2024-2025 Research Scholars
Winter Quad Research Scholars
Supported by the Global Health Research Fund
- Chelsea Wilp, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Addressing Waning Vaccine Immunity by Targeting Lymphatic Endothelial Cells
- Mentor: Aaron Esser-Kahn
Supported by the Hoeft Family Research Fund
- Ali Alamery, Second-Year, Neuroscience, Psychology
- Project Title: NeuroAdapt: Real-time Biometric Feedback for Cognitive Performance Optimization
- Mentor: Howard Nusbaum
- Kashi Bhagat, Third-Year, Biology
- Project Title: Creating a Transient CRISPR system to Investigate long noncoding RNA
- Mentor: Alexander Ruthenburg
- Michael Bolgov, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering, Chemistry
- Project Title: Multiple cycles of non-enzymatic RNA primer extension under varying concentrations of formamide, magnesium, and citrate
- Mentor: Matthew Tirrell
- Vivian Chang, Second-Year, Neuroscience, Computational Biology
- Project Title: Identifying Key Brain Regions Impacted by Surface Corrections in SuperAgers
- Mentor: Adam Martersteck
- Mike Chen, Third-Year, Neuroscience, Computer Science
- Project Title: Exploration of Missing Grasp Force Neural Signals during Transportation
- Mentor: Nicholas Hatsopoulos
- Xiaoyu Chen, Third-Year, Physics, Mathematics
- Project Title: Sub-Doppler Lambda-Cooling Simulation of Potassium & Silver Isotopes
- Mentor: Zoe Yan
- Harry Citow, Second-Year, Biology, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Discovering a Novel, Interspecies Bacterial Antagonism System
- Mentor: Laurie Comstock
- Charlie Davis, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Is “stable” a successful outcome for thoracic aortic aneurysms?
- Mentor: Luka Pocivavsek
- Clarissa Ding, Second-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Interactions of SNF2H with RNA as a Method of Surveying Chromatin Remodeling
- Mentor: Alexander J. Ruthenburg
- Ha Do, Third-Year, Astrophysics, Race, Diaspora, & Indigeneity
- Project Title: Mapping the very metal-poor Jet stream using CaHK photometry
- Mentor: Alex Ji
- Srusti Donapati, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Data Science
- Project Title: Molecular Docking to Enhance Selectivity of Sensors for PFAS "Forever Chemicals" in Drinking Water
- Mentor: Andrew Ferguson
- Lucas Dong, Second-Year, Physics
- Project Title: Developing a zebrafish cell type classification algorithm by morphology based on 3D images of fluorescent confocal microscopy
- Mentor: Elizabeth Jerison
- Taylor Elliott, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Engineering Aptamer Micelle Nanoparticles to Treat Cardiovascular Atherosclerosis in Vitro
- Mentor: Matthew Tirrell
- Shelley Fernando, Second-Year, Biochemistry, Chemistry
- Project Title: Elucidating the role of BRWD1 in B cell development
- Mentor: Marcus Clark
- Leon Gold, Fourth-Year, Physics, Geophysical Sciences
- Project Title: Improvement of Cold Atom Experiment Systems
- Mentor: Cheng Chin
- Declan Gunn, Fourth-Year, Cognitive Science
- Project Title: A Dream’s Potential: How do aspirations shape children’s perceptions of future possibilities?
- Mentor: Fan Yang
- Rafael Gutierrez, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Evolutionary adaptations to neuromuscular circuits: a comparative study in larval flies
- Mentor: Elizabeth Heckscher
- Liam Hade, Fourth-Year, Computer Science
- Project Title: Cataloging Biases In Prebiotic Replication Experiments
- Mentor: Jack Szostak
- Caroline Hou, Second-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Towards Durability in ORR Electrocatalysis: Self-Assembled and Regenerative Layers
- Mentor: Anna Wuttig
- Derek Hsu, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Economics
- Project Title: Patient-Level and Oncologist-Level Factors vAssociated with Intravenous versus Subcutaneous Routes ofTrastuzumab Administration
- Mentor: Austin Wesevich
- Chenwei Hu, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering, Chemistry
- Project Title: Predicting the Degradation Pathways of Li-ion Batteries Under Harsh Conditions with Non-Invasive Impedance Studies and Machine Learning
- Mentor: Ying Shirley Meng
- Abubacarr Jalloh, Fourth-Year, Bilogical Chemistry
- Project Title: Elucidating the Function of buttonhead During Early Embryonic Development in the Midge Chironomus riparius
- Mentor: Urs Schmidt-Ott
- Hazal Kara, Third-Year, Mathematics
- Project Title: A random flow-kick model of a fire-savanna ecosystem
- Mentor: Mary Silber
- Asaf Lebovic, Fourth-Year, Biochemistry, Neuroscience, Chemistry
- Project Title: Establishing the roles of molecular specificity and affinity in motor axon guidance in the developing fruit fly neuromuscular system
- Mentor: Engin Özkan
