Anthony Varner — The Texas Scientist

Neuroscience senior. Interviewed by Amanda Figueroa-Nieves.

In your time at UT, how have you been involved in under graduate research?
During my first year I got involved with the Freshman Research Initiative’s Fish Behavior stream, which is very cognition-based. We do research on live fish species, observing their behavior and how they respond to different stimuli. In my own independent research, I study a highly invasive fish called the western mosquitofish. I’m trying to find out whether these fish prefer to associate with familiar or unfamiliar fish. That’s part of determining the mechanisms by which they spread to different environments – information that could be used to slow the spread of the fish to places where they disrupt the local environment.

Have you run into challenges with this type of research?
The western mosquitofish is challenging to work with because they eat their young after giving birth, often very quickly. I was overseeing a project studying how anxiety affects fish at the different stages of pregnancy. We had to come up with a way to separate moms from their young before they ate them. Because these fish have a tendency to drop down to the bottom, we put a grate across the bottom that was large enough so the babies could go below it but too small for the mothers to cross. It failed a significant portion of the time but it worked well enough for us to get a clearer picture of what was happening.

What has it been like to mentor other, younger students in the Fish Behavior FRI stream?
It’s definitely inspiring to see people go from being really timid about the subject to being able to take the lead in designing and running experiments. One of the first students I taught as a peer mentor is now working with me and designed a new option for my experiment. In her option, we are familiarizing fish with certain objects, rather than with other fish, and seeing how that affects the fish’s preferences. It’s so cool that she saw the work I’m doing and wanted to take it even further.

How did you find your way to the neuroscience program here at UT Austin?
My dad is a combat veteran, so he spent a lot of time going to doctors. I would go with him and be so fascinated by that environment – being in doctor’s offices, being in hospitals, the amount of knowledge those people possessed and, ultimately, their ability to help people. Being inspired by that, I knew from a young age that I wanted to go into medicine. Later on, I became very interested in the brain and how its function ultimately shapes the whole world. UT Austin’s neuroscience program allowed me to combine both of those interests.