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Undergraduate Research
Exposition
April 21, 2017
A celebration of inquiry
Order of Events
12:30 p.m. SYMPOSIUM TALKS
Engineering & Applied Sciences
Lattimore 201
Humanities Dewey 2-110D
Natural Sciences & Mathematics
Bausch & Lomb 106
Social Sciences Welles-Brown Room, Rush Rhees Library
2:00 p.m. POSTER SESSION
Hawkins-Carlson Room Rush Rhees Library
3:15 p.m. UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH AWARDS SA PROFESSOR OF THE YEAR AWARDS
Hawkins-Carlson Room Rush Rhees Library
3:55 p.m. CLOSING REMARKS
Hawkins-Carlson Room Rush Rhees Library
Engineering & Applied Sciences Lattimore 201
12:30 p.m.
Nancy Aguilera ’18 Optical Engineering
Mentor: Professor Andrew Berger
"Measuring Organelle Size Distributions in Single Cells Using Scattered Light"
12:50 p.m.
Ibrahim Mohammad ’17 Mechanical Engineering & Mathematics
Mentor: Professor Douglas Kelley
“Laboratory Model of Inner Ear Mechano-Transduction”
1:10 p.m.
Ge Song ’17 Biomedical Engineering
Mentor: Professor Jennifer Hunter
“Adaptive Optics Scanning Light Ophthalmoscopy for Retinal Imaging and Vision Disease Detection”
*Abstracts available in final pages
Humanities Dewey 2-110D
12:30 p.m.
Sarah Bjornland ’17
Optics Mentor: Professor Gregory Heyworth
“Effects of Ultraviolet Radiation Exposure on Manuscripts”
12:45 p.m.
H. Mark Kenney ’17
Religion & Economics of Health Care Mentor: Professor Emil Homerin
“Religion of Illness”
1:00 p.m.
Jessica Newman ’17
British and American Literature Mentor: Professor Katherine Mannheimer
“Of Song and Songbirds: Exploring Music and Place in
Emily Dickinson’s Poetry”
1:15 p.m.
Danielle Vander Horst ’17 Classics & Archaeology, Technology & Historical Structures
Mentor: Professor Elizabeth Colantoni
“Making Men Gods: The Precedence and Pursuit Of Deification at Rome”
*Abstracts available in final pages
Natural Sciences & Mathematics Bausch & Lomb 106
12:30 p.m.
Jordan Aronowitz ’17 Molecular Genetics
Mentor: Professor Michael Welte
“Characterizing the Effect of HSF Mutations on Brain Tumor Development in D. melanogaster”
12:45 p.m.
Jenna Glatzer ’17
Neuroscience Mentor: Professor Amy Kiernan
“Progenitor Proliferation in the Mammalian Otocyst”
1:00 p.m.
Alicia Wei ’18
Neuroscience & Mathematics Mentor: Professor Andrew Wojtovich
“Optogenetic Control of ROS Production in C. elegans”
1:15 p.m.
Keith Wiley ’17
Physics Mentor: Professor Kevin McFarland
“Effects of Nuclear Mass on Pion Neutrinoproduction”
*Abstracts available in final pages
Social Sciences Welles-Brown Room, Rush Rhees Library
12:30 p.m.
Gabrielle Bueno ’17
Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Psychology Mentor: Professor Jessica Cantlon
“The Effect of Stimulus Features on Metacognitive Decisions
in Monkeys”
12:45 p.m.
Ethan Dimmock ’17 History
Mentor: Professor Molly Ball
“The Cuban “Colonial Complex”: The Spectre of Imperialism in American Guidebooks to Twentieth Century Havana”
1:00 p.m.
Emily Landau ’17
Psychology Mentor: Professor Loisa Bennetto
“Speech Disfluencies in Autism Spectrum Disorder”
1:15 p.m.
