Location: Reid Campus Center Young Ballroom
Zoom Meeting Link
Ava Liponis, Moderator
10:45 a.m. ABBY BERGEY, OLIVIA LIPONIS, Attachment Security, Sense of Belonging, and Depressive Symptoms Among Sexual Minority Adults: A Moderated Mediation Model
Our research investigated associations among attachment security, sense of belonging, and depressive symptoms in sexual minority adults (N = 364). We attempted a partial conceptual replication of a 2009 study by McLaren, which found that a high sense of belonging to the Lesbian Community was associated with lower levels of depression for lesbians who felt low sense of belonging to the general community. We tested whether sense of belonging to the LGBQP (lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer, pansexual) Community mediates the relationship between attachment security and depressive symptoms, and whether sense of belonging to the general community moderates the relationship between sense of belonging to the LGBQP Community and depressive symptoms. Our results showed support for our proposed mediation, but not the associated moderation. This research contributes to a better understanding of mental health struggles among sexual minority individuals.
Faculty Sponsor: Pavel Blagov
Research Funding Source: Department of Psychology
11 a.m. DANA WALDEN, Intraracial Disidentification: Strategies of Whiteness in Racial Justice Movements
In this presentation, I provide a new theory of compensatory division, intraracial disidentification, that complicates rhetorical understandings of identification/division and further elucidates the strategic purpose of division within social movements. I argue that disidentification is rhetorically necessary for radical coalitional change; intraracial disidentification provides a needed framework for white involvement in anti-racist activism. Though intraracial disidentification can be used as a tool for coalitional solidarity building, the rhetorical strategy can also be used to reinscribe hegemonic structures of power. To better understand intraracial disidentification as a vital part of racial and class justice movements, I analyze the Young Patriots Organization (YPO), their involvement with the Original Rainbow Coalition, and their articulation of poor, white, Southern identity within interracial and enclaved discursive spaces.
Faculty Sponsor: Ellen Defossez
11:15 a.m. CHLOE YOUNG, The Relationship Between Xinjiang and the Chinese Government
Beginning in the early 2010s, the Chinese government has placed some Uyghurs in re-education camps. Uyghurs are a largely Muslim ethnic group native to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in northwest China. In these camps, Uyghurs are taught Mandarin language skills and patriotic chants that praise President Xi Jinping and the People’s Republic of China. Although tension between the Chinese government and the Uyghurs dates back centuries, my presentation explores the following question: Why has the Chinese government recently constructed re-education camps for Uyghurs? Drawing upon official Chinese government documents and international nongovernmental reports, this presentation reinforces the importance of analyzing conflicting stories with a critical eye.
Faculty Sponsor: Donghui He
11:30 a.m. MERON SEMERE, Historical Practice of Islamic Law in Eritrea
How do religious practices apply in intersections of intra-regional and trans-regional contexts? Eritrea, located in Northeastern Africa, is characterized by diverse religious practices yet surrounded by religiously homogeneous countries. Eritrea’s Muslim societies are heterogeneous as they belong to different ethnic groups, speak a variety of languages, and are socially and politically organized in diverse ways. Eritrea is at the meeting point of several frontiers such as the Arabian Peninsula, Sudanese Nile Valley, and Ethiopian highlands; its location along the Red Sea has brought many influences over several centuries. For my presentation, I will examine the regional distribution of madhab (Islamic school of law) and exemplify the layering of cultures and different Islamic practices that have been adopted. Exploration of Islamic law within a country with diverse religious distributions in both the nation and region of East Africa provides an opportunity to bring the nuances of religious jurisprudence to the forefront.
Faculty Sponsor: Lauren Osborne
11:45 a.m. CLARA EPELMAN, El Ver Lo Que No Está: Collective Trauma in Post-Dictatorship Argentina Photography
We see you between ourselves. We see you in our own reflections. We feel you everywhere. In 1976, Argentina suffered a coup d'état and entered a seven-year era of public disappearances, censorship, silence, and loss. In the wake of this traumatic collective event, variable fictional adaptations of Argentine concentration camps became popularized as a means of granting vision to the millions of Argentinians who were disappeared and murdered during the military dictatorship. Now, how does the medium of photography further complicate praxes of emancipation and resignification emphasized in Argentine film and testimony? This presentation offers a close reading of the works of post-dictatorship photographer Graciela Sacco to engage themes of collective trauma and multigenerational haunting. Specifically, Sacco's unconventional and three-dimensional photography installations function as a deconstructive rebellion art, uniting the viewer and subject of the work alike to the omnipresence and permanence of the specters of modern Argentine society.