- Hyunsik Lee, Third-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Uncovering the significance of activating signals through 4-1BB, CD28, and DNAM-1 in reinvigoration of CD8+ T cells and the efficacy of checkpoint immunotherapy
- Mentor: Randy Sweis
- Ethan Li, Second-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Novel Structural Features of Braarudosphaera bigelowii: The Ultrastructure of UCYN-A “Nitroplast” and Scale Structures
- Mentor: Mohammed Kaplan
- Alan Liang, Second-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Investigating the Pattern of Spatially Restricted Gene Expression in Neural Stem Cells between Two Fly Species—Drosophila melanogaster and Megaselia abdita
- Mentor: Ellie Heckscher
- Anibal Loureda, Third-Year, Physics, Mathematics
- Project Title: Design and Construction of an Automated Photodiode Packaging System
- Mentor: Juan I. Collar
- Lucas Marquie, Second-Year, Computational and Applied Mathematics
- Project Title: Optimizing Stability and Performance of Quantum Dots for Next-Generation Photovoltaics
- Mentor: Kamran Forghani
- Mason McCormack, Second-Year, Astrophysics
- Project Title: Tracing hot Jupiter Formation Using Sulfur
- Mentor: Diana Powell
- Vivi McDermott, Second-Year, Physics, Religious Studies
- Project Title: mRNA Expression and Systematic Inflammatory Responses of Huang Lab Vaccines
- Mentor: Jun Huang
- Camilla Meyers, Third-Year, Biology
- Project Title: Single-Cell Analysis of Gene Expression During Adolescent Neurodevelopment in Rats
- Mentor: Zhuzhu Zhang
- Ben Monahan, Second-Year, Neuroscience, Economics
- Project Title: Elucidating the Impact of Social Isolation on Gene Expression in Adolescent Rats to Understand the Molecular Mechanism Underlying Addiction Risk
- Mentor: Zhuzhu Zhang
- John Ponce, Second-Year, Chemistry, Economics
- Project Title: Mapping Memory: The Role of Mossy Cells in Spatial memory Encoding and Retrieval in CA3
- Mentor: Mark Sheffield
- Gareth Qi, Fourth-Year, Computer Science, Data Science
- Project Title: Ultrafast phonon dynamics of SnSe
- Mentor: Sarah King
- Christine Qian, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Investigating the Structural Details of Amyloid-β Oligomers and Their Interactions with Membranes of Varying Lipid Compositions
- Mentor: Esmael Haddadian
- Tanvi Rao, Third-Year, Physics
- Project Title: Integration of Multi-Laser Locking System
- Mentor: Zoe Yan
- Emma Rifat, Third-Year, Comparative Human Development
- Project Title: Investigating Microbial Stress Response to Antimicrobial Nanostructures: an Innovative Approach to Combat Antimicrobial Resistance
- Mentor: Anindita Basu
- Graydon Schulze-Kalt, Third-Year, Physics
- Project Title: PULSE-A Electronics Development
- Mentor: Tian Zhong
- M'Kaia Trent, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Toward α1ACT-Specific Silencing via Inhibiting the CACNA1A-IRES function by Antisense Oligonucleotides
- Mentor: Christopher Gomez
- Arvin Wang, Second-Year, CoBiological Chemistry
- Project Title: Development of Novel Dicarbonyl Warhead for Chemical Biology Application
- Mentor: Chuan He
- Jason Wu, Fourth-Year, Astrophysics
- Project Title: Modeling the Ionizing Photon Escape During the Epoch of Reionization
- Mentor: Andrey Kravtsov
- Linda Yiu, Fourth-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Site-Selective Catalytic Activation of aryl C-C bonds
- Mentor: Guangbin Dong
- Rick Yoon, Third-Year, Physics, Mathematics
- Project Title: Elucidating Connection between Preparation Protocol and Wicked Quantum Phases of Matter
- Mentor: Ruben Verresen
- Leon Zhou, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences, Data Science
- Project Title: Defining Roles of Telomerase Reverse Transcriptase in DNA Repair Pathway
- Mentor: Stephen J. Kron
Supported by the Liew Family Research Fund
- Adera Craig, Fourth-Year, Environment, Urbanization, and Geography, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: The industrial evolution of the Calumet: a spatial timeline of land ownership and environmental degradation
- Mentor: Mary Beth Pudup
- Cleo Delogu, Third-Year, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Cinema and Media Studies
- Project Title: Making History (and Money) in Chicago’s Oak Woods Cemetery
- Mentor: Na'ama Rokem
- Alissa Domenig, Second-Year, Biological Sciences, Computer Science
- Project Title: Learning the Structure of Environmental Change Across Global Soil Microbiome Samples
- Mentor: Seppe Kuehn
- Jedd Horowitz, Second-Year, Fundamentals: Issues and Texts, Cognitive Science
- Project Title: The Religious Dimension to Conceptions of the Good Life
- Mentor: Shige Oishi
- Matthew Jeung, Third-Year, Computer Science, Public Policy
- Project Title: TorqueCapsules: Fully-Encapsulated Flywheel Actuation Modules for Prototyping Movement-Based and Kinesthetic Interaction