Joseph Orman ’17
Anthropology Mentor: Professor John Osburg
“The Wild West of Weed: Activism, Business, and Changing
Legislation”
*Abstracts available in final pages
Poster Exhibition Participants
ENGINEERING & APPLIED SCIENCES
Callum Breene ’18 Chemical Engineering
“Effect of Additives on Reduction Potential for Electroplating Battery Anodes”
Daniel Diaz-Etchevehere ’17
Environmental Science “High Resolution Analyses Reveal Elevated Sea-to-Air Methane
Fluxes in Localized Areas in the Gulf of Mexico”
Connor Virgile ’19 Biomedical Engineering
“Differentiating Glioblastoma and Metastasis Using MRI”
NATURAL SCIENCES & MATHEMATICS
Alice Bandeian ’17 Geological Sciences
“Microstructural Study of Deformation in Fault Rocks from the Peruvian Andes”
Roberto Bertolini ’17
Mathematics “Modeling Japanese Knotweed with a Reaction Diffusion
Equation”
Ashley Bui ’17 Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Psychology
“Projections from the Temporal Cortex to the Basal Nucleus of the Amygdala in the Macaque Create a Gradient of Visual Input”
Hayden Carder ’18 Chemistry
“Modeling Japanese Knotweed with a Reaction Diffusion Equation”
Danlei Chen ’17
Brain & Cognitive Sciences “Using fMRI to Explore the Neural Basis of Anticipation after
Implicit Distributional Learning”
Varun Chowdhry ’19 Cell & Developmental Biology
“Using a Specialized Translation System to Study Ribosome Biogenesis”
Aryel Clarke ’17
Biochemistry “Effects of Anti-Prion Compounds on Autophagy and the
Lysosome”
Mattison Flakus ’18 Physics & Applied Mathematics
“Atmospheric Pressure Plasma Jet: Shielding Gas Effects on DNA Damage”
Zunran Guo ’17
Physics & Applied Mathematics “Vector Boson Scattering (VBS) Analysis in ZZ + 2 jets Production
with TMVA”
Toby Kashket ’18 Brain & Cognitive Sciences
“Investigating the Link between Low Level Perceptual Suppression and Higher Level Cognitive Abilities”
Mahir Khan ’18
Neuroscience “Using BOLD to Measure Cerebrovascular Reactivity”
Shon Koren ’17 Neuroscience
“Insights into Autophagy and Alzheimer's Disease: The Role of the BAG3-Hsp70 Interaction in Clearing Tau in Rat Primary Cortical
Neurons”
Heather Le Bleu ’17 Cell & Developmental Biology
“Extraction of High-Quality RNA from Human Articular Cartilage”
Rosa Park ’17 Biochemistry
“Uncovering Pathways to Longevity Through the Sirt6 Ribosylome and Interactome”
Gavin Piester ’17
Biochemistry & Chemistry “Effects of Infectious and Genetic Factors on Lysosomal Function:
Implications for Demyelinating Diseases”
Adriana Schoenhaut ’17 Brain & Cognitive Sciences
“Contributions of Visual and Extra-Retinal Cues to Selectivity for Direction of Eye Rotation in Macaque Area MSTd”
Jonathon Thomalla ’18
Cell & Developmental Biology “Determining ATP Synthase-β’s interaction with Jabba in vivo”
Hanna Vinitsky ’17
Neuroscience “Reciprocal Effects of Glymphatic Function and the Experimental
Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis (EAE) Model of Multiple Sclerosis”
Tony Zhao ’17 Statistics
“Understanding Radiation Therapy Resistance of Colorectal Cancer”
SOCIAL SCIENCES
Nianzhi Chen ’20 Gender Studies & Anthropology
“What Influences Ugandan Women's Choices?”
