In May, 2020 the Office of Undergraduate Research announced 149 SURF Awards for the Summer Semester. Congratulations to all!

School of Architecture & Urban Planning

  • Maysam Abdeljaber working with Arijit Sen: “Conversations During Times of Social Distancing”
  • Samantha Brusky working with James Wasley: “Reimagining Water: Linking Sustainable Urban Water Systems in the Great Lakes Basin”
  • Isabel Castro working with Alexander Timmer: “Mobile Design Box Retrofit: Addressing Urban Vacancy through Entrepreneurial Infrastructure”
  • Destiny Brady and Benjamin Zerrien working with José Ibarra: “Werewolf: The Architecture of Lunacy, Shapeshifting, and Material Metamorphosis”
  • Roe Darus, Maxwell Hunt, Taylor Lovick and Liam Kolstad working with Mo Zell: “Re-Envisioning Architectural Education for a Post-Pandemic World”
  • Patrick Finucane, Steven Rasmussen and Taylor Romanyk working with Trudy Watt: “Know Thyself”
  • Nicholas Geffers, Steven Hoernemannand Nicole Reinders working with Brian Schermer: “Measuring Discoverability in Buildings Through Visibility Graph Analysis”
  • Corwin Hoefling working with Alexander Timmer: “Architectural Form and Timber Waste Utilization: Phase Two”
  • Courtney Hoffeller working with Mo Zell: “Building Leadership: How to Prepare for a New Economy – Changes in Architecture School”
  • Gabriela Ramos and Tess Richard working with Arijit Sen: “Mobile Design Box Retrofit: Addressing Urban Vacancy through Entrepreneurial Infrastructure”
  • Parris Wright working with José Ibarra: “III Premio Félix Candela: Casa Agave”

Peck School of the Arts

  • Meghan Berger and Peter Green working with Nathaniel Stern: “Untitled Earth Art Project”
  • Elliott Blackburn, Dario Camarena, Pamela Westphal and Sheyenne Wilson working with Jennifer Plevin: “Atlas of Justice-doc|UWM”
  • Candice Booker working with Glenn Williams: “Patina Transfer Series”
  • Lisdon Brannon working with Yevgeniya Kaganovich: “Divergent Fates: Tree Intuiting Chair”
  • Jessica Carpenter working with Christopher Willey: “Exploring the Security within Social VR”
  • Shayla Finley working with Phillip Sink: “Cue the Music! Original Music for Theater”
  • Zoe Glise, Madeline Prokop, Lyndsay Sorg and Alexandra Seager working with Simone Linhares Ferro: “Milwaukee Through Embodied Research”
  • Ava Hager working with Glenn Williams: ” Bottle Tree Project”
  • Hope Glassel working with Nathaniel Stern: “Art and Design Photography”
  • Ashley Hohnstein working with Stephan White: “Open Sound Control (OSC): A Protocol For Networked Devices”
  • Michael Hope working with Jennifer Plevin: “The Atlas of Justice”
  • Aaron Isbell working with Christopher Willey: “Digital Humanity: Analyze and Develop Discourse within Participatory Media”
  • Zachary Just working with Philip Sink: “Cue the Music! Original Music for Theater”
  • Shawna Keating working with Alvaro Rios: “San Patricio Project”
  • Sean Linnihan working with Christopher Willey: “R&D for Immersive User Experience and Content Creation”
  • Paula Lovo working with Portia Cobb: “The Milwaukee Gun Violence Project”
  • Xai Osa working with Amanda Schoofs: “Vox Femina – Artists Respond to #MeToo”
  • Seren Pellett working with Christopher Willey: “Augmented Reality and New Media Production”
  • Casey Phipps working with Nathaniel Stern: “Circuit-Backed Tiles”
  • Mary Widener working with Nathaniel Stern: “Untitled Battery Project”
  • Richard Wilkerson working with Christopher Willey: “Interactive Narratives in Extended Reality”

Lubar School of Business

  • Gabrielle Schwartz working with John Huck: “Quantitative Financial Analysis”
  • Anne Lise Kelassa Sehi working with Veena Brown: “The Future of International Accounting in the United States – Impact on the CPA Exam and the Accounting Curriculum”

