Prachi Shah receives an AART training grant to support her research into memory loss!

This month, Prachi Shah from the Cervantes Lab was awarded an Aging and Alzheimer’s Research Training (AART) program grant! Founded to provide stipend support to predoctoral students researching cognitive impairment, the grant currently trains a diverse background of researchers in aging and Alzheimer’s disease research. Before joining the Cervantes Lab, Prachi received a B.S. in Biological Sciences from Binghamton University in the Class of 2021. Now a graduate student here at Georgetown, she studies memory in the model organism Drosophila melanogaster. Her project focuses on modeling retrograde amnesia, a form of memory loss in which the organism cannot remember memories from before they got amnesia. To model this process, Prachi uses in vivo calcium imaging, olfactory classical conditioning, and optogenetics to research how memories are lost in the flies. With the support of the AART program grant, Prachi plans to gain a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s disease. Additionally, she will undergo training in biostatistics, grant writing, and project leadership, skills that will prove invaluable during her time as a Ph.D. candidate. Overall, the AART grant will significantly contribute to her work over the next couple of years! Congratulations to Prachi, we’re confident that she’ll make great strides forward in her research and personal development.