Student News

Edwin Baldelomar, a senior physics major, was awarded the Society for Physics Students' Undergraduate Presentation Award at the American Physical Society's national meeting in April in Anaheim, Calif. Baldelomar's poster was titled: "Pressure Dependence Studies on UTA GEM Based Digital Calorimeter." It described research that UT Arlington's High Energy Physics group is doing into a new detector technology that could be used in a future linear collider project. A linear collider is a large scale accelerator on a straight line and thought to be a successor to the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland which is currently in use.

Nelson Cardenas, a senior physics major, was named a recipient of the Hyer Award by the Texas Section of the American Physics Society. Cardenas and his faculty advisor, Samar Mohanty, were honored at the Fall 2011 joint meeting of the APS and the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) on Oct. 6-8 at Texas A&M University-Commerce for Cardenas' research, titled "Biomechanics and dynamics of red blood cells probed by optical tweezers and digital holographic microscopy".

Crystal Cooper, a Ph.D. student in the Health Psychology and Neuroscience program of the Department of Psychology, won an award for her poster presentation at the 2010 Greater Dallas Human Brain Imaging Retreat. Posters were judged based on quality of research, clarity of presentation, and aesthetics. Cooper's poster was titled "Successful recollection of names involves a network of brain regions including the left hippocampus and left inferior parietal lobe." Cooper received a bachelor's degree in Psychology in 2007 and a master's in Health Psychology and Neuroscience in 2009, both from UT Arlington. Associate professor of psychology Timothy Odegard is her faculty advisor.

Jantiya Isanapong, a student in the lab of assistant professor of biology Jorge Rodrigues, received the 2010-11 Outstanding Doctoral Student Award from UT Arlington's Environmental and Earth Sciences Program.

Graduate student Annas Javed received a travel award to attend the Biophysical Society 55th Annual Meeting in Baltimore on March 5-9.

Chloe Lemelle, an alumna who earned M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Industrial and Organizational Psychology, was named to the executive consulting team with Batrus Hollweg International, a company which helps other businesses identify, train and grow the best talent.

Dayla Morrison, a Ph.D. student in physics under the direction of physics professor Asok Ray, was awarded a 2011 U.S. Department of Energy Innovations in Fuel Cycle Research Award for her paper, "An Ab Initio Study of Bulk Gamma-Uranium and the (100) Surface."

Nisita Obulareddy, a graduate student researcher in Melotto's lab, was selected to make an oral presentation of her research in August 2010 at the National Annual Meeting of the American Phytopathological Society held in Charlotte, N.C. The abstract of her presentation, "Towards understanding coronatinedependent suppression of Arabidopsis innate immunity," was published in the society journal.

Adria Toliver, a graduate student and Ph.D. candidate in psychology, was selected to participate in the I Engage Mentoring (IM) Program this summer. She is working closely with Jessica Sanchez, a psychology undergraduate student, mentoring Sanchez on a research project titled, "Nonverbal Communication in the Workplace." Nicolette Lopez, assistant professor of psychology, is serving as faculty mentor for the project.

Graduate students Ninad Ingle and Shivaranjani Shivalingaiah received Newport-Spectra Physics Research Excellence award at the SPIE Photonics West in San Francisco in January. Postdoctoral fellow Dr. Ling Gu and undergraduate student Nelson Cardenas received an SPIE officer's travel grant and an SPIE travel grant, respectively. Graduate student Mervyn Pinto received a Wells Fargo Scholarship to attend the conference.

Undergraduate students Lindsey Dornberger, biology; Brian Hull, mathematics; and Christopher Mitchell, mathematics, won an award for "Best Undergraduate Student Presentation in Modeling and Differential Equations" at the 91st Annual Meeting of the Texas Section of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA), April 14-16 at the University of Texas at Tyler. The students are members of UT Arlington's Undergraduate Training in Theoretical Ecology Research (UTTER) program. Their project was titled "When Zombies Attack: Quarantine Dynamics in a Small Urban Population".

