Research Scholars 2021-2022

2021-2022 Research Scholars

Quad Summer Research Scholars

  • Hannah Halpern, Fourth-Year, Classical Studies
    • Project Title: Raffaelo Maffei’s Commentariora Urbana and the History of Censorship
    • Mentor: Ada Palmer
  • Eyshe Beirich, Fourth-Year, Germanic & Jewish Studies
    • Project Title: The work of feminist translation and Miriam Karpilove’s Yiddish-language archive
    • Mentor: Jessica Kirzane
  • Yike Huang, Second-Year, East Asian Languages and Civilizations & Music
    • Project Title: Overflow of Songs: Pan Zhiheng and Kunqu Performance
    • Mentor: Judith Zeitlin
  • David Spitz, Second-Year, Computer Science & Philosophy and Allied Fields 
    • Project Title: Further Topics in Logic: Type Theory for Philosophers
    • Mentor: Kevin Davey
  • Elizabeth Gerlach, Fourth-Year, Romance Languages and Literature 
    • Mentor: Timothy Campbell
  • Mara Duquette, Third-Year, Global Studies & Creative Writing 
    • Project Title: Object Handling and Word Learning Across Cultures 
    • Mentor: Marisa Casillas
  • Su Karaca, Third-Year, Psychology & Data Science 
    • Project Title: Effects of Conversational Disruptions in Computer Mediated Communication Models on People’s Feeling of Closeness and Social Connection
    • Mentor: Anne Henly
  • Samantha Feder-Trosclair, Third-Year, Psychology
    • Project Title: The representation and communication of social thought through gestures
    • Mentor: Susan Goldin-Meadow
  • Brandon Shin, Third-Year, Sociology
    • Project Title: Concentrated Poverty, Exposure to Violent Crime, and Child Academic Achievement
    • Mentor: Geoffrey T. Wodtke
  • Katherine Ambrose, Third-Year, Media Arts and Design & Sociology
    • Project Title: fNIRS and Math Equivalence
    • Mentor: Susan Goldin-Meadow
  • Tianyi Zhang, Fourth-Year, Economics & Mathematics
    • Project Title: Investor behavior and returns in markets for crypto-assets
    • Mentor: Anthony Lee Zhang
  • Erica Hogan, Fourth-Year, Fundamentals: Issues and Texts & Economics
    • Mentor: Raul Sanchez de la Sierra
  • Shannon KIm, Second-Year, Biochemistry & Chemistry
    • Project Title: Enantiomeric Specificity in Chemical Aminoacylation
    • Mentor: Jack Szostak
  • Joseph Farrell, Fourth-Year, Economics & Computer Science and Mathematics
    • Project Title: Automated Refinement Protocol to Improve the Quality of Protein Structures Deposited in the Protein Data Bank, Applied to SARS-COV-2
    • Mentor: Esmael Jafari Haddadian
  • Darius Suplica, Second-Year, Neuroscience
    • Project Title: Decoding Auditory Working Memory Load Using Multivariate Analysis
    • Mentor: Ed Awh
  • Krishna Raghavan, Third-Year, Biological Chemistry & Chemistry
    • Project Title: The effects of charge and tail composition of membrane phospholipids on the binding of α-synuclein
    • Mentor: Ka Yee Lee
  • Jan Kasal, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience
    • Project Title: Auditory Motor Adaptation in the Speech Production System in Humans
    • Mentor: Shannon Heald
  • Emily Scott, Second-Year, Neuroscience
    • Project Title: Behavioral Implications of Inner Ear Potassium Channels in Mice
    • Mentor: Ruth Anne Eatock
  • Jonathan Tang, Fourth-Year, Biological Science
    • Project Title: Naturally assembled microbial communities for BPA degradation
