In honour of “Women’s Month.” Each week, in March, the Tribune is profiling different female researchers at McGill, and the story behind their work.

 For most of us, the idea of working as a mathematician seems too far-fetched. Dr. Johanna Nešlehová, associate professor in the department of mathematics and statistics at McGill, certainly felt that way throughout primary school. This all changed in high school when an inspiring teacher sparked Nešlehová’s interest in mathematics, and motivated her to pursue the subject at university.

“We were on the same wavelength, everything just clicked,” Nešlehová recalled.

Guidance from various mentors have played a major role in Nešlehová’s career development. Throughout her studies in the Czech Republic and Germany, she met many influential female statisticians who eventually became her role models. Other than the occasional odd comment from elderly professors, she says that her experience as a female in mathematics has been very positive.

“You meet people that are so accomplished and inspiring, yet are completely human and have lives,” Nešlehová joked.

As for encouraging her own students, she feels that McGill could benefit from a mentorship program, where students can receive practical training and guidance to prepare them for careers outside of academia. Nešlehová thinks that outreach can also be done at the high school level, where advanced mathematicians could have the opportunity to demystify preconceptions about working in math and statistics earlier on.

The development of these types of programs is important, as statisticians are in high demand. Sectors such as healthcare, finance, and public policy are in need of experts to help them manage and understand mass amounts of information. As advances in technology have increased data collection, there is an increasing need for new strategies to properly handle and draw accurate conclusions from such large datasets.

“There are all sorts of applications in statistics, in all sort of sciences,” explained Nešlehová.

This diversity in career options is even showcased in her own careerpath. Since finishing her PhD at the University of Oldenburg, Nešlehová has completed a fellowship at the University of Hamburg, consulted for financial institutions internationally, and conducted postdoctoral research on neuroscience at Harvard Medical School.

Her current research focuses on extreme value theory (trying to predict the occurrence of very rare events), and copulas. Copulas are mathematical functions used to describe how random quantities relate and interact with one another. Her work aims to devise new methods to calculate such functions, and apply them to medical and environmental research.

The 2008 financial crisis is thought to be partly attributable to copulas; traders allegedly misused a formula that models complex risks in the financial market, and, as a result, they made riskier decisions than intended. This example further highlights the gap between academia and industry, and the need to emphasize practical training (application and communication of theories) throughout undergraduate and graduate studies.

For students still hesitant to enter the field of mathematics, Nešlehová offers a last bit of reassurance: “If you study math, there’s nothing to lose. You’re going to train your brain, and learn how to think.”

Scientists are getting closer to something mothers have been doing for years: knowing what we’re thinking. The development of neuroimaging technology—various techniques used to directly and indirectly image the brain—has shifted our understanding of how the brain works. Recently, two studies utilized technology to visualize brain activity associated with the brain’s perception of the external and social worlds.

For many years, the brain was a mystery. It could only be studied through invasive procedures, and usually, only when a patient was dead. Now, using neuroimaging technology to observe brain activity, scientists can see how multiple parts of the brain work together to process and store sensory information.

A team of cognitive neuroscientists at Cornell University is making use of functional magnetic resonance imagery (fMRI) to understand the physical mechanisms that allow humans to interpret their social sphere. This technology has allowed scientists to see who a person is thinking of for the first time in history.

Participants in the Cornell study were given the personality traits of four individuals, and then asked to imagine how each would behave in a set of scenarios. The researchers were able to predict who the participants were thinking of based on activity patterns in the brain’s medial prefrontal cortex. This region of the brain stores and analyzes personality traits.

The brain combines personality traits to represent individuals in “personality models,” which are what the brain uses to predict behaviour. As you learn more about a person, the brain continues to combine their personality traits to create accurate and complete models. It is for this reason that parents may be able to predict their child’s behaviour.

Social cognition disorders, like autism, are also linked to the anterior medial prefrontal cortex. Research from Cornell suggests that these disorders are due to a person’s inability to accurately develop these personality models.

Just as fascinating is a study conducted by scientists from Japan’s National Institute of Genetics in Shizuoka Prefecture, which took advantage of the larval zebrafish’s translucent head, and the brightness of the green flourescent protein (GFP) to track how the fish take in their environment.

When neurons are activated, calcium concentration increases in nerve cells, which illuminates the GFP. Through the illumination of this protein, researchers could observe brain activity during predation by creating transgenic fish (fish with a GFP gene) that express GFP in their optic tetum (the centre of visual processing in the brain).

Researchers first recorded the fish’s response to a moving dot on a screen and next to paramecium, a common prey of the fish. The stimuli caused neurons to flash across the brain, which corresponded to the directional movement of the dot and paramecium. Using real-time video, scientists observed the zebrafish’s brain activity, as it responded to its environment.

In the future, these techniques will be used to observe and map the neural activities implicated in other forms of thinking and learning, taking scientists one step closer to understanding the mysteries of the human brain. However, as far as someone being able to see my thoughts, I’d prefer to keep those to myself, thank you.

With finals less than a month away, the Tribune has reviewed three productivity apps to help keep you on top of your work.