Kelsey Csumitta ’17 Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Psychology
“No Gender Differences in Children's Core Numerical Processing Abilities”
Sadie Dix ’18
Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Psychology “Conveying Speaker Reliability to Affect Contrastive Inference”
Allison Friske ’17
Psychology & English “Bias in Parental Appraisals of Childhood Adversities: Links to
Parental and Offspring Depressive and Anxiety Symptoms”
Julianne Kapner ’19 & Theresa Kettelberger ’19 Linguistics (Kapner) / Linguistics & Classics (Kettelberger)
“Glottalized Stops in Eastern Armenian”
Crystal Lee ’18 Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Linguistics
“Learning Adjective Meanings Through Variable Exemplars”
Crystal Lee ’18, Lauren Oey ’18, & Emily Simon ’17 Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Linguistics (Lee) / Brain & Cognitive
Sciences, Statistics, & Linguistics (Oey) / Brain & Cognitive Sciences (Simon)
“How We Comprehend Foreign-Accented Speech: Learning to Generalize Across Talkers”
Wesley Orth ’17 Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Linguistics
“Contextual Factors in Child Adjective Comprehension”
Christine Otto ’17 Brain & Cognitive Sciences & Psychology
“The Asexual Experience and Community in Denmark”
Benjamin Panny ’17 Neuroscience & Psychology
“How Do We Adapt When We Feel Awe?”
Torrey Wyatt ’17 Biology & Public Health
“Rural Indian Women: Down the Path of Empowerment”
Student Association Professors of the Year
Humanities
John Givens Department of Modern Languages & Cultures (Russian)
Natural Sciences & Engineering
Kalyani Madhu Department of Mathematics
Social Sciences
Michael Rizzo Department of Economics
Undergraduate Research Awards
3:15 p.m. PROFESSOR STEVEN MANLY
Introductory Remarks
3:18 p.m. PRESIDENT JOEL SELIGMAN
Presentation of the President’s Awards for Undergraduate Research
3:28 p.m. DEAN RICHARD FELDMAN
Presentation of the Deans’ Awards for Undergraduate Research in Engineering & Applied Sciences, Humanities, Social Sciences,
Natural Sciences & Mathematics
3:35 p.m. PROFESSOR STEVEN MANLY
Presentation of the Professors’ Choice Awards for Undergraduate Research
3:40 p.m. SA PRESIDENT VITO MARTINO
Students’ Association Professor of the Year Awards
3:55 p.m. PROFESSOR STEVEN MANLY
Closing Remarks
SYMPOSIUM ABSTRACTS
Nancy Aguilera ’18 "Measuring Organelle Size Distributions in Single Cells Using Scattered Light" Angular scattering patterns of single cells can be fit to the solution to Maxwell’s equations for light scattered by infinite spheres, which can be used to measure the distribution of sizes of the organelles inside the cell. This research is unique in that it can monitor single cell changes over time. The goal of this work was to determine the amount of fluctuations in the size predictions over time due to measurement noise and error in the optical system, as well as changes due to biological causes. This was accomplished by acquiring the scattering pattern from cells fixed with formaldehyde, and comparing the results to measurements of live cells. By analyzing different parameters obtained from fitting the scattering patterns to theory, it was found that the live cells demonstrated more fluctuations in size predictions over time than fixed cells. Jordan Aronowitz ’17 “Characterizing the Effect of HSF Mutations on Brain Tumor Development in D. melanogaster” The transcription factor HSF has been shown to dramatically enhance the growth of diverse tumors, in cultured cells, in mice, and in human patients (Dia, 2007), making it an attractive target for anti-cancer therapy. However, the molecular mechanisms by which HSF sustains tumor growth remain ill defined. We are interested in determining whether HSF also supports tumor growth in D. melanogaster; if so, this process can be studied using the advanced genetics tools available in flies. We take advantage of a larval brain tumor model: larvae homozygous for loss-of-function alleles of the gene lgl (lethal giant larvae) display overprofileration of neuroblasts and overgrowth of the brain. Using the null allele HSF1, we generated animals with a single copy of wild-type HSF: in this
genetic background, the size of lgl-induced brain tumors was reduced, and immunostaining for the neuroblast-specific marker Deadpan indicates that fewer neuroblasts are present. These results suggest that HSF indeed promotes tumor growth in Drosophila. We are now employing immunostaining and Western analysis to determine if reduced HSF gene dosage results, as predicted, in lower accumulation of HSF protein. We are also characterizing the effect of the point allele HSF4; in animals carrying a single copy of HSF4, the tumorous brains are similar in size to those in animals with two copies of wild-type HSF. These observations suggest that HSF4 may enhance the function of HSF in this context, providing a new tool for analyzing the role of HSF in tumor development. Gabrielle Bueno ’17 “The Effect of Stimulus Features on Metacognitive Decisions in Monkeys” Metacognition is the ability to know what you know. Humans can use this ability to both evaluate our own thoughts and to make decisions based on our knowledge. Studies show that humans use features like perceptual fluency and visual similarity when making metacognitive judgments. Like humans, monkeys make accurate metacognitive certainty judgments. However, the extent to which they use visual features like perceptual fluency when making these certainty judgments is unknown. To investigate what visual features affect monkeys’ metacognitive judgments, we are analyzing data and images from a previous metacognition experiment to see how visual features such as sample complexity, sample uniqueness, and distractor similarity might affect monkeys’ confidence. This will help further reveal what aspects of metacognition we share with monkeys, and thus a better understanding of where they arose in evolutionary history.
