NEI grant will support undergraduate research at WVU as faculty researchers and students partner to explore relationship between vision and the brain

Since launching his lab in 2019, West Virginia University Department of Biology assistant professor Eric Horstick, Ph.D., has emphasized the importance of student participation in research at the undergraduate level by providing students with opportunities to work directly on major research projects.

A new grant awarded to the University from the National Eye Institute will help strengthen this initiative, as it provides funding for undergraduate students to work alongside faculty researchers as they further explore the relationship between vision and the brain.

Dr. Horstick said he hopes that these opportunities will ignite a passion for research among students, similar to the way it did during his time as an undergraduate student.

“My fascination for research began as an undergraduate student, where I had my first opportunity to work in a lab and engage in hands-on experiments with mentors and other students,” he said. “It was then that I began studying the neurological activity of zebrafish and now nearly 20 years later, I am continuing that same work alongside students in my own lab. I hope that I can help other students discover a lifelong passion for science and research.”

The three-year renewable grant will provide approximately $400,000 of funding for research that will explore the relationship between the thalamic area of the brain and visual experience. Horstick said this research is a continuation of a project he began in 2023, where he worked alongside an undergraduate student to examine how the changes in lighting conditions affected the behavior of zebrafish.

Horstick explained that the thalamus, an egg-shaped structure in the brain that acts as a relay station for sensory and motor information, is a deep-rooted structure that was recently discovered to have independent and crucial roles in visual experience. He added that because of where the thalamus is located in the brain, it can be much harder to examine than more exposed areas such as the cortex.

Zebrafish, however, do not have a cortex, allowing the thalamus to be clearly examined with standard microscopes. Horstick said the funding will enable students to participate in research that produces tangible results, as they will have the rare opportunity to be on the ground floor of making novel discoveries about the thalamus and vision.

“Students will partner with faculty researchers as we use neuron-level resolution to examine how the thalamus responds to visual changes in real-time and make groundbreaking discoveries on the relationship between the two,” he said. “If we can develop a better understanding of how the brain reacts to visual experience at all levels, we can better address the issues and ocular conditions that can arise during crucial developmental stages.”

Horstick is also a pilot project leader in the NIGMS-supported Visual Sciences Center of Biomedical Research Excellence at West Virginia University.

“The achievement of this grant exemplifies the strength of collaboration among various schools within WVU and promises a bright future for research in visual sciences, as well as our broader objective of reducing visual disparities in the state of West Virginia," said Visvanathan Ramamurthy, Ph.D., the director of research at the WVU Eye Institute and chair of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine.

To learn more about vision research at the School of Medicine and COBRE, visit medicine.hsc.wvu.edu/eye/research.