Ana
Ana
Brockton High School
Brockton, MA
Mentors:
Malissa Vieira & John Bianchi Colangeli
Broad Technology Space
Ana spent her summer tackling an unusual challenge in veterinary immunology: scientists have hundreds of antibodies available for studying human immune cells, but comparatively few validated antibodies for studying immune cells from cats. Rather than developing entirely new reagents, Ana and her team asked whether some existing human antibodies might also recognize the corresponding targets in Felis catus.
Working in the Broad Technology Space, Ana partnered with Merrin to screen human-reactive antibodies against feline peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs). The team used BioLegend's LEGENDScreen platform, which contains hundreds of antibodies against human cell-surface proteins, and tested an initial set of 93 antibodies in human and feline samples in parallel.
Ana gained hands-on experience with PBMC preparation, Ficoll gradient centrifugation, cryopreservation, cell thawing and pooling, fluorescent antibody staining, and flow cytometry. An important part of the work was learning how to distinguish meaningful fluorescence from background signal. The team used a gating strategy to remove debris, doublets, and dead cells before examining different immune-cell populations based on markers including CD5 and CD21.
The screen identified 26 antibodies with evidence of feline reactivity in at least one immune subset. Among the strongest candidates were CD18, CD107b, CD194, CD151, and CD123, which produced bright, well-separated populations resembling the corresponding human staining patterns.
She learned how controls, gating, fluorescence intensity, and immune-cell markers are combined to distinguish true antibody reactivity from background signal in flow cytometry.
Ana's work demonstrates how existing biomedical resources can be creatively repurposed to address gaps in veterinary research. Expanding the collection of validated feline antibodies could enable researchers to characterize cat immune cells in much greater detail, ultimately supporting studies of feline diseases and comparative biology.
For Ana, that scientific growth was inseparable from the community around it. She described BSSP as “one of the best experiences I’ve ever had,” reflecting that even without an extensive scientific background, the program gave her a place in a scientific community, expanded both her scientific and personal knowledge, and introduced her to people she will “forever be grateful for.”
