INFORMATION FOR
RESEARCH Summer 2019
RESEARCH 2015
INTERNSHIPS, EXTERNSHIPS
WILLIAM PATERSON UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF SCIENCE AND HEALTH
BIOLOGY DEPARTMENT
Garden State-Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (GS-LSAMP)Sixth Annual Edition
&
Minority Association of Premedical Students (MAPS)
Celebrating Student Research Activities 2015
Sixth Annual Edition
Research Internships
William Paterson University Biology Department
Adonis Rivie, ISSBB Scholar, Biology Biotechnology Club ( BBT) President
Mentors: Dr. Kevin Martus ( Physics) and Dr. Jaishri Menon
Title: Plasma Treatment Accelerates Tail Regeneration in Tadpole, Xenopus laevis
Unnati Chauhan ISSBB scholar, BBT officer and Daniel Lupo ISSBB scholar, MAPS officer
Mentor: Dr. Emily Monroe
Title: Effect of High Light Intensity on Polyketide Synthase Gene Expression in the Florida Red Tide Dinoflagellate, Karenia brevis
Neal Joshi, ISSBB scholar, Alec DeGraaf, Noor Eldabagh , ISSBB scholar
Mentor: Dr. Jeung Woon Lee
Title: Transplantation of islet of Langerhans cells reverses diabetic hyperglycemia in mice with diabetes mellitus type-1
Ammar Ali, ISSBB scholar, Minority Association of Premedical Students ( MAPS) President
Mentor: Dr. Kendall Martin
Title: Designing TaqMan Probes to quantify species-specific conifer DNA in real-time PC
Barbara Abboud
Mentor: Dr. David Gilley
Title: Quantitate Natural Levels of a Foraging Pheromone within Foraging Honey Bee
Patrick Fardella
Mentor: Dr. Emily Monroe\
Title: Genomic Investigations of Natural Product Rich Marine Cyanobacteria
Alison Caceres
Mentors: Dr. Carey Waldburger and Dr. David Slaymaker
Title: Genetic Structure of Native and Restored Populations of American Beachgrass
(Ammophila breviligulata Fern.) Along the New Jersey Coast
Rebecca Atencio and Erin Connor, ISSBB scholars
Mentor: Dr. Jeung . Woon Lee
Title: The Role of Cortisol in Mediating the Pain Response of Children with Austism Spectrum Disorder as Modeled in BTBR T+ tf/J Mice
De Graaf, Alec . Joshi, N., Eldabagh, N.
Mentor : Dr.J.W. Leee
Title: Xenotransplantion of Islet of Langerhan cells from Sprague Dawley rat to diabetic C57 mouse to reverse diabetes-induced hyperglycemia
Noor Eldabagh, ISSBB scholar
Title: Transplantation of islet of Langerhans cells reverses diabetic hyperglycemia
in mice with diabetes mellitus type-1
Brittany Simon, FHP President
Mentor: Dr. Carey Waldburger
Title: Studying PhoQ-PhoOP Signal Transduction System in E.coli
William Paterson University: Physics Department
Joyce June ,ISSBB scholar
Mentor: Dr. Kevin Martus
Title: Helium Plasma Exposures: Analysis of the Variation in Tadpole Tail Regeneration and PC12 Neuronal Growth
William Paterson University: Chemistry Department
Bryant Catano, ISSBB Scholar
Mentor: Dr. Yalan Xing
Title: Transition Metal Catalyzed Functionalization of Terminal Alkynes
Benjamin Onyechi, Qiaxian Johnson and Swetha Matam
Mentor: Dr. Bhanu Chauhan
Title: A New Approach to Functionalization of Carbon Nanotubes Decorated With Metal Complexes and Nanoparticles
William Paterson University: Environmental Sciences Department
Bryan Gonzalez
Mentor : Dr. Michael Griffiths
Title: Reconstructing seawater Sr/Ca through the late Phanerozoic from fossil shark teeth
Daniel Pagano
Mentor, Dr. Martin Becker
Title: A Tale of two submerged cities: Modern sharks in an ancient forest, ancient sharks in a modern forest. An observable model of sea level change.
