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CAS Robyn Rafferty Mathias Student Research Conference

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Robyn Rafferty Mathias
Student Research ConferenceSaturday, March 22, 2025 | In personat Don Myers Technology & Innovation Building (DMTI)


The College of Arts & Sciencesis pleased to announce that the 35th Annual Robyn Rafferty Mathias Student Research Conference will take place onSaturday, March 22, 2025,in person at 鶹ƽ's. This event is a forum for CAS undergraduate and graduate students to present original research, scholarship, and creative work before colleagues, faculty, and friends.

We’re thrilled to introduce two brand-new AI-focused award categories for 2025:

  • AI in Mathematical, Computer Sciences, and Natural Sciences
  • AI in Arts, Humanities, and the Social Sciences

Awards & Recognition

Each oral and poster presentation will be evaluated by a panel of judges from the 鶹ƽ community. The standout presenters will earn a certificate signed by the CAS Dean and monetary awards to celebrate their hard work and creativity.

Attending the Conference

Attendees are requested to enter the via Entrance 1, which is closest to the Eagle Statue or Duber Hall. Free parking at the or will be available. All garages are about 5-10 minutes walking distance from the .

The university provides free 鶹ƽ shuttle service to and from the Tenleytown-鶹ƽ Metro station on Metro’s Red Line. Shuttle buses will run every 10 minutes from the Tenleytown-鶹ƽ Metro station.

All participants and guests must check in before proceeding to the presentation sessions. If you haven’t registered, please complete the registration form (link pending).

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Contact CAS Events atcasevents@american.edu.

Sponsors

The Mathias Student Research Conference is partially sponsored by a generous grant from 鶹ƽ trustee and alumna Robyn Rafferty Mathias and by the NASA District of Columbia Space Grant Consortium.


College of Arts & SciencesDC Space Grant Consortium

Schedule

Click on a session's name or scroll below to see a full details ofthe session's presentations.

8:00 am-3:00 pm
Registration| DMTI 111

Light breakfast will be available until 11 am.

9:00-10:15 am

Breakout Session I
Artificial Intelligence Uses and Threats | DMTI 114
Communities: Local and Global | DMTI 116
Environmental Impacts and Climate Change | DMTI 119
Health and Well-Being | DMTI 121
Identities, Culture and the Self | DMTI 213
Insights into the Cerebrum and Cognition | DMTI 217
Molecular Mechanisms of Development and Disease | DMTI 215

10:30–11:45 am

Breakout Session II
Animals & Model Organisms | DMTI 217
Art in its Historical and Social Context | DMTI 116
Aspects of AI Technology | DMTI 114
Ecological, Evolutionary, and Stellar Phenomena | DMTI 119
Health and Well-Being #2 | DMTI 121
Perpetuating and Challenging Racism | DMTI 213
The Power of Literary Text | DMTI 215

12:00–1:30 pm

Dean’s Remarks followed by Keynote Speaker | DMTI 111
Join us for remarks by Dean Linda Aldoory and Dr. Laura DeNardis. Lunch will be provided.

1:45-3:15 p.m.

Poster Presentations
Students from different knowledge areas: Humanities, Natural Sciences, Physical Sciences, and Social Sciences, will showcase their research.
Constitution Hall

3:30–4:45 p.m.

Breakout Session III
Apps Take Off! | DMTI 114
Art and Political and Social Commentary | DMTI 116
Ethics, Politics, Religion | DMTI 215
Food, Nutrition and Sustainability | DMTI 119
Gender and Sexuality | DMTI 213
History, Culture and Politics | DMTI 121
Measuring and Manipulating Models | DMTI 217

4:45–5:00 p.m.

Merit Awards Panel | DMTI 111
Hear from national scholarship recipients (student Elli Anderson and alumJulian Chehirian) and learn your next steps with Paula Warrick, Merit Award Office.
Come learn, win a raffle, and enjoy some desserts!