Faculty Sponsor: Janis Be
Location: Maxey Hall Auditorium
Zoom Meeting Link
Rohan Press, Moderator
10:45 a.m. ISABELLE BEDICHEK, The Eastern Garter Snake (Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis) as a Bioindicator of Land Use
Reptiles play an important role in ecosystem food webs and can be affected by urbanization and agriculture in many ways: habitat fragmentation, change in prey type, and direct human contact such as relocation, vehicular accidents, and etc. The garter snake, in particular, is a generalist snake species found in most regions of the United States where urban and agricultural land use has increased steadily over the course of the 20th century. Establishing the garter snake as a reptilian bioindicator of land use would be useful for quantifying the effects of humans on ecosystems. In this study, I recorded scale counts, body measurements, and GPS coordinates of 213 eastern garter snake specimens from the Carnegie Natural History Museum that had been collected between 1982 and 1988. My study will help determine whether eastern garter snakes sampled on land occupied by crops, humans, and forests exhibit significant differences in traits.
Faculty Sponsor: Kate Jackson
Research Funding Source: Carnegie Museum of Natural History
11 a.m. PATRICK HWANG, Characterization of Soil Enzyme PnpC1C2 through Site-Directed Mutagenesis
My research focuses on specific soil enzymes that are able to break down pollutants. These enzymes are unique in the types of pollutants they react with, specifically 6-membered rings known as aromatic substances. In this study, I focused on an enzyme called PnpC1C2 and the mechanism by which it metabolizes these pollutants. I edited the gene for this enzyme in order to mutate specific sites on the protein and learn more about gene function. This technique is known as site-directed mutagenesis and involves targeting specific amino acid sites, swapping them for different ones, and then studying the resulting proteins. The two sites in question were both glutamate amino acids which are negatively charged and close in proximity to the active site. Early data implies that the electric charge of the two sites is crucial to mechanistic function. This research could lead to more efficient and cost-effective breakdown of pollutants.
Faculty Sponsor: Tim Machonkin
Research Funding Source: M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust
11:15 a.m. MIA GROFF, Stories of Contaminants Past and Future: The Bioavailability of Toxic Manganese Based on Particle Grain Size and Structure
In the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, both anthropogenic and geogenic contaminants have entered and settled within the river, adjacent terrace, and dam sediment. Studying grain size and elemental abundances in fluvial sediment illuminates the complex geochemical relationships present, including the bioavailability of toxic manganese. The presence of manganese can be traced back to the underlying rock types (lithologies) and regional mining history. Of particular concern is soluble manganese, which can be harmful to humans, especially infants and children, at chronic low levels. It is vital to monitor and study the Shenandoah Valley region for potential contaminants since the Maury River provides water for many communities. I used grain size analysis and X-ray diffraction to assess the interactions between sediment composition, surface area, and water conditions and to identify the minerals present. This research will illuminate possible chemical processes that release toxins and help guide the future of dam removal processes.
Faculty Sponsor: Kirsten Nicolaysen
Research Funding Sources: Department of Geology, Keck Geology Consortium, National Science Foundation
11:30 a.m. RIVER TAYLOR, Prehistoric Representation of Unangan Culture in Relation to Recurring Volcanic Ashes
Human resilience expresses itself as a necessity in cultures that develop proximally to volcanoes, especially for the Unangan (Aleut) people. The volcanic Aleutian Island of Carlisle, Alaska, was home to an Unangan village from ~3800 calibrated years before present (yBP) until contact with Russian expansionists in ~1767 AD. Massive eruptions occurred ~1000 yBP leading to temporary abandonment of the island; carbon-14 dating of cultural sediment layers revealed another possible abandonment between 3600-3200 yBP. Interlayered ashes bounding the upper end of the cultural layers point to unstudied volcanic mechanisms. Studying the microstratigraphy of layers from Carlisle’s prehistoric village that have been exposed by coastal erosion, I characterized the volcanic ashes and identified carbon-rich cultural sediments, evaluating the cause for abandonment. Through backscattered electron imaging and compositional analysis, I compared minerals in a sample taken from the village to assess prehistoric volcanic activity impacting the Carlisle ecosystem and the Unangan culture.
