121 Research Reflection by Julia Clista Galecki

Faculty Mentor: William Anderegg (School for Biological Sciences)

Research experience includes Access Women in Science, where as a freshman, I was paired with Dr. Anderegg’s biology lab working on drought stress in trees, where I presented the research at the U of U ACCESS Symposium. I still gratefully work for Dr. Anderegg, and am conducting my honors project in association with the work that he is doing. My honors project involves assessing the resilience of Juniper trees in burned and non-burned areas of central Utah. I’ve also worked in Dr. Harris’ Analytical Chemistry lab, where I am researching protein association with supported lipid bilayer on silica particles. I was also conducted research in Germany on aligning molecules for artificial solar cells to enhance energy efficiency with diffused sunlight capture. I continue to learn new skills and techniques to advance my project. For example, I am currently learning how to do protein splitting to create monovalent binding proteins. I presented the research at the National Graduate-student Eastern Analytical, Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program Symposiums, National Conference on Undergraduate Research, the ACS Conference, and the Utah Conference of Undergraduate Research. These experiences have helped me find a passion for research. Which helped me decide to persue a PhD.