Research Opportunities for Undergraduates
Undergraduate students in the Biomedical Engineering program enjoy a unique opportunity to engage in cutting-edge research with UConn faculty in a laboratory setting. Students may contact individual faculty members directly to learn more about their specific research programs. If mutual interest exists, students are integrated into the research as a lab group member. This lab experience allows students to pursue research within a specific field of interest, gain experience using lab equipment, learn valuable data collection and analysis techniques, and increase networking opportunities.
While all of the BME faculty welcome undergraduate students in their labs, the availability of opportunities is contingent on the number of undergraduates already working in labs and the status of the research projects. Some faculty projects entail funding that permits undergraduate students to be paid, while other projects may not translate into paid undergraduate lab positions. Nonetheless, in many cases faculty whose research funding does not afford paid positions for undergraduates may still welcome undergraduates in the lab, provided research positions are available.
Participating Faculty
Following is a list of BME faculty members offering research opportunities. Students are also encouraged to contact BME faculty members whose names do not appear below to learn whether opportunities exist.
Chen, Thomas T.
Department of Molecular and Cell Biology
Research: (Using fish as experimental model)
- Structure, evolution and regulation of growth hormone and growth factor genes in finfish and shellfish
- Molecular actions of growth hormone and growth factor
- Production of transgenic finfish, shellfish and crustaceans for aquaculture
- Structure and regulation of gonadotropin-releasing hormone gene in finfish
- Molecular toxicology: development of molecular biological markers for assessing stress in fish caused by environmental xenobiotics or other pollutants at sublethal levels
Funding: Possibly
Student Opportunities: Yes
Enderle, John
Biomedical Engineering, Storrs Campus
Research:
- Design Projects to Aid Persons with Disabilities
- Characterizing the neurosensory control of the human visual and auditory system. The ultimate goal of this research is to enhance our understanding of how the brain monitors, integrates and adaptively controls neurosensory information. Since the models developed are driven by subsystems, modeled mathematically and parameterized by experimental data, one can observe phenomenon down to the molecular level as well as the system to observe performance. The insight gained in this research is directly applicable to many facets of clinical applications or sensory tests: e.g., guide future “brain repair” via targeted gene therapy or altered circuitry, assess effects of fatigue, aging, alcohol, drugs, or pathology on motor neuron activity, design control of artificial eye implants, or applications in robotics and virtual reality.
Funding: Yes
Student Opportunities: Yes, during academic year and summer
Escabí, Monty A.
Dept. of Electrical & Computer Engineering, Storrs Campus
Research:
- Neuronal mechanisms underlying sound analysis, detection and recognition
- Topographic organization of receptive field preferences in the inferior colliculus and auditory cortex
- Optical imaging of auditory cortex
- Neuronal mechanisms involved in impaired auditory cortical processing
- Anatomical organization in the inferior colliculus and auditory cortex
- Neuronal modeling and information processing of single neurons
Funding: Yes
Student Opportunities: Yes
Kim, Duck O .
University of Connecticut Health Center
Research:
- Adaptive plasticity of the barn-owl auditory localization system
- A combined physiological and anatomical study of the cochlear nucleus and other auditory structures in the brain stem.
- Development of neurobiologically-based models for various cell types of the cochlear nucleus.
Funding: Deafness Research Foundation
Student Opportunities: 1 Postdoc position, interested in having a student work in his lab starting in summer 2005.
Loew, Leslie M .
University of Connecticut Health Center
Research:
- Studies of the non-linear optical properties of the dyes, including second harmonic generation as an alternative to fluorescence as a probe of membrane potential.
- Elucidating how electrical potentials may vary along neuronal surfaces and the cell physiological consequences of such heterogeneities.
- “Virtual Cell”: Cell models built naturally from experimental images of cell and subcellular structures combined with biochemical and electrophysiological data; a framework for using computer simulation to explore cell biological mechanisms.
Funding: Yes
Student Opportunities: Yes
Mandoiu, Ion
Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Storrs Campus
Research:
- VLSI Computer-Aided Design & Manufacturing
- Ad Hoc Wireless Networks
- Computational Molecular Biology
- Network Design and Routing
- Combinatorial Auction
- Coding and Algorithmic Information Theory
Funding: No
Student Opportunities: Yes (certainly interested in working with students)
Oliver, Douglas L .
University of Connecticut Health Center
Research:
Research interests include neurocytology, morphology, and cellular physiology of CNS sensory systems; biology of hearing and deafness; synaptic organization; parallel information processing in the central nervous system; and ionic currents and channel expression and their role in information processing.
Funding: No
Student Opportunities: Yes, welcomes undergrad students.
Pilbeam, Carol C.
University of Connecticut Health Center
Research:
- Regulation and function of cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2, also called prostaglandin G/H synthase-2 or PGHS-2) in bone.
- Role of COX-2 in the osteoblastic response to mechanical loading. COX-2 may mediate effects of mechanical loading on bone.
Funding: Yes
Student Opportunities: Yes
Wolgemuth, Charles W .
University of Connecticut Health Center
Research:
- Bacterial gliding motility: Developing a theoretical model that utilizes the swelling of a polyelectrolyte gel (slime) to describe gliding in cyanobacteria and A-motility in Myxococcus xanthus . As well, we are interested in understanding the diverse pattern formation that is seen in multicellular groups of Myxococcus Xanthus.
- Supercoiling of filamentous bacteria: Utilizing elasticity and viscous fluid dynamics, we hope to describe how growth leads to the complicated supercoiling that is seen in these filaments.
- Ascaris sperm motility: We hope to show how polymerization and depolymerization of Major Sperm Protein (MSP) can lead to the motility and lamellipod protrusion that is observed in Ascaris sperm.
- Spirochete morphology and motility: We hope to show how morphology and motility is achieved in these bacteria by studying the coupled elasticity of the cell wall with the flagella.
Funding: No, but possibly in the future.
Student Opportunities: Yes
Zhu, Quing
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Storrs Campus
Research:
Includes ultrasonic wave propagation in tissue, acoustic transducer and imaging system design and construction, high resolution ultrasound imaging, near infrared (NIR) diffused light measurement in tissue, NIR instrumentation and imaging and coherent optical tomography.
Funding: No
Student Opportunities: Yes
