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Millions of people are affected by cancer of some form, and those notalready diagnosedcould be in danger of getting it. There are manyunknowns about thedisease, and that is why many people have dedicatedtime, money, and effort into finding cures for it. Cancer can form fromincorrect modifications to your DNA that affect how your genes areexpressed. Basically, DNA modifications gone awry can manifest itself intolung cancer, breast cancer, skin cancer, etc depending in which cellstheproblem lies. There are numerous ways that cancer can develop but there ismore to the story.Cells have a mechanism that preventsindefinite cellular division. The more a celldivides the more likely there will be harmfulmodifications to the DNA and thus the larger achance there is for the descendents of the cell(a cell line) can become cancerous. If cells replicated forever, cancers couldbecome widespread throughout the body. The telomere is believed to be apart of the DNA that can prevent this.DNA can be found in cell nuclei in the form of chromosomes, and at theend of each chromosome is a section of highly repetitive DNA (in humans theDNA sequence is TTAGGG) called the telomere (Figure 1). Each time a celldivides the telomere is shortened. This is to prevent a loss of importantgenomic DNA which is the genetic code that defines each species and person(it makes you, you). The length of telomeres has been documented to
 
determine how long a cell line lives (and ultimately an organism). Shortertelomeres exist in the cells of older organisms. The “device” that is used to maintain the length of the telomeres is anenzyme known as telomerase. It has the ability to add the repeat DNAsequence to the end of the telomere to salvage DNA lost. There is adownside in that when telomerase acts unrestricted it constantly lengthensthe telomere, enabling defective (cancer) cells to reproduce indefinitely. Bystudying the nature of the telomere and the important enzyme thatmaintains it, I hope to add major contributions to the field of cancer research. The tool I wish to employ is known as Optical Tweezers.Optical Tweezers were discoveredto have the ability to trap an extremelysmall particle (in the micrometer andeven nanometer size) by applying a forceon it, and they are a very powerful toolthat can be used to analyze the structure of DNA. The basic mechanism is tofocus laser light through a microscope objective using specifically tailoredlenses and other devices that guide the laser through the objective. At thefocus is where the tweezers are able to “grab” the small particle (in myexperiments it will be a microsphere).With optical tweezers, I plan to perform experiments that will allow meto analyze the structure of telomeric DNA. I will be able to preciselydetermine how long telomere DNA is, where proteins that can bind to the
 
DNA are located, and can attain force profiles associated with the structureof the DNA and/or the proteins (while bound) that can provide further insightinto this area of study (see Figure 2).With the aid of collaborators and other simultaneous experiments of the lab, I believe this project can be achieved in the near future. Currently,the lab is underway in constructing the optical tweezers and collaboratorsare working towards providing us with the DNA needed. I hope to use theGRD Grant money to buy a component that will provide more reliable dataattained from the optical tweezers.My lab (KochLab, Dr. Steve Koch, PI) is a new lab at UNM currentlyrunning with very limited funding. I feel the lab has the ability to be a majorcollaborator with UNM’s Cancer Research Facility for many years to come andcan provide excellent research in numerous other areas besidestelomericresearch and can further accentuate UNM as one of the premiercancer research universities. The research we do here can greatly impactthe immediate community by furthering the prestige of the University,especially the UNM Hospital’s cancer treatment capabilities.I, myself, am a Puerto Rican and am one of a few Hispanics to pursue adegree in physics (concentration biophysics). I have a deep respect for mycommunity and as such I feel it is my obligation to try and get as manyHispanic children interested in science (and Physics) as possible. Here inNew Mexico, I have found the opportunity to do this. My lab collaborateswith middle schools in Albuquerque to give tours of the lab and show them
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