- Mentor: Ken Nakagaki
- Ariadne Merchant, Second-Year, Linguistics, Psychology
- Project Title: Comparative Analysis of Deictic Systems in English-Speaking Children, ASL Users, and Homesigners
- Mentor: Susan Goldin-Meadow
- Yash Rastogi, Fourth-Year, Mathematics, Statistics
- Project Title: Quantum Bayesian Estimation
- Mentor: Harald Uhlig
- Dhirpal Shah, Fourth-Year, Computer Science, Economics
- Project Title: Quantum Architectures for Constant Depth Circuits
- Mentor: Fred Chong
- Yunyi Xing, Third-Year, Anthropology, Art History
- Project Title: Kamigata Kabuki Prints in Smart Museum’s McCormick Collection: Content, Production, and Social Circle of Appreciation
- Mentor: Chelsea Foxwell
Supported by Collegiate Research Funds and other generous gifts from donors
- Marianni Cruz-Velez, Third-Year, Neuroscience, Psychology
- Project Title: Mechanisms of Play
- Mentor: Susan Goldin-Meadow
- Alice Roberson, Third-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Enhancing the Processability of Liquid Crystalline Polymeric Materials
- Mentor: Stuart Rowan
- Eva Schultz, Second-Year, Astrophysics, Visual Arts
- Project Title: Precision Engineering of Optical Calibration Systems for Ground-Based CMB Experiments
- Mentor: Jeffrey McMahon
Autumn Quad Research Scholars
Supported by the Global Health Research Fund
- Layne Kohler, Third-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Weight Cycling Effects on Female Fertility
- Mentor: Ada Weinstock
- Ava Lewin, Second-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Assessing the genetic determinants of arsenic metabolism efficiency in children
- Mentor: Brandon Pierce
- Jessalin Nguyen, Fourth-Year, Environmental Science
- Project Title: Water Contamination from Animal Feeding Operations (AFOs)
- Mentor: Eyal Frank
- Maryam Shariff, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: The Immunological Role of the BRCA1 Pseudogene (BRCA1P1) in Human Cancers
- Mentor: Olufunmilayo Olopade
- Cynthia Tang, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Train the Trainer
- Mentor: Marcia Tan
Supported by the Hoeft Family Research Fund
- Zack Hassman, Third-Year, Mathematics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Improving Quantum Chemistry with Classical Assistance
- Mentor: Fred Chong
- Anna Jensen, Third-Year, Astrophysics
- Project Title: Astrophysics Research Paper Publication - SN 2023ixf
- Mentor: Vikram Dwarkadas
- Alexander Katz, Third-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Hemodynamics at the Anastomosis: Entry Angle Effect on Disturbed Flow
- Mentor: Anindita Basu
- Noam Levinsky, Third-Year, CEGU
- Project Title: Patterns in Management Perceptions of Sustainability at U.S. West Ski Resorts
- Mentor: Evan Carver
- Kaitlyn Li, Fourth-Year, Computer Science, Data Science
- Project Title: Designing Robot Coaches to Support Child Social Emotional Learning
- Mentor: Sarah Sebo
- Quinn Liu, Third-Year, Computer Science, Cognitive Science
- Project Title: Automating Gesture Coding with Machine Learning
- Mentor: Susan Goldin-Meadow
- Nyah Lues, Fourth-Year, Environmental Science, Global Studies
- Project Title: Hiatal control on the turnover of mammalian assemblages in the Eocene of Wyoming
- Mentor: Susan Kidwell
- Edward Luo, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Sweat-Reactive Textiles for Human Body Temperature Control
- Mentor: Po-Chun Hsu
- Jack Luo, Second-Year, Biological Studies, Economics
- Project Title: Transformer-based Computer Networks Congestion Control
- Mentor: Junchen Jiang
- Layla Mravac, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Twisted Topological Insulators
- Mentor: Shuolong Yang
- Ornella Ndatabaye, Second-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Elucidating Inflammatory versus Non-inflammatory Control of Duodenal Lymphatic Architecture
- Mentor: Daria Esterhazy
- Duc Nguyen, Third-Year, Physics, Mathematics
- Project Title: Investigating the Progression of Aortic Disease with Mechanics-driven Agent-based Modelling
- Mentor: Nhung Nguyen
- Kyle Obermeyer, Second-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: The Pathological Progression of a Genetic Prion Disease Represented Through Behavioral Markers
- Mentor: James Mastrianni
- Marta Pantin, Third-Year, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Bacterial Light-Sensing Mysteries: Unraveling the Mechanisms of an Uncharacterized Biliverdin Synthase in Pseudomonas aeruginosa
- Mentor: Sampriti Mukherjee
- Armin Pazooki, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Spotting Nerve Damage Early with the Pointing Task
- Mentor: Peggy Mason
- Noa Perlmutter, Fourth-Year, Cognitive Science
- Project Title: Do We Know What Mugs We Like?