Breakout Session I

  • Man-in-the-Middle Attacks in the 2020s
    Aidan Ford, Michael Aguirre

  • AI-Generated Cyber Attacks: Testing Compliance Frameworks with Honeypot Analysis
    Gretchen Callahan, Francesca Castagnetti, Jeffrey Mann

  • How AI-Generated Images Clog Media Landscapes and Distort Perceptions of Time
    Chelsea Perry

  • Towards the Critique of Algorithmic Subjectivity
    Devin Bae

  • AI and the Ju’hoansi San: Indigenous Perspectives on Emerging Technology
    Garrett Washington

The Effect of Vacant Properties on Property Values in DC
Evan Bailard

Strategic Approaches to Government Policies and Programs in Tenant Organizing
Rohin Ghosh

How Tourist Economies Cope with Negative Demand Shocks: A Case Study of Consumer Spending in Ocean City, Maryland
Thomas Soodak

Reinvigorating Urban Waterways: Investigating the spatial-temporal distribution of Fatty Acids, Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons and Alkanes in the Anacostia River within Washington, DC
Daniel Punales

Ice-associated production in the northern Bering Sea determined from sea ice biomarkers
Angela Crosatto

Examining Retinal Regeneration via Intracellular and Molecular Pathway Difference from Chemically Damaged Zebrafish Retinas
Nathaniel Fleming

Using CRISPR to test a proposed regulatory region of the Arabidopsis transcription factor ABI4
Aidan Deneen

Beyond Allocation: Civic Engagement and PB Process in Underserved Communities
Melissa Lopez Vasquez

Is the 40hr Work Week Morally Ethical?
Isabella Gourley

The price of gold: transformations within gymnastics culture
Nora Hans

Child Labor in the American Victorian Era
Ashley Miller

European Classical Music in the 18th Century Anglo-American Parlor
Les Whitehead

Miles Morales in the Spider-Verse: Racebending as a Cinematic Practice
Kirah Tianga

Her Congo: Activism Anthology on Violence against Women in Colonial Congo
MacKenzie Burgoyne

Dressing Imperialism: Barbie, Neoliberalism and U.S. Cultural Hegemony in Chile and Colombia
Eva Rey Pinto

Enhanced Neurochemical Detection Using Carbon Fiber Microelectrodes Modified with Metal-Organic Frameworks (MOFs).
Teflah Alshammari

Cerebellar Modulation of Brain Activation during Cognitive Flexibility in Autism: A tDCS-fMRI Study
Joseph Dust,Rebecca Tegiacchi, Marissa Marko Lee, Maneli Paknejad, Adina Schwartz, Honeyeh Younesie

Early cerebellar damage disrupts typical cognitive development in pediatric patients
Rebecca Tegiacchi

The neural basis of Cerebellar Mutism Syndrome in children
Sadie-Anne Dusape

Targeting Latent HIV Reservoirs: Effectiveness of Combination Therapy with HDAC and PARP Inhibitors
Dacia Marquez,Hasset Tibebe

Characterization of STERILE APETALA (SAP) in Arabidopsis thaliana floral development using CRISPR-Cas9 and RNA in-situ hybridization
Grace DiPietro

The Role of Mutations on Gene Expression (Analyzing the Role of Intronic Regulatory Mutations in Agamous (AG) Gene Expression: Investigating CArG Box Disruptions in Arabidopsis Mutants Using Spatial and Quantitative Analysis)
Sierra Wynn

Impacts of Caspase-3 Inhibition on Multiple Myeloma Cell Proliferation
Sydney Gough

Mitochondrial Reactive Oxygen Species and Cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinoma
Raelyn Akdag

Breakout Session II

Effect of HFD-Induced Hyperglycemia on the Visual and Cognitive Systems of Zebrafish (Danio rerio)
Justin Ciocirlan

The Impact of Nesting Diet on Songbird Health: A Natural Experiment During the 2021 Periodical Cicada Emergence
Shayna Friedman

The Strange Anatomy of Midwater Hyperiids: Finding Organismal Differences from microCT Body Ratio Analysis
Anna Clark

Effect of Gefitinib and Lapatinib on Inflammatory Pathways in Cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinoma
Charles Irvine

Evaluating Sustainability Metrics for Maine River Herring Populations in the Penobscot River
Aileen McDonald

