Need Help Figuring Out a Research Topic

[surgeon_hopeful]

Hi,

I'm a high schooler that is part of the IB program. One of the requirements of the program is that we must complete an essay between 3000-4000 words (I'm not complaining because I know that once I hit college, 5000 words is like a weekend project). I really want to do it on human anatomy, or anesthesiology, so I was wondering if any of you guys have ideas. The requirements are that the topic cannot be clinically based: it must focus on the biological aspects of whatever the topic may be. Also, it can't be something obvious that can be easily figured out by doing simple research. So yeah let me know.

thanks

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[upekkha]

I see that "surgeon_hopeful" is your ID - so that's the reason you're interested in topics like anatomy and anesthesiology, right? I am not necessarily clear about what you're envisioning as a "biological aspect" of anatomy that isn't clinically based - I think of all anatomy as clinical - when I think of the biological aspects of anatomy, I think of physiology - not sure if you're interested in that. Any additional information on your interests or the scope/angle of your project that might help us think of ideas for anatomy?

As far as anesthesia goes, I think a paper on HOW anesthesia works could fit the bill. I would pick one class of drugs/one drug that is used in general anesthesia and discuss how it works on a biological level. For example, you could discuss the inhaled anesthetics (gases) like desflurane, for example. Or you could discuss the muscle relaxants - like succinylcholine. Or the IV sedatives, like propofol. (Propofol happens to be one of my all-time favorite drugs.) I'd talk about when it is used in the stages of inducing/maintaining general anesthesia and talk about what its mechanism of action is (which of course relates to when it is used in the sequence).

I think one of the areas of medicine that people are most excited about these days (please note I am an internal medicine person) is targeted therapies. This is how medicine will be evolving over the near future, ideally. You could do research on herceptin or on gleevec, which are two of the most widely discussed targeted agents. Both are cancer medications.

Good luck, and try to pick something you'll find interesting! One of the challenges in something "biological" is that it may feel far removed from your every day life and might feel a little alien and thus boring. It helps to try to keep a broad picture and to personally internally (even if you can't write about this stuff in the paper) keep it connected to the clinical application - this may keep the topic more fresh and relevant for you, because I get the sense that you do have some interest in clinical medicine!

Enjoy!