Alexandria Wise, Summer Research Assistant, PreCollege Science Collaborative for Urban Minority Youth. © Mark Siddall

Alexandria Wise is a graduate of New York City's LaGuardia High School of Music, Art, and Performing Arts. She works with kids, is a singer, and is active in her church—but she's always been interested in the sciences. "My mom used to take me to the American Museum of Natural History all the time. It was my playground," she recalls with a grin.

In 2001, the Museum became much more than a playground to Alex. Every day after school, and full-time over the summer, she worked in a molecular biology lab in the Museum's Department of Invertebrate Zoology, as part of the Precollege Science Collaborative for Urban Minority Youth (PSC). Now in its ninth year, this AMNH internship program gives high school students from underserved communities an opportunity to pursue serious research with working scientists. Past interns have worked with Museum staff on projects ranging from developing techniques for predicting volcanic eruptions to identifying Paleocene mammal fossils. Applicants must be in good academic standing and be able to commit to an intensive two-year experience. They must also be prepared to work as part of a research team with a curator or postdoctoral research scientist at the Museum, who serves as a mentor.

An opportunity for mentors, too
The prospect of becoming a mentor appealed to Dr. Susan Perkins, who had enjoyed mentoring four undergraduates doing their senior projects at the University of Vermont while she obtained her Ph.D. in biology. "I enjoyed the one-on-one work with the students," says Susan. "The PSC program is unique in that it gives me an opportunity to interact with local students, since researchers here often aren't as in touch with students and the general public as staff in other departments, such as the Education or Volunteer departments." She took Alex on as an intern in March 2001.

Alex Wise joins the Precollege Science Collaborative program
Alex heard about the PSC program from her science advisor when she was taking AP biology her junior year. One of eight students accepted out of 100 applicants, Alex was interested in neuropsychology. Since the Museum had no such department, she followed the example of a PSC student the year before who had found a mentor at Columbia University. (Columbia and the Museum are longtime collaborators on a number of projects.) She ended up working that summer and fall for Dr. Robert Kass, head of the university's pharmacology department. "It was my first lab experience, and it was awesome," says Alex. "We were making mutations—changing the DNA—within the sodium channels of heart cells of arrhythmia patients in order to determine effective drug treatment."

When Dr. Kass was unable to keep her on, Alex wondered if there was a chance to work in a lab at the Museum. "Lo and behold, there was a spot as an assistant to Dr. Mark Siddall and Dr. Susan Perkins, working with leeches," Alex recounts. Mark, Assistant Curator in the Division of Invertebrate Zoology, is an expert on the systematics of leeches; Susan, who did her doctorate work on the systematics and biogeogaphy of malaria, had come to work with him that summer because of their shared interest in blood parasites.

Looking at leeches
Reflecting on her work with Mark and Susan, Alex explains, "We dissect them [leeches] and look for a specific structure called a mycetome—a globular structure that's attached to the proboscis leading to the stomach, which is crucial to the digestion of blood for these species of leech.

The leech Placobdella parasitica. © Mark Siddall

This enables us to describe them more clearly, so we can classify their evolutionary development. We also look for the presence of bacteria inside the mycetomes of many different leech species, to learn how they coevolved, and to understand the origins and the possible function of the bacteria," Alex explains. She worked in the lab through the rest of the school year, and Mark, impressed with her work, invited her to stay on with a Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) grant for the summer. "I was so excited! I didn't realize that I could get paid a stipend for doing this work!" Alex recalls.

Day-to-day activities depend on the lab's research priorities and long-term schedule. "Some days we dissect leeches. The ones we look at are about a quarter-inch to an inch long," says Alex. "I watch Dr. Siddall take the mycetomes out of them, and bring tissues up to the lab. They're visible to the naked eye, but small, like a tiny speck of dirt. We use a standard extraction protocol, with various buffers—and then we heat the material overnight to break it down further. We want to get the DNA. DNA is an excellent chemical because it forms a helical structure that stays together very well when put in these washes. The next day, we finish the extraction, and then use the DNA in a polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, to amplify bacterial genes. Then we put it through a gel electrophoresis—it's like Jell-O without the flavor, except that you wouldn't want to eat it—to see the results. Sometimes it doesn't work, and we have to go back and do the PCR and gel electrophoresis again."

Learning what life in the lab is like
Susan says that one of the major benefits of the PSC experience is that "it shows students how actual research is done, including the frustrations of things not working at first, a second, or even a third time. In some lab classes, everything is preprogrammed to give students a result they can write up in class, while authentic science research is more of a troubleshooting and trial-and-error process."

Dr. Susan Perkins, Research Post-Doctoral Fellow, Invertebrate Zoology © Mark Siddall

She points out that "one reason so many students change their minds as they come into graduate school and decide not to pursue a career in science is because they're surprised by what day-to-day life as a scientist is really like. It's more than adding Chemical A to Chemical B and getting Result C. It can be discouraging at times, but there are rewards. Part of the pleasure is examining a problem and figuring out new ways to attack it."

Susan also likes the more casual aspects of the job: "Being someone whom Alex can come and talk to after school. Being someone she can bounce ideas off of. We head up to the lab, where I show her what I'm doing and give her a chance to ask questions. That way she knows what I'm involved with, and gets a better feel for how the simple techniques that she's learning—PCR and sequencing—can be used to answer a broad range of questions in biology," says Susan.

Mastering the techniques of genetic research
"I need to work on basic lab skills," agrees Alex. "That's where everybody starts, whether they're working on leeches or human brain cells. It's all tissue, and we're all looking for DNA. That's the key." Her favorite is the gel electrophoresis part, "because you have to be careful getting the material into the wells in the sheets of gel without puncturing the wells. You also get to see your results." Bands of DNA are visible in the gel, which is then broken down so that nothing is left but the pure DNA, which can then be sequenced. "We take the sequence and do a search—it's called blasting—on Genbank. It's an online bank of the genetic material of different organisms, and it tells you which bacteria are similar to those found within our leech. We use that information to establish the phylogeny of the bacteria," she explains.

Pressed, Alex admits, "I'm not really interested in leeches themselves. We have thousands of different species in the lab, jars and jars, and we had some live ones." A high point—or perhaps a low point—was once being offered the opportunity to feed a leech. "You put your hand in the water; it kind of feels like a little booster shot. But I did it. Ideally, I'd like to train them to become vegetarian!" she jokes. "Alex is very dedicated and very inquisitive," says Susan. "She asks me a lot of questions, which I always take as a good sign that someone's thinking through the process and understanding it. The program would definitely benefit any student who showed an interest in further work in science, to get out of the classroom and cookbook lab atmosphere, and to work with someone actually in the field." Now a freshman at Ohio Wesleyan and planning a double major in chemistry and neuropsychology, Alex definitely agrees that she got a lot out of PSC. "It's a great way to explore your interests," she declares. "Science is a huge field, and it's hard to say, 'I want to do this' until you get some hands-on experience and some basic building blocks."