Increased EGFR/Her2 pathway activation contributes to skin tumorigenesis in wild-type and Tpl2-/- mice
Stefania Mehedincu

Tawaraya Sōtatsu's "Dragons and Clouds"
Laura Mirabella

Lavinia Fontana and her Boudoir Venus
Jessica Ban

Imitatio Buonarotti and Artistic Emulation in the Sculpture of Pietro Bernini
Lucas Field

Young Love: Gender, Desire, and Growing up in Giulio Romano's Sala di Psiche
Chase Helein

Manet’s Political Allusions: Mademoiselle V… in the Costume of Empress Eugénie
Jessica Papay

Comparing Direct Classification with Pairwise Comparisons Using Generative Large Language Models
Chen Hsu,Yi-Hung Lu

A Comparative Study of Self-Supervised and Pre-Trained Models for Speech Restoration
Biboswan Biswas

Relationship Between Language of LLM Tokens and Dimension, Ricci Curvature
Sam Spivak,Griselda Jesse-Dodoo

AI Image Generation, Circulation, and Value In Hand with Language and Authorship
Mina O’Dell

Xenakis' Free Stochastic Music to MIDI
Jason Gerber

Live Multilayer Perceptron Based Control of Guitar Effects
Simon Ellerbe

Assessing Spatial Dynamics of Vibrio-Symbiodiniaceae Interactions using Fluorescence in situ Hybridization (FISH)
Vivian Burnham

Utilizing a Novel FRET Based Detection System (iHFRET) for the Quantification of HIV-1 Maturation
Grace Hillmer

Instability Analysis of a Simulated Flare Current Sheet
Rebecca Bonness

Elucidating the Role of HeaT-Upregulated Protein 1 (HTUP1) in Halicephalobus mephisto
Tingwen Zhang

A Comparative Analysis of Telehealth Policy: Massachusetts vs. Mississippi
Summia Mahmud

Improving Community Engagement in Public Health
Undergraduate Education: A Landscape Analysis and Strategic Framework
Zarish Sultan

Endometriosis: The Crossroads of Healthcare and Internalized Ableism
Olivia Salamone, Jessica Chacko, Wendy Anderson, Garrett Washington, Caryalyn Jean, Hannah Wingo, Tabby Ford, Amanda Vincent, Sofia Guerra Oropeza, Frenika Mudd, Katheryn Olmos

Patient Pain Perceptions and Informed Consent: Strengthening Patient-Physician Trust in Reproductive Healthcare Settings
Isabella Long

An Analysis of Unethical “World of Ignorance” Through Lived Experiences
Aaron Pottinger

The Impact of Race on American Servicemen in Occupied Japan
Daiki Tsumagari

Desire and Discontent: The Characterization of Black Women from Minstrelsy to Reality Dating Shows
Bethlehem Wolde

Obscuring Indigenous History: The DAR and the Seminole Wars
Callen Wallace

Framing Injustice: The Roots of Japanese American Incarceration in Prejudice, Propaganda, and Public Opinion
Griffin Mentzer

Prometheus’s Uneducated Fire: Mary Shelley’s Criticism of Monstrosity
Amelia Traylor

The Living Dead Girls
Gisela Audrey Gunadi

Interiority Across Mediums: Analyzing and Translating Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun
Seynabou Mbaye

Who's the "Other"? Constructed Identities and Oppression in Twain, Stowe, and Baldwin
Lulwa Al Khalifa

Girlhood Sucks: Joyce Carol Oates' Gothic Bildungsroman
Ava Stern

Dean's Remarks and Keynote Speaker

Join us for remarks by Dean Linda Aldoory and Dr. Laura DeNardis. Lunch will be provided.

Laura DeNardis

Ethical Flashpoints in AI

As artificial intelligence continues to reshape society, critical ethical and policy challenges emerge at the intersection of technology, governance, and democracy. Join Dr. Laura DeNardis, a globally recognized expert in internet governance and cyber policy, as she explores Ethical Flashpoints in AI—the pivotal moments where technology, ethics, and society collide.