Sarah Bjornland ’17 “Effects of Ultraviolet Radiation Exposure on Manuscripts” Multi-spectral imaging is used to recover illegible text from damaged manuscripts. The modality employs light emitting diodes at a wide range of wavelengths including visible, infrared, and ultraviolet. The International Commission on Illumination (CIE) recommends that manuscripts are not exposed to any level of ultraviolet radiation, despite the wavelength’s role in text recovery. My project attempts to determine the levels of total ultraviolet exposure that will induce irreversible damage to the manuscripts. Ethan Dimmock ’17 “The Cuban “Colonial Complex”: The Spectre of Imperialism in American Guidebooks to Twentieth Century Havana” This is a study examining the influence of tourists on the development of Cuba from the time of the US Military Occupation, 1898-1902, into the beginning of the Socialist period in 1959. The urban public spaces of Havana act as the stage upon which tourists and Cubans interacted for over a century. The attitudes toward different neighborhoods of Havana reveal the impact of tourism on the physical development of the city, and with this development the nature of the pleasure-seeking American’s relationship with Cuba. By tracing American writings on Cuba back to before the military occupation, the roots of American tourist paternalism can be dug up and set into the context of the over-arching theme of growing American imperialism in the Caribbean and Latin America generally. This paper is particularly concerned with Habana Vieja, the colonial neighborhood, because of the assumed historical value and subsequent preeminence Habana Vieja’s plazas had for tourists, on top of the plazas’ existing importance to Spanish colonial and Cuban Republican symbolic displays of political power. Situating the importance of the plaza in the Latin American urban sphere is integral to contextualizing the thesis of this project and both establishes the topic in the wider realm of Latin American history and grounds the significance of Cuba as unique within Latin America. The tourist influence in Havana’s public space is
determined through the examination and evolution over time of American guidebooks to these cultural spaces. The guidebooks, and their authors, were the means by which generations of tourists became inculcated in the paternal attitude Americans had towards Cubans across the Twentieth Century, itself a product of US imperial expansion in the Caribbean and Latin America, displacing Spanish colonial power. The dissemination of the fictitious Cuban Colonial Complex via tourist guidebook to Havana transformed explicit imperial intentions toward Cuba into the tacit paternal attitudes of a century of American tourists. Jenna Glatzer ’17 “Progenitor Proliferation in the Mammalian Otocyst” Auditory and vestibular disorders result from damage or death of critical inner ear cell types, as mammals lack a biological replacement mechanism for these cells following damage. The progenitors of these critical cells begin dividing in the otocyst, an early embryonic structure that undergoes a dramatic increase in size as well as structural changes during development. Knowledge of the molecular mechanisms by which these cells normally proliferate in the otocyst may be useful for replacement therapies aiming to regenerate these critical cells in vivo or in vitro after injury. One obstacle to this is the current dearth of information regarding how inner ear progenitors proliferate in mammals. In efforts to understand the molecular events surrounding proliferation, we focused on Sox2, a critical gene for inner ear development and additionally for stem cell maintenance. Mice with otic-specific mutations in the Sox2 locus (Lcc mutants) display inner ears with profound sensory defects and gross morphological abnormalities. The extent of these deficits could suggest a failure of early proliferative events in the otocyst; however, a role for SOX2 in otic proliferation had not previously been investigated. In order to test SOX2’s role, we conditionally deleted Sox2 using an inducible-Cre mouse line (SOX2-CreER) crossed with a line carrying a floxed Sox2 allele (Sox2fl/fl). Cre was activated by tamoxifen administration at 3mg/40g of body weight at embryonic day (E) 8.5. To further characterize the role of SOX2, we used an over-
