Women in Philanthropy Students and Research Projects

The 2005-06 recipients are (left-right) Katy Swancutt (Biology/Zoology option), April Kongkosonkichkan (Theatre Arts), Carlye Peterson (Geology), April O'Brien (Physics), Greer McMichael (Biochemistry), Ben DeSousa (Mechanical Engineering), Erin Paig (Marine Biology), Michael Sundberg (Cell Biology/Journalism), Angela Llaban (Marine Biology), and Casandra Cox (Chemistry)

Eight of the ten recipients of the Women and Philanthropy Undergraduate Research Scholarship Recipients were students from the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. The ten students (pictured above) were honored at a reception held in their honor. This is the first time these scholarships have been awarded. This new scholarship program is being offered in addition to the re-entry scholarships the organization awards in the fall semester.

The eight CNSM recipients were awarded scholarships based on the following research projects:

Two recipients, Katy Swancutt and Casandra Cox, are members of the Mezyk RadKEMP research group, supervised by Dr. Stephen Mezyk of the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department. Katy Swancutt's research studied the free radical chemistry of the anti-cancer drug cisplatin (cis-diamminedichloro platinum II), and Casandra Cox's project is involved with the quantitative removal of unwanted chemicals in water.

Carlye Peterson performed research with Dr. Lora Stevens (Landon) of the Department Geological Sciences on Biogenic silica as a climatic proxy for monsoon intensity in Vietnam over the last 1200 years.

April O'Brien researched novel superconductor magnesium diboride (MgB₂) under the direction of Dr. Jiyeong Gu of the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

Two students, Angela Llaban and Erin Paig conducted research in the field of marine biology. Angela Llaban's research project is part of a project conducted by Dr. Bruno Pernet of Biological Sciences, Phylogeography of ghost shrimp (Neotrypaea californiensis) on the west coast of the United States. Erin Paig's research is under the direction of Dr. Christopher Lowe, also of Biological Sciences.

Greer McDonald worked with Dr. Eric Marinez of Chemistry and Biochemistry, and Michael Sundberg's research was under the direction of Dr. Kelly Young of Biological Sciences.

Student Research Projects

• Casandra Cox
• Angela Llaban
• April O'Brien
• Erin Paig
• Katy Swancutt

Casandra Cox

Casandra Cox is a Chemistry major in her Junior year. She has been working in the Mezyk RadKEM group for the past three years. Her research project involves the quantitative removal of unwanted chemicals in water. Typical examples of these chemicals include pesticides and their residues, pharmaceuticals, and even carcinogenic chemicals such as nitrosamines formed by the water purification process. These chemicals are not destroyed by the addition of disinfectant chlorine, or eliminated by physical treatments such as flocculation. Therefore, new processes need to be developed to ensure that these chemicals are completely removed before the water is distributed to the public.

The use of Advanced Oxidation Processes (AOPs) to destroy such chemicals directly in the water is a new approach that is being considered. AOPs cover a number of different techniques, but all use the generation of oxidizing (hydroxyl, ·OH) or reducing (hydrated electron, e-; hydrogen atom, ·H) radicals. These highly energetic radical species react directly with the organic contaminants in water to completely destroy them.

However, the large-scale use of these processes is prohibitively expensive at present. To optimize their use, and thereby minimize their costs, a full understanding of the chemistry involved in these reactions is necessary. Unfortunately, there is very little basic information available for many of the problem chemicals.

For this study, kinetic and mechanistic data for radical reactions with a series of chemicals will be determined. The kinetics of oxidative (hydroxyl radical) and reductive (hydrated electron) destruction and the final products produced will be measured. All of these data will be ultimately collected into a computer model to be used for predicting real contaminant chemical removal in commercial water systems.

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Angela Llaban

Angela Llaban's research is part of the a project studying Phylogeography of ghost shrimp (Neotrypaea californiensis) on the west coast of the United States.

This research project focuses on testing the hypothesis that there is significant population genetic structure among ghost shrimp populations on the west coast of the United States. The ultimate goal is to evaluate potential risks associated with importing ghost shrimp as live bait for recreational fisheries into southern California from Oregon and Washington. Specifically, we want to assess whether there is a risk of introducing distinct genes from these northern populations into southern California populations.

