Hello! My name is Alessia George and my capstone is titled “Hippocampal Development and Depression” and was developed under the supervision of Professor Rotondo.
Originally, I was in a research lab and I was going to use the work I’ve done there as my capstone. However, as time in the lab progressed, I began to realize where my interest in research was and that the lab was not a good fit for me and my ambitions. This realization was extremely upsetting at first. I did not view this as an incompatibility, but as an inadequacy on my end. Looking back, I understand that sometimes something isn’t for you and that it is okay to walk away and close that door of opportunity. When you’re surrounded by so many brilliant minds and interact with peers who seem so much more aware of what they’re doing, it is hard to realize that you’re still figuring things out. You have this expectation that you need to take this opportunity and stick to it, that it will make you better, yet sometimes it doesn’t. And that’s ok.
This isn’t to say that you should not do research within the labs on campus, I advise that you do, as soon as possible in your undergraduate career. Explore your options on research within the campus. There is so much knowledge and experience to gain from so many brilliant minds that will inspire you to be and do better.
Even so, when you do explore an option please remember that you can always try something else. For me, I did not enjoy the research that I was doing as much as I thought/hoped I would. Thus, when I left the lab I didn’t really have enough time to explore my other options, so I looked back on my undergraduate career and tried to remember what I did enjoy. This reflection reminded me of a previous topic that I really enjoyed learning about, which was the relationship between depression and the hippocampus, which opened a new window of opportunity.
My enjoyment and love for this topic inspired me to use it for my capstone, which I developed under the supervision of Professor Rotondo (I highly recommend him, an absolutely stellar teacher and mentor). I developed a meta-analysis of different peer-reviewed studies on this topic and cultivated cognitive and biological functions of the hippocampus, which is a brain structure responsible for memory and learning, and how they are affected by depression.
This topic is very multi-dimensional and has a lot of topics that relate and can be studied further which is exciting to even consider. It would be nice to further develop this research by looking at other details of this relation, such as a more neurological approach where there is an evaluation of cell production in memory and neurological pathways formed in the gray matter of the brain, or how antidepressant medication affects the hippocampus and how this relation can address other disorders/diseases that affect cognitive functioning, etc. There is so much to explore and it's extremely interesting.
This entire experience of doing research was refreshing since it was a very in-depth look at a topic I truly enjoyed. It was such a wonderful opportunity I am very fortunate to have experienced and stuck with and has made me a much better participant in academia. It has opened my eyes to how if a door of an opportunity closes you still have a window to go through.
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