Faculty Sponsor: Kirsten Nicolaysen
11:45 a.m. RENNY ACHESON, Grieving Beyond Only the Human: Exploring the Possibilities for Political Mourning in the Anthropocene
The effects of ecological collapse will precipitate irreversible losses of human and non-human bodies. While human-led political efforts to halt the warming of the earth and mitigate its destructive effects exist, these efforts largely neglect the possibilities of employing human affect and emotional experiences towards addressing the climate crisis. Historically, the deaths of everyday citizens, in events such as the AIDS epidemic, Hurricane Katrina, and 9/11 have led to individual, private experiences of grief and mourning becoming collective and public in the interest of political change. Drawing inspiration from political theorists and the environmental humanities, my presentation explores the possibilities of mobilizing collective grief. Whether anticipatory or present, these experiences have the ability to precipitate networks of care and community engagement in the age of the climate crisis.
Faculty Sponsor: Aaron Bobrow-Strain
Location: Olin Hall Auditorium
Overflow room: Olin 129
Zoom Meeting Link
Marian Sandoval, Moderator
10:45 a.m. JEFF MUTETHIA, Python, Data Visualization and Wall Street
Curious about work in financial technology? Over the course of last summer, I had the opportunity to immerse myself in the world of high tech on Wall Street. As a software engineering intern at Morgan Stanley, I worked on a proof-of-concept that leveraged technology such as Python and AWS Cloud to generate descriptive analytics on data concerning the firm’s research division. This kind of work is imperative to enhancing user experience while reducing waste and increasing productivity in any setting. In my presentation I will walk you through the thought process I used and methodologies I learned, as well as address the potential impact that a software engineering intern at a firm with 70,000+ employees can hope to achieve.
Faculty Sponsor: Janet Davis
Research Funding Source: Morgan Stanley
11 a.m. MAX HORNE, Measuring Reasonances of Guitar Top Plates at Various Stages of Fabrication
The shape, quality, and boundary conditions of an object affect its normal modes of vibration. Here, an apparatus consistent with electronic speckle pattern interferometry (ESPI) measured interference patterns on two potential guitar top plates as they were modified from a solid wooden rectangle into the final top plate shape with a sound hole and bracing. After each modification, the observed interference patterns for each plate were found to be similar at lower frequencies and different at higher frequencies. Experimental data was compared to theoretical data modeled in the simulation software COMSOL to test the accuracy of the input parameters characterizing the wood. We found that model results agreed with the experimental data well at low frequencies, but accuracy of the model decreased when higher frequency modes were considered. In sum, this project informed our understanding of the effects of top plate construction on the sound produced by a finished guitar.
Faculty Sponsor: Kurt Hoffman
Research Funding Source: Department of Physics
11:15 a.m. RAIN NAYLOR, Using Light Polarization in Astronomical Observations
My research takes a two-pronged approach investigating how light polarization (directionality of a light beam) is observed in astronomy. First, working at the University of Chicago, I calibrated polarization angles of Simons Observatory optical detectors for telescopes currently being installed in Atacama, Chile. The detectors are designed to survey the polarization of Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) photons in order to determine progress of early universe structure. Second, I practiced assessing key attributes of different light polarizations. We made measurements of light through samples of common extraterrestrial geological conditions as well as organic liquid concentrations, investigating what types of light would be seen by a telescope based on where the light had traveled. These data are crucial to CMB observations, as the structures through which light travels shape its polarization.
Faculty Sponsor: Frederic Liebrand
Research Funding Source: National Science Foundation
11:30 a.m. GERAINT WEBB, JAMES KLINMAN, Binding Dark Matter
Understanding the matter that makes up our universe is an important task for many physicists and astronomers. While the matter we primarily interact with makes up about 5% of the universe, dark matter makes up about 27% of the universe. However, we are unable to observe dark matter directly. To better understand dark matter, a variety of theories have been proposed that help guide us towards more realistic dark matter candidates. In our research, we explored few-body identical systems of fermions that could potentially model dark matter. To achieve this, we modeled these systems’ semi-relativistic ground state energy values using the Stochastic Variational Method and compared them to the non-relativistic ground state energy values. This allowed us to further refine our dark matter model. We found that the more bodies we add to a system, the less of an effect the semi-relativistic energy has.