Jon Adamson, Joseph Adedeji, Kelly Bullock, Uyen Dang, Rebecca Denney, Marcos Duran, Sarah Gauntt, Gabriel Gonzales, Sarah Hussein and Lauren Tedmon, participants in UT Arlington's LSAMP program, presented their research at the LSAMP Research Conference and General Meeting September 16 at UT Arlington.

Ten students of chemistry professor Kevin Schug and one recent Ph.D. graduate presented posters at the 2011 ASMS (American Society for Mass Spectrometry) Conference on Mass Spectrometry and Allied Topics in Denver from June 4-9. The group included undergraduates Caleb Hodge, Jonathon Bobbitt, Lauren Tedmon, Heather Tippens and Aaron Morgan, and graduate students Doug Carlton, Samuel Yang, Jeremy Barnes, Hui Fan, Li Li, along with Schug and 2010 Ph.D. in Chemistry recipient Hien Nguyen. Hodge and Tedmon also participated in a special undergraduate poster competition and Tedmon won first prize for her poster ($300 + certificate) titled "Differentiating Isobaric Steroid Hormone Metabolites Using Multi-Stage Tandem Mass Spectrometry". Her work on this was done in collaboration with UNT Health Science Center and UT Southwestern.

The UT Arlington chapter of Sigma Pi Sigma Physics Honor Society held its Fall 2010 induction ceremony on Nov. 22, 2010. Six undergraduates and two faculty members were honored with induction, bringing membership of UT Arlington's chapter to 233. New inductees include: (students) Robert C. Allen, Edwin J. Baldelomar, Swapnil Baral, Sophia J. Cockrell, Jimmy Corbin, Robert William Lord; (faculty) Dr. Jaehoon Yu, Dr. Ali Koymen. Chapter advisor Ramon Lopez made a presentation on the history and purpose of Sigma Pi Sigma.

College of Science students picked up numerous awards at the Annual Celebration of Excellence by Students (ACES) on March 24. They included:
Ruben U. Tovar, biology, won the Undergraduate Sustainability Award ($200), for his project, "Chemosensory prey preference in Neotropical gastropod-eating snakes (Colubridae: Dipsadinae: Dipsadini)."
Ricardo Avina, biology, won the President's Poster Award ($200) for his project, "Turning up the heat: Elevated temperatures putting stress on the symbioses between coral and algae."
Scott Alford, biology, won the Provost's Poster Award ($100) for his project, "Behavioral modification of body shape in the Texas Horned Lizard (Phrynosoma cornutum) enhances thermoregulatory efficiency."
Maria Guarneri-White, psychology, won the Graduate Dean's Poster Award ($50) for her project, "All You Need is Love?: Victimized Children, Health, and the Role of Social Support."
Ajal Patel, Industrial/Organizational Psychology, won the Provost's Poster Award ($100) for his project, "Improving the Orientation Process for Colleges and Universities."
Samuel Yang, chemistry, won the Provost's Award ($200) for his project, "Continuous Flow - Extractive Desorption Electrospray Ionization - Mass Spectrometry for Charge State Manipulation of Proteins."
Briony Foster, biology, won the Graduate Dean's Award ($100) for her project, "A new defined medium of the axenic culture of a mixotrophic flagellate from the genus Ochromonas."

