Hello everyone! My name is Tyler Montgomery, and I am a senior at the University of Arizona majoring in Molecular and Cellular Biology. I conduct research in the Madhavan lab, where we focus on neurodegenerative diseases and aging, aiming to uncover regenerative strategies to combat these challenges. My work specifically examines the mechanisms of brain aging within the female physiological context. While previous studies have primarily explored aging in the male brain, research on the female brain remains limited. Our goal is to understand how age and female sex hormones influence neurogenesis—the process of forming new neurons. By utilizing a combination of biochemical and computational techniques, we can indirectly measure neurogenesis across different ages and in the presence or absence of female sex hormones.
Ultimately, we hope this research will contribute to the development of regenerative therapies that slow or even reverse neurodegenerative decline and brain aging. Outside of the lab, I enjoy traveling, listening to music, playing the guitar, gaming, and spending time with friends!
Transcript:
From KXCI Tucson, this is Research Matters. My name is Bridgitte Thum, and I’m so glad to be in the studio today with a senior from the University of Arizona who’s majoring in molecular and cellular biology with a minor in biochemistry. Welcome to Research Matters, Tyler Montgomery. Thank you so much. I’m so happy to be here. What are you researching? I’m in a neuroscience research lab, the Modivon Lab. I work with, my PI is Dr. Lalitha Modivon.
00:00:41
And we are looking at the mechanisms of aging and the mechanisms behind neurodegenerative disease. Our focus is really understanding what is driving the aging process in the brain. And we want to figure out, I guess, of ways that we can combat it and even possibly reverse it. We’re looking at aging in the context of the female brain. There’s a lot of research that exists right now to sort of explain how.
00:01:16
this aging process occurs in the male brain, right? We’ve identified a critical period where this process, neurogenesis, the formation of new neurons in your brain, we’ve identified this critical period in males where this process halts or declines. But there is very limited research right now that explains female brains. Honestly, it’s not just in the context of neuroscience. There’s a lot of research right now that’s just lacking with female physiology in.
00:01:50
general. And this is because, you know, there’s been a lot of research that’s been done on female this long-standing sort of idea or stigma that in the female physiology, right? you have these hormones that are circulating that could sort of confound whatever data you’re looking at and so for that reason historically people have sort of undermined the importance of researching female physiology and so we’re sort of trying to i guess bridge the gap of knowledge that.
00:02:20
exists right now in that realm and so we’re specifically trying to understand the relationship between age female sex hormones like estrogen and progesterone and the aging process in the brain in general wow what have you found so far i cannot reveal too much because this is unpublished work but what i can say is that we’re finding, that there is also this critical period in females, and at this point this is when we’re seeing there is.
00:02:51
a notable decline in neurogenesis we’re seeing that the formation of neurogenesis is a critical period in the brain and at this point this is when we’re seeing there is a notable decline in neurogenesis we’re seeing that the formation of neurogenesis we’re seeing that the formation of neurons is significantly, climbing. This effect is even more pronounced in animals that are lacking female sex hormones. That reveals to us that there is something really critical happening with the presence of estrogen and progesterone. As if they were up there for a reason. Exactly. Exactly. You’ve been listening to Research Matters. Our guest today has been Tyler Montgomery.
00:03:23
What a pleasure, Tyler. Thank you so much for visiting our radio station today. Thank you so much. It was a pleasure. You’ve been listening to Research Matters from KXCI, Tucson. To hear more episodes or for more information, visit the program’s page at kxci.org.