expression paradigm where a mouse line carrying a constitutive-Cre (FOXG1-Cre) was crossed to a line carrying a floxed stop cassette upstream of Sox2 (RosaSOX2). Samples were collected in both cases at embryonic day (E) 10.5, and processed for cryosectioning, immunohistochemistry, and imaging with Zeiss AxioVision Software. Proliferating cells were labeled using an antibody to p-Histone H3 (pHH3), a marker of dividing cells, while an antibody to SOX2 was used to characterize the expression pattern of SOX2 in the E10.5 otocyst. In wildtype controls, SOX2 expression was observed broadly except in the most dorsal portions of the otocyst, and robust proliferation was also observed at this time point. The overwhelming majority of pHH3+ cells (> 80%) co-localized with SOX2 in wild-type controls. Notably, SOX2-deficient mutants had about 50% fewer pHH3+ cells and a 40% reduction in otocyst volume, a result not attributable to an increase in cell death at this time. These results indicate a novel role for Sox2 in inner ear proliferation. Efforts are currently underway to determine whether overexpression of SOX2 leads to increased proliferation, further establishing a direct role for SOX2 in promoting cell division in the early otocyst. H. Mark Kenney ’17 “Religion of Illness” Issues of death and dying are central to palliative care. Treatment for the dying focuses on comfort as defined by the individual as opposed to being decided solely by the medical system. This project recounts the stories of terminally ill patients in Rochester’s comfort care homes focusing on the ways in which their religious and/or spiritual beliefs may influence their approach to death and dying. Palliative care relies heavily on understanding a patient’s particular belief structure in order to accommodate each individual’s needs to die comfortably. Rochester provides a unique study population as it is the only city in the world with privately functioning comfort care homes for the dying. Each comfort care home in Rochester only houses two residents in order to retain their status as a home as opposed to a medical facility and are tax exempt non-profit organizations funded solely through fundraisers and donations.
Comfort care homes retain the love and freedom of a home atmosphere, while offering constant skilled care for those with a three month or less terminal prognosis. The mission of comfort care homes is to provide free accommodations for the terminally ill, including those who do not have access to other types of palliative care, emphasizing that dying comfortably should be a human right. Through the stories of the individuals admitted to comfort care homes, this project will provide qualitative evidence of the benefits that palliative care offers the dying and the importance of Rochester’s comfort care homes in expanding these experiences. Emily Landau ’17 “Speech Disfluencies in Autism Spectrum Disorder” Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is categorized by deficits in social communication and interaction in addition to restricted or repetitive interests and/or behaviors. People with ASD who experience language difficulties tend to have impairments with semantics and pragmatics, but have no difficulty with syntax, morphology, or phonology. Therefore, a person with ASD who struggles with pragmatics may be unaware of how to effectively maintain a conversation and correct communication breakdowns. Speech disfluencies can then be used to look at communication because they offer a unique insight into the intent of the speaker; some disfluencies contain a communicative purpose (called productive disfluencies), while others lead to a breakdown of communication (unproductive disfluencies). Productive disfluencies include filled pauses and self-repairs, while unproductive disfluencies include silent pauses and repetitions. This study compares productive versus unproductive disfluencies in conversational speech to determine if there are significant differences in the rates of occurrence between ASD and typically developing (TD) participants. The hypothesis is that individuals with ASD will produce more unproductive disfluencies due to the pragmatic difficulties associated with ASD. Research is still ongoing, and final results have not yet been obtained. The results of this study will help us to understand how children and adolescents with ASD are using pragmatic language.