- Mentor: Howard Nusbaum
- Christian Ramos, Second-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Effects of THC on Negative Facial Emotions During Retrieval of Stressful Memories
- Mentor: Hanna Molla
- Uriel Rodriguez, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience, Music
- Project Title: The roles of the neurodevelopmental disease-linked protein Ube3a in Golgi satellite function
- Mentor: William Green
- Jacob Rothman, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Decoding the Immune System’s Pathways Between the Gut and Skin using Colitis and Psoriasis Mouse Models
- Mentor: Nicolas Chevrier
- Hanna Ruiz, Second-Year, Biological Chemistry, Business Economics
- Project Title: The Effect of Optimized Dosages of Type-1 Interferons on 4-1BB CAR T-cells
- Mentor: Jun Huang
- Kent Schechter, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Characterizing the Role of Cancer Cell-Intrinsic XBP1s on Anti-Tumor Immunity in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer
- Mentor: Marsha Rosner
- Dellara Sheibani, Third-Year, Linguistics
- Project Title: Novel Gene Correction of Human ADNP Mutations Using Prime Editing
- Mentor: Xiaochang Zhang
- Gwen Sheley, Third-Year, Astrophysics, Computational and Applied Mathematics
- Project Title: Accessing Potential Systematics in Cosmic Shear – tSZ Cross-Correlation Analyses
- Mentor: Chihway Chang
- Jay Shen, Third-Year, Physics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Deep Learning for Immunomodulation Prediction
- Mentor: Andrew Ferguson
- Prithi Srinivasan, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Chemistry
- Project Title: Investigating the mechanism of the actin transport into the nucleus by Importin 9
- Mentor: Alex Ruthenburg
- Junfei Sun, Third-Year, Mathematics, Computer Science
- Project Title: A symplectic duality theory for saddle point problems from Sherman's Area Convexity Algorithm
- Mentor: Lorenzo Orecchia
- Tim Sun, Fourth-Year, Biological Chemistry, Economics
- Project Title: Investigating the Connection Between Ribosome Biogenesis and the Heat Shock Response
- Mentor: David Pincus
- Eric You, Third-Year, Physics, Economics
- Project Title: Prototype Smart Pixel Detectors
- Mentor: Karri DiPetrillo
- Jacob Zhang, Fourth-Year, Psychology, Economics
- Project Title: Effect of Education on Wellbeing
- Mentor: Shigehiro Oishi
- Rain Zhu, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences, Economics
- Project Title: Increasing T lymphocyte/CAR-T cell potency through modulation of TET2 enzyme activity
- Mentor: Amittha Wickrema
- Sneha Agarwal, Third-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Intratumoral administration of chemokine mRNA to promote immune infiltration into the tumor microenvironment
- Mentor: Jeffrey Hubbell
- Ophra Atar, Third-Year, Cognitive Science, Psychology
- Project Title: More Semantic 'Connections' in Aphantasics than Imagers
- Mentor: Wilma Bainbridge
- Maya Atassi, Second-Year, Astrophysics, Physics
- Project Title: An Experimental Approach to Cosmic Constraints with the Simons Observatory
- Mentor: Jeffrey J. McMahon
- Iris Badezet-Delory, Second-Year, Physics, Classical Studies
- Project Title: Cracking the Blocks: Decoding the Precursors of Extreme Heat
- Mentor: Noboru Nakamura
- Emmanuel Barajas, Third-Year, Psychology
- Project Title: Who Causes Boys to Seek Help Less: In-group vs Out-group Masculinity Threats
- Mentor: Lin Bian
- Aubrey Barb, Second-Year, Chemistry, Environmental Science
- Project Title: Decarbonyl Functionalization of Cyclic Ketone via a Dual Aromatization Strategy
- Mentor: Guangbin Dong
- Hunter Bershtein, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Economics
- Project Title: The Therapeutic Potential of Fcgr4-Expressing Macrophages in Atherosclerosis Resolution
- Mentor: Ada Weinstock
- Rohan Buluswar, Third-Year, Mathematics
- Project Title: Applications of Optimal Transport Theory
- Mentor: Lorenzo Orecchia
- Surya Chinnappa, Third-Year, Linguistics, Cognitive Science
- Project Title: Lexical-Semantic Predictors of Compelling Preaching
- Mentor: Howard Nusbaum
- Karolina Dorosz, Third-Year, Biological Chemistry, French and Francophone Studies
- Project Title: Exploring the Role of Extracellular Vesicles in Mediating the Impact of Chronic Inflammation on Epithelial Stem Cells
- Mentor: Yuxuan Miao
Supported by the Liew Family Research Fund
- Fady Adal, Fourth-Year, Computer Science, Linguistics
- Project Title: Verified Quantum Error Correction and Fault Tolerant Computing
- Mentor: Robert Rand
- Genevieve Evans, Third-Year, Creative Writing
- Project Title: Degrowth Game Design Project
- Mentor: Katherine Buse
- Avah Harris, Second-Year, Computer Science, Media Arts and Design
- Project Title: The Aesthetics of Artificial Intelligence
- Mentor: Andre Uhl
- Keshav Malik Kapoor, Second-Year, Economics, Philosophy
- Project Title: 'Smart to the Core' Exhibition Research
- Mentor: Meg Jackson Fox
- Leo Kupperman, Third-Year, Mathematics, Anthropology
- Project Title: Aesthetics of AI
- Mentor: Andre Uhl
- Ernest Leong, Third-Year, Romance Language & Literature
- Project Title: Good shepherds and sheep of human descent: towards a medieval biopolitics
- Mentor: Daisy Delogu
- Dani Levy, Fourth-Year, Religious Studies, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
- Project Title: Research in the ISAC Tablet Collection
- Mentor: Susanne Paulus
- Eli Naftulin, Third-Year, Mathematics