In this keynote, Dr. DeNardis addresses how AI is already deeply embedded in core societal systems such as healthcare, cybersecurity, finance, and creative arts. This surge of innovation is simultaneously creating new ethical flashpoints around human wellbeing, privacy, bias, digital deception, and national security. Drawing on her extensive research and leadership in technology policy, she will offer insights into how we can ensure responsible AI development and use while safeguarding the public interest.

This thought-provoking session will be followed by a faculty panel discussion and audience Q&A, providing an opportunity to engage in a dynamic conversation about the future of AI governance and its broader implications.

Laura DeNardis is the Endowed Professor in Technology, Ethics, and Society at Georgetown University, where she also directs the Center for Digital Ethics. An acclaimed scholar of technology and society, Wired UK named her one of “” and her book The Internet in Everything: Freedom and Security in a World with No Off Switch (Yale University Press) was recognized as a Financial Times Top Technology Book of 2020. Among her seven books, The Global War for Internet Governance (Yale University Press), is widely considered the definitive source for understanding power struggles over technical infrastructure. DeNardis is a life Member of the and an affiliated Fellow of the , where she previously served as Executive Director. DeNardis was on the faculty of 鶹ƽ for more than a decade, serving for two years as Interim Dean of the School of Communication and receiving, in 2018, 鶹ƽ's Scholar-Teacher of the Year award. She previously served as the appointed Director of Research for the Global Commission on Internet Governance and an appointed member of the State Department’s Advisory Committee on International Communications and Information Policy. Professor DeNardis holds an AB in Engineering Science from Dartmouth College, an MEng from Cornell University, a PhD in Science and Technology Studies from Virginia Tech, and was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship from Yale Law School.

Poster Presentations

Retribution or Reeducation? Ethical Perspectives on the Actions and Accountability of Former Child Soldiers
Mae O'Neal

Sympathy for the Machine: An Exploration of Sensory Robots
Kennedy Smith

From Screens to Stages: How Live Concerts Revive Gen Z’s Lost Art of Connection
Nicolas Jimenez

Metacommunication, Tone, and Texting: The rapid development of English vocalics in the age of written communication
Haley Vetter

Let’s Get Into Our Places!: Dance and the (Re)Composition of Place in DC
Samantha Short

Buried Histories: Examining Violence, Anti-Blackness, and the Systematic Displacement of Black Afterlives Beneath Georgetown
Katharine Grace McCartha

The Legacy of Historical Memory and its Influence on the Polish Nationalist Movement
Zoe Ackerman

Go on Gossips: The Production of Gossip As a Safety Mechanism in Femme and Queer Communities
Naomi Skiles

“Were You There?”: A Case Study for Identity and Absence within Anti-War Movements
EG Street

Turkish Rooms and the Allure of the Orient: Exploring Orientalism in American Victorian Interior Design
Stella Breen

Sex, Sexuality, Sexual Behavior, and Representation in Primetime Teen Television Shows
Isabel Gittines

Analyzing BELLRINGER interaction in a mutant HDA19 background in Arabidopsis thaliana
Mariam Coulibaly

Synthesis of Fragment Library and NMR Binding Studies of Lecithin Cholesterol Acyltransferase (LCAT) modulators
Christina Anderson

Understanding the long term effect of developmental BPA exposure on zebrafish retinal function via electroretinogram analysis
Claire Selby

Transcript Level Analysis of the Effect of Estradiol Synthesis in the Hippocampus on Distal Brain Structures
Abby St Jean,Ellie Pryor, Clementine Harvey

Development of 3D printed coral skeletons using Calcium Carbonate (CaCO3) and appropriate polymer systems
Lilyann Schied

Neural Visual Replay with Audible Cues: Decoding and Predictions
Kathryn Van Dusen

Effects of sugar overconsumption during adolescence on adult social behavior
Victoria Santos Blanco,Faith Brantley-Cotton

Role of HSF1 in the growth and survival of H. Mephisto
Alexandra Manning,Amaya Rothrock

Task Dependent Eye Movement Strategies in Material Perception
Vatanak Lavan

Interoceptive signals that predict aversive effects can regulate consumption
Shihui Huang,Zaina Chowdhury, Emily R. Marrow, Penelope A. Clark

