Undergraduate Research Day 2020

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/20158

With students involved in so many research opportunities, Undergraduate Research Day provides the perfect opportunity for them to share their work with the campus community. Held each April, Undergraduate Research Day showcases current research, scholarship, and artistic endeavors.

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Now showing 1 - 20 of 105

Adolescents' knowledge of JUUL policies and perceptions of enforcement
(2020) Nketia, Bryanna; Borzekowski, Dina
JUUL is a PAX labs electronic nicotine delivery system (ENDS) product that entered the e-cigarette market in late 2015 and accounted for 40% of the market share in 2017 (Willet et al., 2018; Huang et al., 2019). This study seeks to understand adolescents’ knowledge of JUUL policies, perceptions of policy enforcement, and intentions to use JUUL based on perceptions of policy enforcement. 300 middle and high school students from both private and public schools in Howard County, Maryland will be surveyed. Data will be analyzed using univariate and bivariate analyses. Understanding what adolescents know, think, and do in response to policies is helpful in strengthening policies and curtailing underage JUUL use.
Amygdala Volume and Social Reward in Children with and without Autism Spectrum Disorder
(2020) Kiely, Matthew; Yarger, Heather; Merchant, Junaid; Redcay, Elizabeth; Redcay, Elizabeth; Yarger, Heather
Social interaction is a vital part of our everyday life and while there have been many studies that have helped elucidate both the neural components and extrinsic factors of these processes, it is still something that is not completely understood. This is especially relevant to those with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), as they are often characterized as having social processing deficits. Social cognition is one of the many functions associated with the limbic system, along with reward and emotion processing. Previous studies have shown that social interaction is rewarding and has been shown to activate regions in the limbic system (Warnell et al., 2017). The amygdala is a region included in social/reward circuitry within the limbic system, such that larger amygdala volumes have been associated with higher connectivity within these regions (Bickart et al., 2012). There have not been previous studies to our knowledge assessing how amygdala volume and social reward sensitivity may vary together, motivating the current study. Therefore, this study aims to assess how social reward relates to amygdala volume in 49 children (ASD = 21, TD = 31) aged 8 to 14 with and without a diagnosis of ASD. Social reward will be assessed using the Prosocial Interactions and Sociability subscales of the Social Reward Questionnaire (SRQ; Foulkes et al., 2014). Amygdala volumes were extracted using MRICloud (Mori et al., 2016). Amygdala size and SRQ subscale differences between groups will be analyzed using an analysis of covariance (controlling for total gray matter) and an independent samples t-test, respectively. A regression analysis will be conducted in order to examine amygdala and SRQ associations.
Analysis of animal use of "4-Poster", a commercial host-targeted tick control device
(2020) Pineda Hernandez, Estefany; Mullinax, Jennifer; Li, Andrew
In the mid-1800s there were 500,000 white-tailed deer. By 1992, the deer population rebounded to an estimated 18 million. The expanded deer population has facilitated black-legged tick expansion throughout the northeast of the United States which has resulted in an increased incidence of Lyme Disease. The main objective of the USDA-ARS Area-wide Tick Control Project is to manage deer and tick populations, as an effort to reduce the number of ticks, thus decreasing Lyme disease transmission potentials. The “4-Poster” is a host targeted tick control device used in USDA's Areawide Tick Control project in Howard County, Maryland. The device has a bait dispenser surrounded by paint rollers coated with permethrin- based “Tickicide” solution. While feeding, deer will brush against the rollers applying permethrin to their ears and neck. The objective of this project is to help evaluate the use of the "4-Poster" device by deer and non-target animals.
Analysis of animal use of "4-Poster", a commercial host-targeted tick control device
(2020) Pineda Hernandez, Estefany; Li, Andrew; Mullinax, Jennifer
In the mid-1800s there were 500,000 white-tailed deer. By 1992, the deer population rebounded to an estimated 18 million. The expanded deer population has facilitated black-legged tick expansion throughout the northeast of the United States which has resulted in an increased incidence of Lyme Disease. The main objective of the USDA-ARS Area-wide Tick Control Project is to manage deer and tick populations, as an effort to reduce the number of ticks, thus decreasing Lyme disease transmission potentials. The “4-Poster” is a host targeted tick control device used in USDA's Areawide Tick Control project in Howard County, Maryland. The device has a bait dispenser surrounded by paint rollers coated with permethrin- based “Tickicide” solution. While feeding, deer will brush against the rollers applying permethrin to their ears and neck. The objective of this project is to help evaluate the use of the "4-Poster" device by deer and non-target animals.
