It took one neuroscience course for Marina Palumbo ’17 to know neuro would be her major: Introduction to Brain and Behavior with Douglas Weldon, the Stone Professor of Psychology, who is the neuroscience program director.
Palumbo, who plans to go to med school, was keen to understand the physiological processes that control thoughts, feelings and actions. As a rising junior she spent a summer doing research with Weldon on long-term potentiation, which is related to learning and memory.
“Summer research at Hamilton was an entirely new experience for me,” she says. “I was able to be involved in every aspect of the research process, from collecting data to organizing results in a way that could be presented to others.”
Palumbo’s interests are broader than science – for instance, she’s a tutor at the college Writing Center.
“Because of Hamilton's open curriculum, I have been able to take courses in a variety of departments. One of my favorite classes was Poetry and Poetics. In this course, we not only analyzed poems, but also created our own poetic imitations. Imitating the styles of specific poems gave me an interesting perspective of the art of poetry. I appreciated the creative and collaborative nature of our class discussions as we worked together to understand works of poetry,” she says.