Faculty Sponsor: Moira Gresham
Research Funding Source: Faculty-Student Summer Research Award
Location: Reid Campus Center Room G02
Overflow room: Hunter Conservatory Kimball Theatre
Zoom Meeting Link
Moderator: Alissa Berman
10:45 a.m. RACHEL GLASER, Is Rembrandt's Slaughtered Ox a Portrait?
Rembrandt’s Slaughtered Ox, painted in 1655, depicts the headless carcass of a freshly slaughtered ox hung up on beams, possibly inside the butcher’s home, to drain its blood in preparation for the butchering process. Though the Ox is generally regarded as a still-life painting, Rembrandt's use of lighting and perspective strongly recall Dutch portraiture. The ox is, therefore, made rhetorically comparable to a human being, rehearsing its eventual consumption and digestion, or the combining of human and animal bodies. This comparison represents a break in the logic of location, where within the borders of the human body, one is in commune with the animal body. My presentation asks us to consider how Rembrandt’s Ox tangles with the artificially rendered biopolitical caesura between humans and animals.
Faculty Sponsor: Matt Reynolds
11 a.m. REEVE BOYER, Glory's Death and Heroism's Facade in Homer's Iliad and Lucan's Pharsalia
Lucan was a Roman author, once a close friend of the "mad" emperor Nero before joining a plot to kill him. He lived to only 25 years of age and though his poem, the Pharsalia, was left unfinished, it acts as a radical revolution in the epic, attacking the very basis of the genre in the ideas of glory and heroism that make it distinct. Through this presentation, a summation of my honors thesis in Classics, I will explore the poem in relation to Homer’s Iliad and other classical works. Ultimately, Lucan’s poetry is a look into a world where doubt has set in, the Roman vision of Empire has disintegrated, and traditional literature has become a stifling presence for a young poet. I use the poem as a lens to understand his creative process and how Lucan radically re-envisions the genre.
Faculty Sponsor: Kate Shea
11:15 a.m. CALEB SHERMAN, Rhetoric of the Armenian Genocide
In this presentation, I take a critical look at the rhetoric surrounding the Armenian genocide, an event in which the Ottoman Empire and Turkish republic killed over a million Armenians over a 30-year span. As a descendent of survivors of the genocide, in my talk I will intertwine my family’s history with the larger systemic history of the region. My presentation is a response to the Turkish government’s continued denial of the event. I will first establish the historic foundation of the situation with a brief description of the genocide itself, then consider the political lessons to be learned from the Turkish republic’s tactics of state control, and finally dive into examples of Armenians' attempts to understand and cope with the extraordinary violence that has been targeted at them. I hope to challenge the frameworks normally used to view colonialism, knowledge production, and what it means to be a survivor.
Faculty Sponsor: Matthew Bost
11:30 a.m. LAUREN YUMIBE, Reconstructed Memories: The A-Bomb Literature of Seirai Yūichi
Japan is home to several large-scale trauma sites created during the Pacific War, such as the locations of the Battle of Okinawa and the A-bomb detonation. As firsthand survivors age, literary representations of these events are increasingly moving to being created by their children. Interestingly, some second-generation authors write from a point of identification within their parents' memories rather than their own lived experiences. Despite a lack of direct, firsthand experience, the proximity of second-generation authors to survivors and geographic sites of traumatic memories allows their work to have the same precision as that of first-generation writers. Examining Seirai Yūichi as a representative author depicting the Nagasaki A-bomb with his short story Insects, I demonstrate how his work evokes first-generation experiences, and analyze how his background allows him to reconstruct and reinterpret his inherited memories.
Faculty Sponsor: Yuki Shigeto
11:45 a.m. ALICIA EVEN, KAELAN SHAMSELDIN, TAYLOR CHAMBERS, Representation and Belonging in STEM
We investigated whether students’ sense of belonging in STEM fields is influenced by representation of various identities among STEM faculty relative to an individual’s own race and gender. It is also possible that exposure to diverse faculty in STEM influences implicit associations between particular identities and STEM professions. If true, we expect the sense of belonging in women of color (WOC) to be most positively affected by exposure to greater faculty representation, while White men would be less affected. To test this, we recruited participants to view one of four sets of professors that varied in their racial/gender composition. Participants were then asked about their interest and belonging in STEM, and completed an Implicit Association Test to measure cognitive associations between race and STEM fields. We anticipated that WOC participants will report a greater sense of belonging in STEM after seeing STEM faculty that match their race and gender.
Faculty Sponsor: Chanel Meyers