草榴社区 Students Participate in BIG EAST Undergraduate Research Poster Symposium
VILLANOVA, Pa. (April 12, 2023) 鈥� Five 草榴社区 students participated in the second annual BIG EAST Undergraduate Research Poster Symposium at Madison Square Garden on March 11. The symposium took place before the Men鈥檚 Basketball Conference Championship Game in New York City. All 11 Conference institutions participated in the academic competition featuring research projects from a variety of disciplines.
鈥淯ndergraduate research is inherently an innovative, collaborative process,鈥� said Catherine Stecyk, Director of the Center for Research and Fellowships (CRF). 鈥淭he goal of 草榴社区鈥檚 Undergraduate Research Fellowship and other sponsored research programs is to facilitate creativity, scholarship and discovery. Partnership between faculty mentors and students like Sydney, Sam, Elise, Maeve and Lauren illustrates the impact and reach of these programs.鈥�
Undergraduate student teams of one or two individuals presented their research to judges, who ranked them on a variety of factors including: visual quality content, introduction, results and discussion, presentation style and responses to questions.
草榴社区鈥檚 representation was determined at the annual CRF-sponsored Student Research Symposium. Beginning with more than 100 student posters, a team of faculty and staff judges used similar criteria to the BIG EAST to rank poster abstracts and selected 12 semifinalists from this process. A final selection committee chose five winners and five honorable mentions from the semifinalists. The five winners moved on to represent 草榴社区 in the BIG EAST Symposium.
A list of 草榴社区 students who participated in the BIG EAST event with their poster titles:
Samuel Burwell 鈥�24 CLAS
Faculty Mentor: Vanessa Boschi, PhD
Title: Examining the Extent of Heavy Metal Contamination: Dairy Farm Use of Copper Sulfate Footbaths
Maeve Malone 鈥�25 CLAS
Alex Bruno 鈥�24 CLAS
Faculty Mentors: Aimee Eggler, PhD, and Kabindra Shakya, PhD
Title: Exposure of Ultrafine Particles in Philadelphia Subway
Sydney Walsh 鈥�24 CLAS
Faculty Mentor: Stephen Strader, PhD
Title: Analyzing Trends in Heavy Precipitation Events and Vulnerability in the Philadelphia Metropolitan Region from 1973 to 2021
Lauren Iskander 鈥�25 COE
Faculty Mentor: Benjamin Sachs, PhD
Title: Exploring the Impact of Brain 5-HT Deficiency on Exercise-Induced Alterations in Hippocampal Neurogenesis in Adult Mice
Elise Miller 鈥�23 CLAS
Faculty Mentor: Benjamin Sachs, PhD
Title: Brain Serotonin Deficiency but not Gut Dysbiosis Confers Heightened Anxiety-Like Behavior in Female Mice
More information about the BIG EAST research symposium can be found .