Assistant professor of pharmaceutical sciences Dr. Eric Nybo was awarded a $70,000 grant from the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation to study new ways to treat anxiety.
“The university is placing a lot of importance on scientific research,” Nybo said. “Every day I get to wake up and do research in these facilities it is a great day. It is a dream job.”
Research will be conducted by Nybo and students in the Shimadzu Core Laboratory for Academic and Research Excellence (SCLARE). The brand new lab, located in the College of Arts and Sciences, is equipped with $1.5 million worth of high-powered research equipment which includes several mass spectrometers.
Second-year pharmacy graduate students Jacqueline Saunders and Kayla Maki were hired to assist Dr. Nybo in his research.
“The experience kind of supplements what we learn in school,” said Saunders. “Learning outside of the classroom and comparing it to what we’ve learned in class is what I am most excited for.”
“We have all these new machines here now, it’s definitely something you don’t get to do just in class,” Maki said
Saunders double-majored in human biology and environmental economics and policy at Michigan State University. Maki earned her undergraduate from Grand Valley State University in biomedical sciences. Both expressed their excitement for the research.
The goal of the research is to create valerenic acid, the active ingredient found in the over the counter supplement valerian root, from bacteria. It is understood that valerenic acid is effective in treating anxiety.
The grant funds research to be conducted at SCLARE through January, 2018.