Darcy Gabriel
What is your home university and what are you studying?
My home university is City St George’s University of London, and I am in my 4th Year of the Medicine MBBS course.
What attracted you to take a UROP placement at Imperial?
After the second year of my medical degree, I chose to intercalate in Neuroscience and Mental Health at Imperial College London. As part of this, I completed a dissertation with the Barnes Lab at the Dementia Research Institute, focusing on neural plasticity and Alzheimer’s disease. This experience was invaluable – not only did I greatly enjoy being part of the team, but I also developed important skills in data analysis and research writing. It was a highly rewarding introduction to academic research, and I was eager to build on it. The UROP scheme offered the ideal way to continue working with the lab, providing the structure to support a summer placement where I could further contribute to ongoing projects.
What is the focus of your UROP placement?
During my placement, I worked alongside MSc and PhD students to investigate how aging affects the distribution of alpha-synuclein within the motor cortex and its colocalization with other synaptic proteins. Our work contributes to the Safra Project, which focuses on age-related mechanisms in Parkinson’s disease.
What has been the most enjoyable aspect so far?
I’ve really enjoyed the opportunity to develop new research skills during this placement. In particular, I gained hands-on experience with practical lab techniques, confocal microscopy, and coding using ImageJ and MATLAB skills I hadn’t had the chance to focus on during my intercalated year. Returning to the lab and being able to learn these was both exciting and rewarding. Most notably, learning to code has been transformative; it has opened up many new opportunities for me and I’m now applying it in other areas of my university work. I’ve come to appreciate how valuable this skill is, and I believe it’s something everyone should dedicate time to learning.
What has been the most surprising aspect or biggest insight during your visit so far?
I feel that my biggest insight has been experiencing the research process from much earlier on. In my previous project, I was mainly involved in the data and statistical analysis stages, whereas during my UROP project I contributed to the initial experiments and image acquisition. This allowed me to appreciate the complex process of optimising each step of a method to ensure accurate results later on. It also highlighted for me how essential persistence is in research, as setbacks and unexpected results are an inevitable but important part of making progress.
What are your plans after you graduate?
After graduation, I hope to join the Specialty Foundation Programme for resident doctors, which provides the opportunity to balance clinical practice with research. Following this pathway will allow me to begin shaping a career as an academic clinician, potentially leading research teams while continuing to practice medicine. I am also interested in pursuing a PhD in my chosen area of medicine to further develop my skills and advance my progression as an academic clinician.
Any final comments?
If you’re considering applying for the UROP programme, I would definitely say go for it. It has been an excellent experience, allowing me to develop many new skills and build valuable relationships in the area of research that I’m passionate about. I received funding from the Royal Microscopy Society and plan to present my work at their annual Beginners’ Competition this December.
Feedback form Supervisor
Building on her BSc research with us, Darcy secured Royal Microscopy Society (RMS) support for a summer placement in our group. She is an exceptional student and having her return to the lab was a real asset to our team. Over the course of the placement, Darcy developed new skills in tissue cryosectioning, optimisation of immunostaining protocols, and confocal imaging of synaptic proteins. She contributed to the collection of key pilot datasets and showed great initiative in learning advanced da Dr Carola Radulescu Edmond and Lily Safra Research Fellow
Lucy Robinson
What is your home university (ICL) and what are you studying?
I am studying Biomedical Sciences (MSc) at the University of Oxford.
What attracted you to take a UROP placement at Imperial?
I was keen to learn more about what a career in academic research would look like and was extremely interested by the research area of the Matthews Group.
What is the focus of your UROP placement?
My project focused on investigating the mechanistic effects of a common genetic variant in Alzheimer's Disease through immunohistochemistry and immunofluorescence.
What has been the most enjoyable aspect so far?
I have loved learning new experimental and analytical techniques.
What has been the most surprising aspect or biggest insight during your visit so far?
How rewarding results can be following technical difficulties.
What are your plans after you graduate?
I am hoping to pursue a career in research.
Any final comments?
I am extremely grateful for the opportunity to learn from such an incredible group of academics. It was an absolutely fantastic experience.