Ibrahim Mohammad ’17 “Laboratory Model of Inner Ear Mechano-Transduction” A sound wave entering the mammalian ear displaces cochlear fluid, which in turn displaces hair-like organelles called hair bundles that act as acoustic sensors. Their incredible sensitivity is poorly understood, and probably depends on pre-amplification via fluid-structure interaction. Our lab uses a laboratory model to simulate this biological system to study the viscous coupling between the vibrating structures, cochlear fluid, and hair bundles. Measurements are taken by introducing a sinusoidal excitation to the physical model, taking videos, and then using particle tracking via MATLAB code. I will present measurements of modeled hair bundles’ gain and phase difference over a range of frequencies. Recent numerical simulations show that the sensor behaves as a high-pass filter with a gain plateau. However, our results show a peak in the gain. Further, I will show how the length of bundles affects gain. Jessica Newman ’17 “Of Song and Songbirds: Exploring Music and Place in Emily Dickinson’s Poetry” Emily Dickinson’s poetry has been set to music thousands of times by composers of wide-ranging genres and geographical locations. This integration of music and text raises questions regarding the aesthetics of Dickinson’s poetry that make it so melodically conducive. One composer whose interpretation of Dickinson remains most prevalent on the modern concert stage is Aaron Copland, whose compositional goal was to develop “a body of music that expressed a distinctly American consciousness,” a sense of homeland and place. I argue that Copland searched for a poet who, like him, could capture the essence of their American environment; Dickinson and her poetry met this need: her lyric in structure and form – its use of hymn and ballad meter – reflects the religious and secular atmosphere in which she lived; her exploration of diverse images and themes in her poetry – the sacred and spiritual, the Civil War and death, the natural and the material – engages with the philosophies, cultural customs, and opinions of
other New England thinkers and citizens. Through in depth analysis of Dickinson’s poetic forms and themes, Copland’s musical interpretations, and settings of Dickinson by other composers, this study illuminates the ways in which interaction of music and text heightens the poetic voice and simultaneously strengthens compositional choices, revealing and emphasizing the innermost thoughts and opinions of both poet and composer. Joseph Orman ’17 “The Wild West of Weed: Activism, Business, and Changing Legislation” This research examines changes in the businesses and activist community surrounding cannabis following the trend of increased state legalization, focusing on the state of Washington. The central question of this research is how cannabis legalization is both informed by and informs cannabis communities, and how these communities adapt to an ever-changing political environment that often occupies a space of “semi-legality”. I study these changes through the lens of Seattle Hempfest, a festival occurring every August in Seattle, Washington that advertises itself as “The largest pro-hemp festival in the United States.” In my research, I have attended Seattle Hempfest in both August of 2015 and 2016, in order to interview the vendors and businesses, speakers and panelists, and Hempfest volunteers and administrators that constitute this event. My interviewing questions concern length of participation in the cannabis community, their perceptions of developing and passed legislature concerning cannabis legalization, and their own conceptions of the cannabis communities in which they are involved in. I also apply my own participant observations during the event. Finally, I will comment on the specific initiatives and policies that are advocated by the activist community connected to Seattle Hempfest, identity intersections, and how legitimacy is established and given to certain activist positions. In discussing conclusions from my research, I find that the activist community often perceives themselves as being “left out” of policy making and legislature, fueling a conception of government as over-regulatory and greedy, and leading to divisions within the community over
legislative support, the fear of corporatization of cannabis, and the exclusion of many community members based on economic means and the criminal justice system. In summary, I undertook this research in order to develop an anthropological analysis of a newly developing legal community, and see my research as grounded in the tradition of legal anthropology discourses. Ge Song ’17 “Adaptive Optics Scanning Light Ophthalmoscopy for Retinal Imaging and Vision Disease Detection” The adaptive optics scanning light ophthalmoscope (AOSLO) allows for high resolution imaging in vivo of retinal structures and is useful for studying retinal diseases at a cellular level. Ex vivo imaging can be done using the same AOSLO by inserting a microscope objective into the optical path to visualize retinal