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Event #1


For my first event of the quarter, I attended Biomimicry in the Botanical Garden. When I first arrived, I did not know what to expect; I had never been to the Botanical Garden nor did I know what Biomimicry was. However, once the event started, I was pleasantly intrigued.

The first speaker of the night was Nestor R Gonzalez, MD, MSCR. While Dr. Gonzalez is a Professor of Neurosurgery at Geffen and a surgeon, he explained that his real passion is research. As a surgeon, he operates on the arteries and veins of the brain. He noticed that many of his stroke patients were having different responses to the surgeries he was performing. While some would respond well, others would not. As a result, Dr. Gonzalez started to spend more of his time researching this issue and began to focus his life on answering the question: How can blood vessel growth be promoted to increase blood flow to the brain?


The Botanical Garden is a place that Dr. Gonzalez visited often during his residency at UCLA. He described it as his escape from reality, providing him with all the serenity and peace that seemed so absent from his life during his days as a resident. It was in the Botanical Garden that Dr. Gonzalez grew his love for plants and botany.

He began to look into the biology of plants and noticed that sprouting and branching are natural models of proliferation and repair, something that he strived towards accomplishing for the human body. He compared collaterals, connections between veins and arteries, to the branches of trees. 


With that in mind, Dr. Gonzalez continued his research by planting a tree in his lab and observing its growth. Like many scientists, Dr. Gonzalez soon realized that his hypothesis was false. While the arteries and veins of the brain do not mimic the natural sprouting and branching models of trees, they do closely resemble the roots of plants both visually and behaviorally.


Overall, I found Dr. Gonzalez’s talk extremely captivating. He was able to connect the patterns seen in nature, specifically those found in the roots of plants, with the arteries and veins of the brain. As I have learned in this class, despite the disparities between art and science, both have an immense influence on each other. Similarly, while botany and medicine seem different, there are many overlaps between the two fields of study. In short, I would definitely recommend this event for current and future students.


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