College of Engineering & Applied Science

  • Adedamola Adeniyi working with Mahsa Dabagh: “Study of Blood Flow through Human Vasculature”
  • Tyler Betker working with Pradeep Rohatgi: “Self Healing Metal Matrix Composites”
  • Ismael Coello Ramirez working with Benjamin Church: “Microstructure Development of Alumina-Forming Austenitic Alloy Under Inert-Atmosphere Heat Treatments”
  • Anna Daniel Fuentes working with Matthew Petering: “Searching for a Gerrymandering Antidote: Mathematical Models and Heuristic Algorithms for Constructing Fair Political Districts”
  • Anthony De Leo working with Mohammad Rahman: “Human Upper Extremity Kinematics and EMG Signal Analysis in Performing Daily Activity of Living”
  • Alessandra Ebben working with Mahsa Dabagh: “Role of Cancer Cells on Force Transmission in a Multicomponent, Multicell”
  • Samia El-Meanawy working with Pradeep Rohatgi: “Metal Graphene Composites”
  • Miguel Jaimes working with Xiaoli Ma: “Synthesis and Characterization of Nanofiltration Membranes Based on Covalent Organic Framework”
  • Raunak Khaitan working with Mohammad Rahman: “Real-Time Mobility Assistance for the Legally Blind”
  • Joseph Lentz working with Robert Cuzner: “Validation of Common Mode and Differential Mode Models for Frequency Dependent Electromagnetic Emissions Behaviors of the components within Power Electronic Systems with Wide Band Gap Power Semiconductors”
  • Mitchell Murray working with Mohammad Rahman: “Teaching Nonverbal Gesture Communication To Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder Through The Usage Of Modeling With The Nao Robot”
  • Raga Madhuri Podugu working with Jacob Rammer: “Mobile Application for Monitoring Community Mobility in Children with Osteogenesis Imperfecta”
  • John Quinn working with Mahsa Dabagh: ” Developing Computational Models to Study the Cancer Cell Circulation in Microvasculature”
  • Andrew Rohlwing working with Pradeep Rohatgi: “Cast Metal Matrix Composites”
  • Skyler Schwartz working with Robert Cuzner: “Development of Physics-Based Dimensional Analysis and Design Tools for Medium Voltage Interfacing Power Conversion and Distribution Taking into Account Field Forming Isolating and Insulating Materials”
  • Davan Siegfried working with Benjamin Church: “Evaluation of Oxide Performance Under Coking Atmospheres”
  • Hannah Ullberg working with Pradeep Rohatgi: “Synthesis and Characterization of Magnesium Alloy Syntactic Foams”
  • Alina Urbansky working with Yin Wang: “Mineral-Based Material for the Adsorption of Emerging Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances”
  • Nathaniel Valentine working with Matthew Petering: “Searching for a Gerrymandering Antidote: ArcGIS Mapping Methods for Constructing Fair Political Districts”

College of Health Sciences

  • Brooke Follansbee and Megan Vosberg working with Roger O. Smith: “Testing the Validity and Functionality of Community Engagement Event Toolkit in Pilot Communities
  • Sanya Kathuria working with Elizabeth Liedhegner: “Understanding Biochemical Methods of Stress Assessment in Humans: A Literature Review to Guide a Grant Proposal”
  • Kelly McGavock and Megan Sullivan working with Nathan Spaeth: “Development and Implementation of Community Engagement Event Toolkit to Populate the AccessPlace Database”
  • John Poppe working with Brooke Slavens: “Development of Effective Electromyography (EMG) Processing Methods for Manual Wheelchair Users with Spinal Cord Injury”
  • Matthew Sanville working with Bhagwant Sindhu: “Mindfulness and its Effect on Psychological Distress”