- Project Title: Aesthetics of AI
- Mentor: Andre Uhl
- Darren Peng, Second-Year, Computer Science, Statistics
- Project Title: Optimizing Mixture-of-Agents using Neural Architecture Search
- Mentor: Ce Zhang
- Francesco Rahe, Fourth-Year, Fundamentals: Issues and Texts, Religious Studies
- Project Title: The Songs of Khayyam: A Translation
- Mentor: Pouneh Shabani-Jadidi
- Jo Selmeczy, Third-Year, Theater and Performance Studies, Comparative Human Development
- Project Title: Dramaturgy as Artistic Research into Queer Identities in World Premieres at the Court Theatre
- Mentor: David Levin
- William Turner, Second-Year, Linguistics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Curation, Synthesis and Conversion of Textual and Lexical Data for Ancient Languages into Modern Graph Database Formats
- Mentor: Jeffrey Tharsen
- Jiayue Wang, Third-Year, Anthropology, Computer Science
- Project: The Anatolian Atlas
- Mentor: James F Osborne
- Tony Zhou, Fourth-Year, Cognitive Science
- Project Title: Language Contact Simulated in the Lab
- Mentor: Ming Xiang
Supported by the NK Cheung Chemistry Research Fellowship
- Abbie Blenko,Fourth-Year, Chemistry, Music
- Project Title: Amide-Linked Covalent Organic Framework for Dual Photoredox and Copper Catalysis
- Mentor: Wenbin Lin
- Felice Chan, Third-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Resolving Electron-Phonon Interactions in Hybrid Perovskites via Two-Dimensional Electronic Spectroscopy
- Mentor: Greg Engel
- Tomas Germanas, Fourth-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Development of a Metal Organic Framework Cancer Vaccine for Enhanced Tumor Antigen Recognition
- Mentor: Wenbin Lin
- Sofiia Kucher, Third-Year, Biological Chemistry, Chemistry
- Project Title: Synthesis and Modification of Chemically Recyclable Boronic Ester Vitrimer Networks
- Mentor: Stuart Rowan
- Brennan Lee, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering, Economics
- Project Title: Treating Sores with Gas
- Mentor: Bozhi Tian
- Jhan Liufu, Fourth-Year, Computer Science, Physics
- Project Title: Tissue-like Bioelectronics for Stress Management
- Mentor: Bozhi Tian
- Sona Santry, Third-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Natural Products and Drug Discovery: Total Synthesis of Cinncassiol F
- Mentor: Scott Snyder
- Victor Sun, Second-Year, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Solving RNA Structure Puzzles Using Medium Throughput Construct Planning
- Mentor: Joseph A. Piccirilli
- Melody Tang, Third-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Nickel-catalyzed mixed diboration of cyclic alkenyl triflates
- Mentor: Guangbin Dong
- Sarah Thau, Third-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Establishing Protocols for the Production of Zirconium-89 Radiopharmaceuticals for Cancer Imaging
- Mentor: Satish Chitneni
- Ashley Zhu, Third-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Synthesis and Characterization of a Cobalt-Nitrido Complex for the Study of Catalytic Mechanisms
- Mentor: John Anderson
- Guanchen Zhu, Third-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Total Synthesis of Bipolarolide C-D
- Mentor: Scott A. Snyder
Supported by Collegiate Research Funds and other generous gifts from donors
- Claire Fu, Third-Year, Biology
- Project Title: Comparative analyses of doublesex supergene expression during Papilio butterfly wing development
- Mentor: Marcus Kronforst
- Jenna Garcia, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Investigating the Intersection of Terminal Selectors and Neurodegeneration in Aging Motor Neurons
- Mentor: Paschalis Kratsios
- Lola Lambert, Third-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Photoemission Electron Microsocopy for Connectomics
- Mentor: Bobby Kasthuri
- Annie Wang, Fourth-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: A novel investigation of gene expression in cranial suture development via hybridization chain reaction
- Mentor: Russell Reid
- Gasser Elwasefi, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Investigating gene regulatory networks in somatosensory processing neurons
- Mentor: Elizabeth Heckscher
- Elisa Gao, Second-Year, Astrophysics, Physics
- Project Title: X-ray Emission of Supernova 2011DH
- Mentor: Vikram Dwarkadas
- Esther Goldberg, Fourth-Year, Data Science
- Project Title: The Effect of Memorability on Fame
- Mentor: Wilma Bainbridge
- Isabella Summe, Third-Year, Data Science
- Project Title: Predicting Linguistic Surprise from Brain Network Dynamics
- Mentor: Monica Rosenberg
Summer Quad Research Scholars
Supported by the Conard College Foundations of Complexity Initiative Fund
- Eli Lowe, Third-Year, Mathematics, Philosophy
- Project Title: Existence of Scaling Limits of Discrete Lattice Models
- Mentor: Stephen Yearwood
- Gabe Nelson, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Chemistry
- Project Title: Evolutionary Patterns of Feeding Ecology, Body Shape and Fin Geometry in the Marine Butterflyfishes, Family Chaetodontidae
- Mentor: Mark Westneat
- Arjun Sohur, Fourth-Year, Computational and Applied Mathematics
- Project Title: Vegetation Pattern Formation from a Probability Perspective
- Mentor: Mary Silber
- Aden Sun, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Characterizing Novel Role of Cell Division Regulator MinC in Flagellar Biogenesis
- Mentor: Sampriti Mukherjee
