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Abstract:
New Program Helps Applicants Embark on Scientific Journeys

Green Light Given to 21 Undergrad Research Ideas

Dallas, TX | Posted on January 29th, 2008

Test a new way to track flying rockets. Learn whether drugs can help mice withstand the ravages of Huntington's Disease.

Or find out how people react to happy videos with scary music.

These are but a few of the research ideas that UT Dallas students have received funding to pursue as part of the Undergraduate Research Scholar Award Program.

In all, 21 students received $500 each to cover laboratory equipment, travel or other project-related expenses for their research proposals. Under the program launched last semester, the funds were granted for a single semester by the Office of the Vice President for Research, headed by Dr. Bruce Gnade.

When the projects are finished, the students are to submit research summaries, and their faculty sponsors are to certify the projects' completion.

The complete list of student winners and their research projects are as follows:
Undergraduate Research Funding Winners

Okwara Chinonyerem, "Targeted Nucleotide Exchange in cAMP Response Element site (CRE) on the y-globin gene promoter in K562 cells." Faculty sponsor: Betty Pace, Ph.D.

Aaron Cunningham, "Embedded Circuitry." Faculty sponsor: Roozebeh Jafari, Ph.D.

Stephanie Fulenchek, "Temporal and spatial control of peptide nanotubes." Faculty sponsor: Warren Goux, Ph.D.

Anuh Teresa George, "Characterization of Atrophic Changes in the Cerebral Cortex Using 3-D Fractal Dimensional Analysis." Faculty sponsor: John Hart, Jr., M.D. and Richard King, Ph.D.

Nicole Ketring, "Analysis of Myxomycete Mitochondrial cDNAs for RNA editing." Faculty sponsor: Dennis Miller, Ph.D.

Marie Maher, "Towards Practical Applications of Carbon Nanotubes: A Computational Analysis of Solubility." Faculty sponsor: Steven Nielsen, Ph.D.

Tomoyasu Mani, "PARACEST agents with unusually slow water exchange rates." Faculty sponsor: A. Dean Sherry, Ph.D.

Caroline Mejias, "Theories of intelligence, trait hope, and learning vs. performance goal-orientation after a failure." Faculty sponsor: Candice Mills, Ph.D.

Scott Nietfeld, "The Design, Construction & Testing of an Inertial Navigation System for the Real Time Tracking of a Rocket in Flight." Faculty sponsor: Phillip Anderson, Ph.D.

Hector Osuna, "A Nitric Oxide Delivery System for Organ Preservation." Faculty sponsor: Kenneth Balkus, Jr., Ph.D.

Christopher Philip, "Effects on heart rate and skin conductance related to congruent and incongruent audiovisual stimuli." Faculty sponsor: Walter Dowling, Ph.D.

Karishma Parekh, "Cyclic Peptides and Carbon Nanotubes." Faculty sponsor: Rockford Draper, Ph.D.

Chara Price, "Activation of Attachment Working Models Filters as a Result of an Experimentally Created Interpersonal Closeness Task." Faculty sponsor: Duane Buhrmester, Ph.D.

Hrishikesh Singhania, "The Cassel Implementation Project." Faculty sponsor: Catherine Eckel, Ph.D.

Eugen Stanciulescu, "Regioregular polythiophenes with alkenyl substituents." Faculty sponsor: Mihaela Iovu, Ph.D.

Chelsey Storey, "The Effectiveness of Candidate Drugs in Preventing Neurodegeneration in Huntington's Disease-Induced Mice." Faculty sponsor: Santosh D'Mello, Ph.D.

Cho Sung, "Photo-ablation of Cancer Cells Rockford Draper, Ph.D.

Austin Swafford, "The Effect of Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube (SWNT) Concentration on the Thermal Ablation of Cancer Cells by Near-Infrared (NIR) Radiation." Faculty sponsor: Paul Pantano, Ph.D. and Rockford Draper, Ph.D.

Nattanun Thipdararat, "Analysis of G4P4 mitochondrial DNA sequences in Physarum polycephalum strain TX1 for genes requiring RNA editing." Faculty sponsor: Dennis Miller, Ph.D.

Khoan Vu, "Molecular mechanisms of tau neurotoxicity." Faculty sponsor: Gail Breen, Ph.D.

Kerri West, "The Role of Regional Organizations in Institution Building: Lessons from the OSCE's Efforts in South-Eastern Europe." Faculty sponsor: Dachang Cong, Ph.D.