School of Freshwater Science

  • Jacob Braun working with Dong Fang Deng: “Reduction of Biofilm Growth in Freshwater Aquaculture System”
  • Louis Chapman working with Marcia Silva: “Optimization of a Novel Filtration Material for Removal of Ammonia from Water”
  • Devin Gagnon working with Ryan Newton: “The Influence of Host Species and Diet on Fish Gut Microbiota”
  • Abraham Gonzalez working with Ryan Newton: “Fecal Pollution Source Tracking in the Veterans Park Lagoon”
  • Kevin Hicks working with Marcia Silva: “Developing and Testing a Sensor for Detection of Phosphate in Water”
  • Ramprasad Karanam working with Marcia Silva; “Non-Invasive Detection of Thin Biofilm in Pipes”
  • Emma Kraco working with Dong Fang Deng: “Determination of Microplastic Plastic Accumulation in Fish Feed and Tissues”
  • Ryan Roekle working with Russell Cuhel: “Chloride as a Conservative Tracer of Riverine Processes”
  • Elizabeth Stein working with Michael Carvan: “Environmental Factors Influencing Fish Neurobehavioral Development”
  • Elizabeth Ulrich working with John Janssen: “Use of Submerged Aquatic Plant Habitats for Attracting Juvenile Fishes In Milwaukee Harbor”
  • Cameron Wizner working with Marcia Silva: “Differentiation of Gram Positive and Gram Negative Bacteria using Digital Inline Holographic Microscopy”

College of Letters & Science

  • Antonio Acevedo working with Valerica Raicu: “Probing Interactions between Membrane Receptors as a Guiding Tool in Drug Design”
  • Abby Ambrose, Christopher Chavez, Cassie Kinney, Grace Mussell, Elizabeth Papandria and Zachary Small working with Jasime Alinder: “Hostile Terrain 94”
  • Andrea Bishop working with Celeste Campos-Castillo: “Privacy Co-Management among Latinx Families”
  • Jack Dalton Brandt working with Tami Williams: “Orphaned Films in the Digital Age: Archiving, Preserving, and Exhibiting Non-Theatrical Works”
  • Brian Calabrese working with Joseph Walzer: “Encyclopedia of Milwaukee: Primary Source Curation and DNC”
  • Lily Chase and Nathaniel Wojcicki working with Woonsup Choi: “Human Impacts on Hydrological Droughts in the United States”
  • Dylan Childs working with Lindsay McHenry: “Water-Rock Interactions in Sediments Below Modern Evaporites”
  • Lauren Clausing working with Gregory Carter: “The History of Star Wars Fans and Racial Perceptions”
  • Daniel Collison working with Ionel Popa: “Measuring the Unfolding of Fluorescently Labeled Proteins Inside Tissue-Like Materials”
  • Kira Dayton working with Peter Dunn: “Is There an Insect Apocalypse? A Continent-Wide Survey of Insect Abundance”
  • Katrina Degenhardt working with Neal O’Reilly: “Native Orchid Restoration Project”
  • Kimberly Dood working with Ionel Popa: “Engineering of a Protein L Variant for Covalent Binding to Antibodies”
  • Sundance Duchow and Katy Gabryelczyk working with Erin Parcell: “The Gun Violence Project: Narratives of Violence in Milwaukee”
  • Marie Enderle working with Bonita Klein-Tasman: “Contributions of Adaptive Functioning and Executive Functioning to Quality of Life Among Young Children with Neurofibromatosis Type 1”
  • Grace Feucht working with James Moyer: “Neurobiological Analyses of Developmental and Learning-Related Changes in Retrosplenial Cortex”
  • Travis Fichenbauer working with Joseph Swiggum: “Analyzing Nulling Pulsars Using Gaussian Mixture Models”
  • Eli Frank working with Rachel Buff: “Mapping Radical Milwaukee”
  • Dylan Hoffman working with Alexander Arnold: “Synthesis of Glucuronides”
  • Iida Junichi working with Yuko Wert: “Prosody of Tokyo Japanese Revisited: “Boundary Fall” in the Sentence-Level Pitch Contour”
  • Erika Johansen working with Jorg Woehl: “Corral Trapping of Charged Microbeads and Nanobeads”
  • Anna Kaminski working with Clark Evans: “A Climatology of Atmospheric Rivers in the Northeast United States”
  • Mohammad Khokhar working with Adam Greenberg: “Correlations between Daily Fluctuations of Attention and Anxiety”
  • Connor Lynch working with Hobart Davies: “Parent-Child Interactions around Feeding”
  • Miranda Massman working with James Moyer: “Neurobiological Analyses of the Role of Calcium Binding Proteins in Neuroprotection”
  • Vladislav Melnikoc working with Rafael Rodriguez Sevilla: “Social Plasticity and Reproductive Isolation in a Vibrational Insect”
  • Elizabeth Merkel working with Mark Dietz: “Magnetic Liquids as Novel Extraction Solvents for the Removal of Toxic Dyestuffs from Wastewater”
  • Natalie Meyers working with Dawn Erb: “The Milwaukee Urban Observatory”
  • Alexander Moxon working with Paul Roebber: “Agent-Based Modeling of Severe Storm Chasers”
  • Ciera Oglesby working with James Moyer: “Analyzing Structure-Function Relationships in the Brain using a Combination of Patch-Clamp Neurophysiological Recordings from Neurons and Subsequent 3D Reconstructions of Those Cells”
  • Elle Paveglio working with Hobart Davies: “Applications of Psychological Safety in the Context of the Medical Team”
  • Abraham Perez working with Lei Wang: “3D Rational Polynomial Far-Field Expansion for Treecode Algorithms”
  • Bronwen Risse-Connolly working with Rachel Buff: “Rent Strike!: A Milwaukee History from the Great Depression through the Present Day”
  • Sparrow Roch working with Joseph Swiggum: “Geodetic Precession of Pulsar B1913+16”
  • Max Rock working with Changshan Wu: “Hydrological Impact of Beavers in the Milwaukee River Watershed”
  • Sophia Salas working with Bonita Klein-Tasman: “Neural Correlates of Attention in Children with Neurofibromatosis Type 1”
  • Audrey Schlais working with Rafael Rodriguez Sevilla: “Problem Solving in Orb-Weaver Spiders”
  • Brandon Selbig working with Jonathan Kahl: “Implementation of a Wind Gust Forecasting System Throughout the United States”
  • Sana Shakir working with Adam Greenberg: “Characterization of Odorants for Use in Measuring Olfactory Attention”
  • Elana Skier working with Aragorn Quinn: “Translating History: Shinsengumi keppuroku”
  • Marina Slawinski working with Ionel Popa: “Shape-Morphing Protein-Based Materials with Self-Healing Properties”
  • Cheyenne Smith working with Peter Dunn: ” Is Food Supply Responsible for the Decline of Tree Swallows?”
  • Natalia Sotelo working with Krista Lisdahl: “Alcohol and Marijuana Use Predicting Hippocampal Volume”
  • Nathaniel Tennies working with Filipe Alberto: “Species Distribution Modeling of the Bull Kelp in the Salish Sea”
  • Taylor Wilcox working with Alexander Arnold: “Evaluation of Imidazodiazepines as Kappa Opioid Receptor Ligands”

