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Students use a variety of tools to conduct their summer research.

Summer fellowships awarded to exceptional science students

By Mary Hare

SURE Scholars use a variety of technology to fulfil their research goals, including light microscopes.

The College of Science is proud to announce that 41 science students – a record number – have received summer undergraduate research awards that will provide the opportunity and funding to pursue their research ambitions.

Undergraduate research often plays an instrumental role in developing student-faculty relationships that help students learn and grow beyond the scope of the classroom. For many OSU students, these awards provide the financial leverage to work in the field they are passionate about without being constrained to jobs that simply pay the bills.

The Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) award is available to all science students who meet the academic requirements. Participants are paid for 11 weeks of full-time research, or 440 hours, for a maximum of $5060. Awardees also receive an additional $500 for research expenses, including travel costs, materials or equipment rental.

This is also the second year that the Department of Integrative Biology offered the Alexei Lubchenco Menge Fellowship, which was awarded to Lily Miksell to support her research examining the interactions of dominant foundation species in Oregon rocky intertidal communities under the guidance of integrative biology professor Sally Hacker. The fellowship was established in memory of Alexei Lubchenco Menge, who died at age 27 in 2005. The award seeks to help one student each year within the department who exemplifies the deep love of the ocean that Lubchenco Menge personified.

SURE science awards are made possible by generous donations of College of Science alumni, faculty and supporters.

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to come changes in the SURE science program in 2020. Due to COVID-19 restrictions limiting access to laboratory space at Oregon State University, the deadline for completing SURE scholar research projects was extended to May 2021. Some students have projects that can be done entirely remotely and will complete and present their findings by the end of the summer. Some of the students below are able to work on their projects in OSU labs this summer, following OSU and Oregon Health Authority safety guidelines. For the majority of this year's awardees, the extended timeframe will allow them an opportunity to continue their research safely throughout the school year while gaining research experience.

SURE Science Scholars

Juan Altamira | Chemistry | Vince Remcho

Analysis of Explosive Compounds via Paper Microfluidic Device

Roy Anderson | Biology | Bruce Menge

Examining the Effects of Upwelling Intensity and Recruitment Limitation on Successional Trajectories in the California Current Large Marine Ecosystem

Thao Mi Anthony | BioHealth Sciences | Kyriakos Stylianou

Implication of Metal Organic Framework with Nanoparticle Composites to Deliver Medication

John Barnes | Biology | Felipe Barreto

Quantity and Quality of DNA extracted from dry vs. alcohol preserved samples of China rockfish

Elizaveta ‘Leeza’ Bliznyuk | BioHealth Sciences | Dylan Nelson

Targeting Mycobacterium abscessus pre-existing biofilms

Madeline Bloom | Chemistry | Claudia Maier

Microchip-MS Optimization of Oxylipins Analysis as a Biomarker for Cardiovascular Disease

Elizabeth Brennan | Microbiology | Stephen Giovannoni

Plankton Need Their Vitamins: Vitamin B1 Excretion by Marine Synechecoccus

Russell Campbell | Zoology | Robert Mason

Integrative Biology Collections Management

Dustin Campbell | Zoology | Robert Mason

Sexual Dimorphic growth of Harderian glands in Thamnophis sirtalis

Emily Gemmill | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Weihong Qiu

Keeping up with the kinesins: analyzing regulatory proteins and their effects on the motility of KlpA, a kinesin-14 motor protein

Jessica Giulietti | Biology | Patrick Chappell

Exploring regulation of osteosarcoma in vitro: Mechanisms of RANKL production by autocrine neuropeptides

Dylan Gregory | Biology | Virginia Weis

Using the Split Luciferase Complementation Assay to Identify Protein-Protein Interactions In Cnidarian-Algal Symbiosis

Joshua Griffis | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Richard Cooley

Optimized Phosphoserine tRNA Selection

Shelby Hansen | Biology | Brittany Poirson

How is a young mussel's life affected by coastal water conditions?

Joshua Havelind | Biology | Francis Chan

Effect of rising temperature in the ocean on Dungeness Crabs

Toren Ikea-Mario | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Tory Hagen

Glutathiones effect on Mitochondrial Decay

Rohal Kakepoto | Physics | Janet Tate

Hall Measurements of TiO2 Polymorphs

Rony Koluda | Chemistry | Claudia Maier

Low Dose Radiation Effect on Myelination -Associated Proteins in Mice

Chapman Kuykendall | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Colin Johnson

Characterizing the Biophysical Interactions between Dysferlin C2A and the H3 Helix of Syntaxin-4

Dustin Campbell | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Massimo Bionaz

In vivo-in vitro dose-effect response of bovine liver to rumen-protected fatty acids: implementation of a nutrigenomic approach in dairy cows

Jessica Li | Chemistry | Jan Stevens

The effects of xanthohumol on gut microbial metabolism

Maya Livni | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Maude David

Unraveling the impact of the gut microbiota metabolites on intestinal sensory neuronal cells and how EECs transduce signals to the brain by forming a synapse with the vagus nerve

Ruben Lopez | BioHealth Sciences | Bo Sun

Quantifying ECM Remodeling by Invasive Tumors

Christopher Markgraf | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Susanne Brander

Immortalization and Validation of Inland Silverside Cardiomyocytes, Hepatocytes, and Osteoblasts

Saki Nakai | Mathematics | Vrushali Bokil

Mathematical Modeling of Bipolar Disorder

Hunter Nelson | Physics | Tuan Pham

Blowup of Reaction Diffusion Equations

Jacob North | Biochemistry |Victor Hsu

Elucidating binding features of drug targets to Farnesoid X receptor by unsupervised machine learning of molecular dynamics trajectories

Sarah Olson | Microbiology | Frederick Colwell

Investigating Changes in the Microbiome of North Creek

Reina Paez | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Lia Danelishvili

Identifying and Purifying Non-Tuberculosis Mycobacterial Surface Antigens for the Purpose of Inducing Trained Immune Responses in Macrophages

Aneila Parra | Biology | Jiraporn Lueangsakulthai and David Dallas

Premature vs. Term Infant Milk Protein Digestome

Jacob Rauenhorst | Chemistry | Kathy Magnusson

Effects of ibuprofen on NMDA receptor expression and contribution

Alan Schultz | Physics |Hoewoon Kim

The Linearized Navier-Stokes Equations Solved on the Sphere by Fourier Transform Method

Rhea Sellitto | Biology | James Rivers

Evaluating the nutritional landscape for wild bees in managed conifer forests

Anna Sung |BioHealth Sciences| Maria Franco

Role of Redox Signaling in Development and Growth of Tumors of the Nervous System

Savannah Taggard | Biology | Molly Burke

The evolution of RoundUp resistance in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Jessica Waymire | Physics | Matt Graham

Hyperspectral Fluorescence Imaging of Twisted Bilayer Graphene

Kaytlin Wearne | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Kenton Hokanson

The Effects of hsp90 on p2x7 on Human ALS Neurons

Devin Wright | Biochemistry & Molecular Biology | Michael Freitag

Zymoseptoria Tritici Mutation Accumulation Experiment

Elizaveta "Lisa" Zhivaya | Biochemistry & Biophysics | Maude David

Impact of the gut microbiota metabolites on the autism phenotype modulation