2013–2014 Research Assistantships
Summer 2014
Student: Christina Cho
Faculty Member: Dr. Scott Kreher, Biology
Christina will work on an extension of the next step of Dr. Kreher’s research program on olfaction in Drosophila. She will study how fruit fly larvae behaviorally respond to odor mixtures and will examine odor preference. The goal of the project is to gather enough data to make valid conclusions which will ultimately be written into a manuscript for peer-reviewed publication. Christina will prepare and conduct experiments, analyze data and conduct statistical tests. She will also learn how to make graphs and present the data and how to make conclusions.
Student: Samantha Herdegen
Faculty Member: Dr. Irina Calin-Jageman, Neuroscience
Continuation of grant awarded for Fall 2013.
Student: Karolina Kir
Faculty Member: Dr. Scott Kreher, Biology
Karolina will work on a project that involves selective rescue of odor receptor mutants with various odor receptor genes. This project is an offshoot of Dr. Kreher’s previous work and will serve to illustrate how sensory neurons are weighted in neural computations underlying odor coding. Karolina will plan and conduct experiments, organize data, analyze data and make conclusions, as well as conduct statistical tests. She will also learn how to plan experiments and how to determine the next step in a series of connected experiments
Student: Sonia Kosmala
Faculty Member: Prof. Noelle Allen Wright, Sculpture
Sonia’s role will be to assist in the production and conceptual direction of a new body of Prof. Wright’s sculpture. She will gain an understanding of the methodology and conceptual approach of a project as well as the various processes and stages that go into art production. Sonia will learn advanced sculpture skills (graduate school level) Prof. Wright does not teach in class, such as advanced mold making, painting for sculpture, advanced carving skills, and slip casting. She will also help complete the complex and time-sensitive steps of the mold making process from the clay original to the urethane multiple part molds to the final experimental pours in wax, concrete and resin, be responsible for some plaster carving, woodworking and clay modeling, and will help Prof Wright fire works in the kilns and experiment with a new body of sculpture that fires clay and plaster together in the kiln.
Spring 2014
Students: Nikita Belyaev, Yanyan Chen and Peter Mielcarek
Faculty Member: Dr. Marion Weedermann, Mathematics
The project was entitled “One of the Optimal Strategies for Winning the Game ‘Closing the Box’.” The students investigated the possibilities of each dice roll. After identifying probabilities for a role of two dice to result in a specific outcome, they developed and tested a strategy for a single player game and then extended this strategy to a multiple player version of the game. This was a joint project of students from the Mathematics and Computer Science departments and a new URSCI initiative
Students: Joseph Biggs and Jonathan Cabai
Faculty Member: Dr. Daniela Andrei, Chemistry
Continuation of grant awarded for Summer 2013
Student: Theresa Farris
Faculty Member: Prof. Noelle Allen Wright, Sculpture
Continuation of grant awarded for Summer 2013
Student: Samantha Herdegen
Faculty Member: Dr. Irina Calin-Jageman, Neuroscience
Continuation of grant awarded for Fall 2013
Student: Geraldine Holmes
Faculty Member: Dr. Bob Calin-Jageman, Neuroscience
Continuation of grant awarded for Spring 2013
Student: Christine Nguyen
Faculty Member: Dr. Scott Kreher, Biology
Continuation of grant awarded for Fall 2013
Student: Jasmine Stewart
Faculty Member: Dr. Chavella Pittman, Sociology
This project continues Professor Pittman’s research that examines the relationship between racial behaviors and social norms. The research is based on two studies, both of which are online survey experiments that pose social norms regarding racial justice behaviors. The purpose of the research is to produce new knowledge that can be broadly applied in order to promote social change and reduce racism. Specifically, the project aims to identify which aspects of social norms are most powerful proponents of racism, so that norm based interventions can be developed and implemented to reduce racism. The research will produce publishable results, allow for methodology optimization and be the basis for a grant proposal submitted to the NSF to expand the study. Jasmine will assist Dr. Pittman by performing data analysis, writing portions of the project manuscript and merging and cleaning data.
Student: Tyehimba Turner
Faculty Member: Dr. Margaret Jonah, Biology
Continuation of grant awarded for Fall 2013
Student: Breanna Watral
Faculty Member: Dr. David Perry, History
Continuation of grant awarded for Spring 2013
Fall 2013
Students: Joseph Biggs and Jonathan Cabai
Faculty Member: Dr. Daniela Andrei, Chemistry
Continuation of grant awarded for Summer 2013
Student: Theresa Farris
Faculty Member: Prof. Noelle Allen Wright, Sculpture
Continuation of grant awarded for Summer 2013.
Student: Samantha Herdegen
Faculty Member: Dr. Irina Calin-Jageman, Neuroscience
Habituation is a decline in reflex responsiveness due to repeated stimulation. It remains unclear what specific transcription changes are required to enable neurons to encode and maintain long-term habituation memories. The aim of the research is to fill in this gap and identify novel gene transcripts that are regulated in long-term habituation. This project has been ongoing for three years and recently focused on performing a large screening experiment using microarray analysis which is a method by which thousands of gene transcripts can be interrogated at the same time using a small glass chip spotted with gene targets. Samantha learned how to perform the techniques necessary to accomplish the research project, evaluated 10 transcripts, analyzed the data obtained and wrote up her findings for publication. She developed scientific skills that require accurate and detail oriented bench work, critical thinking in analyzing results and developed her scientific writing and presentation skills.
Student: Geraldine Holmes
Faculty Member: Dr. Bob Calin-Jageman, Neuroscience
Continuation of grant awarded for Spring 2013
Student: Christine Nguyen
Faculty Member: Dr. Scott Kreher, Biology
This project continued Dr. Kreher’s project on the genetic and molecular basis of olfaction in the fruit fly. Christine planned and performed experiments, analyzed data, learned about statistical tests and helped write and edit the manuscript. She was also able to observe the final stages of a project and the effort that goes into finalizing data analysis and learned how to ask new research questions as part of a research program. The project was presented at the national Drosophila conference in Washington, D.C., April 2013.
Student: Joanna Sasara
Faculty Member: Dr. Marion Weedermann, Mathematics
The focus of this project was on the modeling of anaerobic digestion—optimization and case studies—and on the establishment of an optimization criterion for the operating conditions that ensure maximum biogas production. Joanna conducted the sensitivity and all other computer experiments for this project. She also conducted computer experiments to confirm whether any such candidates were indeed critical. Joanna increased her knowledge of the use of numerical experiments in applied mathematical research and specifically, the use of computer experimentation in the verification of theoretical results and the extension of those results. She also learned how to use MatLab to see how programs and scripts are written and how to run simulations, learned how to conduct a sensitivity analysis, how to report outcomes, and how to identify critical parameters
Student: Tyehimba Turner
Faculty Member: Dr. Margaret Jonah, Biology
This research explored the potential for various microbes to adapt to using stevia, a tropical plant product used as a non-nutrient sweetener (Truvia™). Tye experimented with soil bacteria, with the intent of finding organisms able to use rebaudioside (the active chemical in stevia plants). This research provided insight into fundamental processes of bacterial evolution and gene transfer, which occur more rapidly in bacteria than in higher organisms and contributed to knowledge of soil bacteria, which have highly varied chemistries but are poorly understood. Tye increased his knowledge of laboratory methods of growing and studying microorganisms and of methods used in molecular genetics. His understanding of the many aspects of microbiology will increase and his skills in gene analysis were augmented and he gained skills that will complement his career goals.
Student: Breanna Watral
Faculty Member: Dr. David Perry, History
Continuation of grant awarded for Spring 2013.