Building a JC Virus-Specific T Cell Bank for Treatment of PML : Allele Selection for Optimizing Donor - Recipient Compatibility
Andra Mutu

Anacostia River Pollutants Impact Biological Systems in Adult Zebrafish (Danio rerio) Model
Abigail McDonald,Jonathan Barley, Sonora Robles, Eric Gwadz, Annika Von Eschen

The effects of aromatase inhibition and estradiol replacement on the hippocampal transcriptome of the zebra finch (Taeniopygia guttata)
Rebecca Andrade,Yvette Nau

The equiluminant remote controls illusion and ganglion cell contrast
Alexander Gokan

Infant's Perception of Partially Visible Objects
Olivia Lowman

Comparing infant-aligned artificial neural networks’ (ANNs) categorization of objects to actual infant EEG
Matthew Rooney

Models vs. Experimental Structures of the GPR101 Receptor: AI Yields Highly Accurate Results
Lea Stahr

Microplastic distributions in river sediments within the Washington, DC Area
Lauren Gygax,Hayes Johnston, Sydney Moss, Jonathan Craig, Andrea Brothers, Douglas Fox

Tracking and Projecting the Impact of Salmonella on Food Systems: A State-Level Analysis
Matthew Bridges,Mya Symeonides

Effects of a Low Glutamate Diet on Cognitive Function in Veterans with GWI
Taylor-Ann Robinson

The Rat Medial Frontal Cortex: Effects of Localized Inactivations on Perceptual Decision Making
Kevin Chavez Lopez

Control by Food Deprivation Cues Interferes with the Ability to Learn Drug State Cues in Male and Female Sprague-Dawley Rats
Garrett Denney

The role of the rat medial prefrontal cortex in perceptual decision making
Jensen Palmer

Synthesis of Green Flame Retardant Coatings Utilizing Natural Materials
Lea Carrigg

Developing a Single Round Infection Assay for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)
Sophia Gagliardi

Early Neural Markers of Socioeconomic Status Disparities: P400, N290, and Nc Responses in Infant Visual Processing
Jack MacCallum

Rats on Heroin: Do They Prefer One Fix or a Binge?
Claudia Olivero-Gamez,Felipe Rego

Impact of a High Fat/Sugar Diet on Morphine-Stimulus Control: Implications for Dysregulated Drug Intake
Nina Ardabili

Effects of Fluoxetine History on the Ability of Ketamine to Support Drug Discrimination Learning in Male Sprague-Dawley Rats
Rachel Crupi,Nina Sinel

Low Glutamate Diet Improves PTSD and Eating Disorder Outcomes in Veterans with Gulf War Illness
Sidney Murray

Predicting Early Breast Cancer Recurrence with Machine Learning
Dalia Karim,Gracie Abrahams, Gretchen Callahan, Tyler Madison

Impacts of Mental Imagery Vividness on Adolescents’ Eye Movements During an Encoding and Recall Science Learning Task
Sarah Wene

Effects of Elevated Water Temperature on Zebrafish During a Four-Week Exposure to Anacostia and System Waters
Sonora Robles,Abigail McDonald, Annika Von Eschen

Utilizing Mathematical Programs with Equilibrium Constraints to Optimize Wasted Food Waste Reduction Policies through Life Cycle Analysis.
Katherine Lessard

Degeneracies and Emergent Symmetries in the Anyon-Hubbard Model
Grennon Gurney,Benjamin Kanzer, Jasmin Mundi,

Memristors in Action: Simulations, Analysis, and AI-Driven Applications
Thomas Di Marco

Topological properties of the configuration space of N bosons on one-dimensional lattices
Jasmin Mundi, Benjamin Fausto Kanzer, Grennon Gurney

Comparing Interactions in Bose-Hubbard Models using Entanglement
Benjamin Kanzer,Grennon Gurney, Jasmin Mundi

Characterization and Stabilization of an Electro-Optic Etalon
Alexandra Friedman,Madeleine Bartin, Evelyn Bristol, Benjamin Kanzer