    • Mentor: Seppe Kuehn
  • Polly Ren, Second-Year, Computational and Applied Math & Economics
    • Project Title: Elucidating the structural conformations of amyloid-beta oligomers,  involved in Alzheimer’s disease, on 2D surfaces
    • Mentor: Esmael Haddadian
  • Mukerrem Tufekcioglu, Second-Year, Computer Science
    • Project Title: MD Simulation of Human IDE
    • Mentor: Esmael Haddadian
  • Lingjie Chen, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering & Physics
    • Project Title: Investigating Heat Shock Response with Diamond Nanothermometry
    • Mentor: Peter Maurer
  • Sze Hang Chan, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering
    • Project Title: Investigating Nanoparticles in their Packaging and Release Capabilities of Anti-Cancer Drugs
    • Mentor: Matthew Tirrell
  • Jonah Medoff, Third-Year, Astrophysics
    • Project Title: Searching for Dwarf Galaxies Around NGC 55
    • Mentor: Burcin Mutlu-Pakdil
  • Kevin Yao, Third-Year, Chemistry & Philosophy
    • Project Title: Investigation into the effects of irradiation conditions for squid beak inspired materials
    • Mentor: Stuart Rowan
  • Jiatong Li, Fourth-Year, Physics
    • Project Title: Physica: Tangible Physics Simulation via Swarm Robot Cluster for Improvisation with Tangible User Interface
    • Mentor: Ken Nakagaki
  • William Zhao, Fourth-Year, Chemistry & History
    • Project Title: Asymmetric Epoxidation by Chiral Brønsted Acid Activated Dimethyl Dioxirane (DMDO)
    • Mentor: Viresh Rawal
  • Joseph Guter, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering
    • Project Title: Adoptive Cell Therapy of Cancer Using Tumor-Associated Memory-Phenotype CD8+ T Cells
    • Mentor: Peter Savage
  • Sarah Candelaria McDuffie, Fourth-Year, Chemistry
    • Project Title: Improving the Mechanical Properties of Polylactic Acid with Diblock Copolymer Grafted Cellulose Nanocrystals
    • Mentor: Stuart Rowan
  • Yunyan Mo, Fourth-Year, Geophysical Sciences
    • Project Title: Revision of the carboniferous ray-finned fossil fish Woodichthys bearsdeni 
    • Mentor: Michael Coates
  • Aniela Mitchell, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering
    • Project Title: Engineering co-BBz CAR-T cells
    • Mentor: Jun Huang
  • Genevieve Ansay, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering & Mathematics
    • Project Title: Investigation of Polymer Thin Films as Anti-Icing Materials with a Quartz Crystal Microbalance
    • Mentor: Steven J. Sibener
  • Aditya Bhardwaj, Third-Year, Physics
    • Project Title: Quantum Optimal Control of Multimode Systems
    • Mentor: David Schuster
  • Chi Ian Ip, Fourth-Year, Physics & Philosophy
    • Project Title: Light-induced Time-reversal Symmetry Breaking at the Bi2Se3/WSe2 Interface
    • Mentor: Shuolong Yang
  • Sophia Li, Fourth-Year, Biological Chemistry & Chemistry
    • Project Title: Synthesis of N-Heterocycles via C-C Activation
    • Mentor: Guangbin Dong
  • Emma Yang, Third-Year, Biological Chemistry & Chemistry
    • Project Title: Transition metal-catalyzed [5+2] cycloaddition of 1-indanone with tethered alkynes via oxidative addition
    • Mentor: Guangbin Dong
  • Noah Geller, Third-Year, Physics & Mathematics
    • Project Title: A Kinematic Analysis of the Tidal Stream of Antlia II
    • Mentor: Alexander Ji