- Rachel Wiley, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Investigating the Role of the Fat1a/Lar Polarity Module in Zebrafish Pronephric Collective Cell Migration
- Mentor: Victoria Prince
- Ryan Witter, Third-Year, Linguistics, Anthropology; Gender and Sexuality Studies
- Project Title: Syntactic Structures of Sakha
- Mentor: Lenore Grenoble
- Sifan Wu, Third-Year, Physics, Mathematics
- Project Title: Low Number Particle–Flow Interaction in von Kármán Turbulence
- Mentor: William T.M Irvine
Supported by the Global Health Research Fund
- Marcus Chandra, Fourth-Year, Statistics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Identifying Core Genes and the Trans-regulatory Network of Depression
- Mentor: Xuanyao Liu
- Charlie Davis, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Modeling and Identifying the Underlying Dynamics in Thoracic Aortic Aneurysm Geometric Evolution
- Mentor: Luka Pocivavsek
- Emilio Del Angel, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Assessing the Effect of Weight Cycling on Pro-Inflammatory Macrophage Responses
- Mentor: Ada Weinstock
- Talia Espinoza, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Creative Writing
- Project Title: HLA-DQ and Asthma: Identifying Bound Proteins Shaping Immune Reactivity
- Mentor: Nathan Schoettler
- Alejandro Garza, Fourth-Year, Biology, English
- Project Title: Understanding Patient Engagement Drivers in Intensive Primary Care Programs: A Qualitative Analysis of Medicare Beneficiaries' Experiences and Care-Seeking Decisions
- Mentor: Alexandra Tate
- Ana Inukai, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Identifying the sex-specific roles of the gut microbiome-brain axis in aged Alzheimer’s Disease Thy1-APP/PS1 and NL-F/PS1 Mouse Models
- Mentor: Piyali Saha
- Layne Kohler, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Weight Cycling Effects on Female Fertility
- Mentor: Ada Weinstock
- Alexander von Kumberg, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Understanding the Role of Bile Acids in Colorectal Carcinogenesis Across Diverse Individuals
- Mentor: Sonia Kupfer
- Brennan Lee, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering, Economics
- Project Title: Investigation of Decubitus Ulcer Treatment with Hydrogen, Oxygen, and Negative Pressure
- Mentor: Bozhi Tian
- Yannik Leuz, Third-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Towards Building a Cytokine Receptor-Janus Kinase Interactome for Immuno-Drug Discovery
- Mentor: Juan Mendoza
- Dani Magbanua, Fourth-Year, Anthropology, Linguistics
- Project Title: A Welcoming City? The Reception of Asylum Seekers in Chicago
- Mentor: Chiara Galli
- Addie Politi, Fourth-Year, Biology, Economics
- Project Title: Developing a Business Infrastructure for Tuberculosis Vaccine Advancement
- Mentor: Shabaana Khader
- Laura Torres Ramos, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Nanoparticle Formulations for Immunomodulation of mRNA Vaccine Responses
- Mentor: Aaron Esser-Kahn
- Obi Ukomadu, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Modulating Adipocyte Metabolism in Leukemia through Caloric and Feeding Patterns
- Mentor: Janane Rahbani
Supported by the Hoeft Family College Research Scholars Fund
- Emma Allen, Third-Year, Business Economics, Art History
- Project Title: Economics of the Wine Industry
- Mentor: Julian Alston
- Janya Allen, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Retrospective DISE Pathways
- Mentor: Phillip LoSavio
- Rodrigo Alvarez Calderon S Castro, Third-Year, Physics, Astrophysics
- Project Title: Sensor testing and development of operations plan for the DarkNESS mission
- Mentor: Juan Estrada
- Alisha Arya, Third-Year, Business Economics, Psychology
- Project Title: Thinking about War and Diplomacy: Investigating an asymmetry of conceptualization
- Mentor: Boaz Keysar
- Josephine Barboriak, Fourth-Year, Sociology, Fundamentals: Issues and Texts
- Project Title: Reducing Career Funneling and Building a Better Workforce for Democracy
- Mentor: Amy Binder
- Hunter Bershtein, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences, Economics
- Project Title: The Therapeutic Potential of CD16hi -Expressing Macrophages in Atherosclerosis Resolution
- Mentor: Ada Weinstock
- Mallory Brabrand, Third-Year, Political Science, Global Studies
- Project Title: Rookie Mistake? The Causes and Consequences of Diplomatic Gaffes
- Mentor: John Mearsheimer
- Marcus Catanzaro, Second-Year, Physics
- Project Title: Investigation of Plasma Z-Pinch Instability
- Mentor: Farhat Beg
- Surya Chinnappa, Fourth-Year, Linguistics, Cognitive Science
- Project Title: A Lexically-Informed Assessor of Compelling Preaching
- Mentor: Howard Nusbaum
- Zofie Christian, Fourth-Year, Mathematics
- Project Title: Improving Anomaly Detection in Clinical Waveform Data with Time Series Foundation Model
- Mentor: Artur W. Dubrawski
- Lucas Edgar, Fourth-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Total Organic Synthesis of Illihenlactoneoside C
- Mentor: Bryan Reynolds
- Matthew Jeung, Fourth-Year, Computer Science, Public Policy
- Project Title: TorqueCapsules++
- Mentor: Ken Nakagaki
- Ernest Leong, Fourth-Year, Romance Languages & Literatures: French
- Project Title: Translating Charles Perrault's "Le Parralèle des Anciens et des Modernes"
- Mentor: Larry F. Norman, Frank L. Sulzberger Distinguished Service Professor
