4 Oral Presentations 10:45AM – 12:15PM

Tuesday, Apr 9th | 10:45AM – 12:15PM

Collegiate Room

Moderator:  Copeland

Metamaterial-based Robots for Surgical Applications

Presenter Name: Britton Jordan

Mechanical metamaterials are materials which do not exist in nature but are rather purposefully constructed to exhibit certain mechanical properties. Manipulators composed of these materials are performant while remaining simple and elegant. However, the motion capability of the manipulator is encoded in its physical composition and cannot be changed. We present multi-modal metamaterial-based robot prototypes which can switch between the behaviors found in two different metamaterials.
College: Engineering
School / Department: School of Computing
Research Mentor: Alan Kuntz

A Jupyter Notebook Educational Repository

Presenter Name: Nicholas Baker

I am creating a repository of jupyter notebooks for the chemical engineering department to use. These notebooks will make sovling problems and coding easier for the students. It will also be a framework to be updated as new information needs to be added. It will be a resource for students to use and hopefully make their lives easier, and encourage them to maintain using code throughout their college career.

College: Engineering
School / Department: Chemical Engineering
Research Mentor: Tony Saad

Unraveling the Q system function in prokaryotes

Presenter Name: Peyton Leyendecker

Here, we explored the QF transcription factor activation mechanism in prokaryotes by characterizing the behavior of a fusion protein (TetR-QFAD) consisting of the tetracycline repressor (TetR) and the QF activating domain (QFAD) downstream of the T7 promoter. We demonstrate that when placed downstream of the T7 promoter, TetR-QFAD functions as a repressor and an activator depending on the presence of aTc.

College: Engineering
School / Department: Bioengineering
Research Mentor: Tara Deans

The Cause of Excess Magmatism in the Northern Atlantic Margin

Presenter Name: Autumn Hartley

Large Igneous Provinces are known to be prominent drivers of climate change in Earth’s past. When the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum occurred, the North Atlantic Igneous Province was forming. In this project, the causes behind the formation of this province are examined through the lens of geothermometry, melting regimes, and composition of the mantle source using data from the International Ocean Discovery Program’s Expedition 396.

College: Mines & Earth Sciences
School / Department: Geology and Geophysics
Research Mentor: Emily Cunningham

Tuesday, Apr 9th | 10:45AM – 12:15PM

Parlor A

Explaining the relationship between galaxy sizes and their spatial distribution.

Presenter Name: Joshua Hill

Galaxies come in different shapes and sizes. One hypothesis is that the sizes of galaxies depend on the properties of their surrounding environments. This hypothesis makes a specific prediction on how galaxies of different sizes are spatially distributed in the Universe. Here we examine this prediction and provide a physical explanation of the relationship between the sizes of galaxies and their spatial distribution. This work will allow us to better understand the validity of the hypothesis.

College: Science
School / Department: Physics & Astronomy
Research Mentor: Yao-Yuan Mao

El Teatro: Latinidad On Broadway

When one thinks of Latine representation in musical theater, there are two common works cited: West Side Story and In The Heights. But of course, given the long and rich history of theatre, there are far more examples that are just simply not given the proper attention they deserve. This project aims to bridge that gap in research and expose audiences to the Latino stage: who’s involved, where it’s been, where it’s heading, and the sociocultural implications that these shows represent.

Presenter Name: Steffan Perez-Velez Solis

College: Fine Arts
School / Department: School of Music
Research Mentor: Elizabeth Craft

Counterfactual Utilitarianism: A New Metaphysical Approach to Consequentialist Ethics

Presenter Name: Milo Yeates

I defend and apply a new ethical framework: counterfactual utilitarianism. I explain how it prescribes that we evaluate the morality of actions and show that (because it takes into account the pragmatic nature of identity and the incoherence of ethical comparisons between existence and nonexistence) it produces moral conclusions distinct from those of other forms of utilitarianism. I apply this framework to the non-identity problem and the the ethics of embryo selection vs gene editing. 

College: Humanities
School / Department: Philosophy
Research Mentor: Matt Haber

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