Active Galactic Nuclei Host Galaxies in CALIFA and MaNGA
Abby Fisher

Chemical Production Pathways in Halley-Type Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks Imaged by the SMA
Eli Rockenbeck

Investigation of ZnxCd1-xO thermoelectric properties and devices
Luke Miller

Initial State Models for High Energy Nuclear Collisions and the Formation of Quark-Gluon Plasma
Makaena Hewitt

The Role of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in Washington, DC
Leah Itani

Pollution and Labor Supply: Evidence from Bangladesh
Rida Hameed

Intergenerational STEM Playgroups
Angelina Genovesi

Kinship in the Age of Ancestry Testing: How DNA Tests Alter the Experiences of Adoption
Madeline Dooner

Leveraging Large Language Models to Detect and Interpret Antisemitic Terminology in Social Media Content
Eric Baran

Social Mobility Under the Largest US Housing Program: A Quasi-Experiment in Big Data and Epistemic Judgement
Lars Brown-Heidenreich

Assessing Bias in Mortgage Lending and Payment Trends During the COVID-19 Pandemic Using Machine Learning
Erika Atoma

Agriculture and Colonialism in the Anthropocene
Lauren Michaels

Relationships between Curiosity and Eye Movement Indicators of Information Seeking in Adolescents
Cassandra Ivie

Women’s Health in Focus: Addressing Eating Disorders and Their Impact
Alexandra Boord

Intrahousehold dynamics and female labor supply in a developing economy
Hoa Vo

Exploring the Role of Parenting Stress in a Parenting Intervention Targeting Toddler Behavior Problems
Sophia Wick

Perceived needs and benefits of an Adult-Life Specialist for cardiac patients undergoing surgery at the University of Michigan
Lauren Baisley,Emilia Stacy

Comparing Cue Depreciation and Perceptual Interference
Mya Parker

Bargaining Power and the Migration Decision in Mexico
Reva Resstack

The Humanization of Pets: A multispecies perspective on Anthropology
Azarine Ledwidge

Headlines, Fake News, and Believability
Gabriella Weissbart

Brewed Connections: An Ethnographic Study of Coffee Shops
Surya Pillai

Dying Twice: How Disease, Stigma, and Racism Buried a Burial Ground
Kaitlyn Rice

Conceptualizing Communities of Care: A Case Study at BIFMC
Grace Hill

Food Access and Geography in Gentrified D.C.
Brigid Flanders

Diet Quality on Immunological Changes from Adverse Childhood Events
Madison Kneipp

Community of Care: An Ethnography of Legal Aid Service Providers
Leticia Soares

How family and identity forms ideas of success for working-class families in West Virginia
Jessa Holton

For Whom Are Facilitative Interpersonal Skills Important: Moderators of the FIS – Patient-Outcome Relationship
Griffin Kerstetter

Comparing Culturally Sensitive Programs: Mothers Reporting on CCC and Podemos
Adela Camposano,Isabella Diaz, Kacie Jimenez, Althea Bennett

Moral Disengagement in the Legal Profession
Braley Haviland

Farmer's Markets and Access: A Pathway to Equitable Urban Space
Peyton McGowan

Pseudoarchaeology in the Online Space: Authority, Commercialism, and Scientific Distrust on YouTube
Will Kirk

Examining Social Isolation and Loneliness Among Queer Older Adults: A Hierarchical Cluster Analysis
Margaret Hyland

Exploring Perceived Resource Barriers to Undergraduate Pre-Med and Pre-Health Students
Katie Brescia

Flawed Filters: The Bias Problem in AI-Powered Resume Screening
Kyan Patel,Nicholas Olvera, Ryan Powers

Breakout Session III

Designing for Community: Building local communities and facilitating connections through design
Gray Walsh,Isabelle Ritz, Sophie Carter

Drop In- Yours to Shred
Reilly Duggan,Rowan Curley, Meiying Matute

Original App Design
Alesia Simon,Caroline Hirn, Cameron Riley

Echo
Ciara Crouth,Zhenglan Tan

Aurify: An Ai Generated Mood-based Playlist App
Sophie Sommer,Grace Godden, Jocelyn Peller

