Undergraduate Scholarship

Ashley Harrison, senior Mathematics major (shown on right) Faculty advisors, Dr. Bang Huang (Mathematics) and Dr. Ian Pimienta (Chemistry)

I had the most wonderful opportunity to attend the Joint Mathematics Meeting in Boston, MA, from Jan. 4th through the 7th of this year. The opportunity resulted from participating in the REU Site in Mathematical Analysis and Applications at the University of Michigan-Dearborn during the summer of 2022 and having a truly outstanding faculty mentor and group members from that program. Our research involved proving the existence of a relationship, recently discovered by physicists using numerical simulations, between eigenvalues of special matrices that arise in probabilistic models. My group presented our work at the Pi-Mu-Epsilon undergraduate poster and contributed paper sessions. Besides our presentations, it was truly an amazing experience being in the presence of such well-accomplished mathematicians and educators. I was starstruck for most of the conference, seeing mathematicians I have followed for years and look up to, like Grant Sanderson, Peter Shor, Peyam Tabrizian, just to name a few. It was an experience I will never forget and the highlight of my undergraduate journey.

Cas Undergraduate Scholars Program

The CUSP initiative is now in its third year. During the 2022-2023, CUSP scholars include the following dedicated researchers and exciting projects:

Noah Helphenstine, Biomedical major Dr. Jessica Slade, faculty mentor

Our research project is focused on investigating the presence of Neuropeptide S through the use of an ELISA (Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay). NPS is a signaling molecule that can vary in concentration due to various factors associated with cancer (type, location of cancer, etc.). Another key aspect of our study is establishing a rough baseline in clinically healthy individuals to compare the patient samples against. This is meant to be a pilot study, but down the line this could serve as an important step for developing tools for the screening and diagnosis of cancer.

Nathan Justice, pre-nursing major Dr. Rob Musick, faculty mentor

In my project, I am using neurographic art, in partnership with lectio divina. The two concepts combine mindfulness with a contemplative approach to reading the bible. The goal of the project is to help relieve stress and enhance the spiritual wellness of people who are in active recovery, especially those in treatment facilities. I hope that my project contributes to the success of addiction treatment by adding to the sense of hope and optimism of those in recovery.

Jordan Cantor, Biology major Dr. Bang Huang, faculty mentor

In this project, we will randomly generate a version of a subject quiz or exam using LaTeX. We will create a subject test bank and utilize the randomization functionality or packages from LaTeX to randomly select problems from the text bank. Furthermore, we will also randomize the numbers or potentially the equations from the problem chosen so that the quiz or exam will be distinct from one student to the other. We are planning to build two models from this project. The basic model will generate more than 10,000 unique versions of quizzes or exams, and the advanced model will create more than 65 million different versions. The project will save time for the professors to develop various quizzes or exams every semester.