We had three students present at this summer’s Symposium. They all presented on their research related to the BPBI project. Great job everyone!

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This year, six of our amazing undergrads were awarded funding through the Office of Undergraduate Research and presented at the annual symposium. Katie and Brooke gave talks about their work with BPBI. Josh, Brian, and Jason presented posters on their BPBI work and Carter presented a poster about his work with the Bone-on-Chip project. We love seeing the amazing work that they’re doing!

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OML was again well-represented at the summer OUR symposium with five posters!! We had Brian, Carter, Josh, Katie, Nic and all present the projects that they’ve been working on over the summer, and all did a phenomenal job.

(click photo to enlarge)

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Our undergraduates have been very busy. Several of them travelled to Wisconsin for NCUR, presented at the NC State Undergraduate Research Symposium, and presented a talk at our year-end Abrams seminar, all in less than 2 weeks!

At the Undergraduate Research Symposium, we had:

• Kathryn: Characterization of Porous, Mineralized Collagen-Chitosan Scaffolds for use in a Bone-On Chip Platform (working with Sandra)
• Brooke: Effects of Brachial Plexus Birth Injury on Composition of Biceps, Supraspinatus, & Subscapularis Muscles (working with Kyla)
• Rose: Verifying Quality of Joint Reaction Forces Obtained from Musculoskeletal Models for Contact Finite Element Analysis of the Rat Shoulder Following BPBI  (working with Jason)
• Amanda: Characterizing Architecture of a Biomimetic Bone Scaffold (working with Sandra)
• Katie: Gait Impairment in a Rat Model of Brachial Plexus Birth Injury (working with Kyla)
• Steven: Understanding Paw Preference Associated with Brachial Plexus Birth Injury (working with Kyla)

Amanda, Kathryn, Katie, and Brooke also presented their research at the Abrams Scholars Final Presentations.

In addition to the four above, Carter and Deeqa also presented at the Abrams final presentations:

• Carter: Characterization of a 3D biomimetic bone scaffold for in vitro examination of bone microenvironments (working with Sandra)
• Deeqa: Finite Element Analysis of Trabecular Bone Microstructure with Passive Joint Loads Following Brachial Plexus Birth Injury (working with Jason)
  

We’re also very proud to share that Jacque won the Michael Dickey Outstanding Research Mentor Award, which is presented annually at the Spring Undergraduate Research Symposium. This award recognizes an individual who has demonstrated excellence in mentoring and supporting undergraduate researchers. Winners of this award show a commitment to serving as a guide for undergraduate students as they move from directed to more independent work, creating opportunities for them to develop advanced technical and soft skills, encouraging then to share their research publicly, supporting underrepresented students, and offering academic and career advice for their mentees. Jacque was nominated by our lab’s undergrads for everything that she does for them and for the lab.

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We had a whopping 6 undergrads present at the 2022 Summer Undergraduate Research Symposium! Or maybe only five, technically, since Christina is technically part of Kate Saul’s Lab. We’re so proud of all of them.

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We had two undergrads present posters at the Spring OUR (Office of Undergraduate Research) symposium. Kathryn presented her research with Sandra to optimize the Bone-On-Chip device, and Deeqa talked about her Finite Element Modeling work with Jason. Great job ladies!

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Two of our undergraduates presented their work at the Summer Office of Undergraduate Research Symposium.

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Our undergrads have been busy the last 8 months!

• Jennifer, and Josh presented at the Spring OUR Symposium in April. Due to COVID they presented a virtual poster, and did a great job! Jennifer presented on her work with Emily: Location of Brachial Plexus Birth Injury Deferentially Affects Humeral Bone Growth. Josh presented on his collaboration with Jason: Increasing Computational Throughput of Heterogeneous Bone Tissue Models

• Annie Kate presented at the Summer OUR Symposium:

• Four of our undergrads were selected as Abrams Scholars: Annie Kate, Vince, Jennifer, and new lab member Kathryn. Annie Kate and Kathryn will be working with Sandra on her bone-on-a-chip project, Vince will continue his work with Jason, and Jennifer will continue to work with Emily. Abrams Scholars are outstanding BME undergraduate students who are selected to receive a stipend to conduct hands-on laboratory research projects. These projects are conceived and designed by the students with the guidance of a faculty mentor. The Abrams Scholar program honors C. Frank Abrams, Jr., a BME and BAE emeritus faculty member. Dr. Abrams led the development of the first courses in Biomedical Engineering at NC State and was instrumental in the founding of NC State’s BME Department, the creation of the joint UNC-CH/NC State graduate program, and ultimately the launch of the UNC-CH/NC State Joint BME Department. He was the Joint Department’s first senior design instructor as well as the first Director of Graduate Studies.

• Four of our undergrads were awarded OUR grants: Vince and Jennifer for the fall semester and Annie Kate and Deeqa for spring 2021.Vince’s project, Optimizing finite element analysis of cancelous bone through microdamage simulation, will support his project working with Jason. Jennifer will continue her work on the BPBI project: Effects of BPBI on humeral bone metabolism. Deeqa will also work on the BPBI project: Effect of BPBI on muscle-bone crosstalk. Annie Kate will be working with Sandra: Examining bone-vascular interactions post-stroke using a bone-on-chip platform.

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Lab member Sara recently presented an update on her research with Nicholas at the NC State Undergraduate Research Symposium annual conference. Great job Sara!

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Congratulations to Maggie, who was awarded an OUR (Office of Undergraduate Research) grant. This grant contributes $1000 toward supplies for her project. Her proposal title is “The Effect of Brachial Plexus Birth Injury on Muscle Structure and Muscle-Bone Cellular Crosstalk”.

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