Analysis of animal use of "4-Poster", a commercial host-targeted tick control device
(2020) Pineda Hernandez, Estefany; Li, Andrew; Mullinax, Jennifer
In the mid-1800s there were 500,000 white-tailed deer. By 1992, the deer population rebounded to an estimated 18 million. The expanded deer population has facilitated black-legged tick expansion throughout the northeast of the United States which has resulted in an increased incidence of Lyme Disease. The main objective of the USDA-ARS Area-wide Tick Control Project is to manage deer and tick populations, as an effort to reduce the number of ticks, thus decreasing Lyme disease transmission potentials. The “4-Poster” is a host targeted tick control device used in USDA's Areawide Tick Control project in Howard County, Maryland. The device has a bait dispenser surrounded by paint rollers coated with permethrin- based “Tickicide” solution. While feeding, deer will brush against the rollers applying permethrin to their ears and neck. The objective of this project is to help evaluate the use of the "4-Poster" device by deer and non-target animals.
Analysis of RNA Concentration of Influenza and other Respiratory Viruses from Dormitory Air Sampling
(2020) Khan, Razeen; Bueno de Mesquita, Jacob; Milton, Donald
Making accurate exposure assessments of airborne disease transmission is an integral part of a proactive response to outbreak events and can help track the pathway of transmission. This study aimed to assess the use of the rebreathed air equation in a dorm room setting and compare the expected exposure provided by the equation with actual viral collection determined by sampling. The study involved quantifying viral aerosol levels in the dormitory rooms of college students infected with influenza and other respiratory infections. NIOSH bioaerosol samplers collected dorm room air overnight and the viral concentration from these samples were compared against the calculated exposure value provided by the rebreathed air equation informed by direct measurements of viral shedding rates from the infected dorm residents ascertained by the Gesundheit-II bioaerosol collector. This comparison was facilitated by the rebreathed-air equation. Air samples were collected from the dormitories of nineteen participants and three participants had influenza. No virus was detected in the NIOSH samples. Data obtained from GII collection on viral shedding was then used in the application of the rebreathed air equation to predict exposure and assess how close the estimate of viral particles was to the actual results. By sampling in the dormitories of students with acute respiratory infections, we can make exposure assessments for roommates of infected students and others living in the dorms with greater accuracy by comparing actual outcomes with theoretical estimates. This work also helps improve understanding of airborne pathogen transmission in dorms and other indoor environments. The outcome of this project and future research like this helps evaluate the use of the rebreathed-air equation in predicting exposure and transmission risk under the assumption of well-mixed air.
Artificially Intelligent Medical Assistant Robot (AIMAR)
(2020) Ronin, Dana; Horne, Nina; Daniel, Paulos; Jacobson, Ben; Kuo, Kevin; Marsandi, Michelle; Offenberg, Natalie; Utz, Ryan; Vandergriff, Johan; Deane, Anil
Healthcare providers face financial, regulatory, and logistical obstacles in supplying quality care. Applying robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) to healthcare reduces demands on providers, increases accuracy by supplementing medical diagnoses, and improves patient outcomes. Team AIMAR (Artificially Intelligent Medical Assistant Robot) has constructed a modular robotic healthcare AI system, consisting of advanced diagnostic features as supplements to a generic base. The team focused on analyzing images with machine learning to identify skin conditions. The base robot can move around the home or hospital, pick up objects, and interact with patients and doctors. The patient can log in using face authentication so that patient data is secure, and interact verbally and visually through the user interface. New features can easily be added to the base robot's existing integrated features, making AIMAR adaptable for many desired contexts.
Assassinations in the Philippines: Pre and Post Election of Rodrigo Duterte
(2020) Goldstein, Ariel; Iacoviello, Julia; Arva, Bryan; Evans, Benjamin
Assessing Life History Parameters of Trissolcus japonicus and Anastatus reduvii, Parasitoids of the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug
(2020) Thomas, Namitha; Dabek, Elizabeth Z.; Shrewsbury, Paula M.; Hooks, Cerruti R. R.
Bacteria-mucus interactions & their role in chronic lung infections
(2020) Curry, Keyona; Joyer, Katherine; Duncan, Gregg
Balancing Fairness and Profit in Rideshare using Deep Learning
(2020-04-26) Raman, Naveen; Dickerson, John
Rideshare services such as Uber and Lyft have become much more popular over the last few years. Determining which riders are allocated to which drivers is a challenging problem, complicated by the number of combinations of riders and drivers. Current solutions typically optimize for gross mean volume or profit, while ignoring fairness in driver pay and rider wait-time. We address these by taking a long-term view, using Neural Networks to simulate value functions, and use Markov Decision Processes to maximize fairness.
