The University of the Virgin Islands College of Science and Mathematics and the Emerging Caribbean Scientists Programs have announced the winners of the Spring 2010 Research Symposium held on March 27, on the St. Croix campus.
Shellese Cannonier won Best Poster Award for her poster entitled Nuclear Receptors Identified in Migratory Cells of Drosophila Egg Chambers. Cannonier is a junior biology major and MARC Research Trainee. She conducted her research at the University of Maryland Baltimore County in Baltimore, MD this past summer.
Second place was awarded to Sara Danaher for her poster entitled Improved Classification of Segments of E. Coli DNA into Promoter and Non-Promoter Categories. Danaher is a HBCU UP Fellow and graduating Computer Science senior. She conducted her research on UVI's St. Croix campus. Her mentors were Dr. Stuart Ketchum and Dr. Marc Boumedine.
Gabriel Rivera placed third with his poster entitled Waiting for the Tide to Come In: Foraging Activity of Nucella Ostrina. Rivera conducted his research at the University of Washington, Friday Harbor Laboratories in Washington state. He is a MBRS RISE Scholar and a Marine Biology senior. He has been accepted into the UVI Master's of Marine and Environmental Science Program and will start this fall.
These students were among 26 others showcasing 22 research topics. UVI student research is supported by grants from the National Institute of Health's MARC and MBRS RISE Programs, the National Science Foundation's HBCU-UP, SEAGEP, VI EPSCoR programs and the MARC Curriculum Development Grant. General support was also provided by UVI's College of Science and Mathematics and UVI's Math Boosters Club.
To learn more about the students' research, visit the Emerging Caribbean Scientists website at http://ecs.uvi.edu and click on ECS Student Research Symposia.