Bisphenol A, or BPA, is a harmful chemical used in plastics that can act as an endocrine and repro ductive system disruptor. Additionally, there are claims that BPA causes nerve degeneration. By contrast Cow Ghee, or clarified butter, is widely used throughout India as an ayurvedic or natural medicine to sup port nerve health and overall cognitive function. In my research, I use the neurodegenerative effects of BPA as a precursur to examine if Cow Ghee is actually capable of healing the neurons of model organism C. el egans. C. elegans are microscopic worms, and my specific strain is AA120, which expresses a GFP gene. High fluorescence of these C. elegans correlates to healthy neurons, whereas low fluorescence suggests that the nerves are damaged. Ultimately, I used fluorescence to quantify the effectiveness of Cow Ghee in treat ing the neurons of worms previously exposed to BPA.

The general procedure for exposure are as follows: I used an Age synchronization procedure to maintain a standard L3 age when exposed, then transferred my worms onto plates already set with E.coli and 130ul of 5*10^-3 mg/ml BPA, which I determined through preliminary trials to be my standard concen tration of BPA. After letting worms grow overnight into L3 stage in an incubator set at 25 degrees Celcius, I then added 130ul of varying concentrations of cow ghee onto these plates. These concentrations included a low of 5*10^-4 mg/ml Ghee, a medium of 5*10^-3 mg/ml Ghee, as well as a high of 5*10^-2 mg/ml Ghee. I then allowed these to set at room temperature overnight before examining them under a fluorescent microscope. When using the fluorescent microscope, I transferred a small amount of worms (10ul) onto agar pads with small circumference and used sodium azide solution to paralyze them. After they were para lyzed, I was able to locate and take images of C. elegans that were later used to determine a fluorescent value using Image J software.

Ultimately, this research supports my hypothesis that C. elegans exposed to BPA then cow ghee would have a higher fluorescence value, and therefore healther neurons as compared to C. elegans exposed merely to BPA. This data is supported by my graphs found in the poster portfolio, as well as the results from a ANOVA Turkey HSD test I conducted to compare significant deviation between each of my trial groups. Further studies involve using Cow Ghee as a medicinal base and compare drug effectiveness when administered by itself vs when the same concentration of drug is administered with cow ghee.