Nicole Kern
Mentor: Dr. Jennifer Callanan
Title: Clay Mineral Weathering in the Post-Fire Environment
Ralph Scimeca
Mentor: Dr. Martin Becker
Title: Fish remains from the Tallahatta–Lisbon Formation Contact (Middle Eocene–Lutetian) Pigeon Creek, Covington County, Alabama
University of Maryland
Horn Point Laboratory
Center for Environmental Science
Adrian Plummer , ISSBB scholar
Mentors: Dr. Jamie Pierson, and Dr. Louis Plough.
Title :Consequences of Diversification among Acartia tonsa in the Chesapeake Bay
William Paterson University: Noyce Internship
Ian Campbell
Computer Science Major
Meeting Presentations
Conferences Photographs
Student awards
Introduction
This is the seventh year the Garden State Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation ( GS-LSAMP) program has put together such publication in order to recognize the research efforts and successes by William Paterson University science majors.
As in previous years, Summer Research Internships and Externships have provided students with the opportunity to work on or off campus, in a laboratory or in their field of interest , under the supervision of a faculty. Such opportunity has allowed them to experience firsthand “how scientists work” and how to conduct scientific research. Many actively participated in specific projects, learn new techniques including the use of elaborate laboratory equipment, computer -assisted analyses, animal husbandry and handling, to name a few. Others have spent their summers volunteering or shadowing physicians in Hospitals and Health Clinics. Such internship has proven to be a valuable asset for students applying to Graduate or Professional school, or in job placement or career selection following graduation.
Many of the students included in this publication are ISSBB ( Increasing Student Success in Biology and Biotechnology) scholars , an NSF funded scholarship to promote research and teaching careers among Biology and Biotechnology majors.. All the summer interns have presented their summer experience at one of our monthly, well attended, meetings in the Fall 2014 and Spring 2015 semesters. Additionally, several GS-LSAMP students presented their work at the Undergraduate Research Symposium which took place at WPU in April 2014. Others have gone to Regional meetings, including GS-LSAMP Annual STEM meeting at Rutgers ( October 2014), National meetings ( Society for Neuroscience, October 2014) , ERN meeting in Washington DC ( March 2015) to present their work and have received major recognition for their research. Most of these abstracts or summaries are in their own words and represent an honest and candid account of their work. Other abstracts are more formal and were presented at a national scientific meeting.
These summer internships would not have been possible without the support of the Biology , Chemistry and Environmental Sciences faculty who have volunteered to mentor our students. Others have provided contacts for off campus opportunities.
This past summer, GS-LSAMP was able to provide stipends to 15 students. This support as well as this publication would not be possible without the support of Dr. Kenneth Wolf , Dean of CSH and of Dr. Jean Fuller-Stanley, Associate Dean of CSH, LSAMP project director at WPU. Many thanks to the Provost, Dr.Waren Sandmann , for providing the additional funding which was needed. Thanks to his support, an additional 10 students were funded. A total of 25 students were involved. A big thank you as well to Rita Levine for assisting in all matters related to GS-LSAMP and to Andres Salazar of the Science Enrichment Center for his technical and graphic support with this manuscript.
We hope that next’s year publication will include many more interns and mentors.
Dr. Danielle Desroches
Professor
Human Physiology and Neuro-endocrinology, PhD
Anatomy and Physiology Coordinator
Minority Association of Pre Medical Students ( MAPS) Coordinator
Biology Biotechnology Club ( BBC) Faculty Co Advisor
Increasing Student Success in Biology and Biotechnology ( ISSBB) Head Mentor
Garden State Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority in Sciences, ( GS-LSAMP) Academic Coordinator
desrochesd@wpunj.edu (973) 720-2329
