Seven students who completed projects this past summer as part of the KS-LSAMP Research Immersion: Pathways to STEM (RiPS) program attended the Emerging Researchers National (ERN) Conference in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) held in Washington DC on February 22-24
, 2018. The ERN conference is hosted by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), Education and Human Resources Programs (EHR) and the Nation Science Foundation Division of Human Resources Development (HRD). The conference is student-focused with an emphasis on college and university undergraduate and graduate students. One objective of the conference was to help students improve their communication skills. This year 950+ students from 250 institutions attended the conference.
Carmen Del Real (Dodge City Community College) presented a poster titled “A Screen for Genetic Modifiers of Protein Phosphatase 1 in Drosophila Collective Cell Migration”. Carmen’s mentor was Dr. Jocelyn McDonald, Division of Biology.
Vanessa Hernandez (Dodge City Community College) presented a poster titled “Using CRISPR/Cas 9 Genome Editing to Study MicroRNA Strand Selection. Vanessa’s summer mentor was Dr. Anna Zinovyeva, Division of Biology.
Nhicolas Aponte (Garden City Community College) presented a poster titled “Measurement of Water Evaporation Rates from Simulated Soil Pore”. Nhicolas’ summer mentor was Dr. Melanie Derby, Mechanical Engineering.
Jose Trejo (Seward County Community College) presented a poster titled “Anaerobic Membrane Bioreactor for Sustainable Wastewater Treatment (AnMBR). Jose’s summer mentor was Dr. Prathap Parameswaran, Civil Engineering.
Diana Najera (Seward County Community College) presented a poster titled “The Role of Endocytosis in Iron Uptake by Insect Cells”. Diana’s summer mentor was Dr. Maureen Gorman, Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics.
Juan Hernandez (Kansas State University) presented a poster titled “Can the End-of-Chapter Questions in College Physics Textbooks Tell Us if Students Can do Physics”. Juan’s summer mentor was Dr. James T. Laverty, Physics.
Nicole Doughramaji (Kansas State University) presented a poster titled “Track Based Climbing Robots Using Dry Adhesives and Variable Suspension. Nicole’s summer mentor was Dr. Stephen Canfield, Mechanical Engineering, Tennessee Technological University.