 Stay Focused

This app is a go-to for studying before any midterm or final. StayFocusd increases your productivity by limiting the amount of time that you can spend on “time-wasting” websites. Developed by Transfusion Media, this free extension to the Google Chrome web browser blocks URLs with a twist. Unlike the popular app Self Control, StayFocusd allows you to block websites like Facebook or YouTube, but still visit them for a limited amount of time. What this means is that if you decide to spend 60 minutes watching YouTube videos, updating your Facebook status, or playing online poker, you will be unable to access all the content that you have blocked for the rest of the day. So if you find yourself wishing there was some way to stop yourself from watching random people “do the Harlem Shake,” install this app and embrace productivity.

Bump

Bump simplifies sharing. As a cross-platform app—meaning it works for a variety of smartphone typesit aids in transferring data between two devices that both possess the application. What makes this app stand out is the sheer ease with which it accomplishes this task—just bump together the phones between which you want to make the transfer and voilà! Smartphone users can transfer contact information, photos, and files to each other over the internet through this method. The developers have now added the additional functionality of bumping your phone with your computer to seamlessly make transfers. Available for both iPhone and Android devices, it’s a steal for the price—free!

Dunno

Dubbed the “Research-it-later” app, this technology helps you keep track of your train of thought. Contrary to note-taking apps or to-do lists, the main function of Dunno is to perform research for you while you’re away from the web. Essentially, Dunno helps you to record any thought that comes to your mind, and then it automatically performs background research on the recorded item. Though the results are not too in-depth—you don’t want to use Dunno for a research paper—the app succeeds in googling things for you to look at later. So, if someone mentions a musician you haven’t heard of, but you don’t have the time to look the artist up on Wikipedia, put it in Dunno. The app will consolidate information about that artist and notify you when it is ready to be read. Available for the Mac and iOS, never again will you catch yourself regretting not having instantly looked something up because you didn’t have the time.

Over the last 30 years, science has seen many breakthroughs with respect to AIDS caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Affecting over 34 million people worldwide, billions of dollars have been donated to finding a cure for this disease. However, as of 2013, there is still no cure for AIDS or HIV infection. Antiretroviral treatments available on the market only suppress HIV symptoms. Currently, the disease can be delayed, but not completely cured.

Along with tuberculosis and malaria, HIV is one of the three most widely spread infectious diseases, responsible for many deaths on an annual basis. The virus replicates by inserting its genetic code into human cells, and particularly, a type of T cell known as CD4 cells. T cells are key players in the immune system. As T cells are depleted, afflicted patients eventually reach a point where they cannot battle infectious diseases or cancers.

As more and more T cells are infected with HIV, the virus levels rise in the blood. At this point, the immune system attempts to fight off the virus, causing side effects that include aches, pains, and fever. However, although the levels of the virus decrease, it is not entirely eliminated from the body. The problem with HIV is that it remains in the blood in low levels as a provirus, its dormant form, which the immune system is unable to recognize. Since T cells are long lived, they will continue to replicate their genomes, along with the virus. After years without symptoms of the infection, the levels of the virus can rise, causing in AIDS.

Although scientists are still searching for a cure, many cases suggest we aren’t far away from discovering a permanent treatment. In 1985, researchers discovered a group of female prostitutes in Nairobi, Kenya, who seemed immune to AIDS. Their bodies produced an army of killer T cells to protect the immune system from cells infected with HIV. Usually, people do not maintain high levels of T cells for long periods of time, once the initial infection is fought off, an individual’s T cell count drops. Yet, in the case of these women, their killer T cell levels remained high, and they continuously drove back the infection whenever it recurred. Researchers have not found any aspect that is fully consistent amongst the women’s immune systems, suggesting the protection could come from multiple overlapping genetic factors.

In 2007, Timothy Brown, the “Berlin patient,” became widely known as the only person cured of HIV after he received bone marrow transplants to treat leukemia. His doctor, Gero Hütter, found a donor who was both a genetic match and had a rare mutation, known as CCR4-delta32, which makes the CD4 cells resistant to infection by HIV. While some scientists were skeptical of whether or not he was actually ‘cured’ of AIDS, tests showed that Brown’s CD4 T cell counts remained fairly stable and HIV genetic material was found only at a level that was barely detectable in the most sensitive tests. All of these results led to the conclusion that through Brown’s treatment, progress was made towards permanently curing the infection.

The most recent discovery in the battle against AIDS occurred this March in Mississippi: a baby girl, born with HIV was cured very early in life after treatment with a standard drug therapy. Unlike the “Berlin patient,” whose HIV infection was completely eradicated with an elaborate treatment for leukemia in 2007, the baby was given an inexpensive treatment of a cocktail composed of three widely available drugs, already used to treat HIV infection in infants. Researchers believe that it was this early use of antiviral treatment that cured the infant, as it kept the virus from forming hard-to-treat viral reservoirs—the proviruses. Her doctor, Hannah Gay, a pediatric HIV specialist at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, was surprised to discover that after 28 months, tests for HIV-specific antibodies—the standard clinical indicator of HIV infection—were negative.

Although much progress has been made towards HIV/AIDS treatment in the past, few discoveries have received such media attention as this most recent finding. Perhaps it is because this Mississippi case is the first time an infant has received a functional cure. This is a rare event, in which a person achieves remission without the need for drugs, and standard blood tests show no signs that the virus is making copies of itself.

More testing needs to be done to see if the treatment would have the same effect on similarly infected children. Nonetheless, these results could change the way high-risk babies are treated for HIV. Though we still do not have a universal treatment for HIV/AIDS, we are now one step closer to finding a permanent cure.