CMCI is pleased to contribute to the research efforts at the University of Idaho and provide opportunities for students to gain hands-on field experience. Why is it important? President Chuck Staben recently asked David Pfeiffer, Director of the Office of Undergraduate Research, the same question and shared his answer in the Friday Letter – President…
University of Idaho senior Emmanuel Ijezie is double majoring in molecular biology and biotechnology. He’s also one of many undergraduate students working directly with CMCI-related research. He said he specifically chose to attend U of I because of the opportunity to be directly involved with cutting-edge research projects. Read more of his story here.
The Friday Letter is the university’s weekly update directly from the president. Today several CMCI faculty were mentioned: U of I researchers are trying to answer questions that could help slow the spread of antibiotic drug resistance, develop techniques to produce vaccines more quickly and help with treatment of malaria thanks to three federal grants from…
Nearly 35 researchers and scientists from the University of Idaho (Moscow, Idaho), Brown University (Providence, Rhode Island) and the University of Vermont (Burlington, Vermont) recently gathered for their first in-person “All-Hands Meeting” for the GenoPheno EPSCoR Track-2 award of $6M. The 3-day session hosted by CMCI was full of brainstorming, collaboration and team-building activities.
CMCI funds were used recently to purchase this ROTOR HDA, high-throughput microbial array pinning robot, to facilitate microbial evolution research on campus. Quoted by the manufacturer as the fastest and most powerful colony manipulation robot in the world, this machine is indeed ultra-fast and easy to use. The ROTOR HDA is designed for the picking…
Project Team: Jakob Magolan (PI), Xiong Zhang, Jagdish Patel Depression is a common psychiatric disorder. According to the most prevalent monoamine theory, depression is caused by an imbalance of brain neurotransmitters: serotonin, noradrenaline, and dopamine. All currently available antidepressant drugs act mainly by increasing the concentration of these in the brain. Primary drawbacks of current…
Working Group leader: Bert Baumgaertner Group members: Steve Krone, Craig Miller, Ben Ridenhour, Florian Justwan Originated: Summer 2015 Description: We develop and analyze epidemiological models of infectious disease to understand how social and behavior factors affect disease dynamics. We work with both analytical models (e.g., ODEs) and generative models (e.g., ABMs). We also design surveys…
Working Group leader: Tanya Miura Group members: Craig Miller, Ben Ridenhour, JT Van Leuven, Andres Gonzalez, Alex Wixom Originated: Spring/Summer 2015 Description: The group began working on establishing a model for viral growth in cell culture and designing experiments to parameterize the model. The group split into 4 separate subprojects (in vitro modeling, microarray analysis,…
Project Team: Helen Brown (PI), Christopher Murphy, Chantal Vella, Marco Mesa-Frias, Michelle Wiest This project will aim to develop or adapt an existing model to generate small area estimates in Idaho counties of the factors that place individuals at highest risk for obesity (e.g. sedentary behaviors, food insecurity, sugar-sweetened beverage consumption). Knowledge of the local…
Project Director: Mark McGuire Project Team: Janet Williams, Sarah Brooker, Chris Remien, Ben Ridenhour, JT Van Leuven Myriad microbial communities within and on the human body interact constantly with each other and environmental factors, and although much work has focused on characterizing these various community structures (especially in adults), almost nothing is known about how…