Supported by the Fosun Fund for Undergraduate Research

  • Emma Montgomery, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
    • Project Title: Development of a humanized zebrafish model to test functional consequences of insulin mutations
    • Mentor: Raghavendra Mirmira
  • Katharine Fox, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
    • Project Title: Cellular basis for androgen-androgen receptor mediated protection from Type 1 Diabetes
    • Mentor: Alexander Chervonsky
  • Sofia V Montoto, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
    • Project Title: Functional Role of DHHC2 in Golgi Satellite Proliferation
    • Mentor: William Green
  • Ellen Ma, Second-Year, Biological Sciences
    • Project Title: Endothelization and Cell Differentiation Projects at the Hibino Lab
    • Mentor: Narutoshi Hibino
  • Jillyn Turunen, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience
    • Project Title: Role of GABA Transaminase (ABAT) in Pediatric Brain Tumor Medulloblastoma Development and Spread
    • Mentor: Josh Neman
  • Maya Ordonez, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience & English Language and Literature
    • Project Title: Understanding the Spatial Variation in Depression Rates within Cities
    • Mentor: Marc G. Berman
  • Daisy Maslan, Third-Year, History & Biology
    • Project Title: Characterizing Yan Phase Separation
    • Mentor: Ilaria Rebay
  • Rowen Glusman​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Fourth-Year, Astronomy and Astrophysics
    • Project Title: Measuring Stellar Cycles of Young Stars with K2 and TESS
    • Mentor: Jacob Bean
  • Riley Rosener​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Third-Year, Astrophysics
    • Project Title: Detector Trigger Timing for Scalar Particles in ICARUS
    • Mentor: David Schmitz
  • Raul Basilides Gomez del Estal Teixeira​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Third-Year, Astrophysics
    • Project Title: Characterizing the Photometric Redshifts for Cosmic Shear
    • Mentor: Chihway Chang
  • Steven Labalme​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Third-Year, Chemistry & Mathematics
    • Project Title: Enhancing Photoredox Gold Catalysis with Metal-Organic Layers
    • Mentor: Wenbin Lin
  • Maya McDaniel​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering
    • Project Title: Development of a Photoswitchable Dye-Based Detector for Improved PET Scans
    • Mentor: Allison Squires
  • Caroline McCleary​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Third-Year, Chemistry
    • Project Title: Undergraduate research position in UChicago Professor Wenbin Lin's lab
    • Mentor: Wenbin Lin
  • Ainsley Iwanicki​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Third-Year, Chemistry
    • Project Title: Investigating the Effect of Chirality on Charge Transfer in TMD-Organic Heterostructures Using 2D-Circular Dichroism
    • Mentor: Greg Engel

Supported by the Hoeft Fund for Undergraduate Research​​​​​​​

  • Alexander Stern, Third-Year, Linguistics & Environmental and Urban Studies
    • Project Title: Tracking children’s shift from child-like to adult-like vocabulary 
    • Mentor: Marisa Casillas
  • Wanxin Peng, Fourth-Year, Psychology 
    • Project Title: Influence of Modalities of Preference Expression on Post-Choice Satisfaction
    • Mentor: Boaz Keysar
  • Yizhou Lyu, Third-Year, Psychology & Statistics 
    • Project Title: Neural correlates of Hostile Attribution Bias
    • Mentor: Yuan Chang Leong
  • Dana Christopher, Second-Year, Biological Sciences
    • Project Title: Testing the Inhibition Properties of Candidate Compounds on Bacterial Protein Mfd's Role in the Evolution of Antibiotic Resistance Development
    • Mentor: Houra Merrikh
  • Aidan Cloonan​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Fourth-Year, Astronomy & Astrophysics
    • Project Title: Search for Widely Separated Lensed Quasars
    • Mentor: Michael Gladders
  • Joseph Geniesse​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Fourth-Year, Chemistry & Environmental and Urban Studies
    • Project Title: Ytterbium-Doped Lead-Free Halide Perovskite Quantum Cutting Materials to Increase the Efficiencies of Silicon Solar Cells
    • Mentor: Eray Aydil
  • Alexander Costle-Tyler​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Third-Year, Chemistry
    • Project Title: Snyder Research Group: Synthesis of Harziane Diprotenoids
    • Mentor: Scott Snyder
  • Hugh Cairney​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Third-Year, Physics
    • Project Title: Synthesis, characterization, and spectroscopic study of bismuth based lead-free perovskite quantum dots
    • Mentor: Greg Engel
  • Frederick Wehlen​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​, Fourth-Year, Physics & Astrophysics
    • Project Title: Holographic Anomalies in the CMB
    • Mentor: Craig Hogan