tissues with improved axial resolution. Observing retinal structures in this manner can provide information complementary to in vivo imaging. In this project, excised non-human primate retina is imaged to determine quantitative and qualitative structural information of the various retinal layers. Optical contrast of retinal structures is provided by two-photon excitation of intrinsic fluorescence in near infrared and allows for direct calculations of physical parameters such as cell density and average cell size. The greater axial and lateral resolution and stronger fluorescence signal afforded by ex vivo imaging can also assist with determining the spatial and axial distribution of two-photon fluorescence in different parts of retinal cells. Danielle Vander Horst ’17 “Making Men Gods: The Precedence and Pursuit Of Deification at Rome” One of the most confounding aspects of the Roman religion is the imperial cult; the worship of the emperor as if he were a god. There are many aspects of this topic that warrant attention, but my concern is the classical precedence for this practice, and the introduction and
later implementation of it into Roman society at the dawn of the Empire. This paper is split into two parts. The first is a historical discussion concerning the Greek precedence for the imperial cult, especially as it flourished under and after Alexander the Great. I then follow the strands of Greek culture as they permeated through the Roman Republic, the issues and virtues of Greek ideals in Roman society, and what attitudes and ideas contemporaries such as Plutarch and Cicero exhibited in their works. Finally, I examine the rise of the Empire under Caesar and Augustus, their respective shortcomings and successes regarding the establishment of the cult. This first part relies on primary and secondary sources. In the second part of my thesis, I further extrapolate upon the arguments made in the first half but supplement my statements with archaeological evidence. By examining the material remains, from coins to entire monuments, we can trace the rise of Greek influence in Roman art and society, and better understand the imagery and ideologies which men like Caesar and Augustus put forth in order to establish their rule and, eventually, their worship. The conclusion of my thesis is that Greek influences were imperative for the rise of the Roman imperial cult, as it was not an inherently Roman practice, and that, while the initial hunt for god-like worship in Rome began in earnest under Caesar, Augustus was responsible for its successful establishment. Alicia Wei ’18 “Optogenetic Control of ROS Production in C. elegans” Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) can be detrimental or may lead to beneficial adaptive responses. The factors that distinguish between these outcomes are not readily determined using existing techniques. Here, we have developed a novel C. elegans model to study the effects of ROS in a physiologic context using a combination of CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing and optogenetics. Mitochondria are a main source of ROS and are central to cell death and adaptation to stress. We used cutting edge genetic techniques to fuse components of the mitochondrial respiratory chain to proteins that can produce ROS in response to light. MiniSOG produces singlet oxygen, which has the singular capacity to elicit damage,
while SuperNova creates superoxide, which we predict may be beneficial in limited amounts. We fused miniSOG to complex II of the mitochondrial respiratory chain in C. elegans. The strain exhibited light-sensitive loss of complex II activity and the worms exhibited adverse reactions to light under conditions of mild stress such as, paraquat, an ROS generator or FCCP, a protonophore. In contrast, the strain expressing the SuperNova fusion had no adverse reaction to light and the conditions of mild stress when coupled with light. Future experiments will be necessary to determine whether light is in fact beneficial in this strain, as we hypothesize. With these constructs, we will be able to study the complex II of the mitochondrial respiratory chain ROS microdomains. Keith Wiley ’17 “Effects of Nuclear Mass on Pion Neutrinoproduction” The kinematics of pions produced by neutrinos interacting with the nuclear targets of the MINERvA detector are studied in order to look for discrepancies between current simulations and data. These results have an important role in the constraint of systematic uncertainties in near-future accelerator neutrino experiments such as DUNE. The analysis is ongoing and results are, for the moment, inconclusive.
The Office of Undergraduate Research would like to give special thanks to:
Judges
Mark Buckley Gonzalo Mateos Buckstein
Amanda Larracuente Anne Merideth Patrick Oakes Ronni Pavan
Ronald Rogge
Staff Ezrine Taylor Lauren Sharpe
&
Our friends at The David T. Kearns Center
University of Rochester Office of Undergraduate Research
Dewey Hall 4209-B Rochester, NY 14627
(585) 276-5306 [email protected]
Catering provided by Meliora Catering