Being ‘Dissed’ and Abused: African American adolescent males’ ideas of unhealthy or harmful dating dynamics
(2020) Johnson, Timothy; Bankole, Caesar; Howard, Donna; Howard, Donna
While the prevalence of teen dating violence (TDV) is among the highest for African Americans (AA), the research and narrative surrounding this issue has been historically one-sided. This qualitative study was conducted to further explore the candid perspectives of adolescent AA males regarding healthy and unhealthy dating relationship dynamics. Convenience sampling and snowball sampling were utilized to recruit 19 AA males from schools and community youth groups around the greater Washington DC area. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted. Analysis consisted of open coding, sorting, aggregation and synthesis of responses to the guiding question question: “How would you describe a dating relationship that was unhealthy or harmful?” Narratives provided multi-layered, descriptive characterizations of healthy and unhealthy dating dynamics. Through an iterative process, emergent themes and sub-themes were generated. The five emergent themes were: Amiss or Dissed Communication; Distrust, Dishonesty, Disloyalty; Fighting and Poor Conflict Resolution; and, Abuse. Adolescent AA males displayed a strong awareness of what constitutes unhealthy dating relationship characteristics, especially concerning conflict and abusive behaviors. Characterizations that addressed Communication and Distrust, Dishonesty, and Disloyalty may present areas that should be focused on in future prevention efforts. Prevention and intervention programs aimed at decreasing TDV within the African American community will benefit tremendously from these authentic perspectives. By building off of the knowledge and values already expressed among adolescent AA males, rather than perpetuated stereotypes, programs will more effectively connect with, educate, and empower them to build healthy dating relationship dynamics.
Bisexual Women’s Female Friendships: Predictors and Outcomes of Sexual Identity Disclosure
(2020) Parekh, Nina; Mohr, Jonathan
This study examined identity-based predictors of bisexual women’s sexual identity disclosure and outcomes of disclosure related to individual and interpersonal well-being. The study assessed hypotheses that Asian bisexual women would be less likely to disclose their sexual minority status to Asian friends and more likely to White friends, as well as less likely to monosexual friends. The study also identified that the act of sexual identity disclosure for all participants, regardless of race/ethnicity would experience stronger interpersonal wellbeing among the friends to which they have disclosed their sexual minority status. A sample of bisexual women completed measures focused on their demographic information, personal self-esteem, self-authenticity, satisfaction with life, and perceived social support, as well as their interpersonal level of outness, validation, trust, intimacy, and overall friendship.
Bootstrapping the Meanings of Each & Every
(2020) Griffith, Meagan; Knowlton, Tyler; Lidz, Jeffrey
The universal quantifiers "each" & "every" have similar truth conditions, but differ slightly in representation. "Each" often has an individual-based representation, while "every" has a set-based representation. In this study, we investigate not only how learners might arrive at these representations, but also whether or not there may be signal in the distributional differences in parents' speech that kids may use to learn the meanings of "each" & "every". To do this, we conducted a corpus investigation of child directed speech, that included the quantifier's "each" and "every", in the CHILDES corpus.
Children's Evaluations of Helpful and Unhelpful Individuals
(2020) Forman, Sydney; Woodward, Amanda; Beier, Jonathan; Beier, Jonathan
Humans are cooperative and often help one another. Although we know that young children are helpful, there is much to understand about children’s evaluations of others who do and do not help. Prior work examined evaluations during middle childhood of helpers and non-helpers in India and the US in different settings (Miller, Bersoff, & Harwood, 1990). American children’s evaluations centered on their relationships with the needy person (e.g. friend or family member) and how severe the person’s need was. These differences in evaluations raise questions of how children’s views of helpful and unhelpful interactions arise, earlier development. The current studies examine 3- to 6-year-old children’s interpretations and evaluations of helpful and unhelpful people. Experiment 1 (N=95 of planned 96) investigated children’s evaluations of people who help versus neutral people and their views of helpful versus unhelpful interactions. Children watched two sets of videos. First, children watched a video of a helper giving tape to someone hanging a poster and a video of a neutral character with another girl. When asked to evaluate the helpful versus neutral characters, children rated the helper more positively (59 of 95, p = 0.01). Then, children watched videos of helpful and not helpful interactions. Overall, children viewed helpful action as more acceptable than unhelpful actions (X^2(1) = 85.01, p < 0.01). Experiment 2 (N=61 of planned 96) expanded this work by examining children’s evaluations of characters who do not help. Preliminary analyses will be presented in the poster.
Children’s Evaluations of Ingroup and Outgroup Members Following Accusations of Wrongdoing
(2020) Ackerman, Elizabeth; D'Esterre, Alexander; Glidden, Jacqueline; Butler, Luke; Killen, Melanie
Children are commonly involved in competitive activities that can result in misunderstands because of differing interpretations of ambiguous situations. This study investigates if the group identity of children affects their interpretation of ambiguous situations when there is an accusation of misconduct. The results support the hypothesis because there was a divergence of evaluations based on team membership following an accusation of cheating.