Quad Faculty Research Grantees

  • Susanne Paulus, Faculty Mentor, NELC/Oriental Institute
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Madeline Ouimet
  • Timothy Harrison, Faculty Mentor, English
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Finn Barry
  • Agnes Callard, Faculty Mentor, Philosophy
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Jessica Aaron
  • Ellen MacKay, Faculty Mentor, English and TAPS
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Jode Sparks
  • Andrew Koh, Faculty Mentor, Pathology
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Gabrielle Berman
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Jacob Bernheim
  • Sampriti Mukherjee, Faculty Mentor, Molecular Genetics & Cell Biology
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Emilia Lim
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Ethan Yarberry
  • Jingyi Fei, Faculty Mentor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Xiaoshu Wang
  • Peggy Mason, Faculty Mentor, Neurobiology
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Jonathan Zeevi
  • Brandon Pierce, Faculty Mentor, Public Health Sciences
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Yohhan Kumarasinghe
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Stephanie Zhang
  • Stephanie Palmer, Faculty Mentor, Organismal Biology and Anatomy; Physics
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Minerva Roscoe
  • Akira Imamoto, Faculty Mentor, Ben May Department for Cancer Research
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Violet Wu
  • John Anderson, Faculty Mentor, Chemistry
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Joel Gardner
  • Pedro Lopes, Faculty Mentor, Computer Science
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Rahman Mustapha
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Noor Amin
  • Bozhi Tian, Faculty Mentor, Chemistry
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Elaine Liang
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Ellie Ostroff
  • Reika Yokochi, Faculty Mentor, Geophysical Sciences
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Nicholas Durani
  • Hsiao-Wen Chen, Faculty Mentor, Astronomy and Astrophysics
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Naren Kasinath
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Rohan Venkat
  • David Jablonski, Faculty Mentor, Geophysical Sciences
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Sharon Zhou
  • Marc Berman, Faculty Mentor, Psychology
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Maya Ordonez
  • Robert Vargas, Faculty Mentor, Sociology
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Juan-Pablo Armes
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Gabriel Morales
  • Ada Palmer, Faculty Mentor, History
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Hannah Halpern
  • Zhiying Ma, Faculty Mentor, Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Michelle Liu
  • Eugene Raikhel, Faculty Mentor, Geophysical Sciences
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Nicholas Durani
  • Olufunmilayo Olopade, Faculty Mentor, Global Health
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Lingyue Yu
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Aarthi Koripelly
  • Allen Lu, Faculty Mentor, Linguistics
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Henry Mackall
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Jonathan Roven
  • Timothy Sanders, Faculty Mentor, Pediatrics & Biological Sciences
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Sara Salomon
  • Raul Sanchez de la Sierra, Faculty Mentor, Harris School of Public Policy
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Erica Hogan
  • Akram Bakkour, Faculty Mentor, Psychology
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Defne Buyukyazgan
  • Gabriel Winant, Faculty Mentor, History
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Benjamin Tjandra
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Abed Alsolaiman
  • Malte Janson, Faculty Mentor, Geophysical Sciences
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Cal LeDoux
  • Luca Grandi, Faculty Mentor, Physics
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Victoria Ankel
  • Dorian Abott, Faculty Mentor, Geophysical Sciences
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Kyla Mullaney
  • Haryadi Gunawi, Faculty Mentor, Computer Science
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Dang Nguyen
  • Jacob Bean, Faculty Mentor, Computer Science
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Dang Nguyen
  • Haryadi Gunawi, Faculty Mentor, Astronomy & Astrophysics
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Devin Hoover
  • David Miller, Faculty Mentor, Physics
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Macallan Maedke
    • Undergraduate Researcher: Sadie Seddon-Stettler

Dean's Fund for Undergraduate Research - Conference Awardees

  • Jonathan Wuwong, Third-Year, Linguistics
    • Presentation Title: Accounting for Grammatical Change and Variation Within Endangered Language Grammars: The Case of Even
    • Conference: Descriptive Grammars and Typology II (Paris, 2021)
  • Mari Mirasol, Fourth-Year, Sociology
    • Presentation Title: The Right to Citizenship: Education in Juvenile Detention Centers in El Salvador
    • Conference: LASA 2022 Congress: Polarización socioambiental y rivalidad entre grandes potencias (San Francisco, 2022)
  • Devin Hoover, Third-Year, Astrophysics
    • Presentation Title: The Population of Interstellar Objects Detectable with the LSST and Accessible for In Situ Rendezvous with Various Mission Designs
    • Conference: American Astronomical Society (Salt Lake City, 2022)
  • Nathaniel Martinez, Third-Year, Computer Science
    • Presentation Title: Using autoencoders to cluster NEXRAD reflectivity images
    • Conference: 21st Annual American Meteorological Society Student Conference (Houston, 2022)
  • Leighton Stanfill, Third-Year, Linguistics
    • Presentation Title: Processes of gesture change within digital media
    • Conference: American Dialect Society (Washington, DC, 2022)

Pictured: João Shida, 2020-2021 Liew Family College Research Fellow and College Summer Research Scholar (Photo Credit: Prof. Allison Squires)