For academically talented high school juniors and seniors, this summer will provide them a chance to research everything from neural circuits in the brain to human/robot interaction during the 2010 STARS program, hosted by the University of Missouri–St. Louis.
The program is sponsored by Pfizer Inc., LMI Aerospace Inc./D3Technologies and Solae LLC, Saint Louis University, Washington University, and UMSL. It pairs students with research mentors from the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in Creve Coeur, Mo., St. Louis College of Pharmacy, Saint Louis University, Solae LLC, Washington University and UMSL.
For six weeks, biologists, chemists, computer scientists, engineers, medical researchers, psychologists and public health experts from the participating institutions will take on student apprentices in laboratory settings and direct students in research projects.
“Through student and mentor-scientist partnerships, participants apply various problem-solving strategies to independent research projects,” said Ken Mares, director of the STARS program. “Students write technical reports and orally present their results in a seminar format on the last day of the program.”
This year’s program, “Experiencing the Scientific Enterprise,” will be held June 7 through July 16 at UMSL. Besides conducting research and presenting papers, students take part in career workshops, attend lectures by leading scientists from the St. Louis community, and enjoy several social activities.
Participants in the program include 62 students from 28 high schools in the St. Louis metro area. The students and research mentors for the 2010 STARS program are:
STUDENTS
Block Yeshiva High School: Avital Shulman
Chaminade College Prep: William Ewing III, Ryan Hall
Clayton High School: Danielle Baron, Scott Jeffrey, Paul Lisker, Sirui Liu, Leigh Ryffel, Tiange Zhang
Cor Jesu Academy: Elise Viox
Crossroads College Prep: Johanna Lowell
Fort Zumwalt West High School: Saahil Sheth
Francis Howell High School: Radhika Natarajan, Nathaniel Stein
Francis Howell North High School: Taylor Bell, Cathryn Pherigo
John Burroughs School: Colman Jin, Jacob Simpher, Conor Tillinghast, Andrew Zhou
Ladue Horton Watkins High School: Yiran Liu, Beenish Qayum, Melissa Wang
Lafayette High School : Jacqueline Yap
Lindbergh High School: Peter Kempf
Marquette High School: Erum Ahmed, Ravali Gummi, Rohit Gummi, Madhav Narayan
Metro Academic and Classical H.S.: Olivia Newbury
MICDS: Vivek Biswas, Aashish Chalasani, Dabin Choe, Chloe Ferris, Kyle Kong, Sydney Schein
Missouri Academy: Stephen Ryan, Fabrielle Schroeder
O’Fallon Township High School: Ryan Patterson
Parkway Central High School: Shawn Kuo, Emily Wilson
Parkway North High School: Calvin Irwin, Zachary Weinstock, Stephanie Zhang
Parkway South High School: Dushyant Bhatnagar, Vikram Ponnusamy, Hima Veeramachaneni
Parkway West High School: Mrigank Gupta, Bob Song
Rolla High School: Erica Westenberg
St. Louis Priory: Andrew Schwartz
Villa Duchesne: Katharine Foster, Sabrina Fritz
Visitation Academy: Himachandana Atluri, Emily Puleo, Mary Puleo
Wentzville Holt High School: Tia Harper
Westminster Christian Academy: Danielle Cicka, Rebecca Lambert, Paul Wheeler
Whitfield School: Jesse Drapekin, Amit Nanda
MENTORS
University of Missouri-St. Louis
Biology: Xuemin (Sam) Wang, Robert Marquis
Chemistry and biochemistry: Nigam Rath, Keith Stine, James O’Brien, Eike Bauer, Chung Wong
Saint Louis University
Biology: Robert Aldridge, Jack Kennell, Laurie Shornick
Biochemistry/Molecular Biology: Joseph Eissenberg, Mariana Beltcheva, Dorota Skowyra, Sergey Korolev, Wenyan Xiao
Chemistry: Dana Baum, Istvan Kiss, Michael Lewis, Ryan McCulla, Shelley Minteer, Brent Znosko
Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Timothy Eichler, Abuduwasiti Wulamu
Molecular Microbiology and Immunology: Rajeev Aurora
Pediatrics/Biochemistry & Molecular Biology: Robert Fleming
Pharmacological and Physiological Science: Decha Enkvetchakul, Amy Harkins, Wendi Neckameyer
Psychology: Michael Anch
Public Health: Terri Rebmann
Southern Illinois University Edwardsville
Chemistry: Leah O’Brien
Solae, LLC
Research: Der-Chyan Hwang
St. Louis College of Pharmacy
Physiology: Chaya Gopalan
Washington University in Saint Louis
Chemistry: Peter Gaspar, Richard Mabbs
Earth and Planetary Sciences: Jeffrey Catalano, Yun Luo
Energy, Environmental and Chemical Engineering: Grigoriy Yablonsky, Young-Shin Jun
Internal Medicine – Cardiovascular: Phyllis Stein
Internal Medicine – Bone and Mineral Diseases: Steven Mumm, Michael Whyte
Internal Medicine – Oncology: Katherine Weilbaecher
Internal Medicine – Michael Tomasson
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering: Ramesh Agarwal
Otolaryngology: J. Gail Neely
Pediatrics: Amit Mathur, Terrie Inder
Radiology: Vijay Sharma
Social Work: Ross Brownson, Christy Hoehner
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Toni Kutchan, Sona Pandey, Richard Sayre, Xuemin (Sam) Wang, Oliver Yu
For more information contact Ken Mares at 314-516-6155 or maresk@umsl.edu.
