out to hospitals, doctors, volunteer coordinators, professors, and other pre-health professionals to compile information for programs that AED members can be a part of. Despite the challenge of finding events that are still running during COVID-19 or searching for new online options, Sinchana has continued to work hard to find shadowing, research, and scholarship opportunities. If you see her around campus, make sure to give her a big thank you for all that she does for AED!
On top of being a dedicated member of AED, Sinchana is also actively involved in a fascinating research lab at Baylor. She is a part of the Simmons lab, which investigates neurobiology and cell signaling within the auditory system. Sinchana is part of the team that works on cell cultures, specifically HEK cells, which are human embryonic kidney cells. The project she is helping with is exploring cell changes that occur due to cell stress by transfecting the cells with a gene for the protein of interest, usually a calcium-binding protein like oncomodulin or alpha-parvalbumin. Then, the experiment entails observing the extent of cell death due to exposure by using an MTS assay. The big picture goal is to create a cell model of what happens when hair cells in the cochlea undergo apoptosis due to noise damage. What is even more exciting is that all the components of the projects in the Simmons lab are coming together and they are starting to get ready to publish! A typical Friday in the lab for Sinchana starts with a lab meeting where an undergraduate researcher or a grad student will present a paper or their data. Then she will head off to work on maintaining the cell line by splitting the cell cultures for the weekend to make sure they don’t overgrow. Sinchana’s favorite part about working in the Simmons lab is when she gets absorbed in the quiet while working with her cells.
Outside of the lab, Sinchana stays busy as a LA for the genetics lab with Dr. Pitts and as a member of BURST, where she is a Scientia editor and designer. On the more relaxing side, she loves to spend her free time reading fiction or drawing. If you are looking for a good read, she recommends Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. Below you can see a few of her amazing drawings. AED is so proud that we have amazing members like Sinchana! Stay tuned for more member spotlights about the amazing people who make up Baylor AED.
Written by Jasmine Hartman Budnik