- Elektra Makris, Fourth-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Design and Validation of de novo Protein Binders to Probe Mechanisms of Inner-Ear Mechanotransduction
- Mentor: Marcos Sotomayor
- Julia Margie, Fourth-Year, Mathematics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Machine Learning for Climate Policy
- Mentor: Chenhao Tan
- Matteo Moessner, Fourth-Year, Mathematics
- Project Title: The Characterization of Stable Topological Orders Against Noise
- Mentor: Sarang Gopalakrishnan
- BJ Moses-Rosenthal, Fourth-Year, Sociology
- Project Title: Exploring Biological Essentialism in Reddit Posts
- Mentor: Bernard Koch
- Natalie Orrantia, Fourth-Year, Astrophysics, Physics
- Project Title: Exploring Abiotic Chiral Resolution of Amino Acids through Co-crystal Formation on Titan
- Mentor: Morgan Cable
- Eliana Schiller, Third-Year, Astrophysics, Anthropology
- Project Title: Characterizing the Baryon Cycle Around Galaxies
- Mentor: Hsiao-Wen Chen
- Gwendolyn Sheley, Fourth-Year, Astrophysics
- Project Title: Predicting the Initial Conditions of Black Holes Using Conditional Normalizing Flows
- Mentor: Chihway Chang
- Milo Sobel-Lewin, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Relating Hydrogel Physical and Chemical Properties to Signal Quality for Applications in Biosensor coatings
- Mentor: Sihong Wang
- Victor Sun, Third-Year, Biological Chemistry, Music
- Project Title: Enhanced Crystallization of RNA Antibody Complexes Conferred through Antibody Scaffold Modifications
- Mentor: Joseph A. Piccirilli
- Rithika Tudmilla, Fourth-Year, Astrophysics
- Project Title: Developing Cryogenic Infrastructure for SPT-3G+: Next-Gen CMB Instrumentation
- Mentor: Bradford Benson
- Winston Wu, Fourth-Year, Physics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Thermophoretic Levitation of Ice Particle Systems
- Mentor: Cheng Chin
- Eric You, Fourth-Year, Physics, Economics
- Project Title: Radiative Cooling Fabrics using Porous Materials
- Mentor: Po-Chun Hsu
- David Yuan, Third-Year, Media Arts and Design
- Project Title: BloomBeacon
- Mentor: Ken Nakagaki
- Torres Zheng, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Business Economics
- Project Title: Assessing the role of PDCD10 as a promising therapeutic target for oral cancer
- Mentor: Evgeny Izumchenko
Supported by the Insight Undergraduate Research Fund
- Justice Andersen, Fourth-Year, Computer Science, Media, Arts and Design
- Project Title: BloomBeacon: Ad Hoc Touch Displays for Embedding, Revealing, and Concealing Interactive Digital Information
- Mentor: Ken Nakagaki
- Andrew Arzac, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering, Mathematics
- Project Title: PSEC6
- Mentor: Henry Frisch
- Sarah Bachrach, Third-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Direct Synthesis and Characterization of 2D Transition Metal Carbides (MXenes)
- Mentor: Dmitri Talapin
- Bilguun Batbayar, Fourth-Year, Astrophysics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Identification of Low-Surface-Brightness Galaxies using Deep Learning
- Mentor: Alex Drlica Wagner
- Emma Beane, Third-Year, Physics, English
- Project Title: Characterizing the spectral energy distribution of starburst galaxies
- Mentor: Hsiao-Wen Chen
- Jillian Bonilla, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Using an Engineer-Learn-Design Iterative Approach to Design Novel Cytokines
- Mentor: Juan Mendoza
- Mike Chen, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience, Computer Science
- Project Title: Exploring Missing Grasp Force Signals in Motor Cortex During Object Transport
- Mentor: Nicholas Hatsopoulos
- Duke Chiow, Third-Year, Physics
- Project Title: Phase portraits of immune stimulation in zebrafish
- Mentor: Elizabeth Jerison
- Jackson Collins, Third-Year, Psychology
- Project Title: Teaching Absolute Pitch
- Mentor: Shannon Heald
- Eva Fajardo, Fourth-Year, Human Rights, Religious Studies
- Project Title: Charting the Impact of "Lawfare"
- Mentor: Kathleen Cavanaugh
- Elisa Gao, Third-Year, Astrophysics, Physics
- Project Title: X-Ray Emission of Supernova 2011DH and 1979C
- Mentor: Vikram Dwarkadas
- Josh Gonzalez, Third-Year, Biological Chemistry, Cancer Biology
- Project Title: Characterization of the Stochiometric Distribution of Volume Regulated Anion Channels During T Lymphocyte Development and Activation
- Mentor: Axel Concepcion
- Sophie Hua, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Interrogating Phenotypic Changes of Macrophages in Lymphatically Infiltrated Triple Negative Breast Cancer in Different Tissue Architectures
- Mentor: Melody Swartz
- Nayun Kim, Third-Year, Chemistry, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Enhancement of Immune Responses by Gut Commensal Bacteria
- Mentor: Tatyana Golovkina
- Laurel Li, Fourth-Year, Computer Science
- Project Title: Synthesizing Intermediate Program States for Efficient Directed Fuzzing
- Mentor: Kexin Pei
- William Mantzaris, Fourth-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Achieving Optimal Aerosol Sizes for Stratospheric Aerosol Injection (SAI)
- Mentor: Mingyi Wang
- Wesley McMillan, Third-Year, Neuroscience
- Project Title: Exploring The Role of the Gut Microbiota in Modulating Microglial Activity and Aβ Plaque Deposition in Alzheimer's Disease Mice Models
- Mentor: Sangram Sisodia
- Gabrielle Moon, Third-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Does BNIP3 Upregulation in Muscle Lead to Atrophy by Reducing Mitochondrial Mass in Glycolytic fibers?
