Matt Wallace looks through the confocal microscope in the microscopy lab in the new bioscience building.
Looking through a microscope and figuring out the mysteries
is what Matt Wallace likes best about research. The research Wallace performed
as an undergraduate in the JMU biology program may one day lead to advancements
in treating people with hearing disorders. In the near term, one result is
certain, the experience has set Wallace up to attend medical school, even if
the research he does there is different from what he is doing at JMU.
The skills he has learned—microscopy work, lab techniques,
learning from the literature and then applying it—are transferrable, said
Wallace, a member of the Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi honor societies.
Wallace graduated magna cum laude in May 2012 with a bachelor's degree in
biology and will continue his studies at the Virginia Commonwealth University
School of Medicine. The Loudoun County native is spending this year working as
an NIH Outstanding Scholar at JMU for his mentor, Dr. Mark Gabriele. Wallace's position
is funded by a grant he helped procure from the National Institutes of Health.
His research has focused on the development of the auditory
system, specifically looking at how a family of receptor tyrosine kinase
proteins called the Eph-ephrins, assist in the formation of neuronal circuitry.
Wallace’s thesis, which received the Phi Beta Kappa Award for the Best
Undergraduate Honors Thesis, clarified the role ephrin-B2 plays in the
development of pathways between brainstem and midbrain nuclei by comparing a
normal system to that of a compromised system.
Interested in using his research as a medical doctor specializing
in neurology or otolaryngology (ear, nose and throat), Wallace said he didn't
know much about neuroscience coming out of Loudoun Valley High School, but he
knew he wanted to do research as an undergraduate and felt JMU gave him the
best opportunity to do that.
"I came to the spring CHOICES event and talked to the
honors program and talked to the pre-med coordinator and spoke to some of the
biology faculty and I really liked their message about getting undergraduates
involved in research early, whereas, when I went to some other universities,
bigger research schools, they really didn't feel undergraduates should be
involved in research to the extent that it is here," he said.
Wallace wasn't disappointed at JMU. He started getting
involved in research toward the end of his freshman year and picked up the pace
his sophomore year. "I've had a lot of great opportunities with Dr.
Gabriele and taking our research and presenting it at different conferences
around the country," he said.
Among conferences he attended were the 2012 annual
conference of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology (ARO) in San
Diego, the Society for Neuroscience in New Orleans in fall 2012, the 2011
annual conference of the ARO in Baltimore and the Central Virginia Chapter
Society for Neuroscience in Richmond, where he won the best undergraduate
presentation award.
Another highlight will be having his first paper published
in a highly respected scientific journal, the Journal of Comparative Neurology, which went into print in January.
The paper, Wallace's honors thesis, is based on his research with a signaling
protein called ephrin B-2. The paper quantifies the anatomy and biological
significance of neuronal circuitry changes that result from abnormal ephrin-B2
expression.
Wallace said his favorite part of the research is looking
into a microscope and collecting data to analyze. "Forming a story. That
is what really gets me excited," he said. "Actually understanding
what's going on because sometimes you'll be looking through the scope and not
really understand what you're looking at until the data is compiled and all of
a sudden you’ve got something big."
By Eric Gorton ('86, '09), JMU Public Affairs
