“I don’t want to leave the lab. This has given me more clarity of what I want to do and what I want to accomplish.”

Research fellow: Matthew Gabrielle
Hometown: Bellingham, MA
School: Roger Williams University
Majors: Biology, Chemistry
Mentor: Avelina Espinosa
Project: Entamoeba spp. as models to explore the effects of environmental stress due to climate change in marine protists

Matthew Gabrielle arrived last fall on the RWU campus freshman year, undeclared for a major and thinking he might head down the pre-law track.

But then, he says, he took some science classes so he wouldn’t fall behind on his requirements and started working with Associate Professor Avelina Espinosa. Gabrielle says he didn’t have much research experience, but he found that he liked running experiments.

That led to applying for the Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program with Rhode Island NSF EPSCoR and spending his summer working in Espinosa’s lab, studying the impact of climate change on Entamoeba spp., a parasitic species that live in humans or a variety of animal hosts.

“We’re altering the conditions in which they grow and monitoring their health,” explains Gabrielle. “I do protein gels to see what proteins it excretes under different conditions and changing acidity levels associated with climate change.”

The parasite Entamoeba histolytica, when ingested, causes the disease amebiasis, which is responsible for about 100,000 human deaths per year. The Entamoeba is found in poor quality drinking water of third world countries and causes dysentery for those who ingest it, forming cysts that the liver can’t process.

The project seeks to gain a better understanding of how climate change may impact the way in which the Entamoeba communicate and group together, and whether they will thrive or decline under the altered conditions.

Gabrielle says working on an open-ended project has given him newfound responsibilities and provided opportunities to develop skills, grow confidence, and gain independence — all of which doesn’t happen in the typical school year lab, where students follow set procedures rather than figuring out things on their own.

Pausing from his work to talk about his SURF experience, Gabrielle says with a broad smile, “I don’t want to leave the lab. This has given me more clarity of what I want to do and what I want to accomplish. I definitely want to go to grad school in some capacity.”

Story and photo by Amy Dunkle