- Mentor: Kay Macleod
- Juliana Passaro, Fourth-Year, Biological Sciences
- Project Title: Modulation of Interferon Signaling by Oncogenic RNA Splicing Factor SRSF10
- Mentor: Sean Pitroda
- Helen Qin, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering, Chemistry
- Project Title: Molten Salt Synthesis and Characterization of Ultra-Large MXene Flakes
- Mentor: Dmitri Talapin
- Albert Seo, Third-Year, Computational and Applied Mathematics, Statistics
- Project Title: Click-based Texturing and Deformation on 3D Triangular Mesh
- Mentor: Rana Hanocka
- Jay Shen, Fourth-Year, Physics
- Project Title: Reduction of Deep Neural Networks for Atmospheric Modeling
- Mentor: Dorian Abbot
- Richard Song, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Biological Chemistry
- Project Title: Defining the membrane composition of LRRC8 channels upon T-cell activation
- Mentor: Axel Concepcion
- Tyler Wang, Third-Year, Biological Sciences, Mathematics
- Project Title: Refinements in Prostate Cancer Theranostics using the Sc-43 and Sc-47-PSMA-617 Radioligand Pair
- Mentor: Chin-Tu Chen
- Matthew Wren, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Identification of T Cell Suppression Mechanisms by Tumor-Derived Ctla2a
- Mentor: Phoenix Miao
- Narek Yavryan, Third-Year, Environmental Studies (CEGU)
- Project Title: Bison Ecology in Albert Bierstadt’s “The Last of the Buffalo”
- Mentor: Jessica Landau
- Ray Yu, Fourth-Year, Neuroscience, Political Science
- Project Title: Function of transthalamic pathway in visual information processing
- Mentor: Murray Sherman
Supported by an unrestricted gift from Google
- Jason Li, Third-Year, Physics, Computer Science
- Project Title: Enhancing Quantum Sensing Sensitivity via Piccolo Collocation of Non-Gaussian States
- Mentor: Aaron S Chou
- Fernando Paiz, Third-Year, Molecular Engineering
- Project Title: Towards Heterologous Eukaryotic Expression of Channelrhodopsin Chrimson for Exploration of Its Excited State Dynamics and Photoproduct Evolution via Two-Dimensional Electronic Spectroscopy
- Mentor: Greg Engel
- Srimaye Peddinti, Second-Year, Quantum Molecular Engineering, Chemistry
- Project Title: Realization of Quantum Spin Liquids through Triphenylenehexathiol-ligand based 2D Metal-Organic Frameworks
- Mentor: John Anderson
- Tom Xing, Fourth-Year, Applied Mathematics
- Project Title: Optimizing Superconducting Qubits Readout
- Mentor: Andrew Cleland
Supported by Collegiate Research Funds and other generous gifts from donors
- Sammy Alderden, Second-Year, Molecular Engineering, Chemistry
- Project Title: Framework for Testing Permeability of Cationic Mesoporous Membranes
- Mentor: Shrayesh Patel
- Emerson Briggs, Second-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Programming Specificity of CRISPR Cas9 by Domain Swapping
- Mentor: Weixin Tang
- Isabel Chang, Second-Year, Biological Sciences, Health and Society
- Project Title: Understanding the fundamental metabolic requirements for CD8+ T cells and their anti-tumor functions to uncover new therapeutic targets to improve T cell fitness
- Mentor: Conghui Yao
- Jinu Chun, Second-Year, Physics
- Project Title: Direct measurement of cytokine diffusion in the zebrafish epithelium
- Mentor: Elizabeth Jerison
- Eva Devlin, Third-Year, Common Year
- Project Title: CD4DC / CAMCM Summer Undergraduate Research
- Mentor: Anna Wuttig
- Thomas Plambeck, Second-Year, Chemistry, Biochemistry
- Project Title: Palladium and Norbornene-Catalyzed Ortho Functionalization of Chloroarene
- Mentor: Guangbin Dong
- Izzy Romita, Second-Year, Chemistry
- Project Title: Single-Atom Editing of Isoxazole Substrates to Pyrroles
- Mentor: Mark Levin