Children’s Interpretation of Additive Particles
(2020) Llanos, Inna; Lidz, Jeffery
This study is about children's interpretation of additive particles. Children learning German, Japanese and Dutch have trouble understanding the meaning of additive particles. We looked at whether or not children that learn English have same problem.
College Dating Violence: Evaluating an Online Intervention
(2020) Herman, Micah; O'Brien, Karen M.; O'Brien, Karen M.
The purpose of this study will be to replicate and extend a randomized controlled trial that tested the effectiveness of an online bystander intervention educational program (STOP Dating Violence; O'Brien, Sauber, Kearney, Venaglia, & Lemay, 2019). Specifically, the intervention was modified and converted into an engaging animated video and then tested for its effectiveness. College students will be randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (1) the STOP intervention, (2) a website containing information about dating violence, and (3) a control condition. Data collection is currently underway. Preliminary data analyses (N=39) suggest that there is a difference in post test scores on the knowledge of bystander interventions measure across conditions (F(2, 36) = 3.876, p <; .03, η 2 = .18). This study will advance knowledge regarding how counseling psychologists might cost-effectively and successfully educate undergraduates about dating violence.
The Comparative Effects of Carbohydrates and Lipids on Mitochondrial Function
(2020) Kattapuram, Nathan; Sunny, Nishanth
Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and Type 2 Diabetes affect approximately 24% and 8% of the global population respectively. The Western diet, high in both carbohydrates and lipids, is believed to have a role in the development of chronic metabolic disease. Dysfunctional hepatic mitochondrial metabolism is also known to be a central feature of disordered metabolism. The objective of this study was to compare the roles of dietary carbohydrates vs. lipids in inducing dysfunctional hepatic mitochondrial metabolism. Mice, C57BL/6NJ were kept on one of three diets: low-fat control (LF; 10% kcal fat), high-fat (HF; 60% kcal fat), and high-carbohydrate (HC; 25% kcal fat and 34.9% kcal fructose) for 10 weeks. Half of the mice were randomly selected to undergo a 16 hour fast prior to sacrifice, while the other half were not fasted. Within the fasted subset, the HC diet induced significantly elevated basal mitochondrial respiration (pmol Oxygen consumed/min) when compared with HF (HF, 70.1±5.8; HC,108.6±17.4; p<.05). Among fasted mice, the HC diet also appeared to induce significantly higher maximal respiration and ATP production when compared with HF. Expression of hepatic mitochondrial complex proteins were also higher in fasted HC mice than fasted HF mice. Overall, these results suggest that the high-carbohydrate diet enhanced mitochondrial activity when compared with the high-fat diet.
COMPARISON OF RIBOSWITCH REPORTER SYSTEMS FOR LIVE CELL IMAGING OF CYCLIC-DI-GMP DYNAMICS IN BACILLUS SUBTILIS POPULATIONS
(2019) Pierre, Yasmine; Spirito, Catherine
Fluorescent riboswitch reporters can be used in vivo to monitor metabolite dynamics. Previous work used a fluorescent yfp reporter based on a cyclic di-GMP responsive riboswitch from Bacillus licheniformis to monitor cyclic di-GMP levels in individual Bacillus subtilis cells. The previous study found that cell fates in Bacillus subtilis are not uniform in the presence of varying cyclic di-GMP levels. It is important to further develop tools that enable single-cell imaging in Gram-positive bacteria. Fluorogenic aptamers are single-stranded RNA molecules that have been evolved via in vitro selection to bind strongly and specifically to fluorophore molecules and emit a fluorescent signal. These fluorogenic aptamers can be used instead of fluorescent proteins in riboswitch reporter systems to provide a more dynamic read-out of metabolite dynamics in cells. However, relatively little work has been done to evaluate the use of these fluorogenic aptamers as reporter systems in Gram-positive bacteria. The objective of this project is to evaluate the use of four different fluorogenic aptamers (Mango-III, Broccoli, dimeric Broccoli, and SpinachII) instead of yfp in a cyclic di-GMP responsive riboswitch reporter system in Bacillus subtilis. All plasmids containing the riboswitch reporters were constructed and successfully transformed into E. coli cells. Subsequently, the cyclic di-GMP responsive riboswitch reporter systems were successfully transformed into B. subtilis WT PY79 and a 𝝙pdeH mutant. Future work involves evaluating their performance in vivo in B. subtilis via laser confocal and fluorescence microscopy.