A new immersive summer internship at UF Health Cancer Center is helping science students from across the country explore cancer research.
Known as Summer Training in Research and Oncology for the Next Generation of Researchers (STRONGER), the 12-week program launched in May, giving seven inaugural students (current undergraduates and recent graduates) a chance to develop their skills as young scientists by collaborating with accomplished UF cancer investigators.
“Our goal is to enhance students’ academic preparedness so they have the skills they need to successfully apply to health-related Ph.D. programs to pursue careers in cancer research,” said Dietmar Siemann, Ph.D., the associate director for education and training at the Cancer Center.
The STRONGER program took a novel approach by inviting graduate students to lead the summer research projects and mentor the interns, who had the opportunity to work in research laboratories, design experiments, analyze results, and present data. Interns received thorough training in basic and translational cancer research, and took workshops led by UF faculty, staff, and graduate student ambassadors on lab essentials and professional development.
Intern Martin Gonzales said the program helped clarify his career interest in cancer research. He researched ways to engineer proteins to target carbohydrate structures in leukemia cells, working alongside graduate student Meng-Lun Hsieh and Yousong Ding, Ph.D., an associate professor in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry in the UF College of Pharmacy.
“I knew I wanted to do research as a career, but I didn’t know what type,” said Gonzales, a rising junior who is studying biochemistry at Ave Maria University. “This type of work solidified what I want to do and I think I’ll pursue this field specifically.”
For Marqus Colon, who graduated in April with a degree in biology from Nova Southeastern University, the internship provided exposure to biolayer interferometry, a leading-edge optical technique for measuring molecular interactions.
“There are not a lot of labs using it, so it was very exciting that I was one of the people to learn how,” said Colon, who researched pH influence in extracellular vesicle-based precision cancer immunotherapy in the lab of Mei He, Ph.D., an associate professor in the Department of Pharmaceutics in the UF College of Pharmacy.
Colon, who hopes to continue doing research in the College of Pharmacy while he prepares to apply to Ph.D. programs, found the mentorship of doctoral student Zachary Greenberg particularly beneficial.
“Even if we didn’t get perfect data every time, it was a learning process and that’s something I really appreciated,” Colon said.
The program gave Greenberg a framework for enhancing his management of trainees, sharpening his organization skills and his ability to navigate challenges when research does not go according to plan.
“It provided me with an idea of how to grow a trainee in a direction that fits their needs and fits the needs of the lab,” said Greenberg, who received a 2023 UF Health Cancer Center Predoctoral Award.
Program mentors like Greenberg had a chance to scope out a project related to their dissertation for an intern to complete. The graduate students formalized their projects through one-page written grant proposals and presented them during three-minute oral presentations when the internship began in May. They then participated in a speed-networking session for the interns to learn more about the research.
“All these are valuable skills of distilling the key points of their research questions into short and impactful modalities that give our graduate students excellent experience as they advance with their Ph.D. programs and move onto the next steps in their career paths,” said Meghan Ferrall-Fairbanks, Ph.D., an assistant professor in UF’s J. Crayton Pruitt Family Department of Biomedical Engineering who mentored two teams. “The STRONGER internship program has helped my graduate students grow in their mentoring capacity, and I’ve enjoyed the new perspectives the interns have brought into our research group.”
At the end of the program, the interns and graduate students presented their research posters at a showcase with the UF Health Cancer Center community on Aug. 7, fielding questions and engaging in meaningful discussions about next steps.
De’llaijah Lucas, who graduated in April from Keiser University with a degree in biomedical science, gained experience in new facets of research, including coding using RStudio, while researching ovarian cancer drug sensitivity in Ferrall-Fairbanks’ lab.
“I had never coded before and it was so hard, but I enjoyed it more than the wet labs and I really love doing wet labs,” Lucas said. “It makes me want to learn more and more.”
The internship connected Lucas to mentors and resources, including MCAT preparation tools, that will help her as she works toward applying to UF’s M.D.-Ph.D. Training Program next year.
“This program put me in the right direction,” Lucas said.