We have sampled ghost shrimp from eight natural populations ranging from southern California to Washington State, as well as two "populations" from southern California bait shops, and sequenced a fragment of the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase I gene from each individual. With the help of Dr. James Archie (Dept. of Biological Sciences), we are now analyzing sequence data to identify phylogeographic patterns. We will present results of this study at a national scientific meeting (Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology) in January, and hope to have a manuscript describing this work submitted to a peer-reviewed scientific journal in spring 2007.

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April O'Brien

April O'Brien's project, In situ Deposition of MgB₂ Thin Films by Magnetron Sputtering, involves superconductors. The discovery of the novel superconductor magnesium diboride (MgB₂) raised great interest for the potential of both science and technology applications. High-quality MgB₂ thin films, preferably deposited in-situ, are necessary for device application. Due to the extreme difference in the vapor pressures of Mg and B, it is known to be very difficult to maintain an environment for the in-situ formation of stoichiometric MgB₂ phase.

She fabricated MgB₂ thin films on a C-plane sapphire substrate using magnetron sputtering. Thin films were deposited by co-sputtering of pure B and Mg targets at room temperature and followed by in-situ annealing. To obtain high superconducting transition temperature close to the bulk value (~ 39 K) of MgB₂, she has investigated the effects of the deposition and annealing parameters on the superconducting properties, such as deposition temperature, deposition Ar pressure, annealing temperature, annealing Ar pressure, and annealing time.

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Erin Paig

Elemental absorption in the round stingray, Urobatis halleri
Erin Winters-Mist Paig

Previous studies have focused on estimating the assimilation efficiency of elasmobranchs by determining the caloric uptake, but directly measuring the amount of elasmobranch elemental absorption has not been attempted. This study focused on estimating the percentage of elemental absorption (carbon and nitrogen) in 31 California round stingrays, Urobatis halleri. Rays were individually housed and each ray was fed 2% of its body weight of shrimp. All fecal samples were collected, dried, homogenized, and run through a 440 CHN Elemental Analyzer. Several samples of homogenized shrimp were also run through the analyzer to obtain elemental composition. Carbon and nitrogen absorption was 74.5% and 89.7% efficient, respectively. Rays did not show any difference in absorption for either element between sexes or size classes. Rays displayed similar nitrogen absorption as other carnivorous species (approx. 80%), but were more efficient than omnivorous species (between 36-79%). Bomb calorimetry will be used to estimate caloric assimilation.

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Katy Swancutt

Katy Swancutt is a Bioloy major, option in Zoology in her Junior year. She has been part of the Mezyk RadKEM group for the past two and a half years. Her research project involves studying the free radical chemistry of the anti-cancer drug cisplatin (cis-diamminedichloro platinum II). This chemical has been used for treating cancer for nearly forty years and was the first of many platinum-containing chemicals developed to fight cancer. While the process by which cisplatin kills cancerous cells is not fully understood, it is believed that cisplatin binds to DNA, and then interferes with DNA repair mechanisms. Unfortunately, cisplatin is also very toxic, which limits the dose given to patients.

Previous work has shown that cisplatin can react with many different free radicals in water, being oxidized by the hydroxyl radical and reduced by electrons. Some studies have also indicated that the species called superoxide (O₂^-) is involved in both cisplatin's toxicity and destruction of cancer cells, so we know that radical reactions are very important to its chemistry.

If we can understand the mechanisms involved in the reactions of cisplatin we may provide insight to the reasons for its effectiveness in treating cancer and tumors as well as for its toxicity. To date, no research has been conducted on cisplatin's reactions with the major biologically-relevant radicals (like superoxide or carbonate) or the consequences of these radical reactions at physiological pH and temperature. To gain this knowledge the absolute reaction rates for cisplatin reaction with hydroxyl radicals and hydrated electrons, as well as with carbonate and superoxide radicals under biologically relevant conditions will be performed. In addition, the radical intermediate species formed will also be identified, which will allow us to quantify the subsequent reaction pathways.

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