IBB rewards top posters by summer interns

Veronica Aguayo, who participated in the Rice Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering’s (IBB) American Heart Association Summer Cardiovascular Research Internship Program, was among this year’s IBB Summer Undergraduate Research Symposium poster winners. From left, Program Director Jane Grande-Allen, Aguayo and IBB Faculty Director Zachary Ball. Photo courtesy of the Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering

Nine summer interns won prizes of up to $500 for presenting the best posters at this year’s Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering Summer Undergraduate Research Symposium at the BioScience Research Collaborative Aug. 3. The students presented 80 posters inspired by their summer projects, representing 10 bio-related Rice undergraduate research programs.

The winners:

Veronica Aguayo for “Mechanical Testing of Small-Scale 3D Printed Hydrogels.”

Emely Tejada Jaquez for “Developing Low-Cost Training Materials for High-Resolution Microendoscopy (HRME) Cervical Imaging in Underserved Areas of Brazil.”

Lesley Jimenez Guerra for “Detecting Mismatch Mutations in the p53 Gene of Colorectal Cancer DNA.”

Yingxuan “Jason” Tan for “A Pilot Study to Understand the Interaction Between Platelets and Ovarian Cancer Cells.”

Tasmia Nadeem for “Expression and Purification of FolP Adaptive Mutant Involved in Resistance to Trimethoprim-Sulfamethoxazole.”

Chiagoziem Ngwadom for “Developing Novel C1 Conversion Methods to Synthesize Multi-Carbon Products Through the Enzyme, 2-hydroxyacyl-CoA Lyase (HACL).”

Anna Schuster for “Selective Expulsion of Symbiodinium During Bleaching of Acropora Hyacinthus.”

Jordan Sims for “Viral Infection of Dinoflagellate Endosymbionts (Symbiodiniumspp.) Expelled During Coral Bleaching.”

Tensae Assefa for “Engineering Optical Reporters of Neural Voltage Dynamics for Cell Specific Imaging.”