Colored Seasons: Illustrated Seasonal Change of Mount Fuji and Its Cultural Significance in Hiroshige’s Prints
Hannah Thomasson

Motifs of Textile Production as an Agency Makers in Ovid's Metamorphoses
Brooke Viner

Reimagining the American Landscape: Helen Frankenthaler’s "Nature Abhors a Vacuum" (1973)
Gabriella Alexander

Quiet dignity on display: Laura Wheeler Waring’s portrait of Anna Washington Derry
Amy Abraham

“Gabrielle d’Estrées and One of Her Sisters”: Sex and the Gendered Gaze in French Mannerist Art
Lauren Mattison

Spatiality and Colonialism: Fanon’s notion of geographical configuration
Charles Sajonia

An Ethical Analysis of Wartime Killing; part of the panel - Ethics of Justice and Social Structures
Adrián Mata

(De)Constructions of Identity Through Divinity in 20th-century Abrahamic Literature
Audrey Magill

A Philosophy of Pestilence: Models of Epidemic in Camus’s "The Plague" Posited Against Models of Religion
Maizie Hirsch

Justice in the Justice System: The Unethicality of Retributive Justice and the Need for Prevention-Focused Sentencing
Chloe Raymond

From Plot to Pot: How America Embraced the Chili Pepper in the Late Nineteenth Century
Anika Rao-Mruthyunjaya

Sustainable Small Business
Ellee McBeth

The Opportunities and Shortcomings of the District of Columbia’s Composting Governance and Stewardship
Luke Carignan

GLP-1 Receptor Agonists, gastric malaise and prevention of weight gain in rats
Charlotte Airosus

Cooking and Well-being Through the Lens of PERMA Engagement Framework
Janaylin Carela

Between History and Modernity: Marie Bracquemond's Marguerite (1874)
Madeleine Collart

Phenomenology: Breaking the Binary
Isabella Jacobs

Eros and Thanatos and Vampires: How the vampire became Hollywood’s most emblematic queer monster
Dinah Schone

Female Visual Narrative Authors: Emotional Depth to the Industry
Sydney Kamin

“In Drag, I Am A Healer” Post-colonial Evolutions in Queer Acceptance and the Emergence of an “un-African” Identity
Silia Dimasi

Cultivating a Nation: Woon Young Chun, Western Science, and the Roots of Chinese Modernization
Qi Feng

Agricultural Adaptation and Food Security on the Gold Coast During the Height of the Slave Trade, 1760-1800
Everett Amstutz

Post-Cold War U.S. Imperialism: Limited Sovereignty Despite Self-Determination in The Republic of the Marshall Islands
Benjamin Parker

The Creation of an American Hero for 1824: Material Celebration of Lafayette in Connecticut and the Construction of National Identity
Madeline Borruso

Sacred Subjugation: Examining the Patriarchy’s Use of Religious Language to Justify Violence Against Women- A Case Study in Christianity
Teya Schneider

Investigating Surface Water Contamination from Injection Wells
Andrew Koenig

Exploring Cell-to-Cell Communication Pathway: Quorum Sensing in Coral-Associated Marinobacter spp.
Molly Schechter

Optimizing a DNA Extraction Protocol to Reduce Eukaryotic Host Nucleic Acids Using Symbiodiniaceae Cultures
Lilia Mei Bose

Molecular Dynamics Simulation of Viral Protein U (VPU) Association with the Cellular Membrane
Kedhar Narayan

Merit Awards Panel

Hear from national scholarship recipients (student Elli Anderson and alum Julian Chehirian) and learn your next steps with Paula Warrick, Merit Award Office. Come learn, win a raffle, and enjoy some desserts!

Elli Anderson is a junior neuroscience major. Elli is a 2025 鶹ƽ Goldwater Scholarship nominee and also a 2025 recipient of a Life Sciences Summer Undergraduate Research Program award organized by the University of Minnesota.

Julian Chehirian is a current Ph.D. student in History at Princeton University. Julian is an 鶹ƽ alumnus who received a Fulbright Grant, which led him to become one of the .