The College of Science presented awards and scholarships for 2010-11 at an April 19 ceremony. Recipients included:
Biology: Bimal Bhattarai, Connie Deo, Hung Le, Bao Nguyen, Kyle Nguyen, Manish Parihar, Derick Vollmer and Kacy Vu, William L. & Martha Hughes Scholarship; Emily Deese, Allied Health Award; Jonathan Lam, Undergraduate Research Award; Matthew Steffenson, T.E. Kennerly Award; Jeffrey Streicher, Graduate Research Award; Ruben Tovar, Minority Scholarship; Jacobo Velasco, William F. Pyburn Fellowship.
Chemistry & Biochemistry: Joe Aslan, Doug Carlton, Charles K. Baker Character Fellowship; Pinaki Bose, Dennis S. Marynick Scholarship; Catrina Campbell, John T. Murchison Scholarship; Yongjing "Lillian" Chen, Graduate Research Award; Beatriz Garcia-Barboza, R. L. Hoyle Award for Outstanding Junior; Cynthia Griffith, Undergraduate Teaching Award; Victor Ngo, Robert F. Francis, Award for Outstanding Sophomore; Tijani Osumah, John T. Murchison Scholarship; Chris Parikh, Chemistry and Biochemistry Society Outstanding Member Award; Steven Poteet, Undergraduate Research Award; Robert Rayford, CRC Handbook Award for Outstanding Freshman; Andy Seal, Outstanding Chemistry Clinic Tutor Award; Charles Phillip Shelor, Graduate Teaching Award; Duncan Sloan, John T. Murchison Award for Outstanding Senior; Lauren Tedmon, ACS 2010 Undergraduate Award in Analytical Chemistry; Nam Tran, Daniel and Linda Armstrong Award; Michael Wey, American Chemical Society Award for Outstanding Chemistry/Biochemistry Major; Jonathan Yang, Sharon and Donald Jernigan Scholarship.
Earth & Environmental Sciences: Zain Abdi, William J. Bailey, Rebekah Ball, Brandi Lynn Clark, Erika Crespo, Gary Howard, Jim Martin, Katharine J. Miller, Shannel L. Philp, Andrew W. Smart, Michelle Taylor, Mark T. Washuleski, Field Camp Scholarship; Erin Crouch, Mineralogy Award and Field Camp Scholarship; Jantiya Isanapong, Outstanding Doctoral Student; David Matthew Boon, Award for Outstanding Senior; Krystin McAfee, Fort Worth Geologic Society Scholarship.
Mathematics: Jesse Baum, Bernice Livers Sonricker Endowed Scholarship in Mathematics; Kristen Beck, Outstanding Graduate Student; Richard Chandler, Outstanding Math Clinic Tutor; Hyung Wook Chun, Jimmy Corbin, Outstanding Senior; Rim Gouia, Outstanding Graduate Research; Christopher Mitchell, John A. Gardner Scholarship; Vi Nguyen, H.A.D. Dunsworth Scholarship; Jared Painter, Outstanding Graduate Teaching; Steven (Chengzhong) Teng, Stephen R. Bernfeld Memorial Scholarship; Wilber Ventura, R. Kannan Memorial Scholarship; Andrew Whaley, Outstanding Senior and John A. Gardner Scholarship; Daniel Wood, Outstanding Junior.
Physics: Jayant Bhalerao and Robert Lord, R. Jack Marquis Scholarship; Nelson Cardenas, Keith W. Tompkins Scholarship; Haoliang Chen, Ximena Cid and Miguel Gomez Ramirez, Scharff Award Scholarship; Sophia Cockrell, Bonnie Cecil and Jo Thompson Award; Jimmy Corbin, Outstanding Physics Major; Bethany Hiller, James L. Horwitz Scholarship; Yanshi Huang, Outstanding Physics Major; Prasad Joglekar, John D. McNutt Memorial Scholarship; Paul Pryor, Bonnie Cecil and Jo Thompson Award; Sunil Sahi, John D. McNutt Memorial Scholarship.
Psychology: Zafina Ahsan and Tiffany Savage, Distinguished Senior in Psychology; Emily Farris, Distinguished Graduate Teaching Award; Farah Khraishi, Outstanding Senior in Psychology; Athula Pudhiyidath, James Kopp Memorial Award; Shannon Bates, James Baerwaldt Memorial Service Award; Rowena Theodore, Andy Baum Memorial Award; Megan Uhelski, Verne Cox Outstanding Graduate Research Award.
UTeach Arlington: Tyler Harrison, Outstanding Science Student;
Anne Marie Russell, Outstanding Math Student.