College of Nursing

  • Luz Areli Contretas working with Heidi Luft: “Relationships and Resiliency among Youth in the Dominican Republic”
  • Jillian Jorns working with Lucy Mkandawire-Valhmu: “Exploring American Indian Women’s Experiences of Intimate Partner Violence in Rural and Urban Wisconsin”
  • Julio Mijia working with Heidi Luft: “Relationships and Resiliency among Youth in the Dominican Republic”
  • Kim Phan working with Teresa Johnson: “Impact of Obesity, Hypertension, and Diabetes on Pregnancy, Birth, and Infant Outcomes”
  • Megan Waage working with Peninnah Kako: “Symptom Management Among Older Persons Living with HIV and HIV-associated non-AIDS (HANA) Conditions in Rural Kenya: A Pilot Study”

Zilber School of Public Health

  • Nicole Carlson working with Ellen Velie: “Racial and Socioeconomic Disparities in Self-Reported Childhood Body Size”
  • Bree Gonzalez working with Paul Florsheim: “Access to Children’s Mental Health Services: Understanding Parents’ Perspectives and Experiences”
  • Michael McMahon working with Todd Miller: “Development of the Internet of Things Mini Data Buoy for Water Quality Monitoring”
  • Wilson Tarpey working with Todd Miller: “Development of an Improved in situ Fluorometer for Algal Bloom Monitoring”
  • Hannah Zelms working with Paul Florsheim: “Research in Public Health Parenting Support for Disadvantaged Families”

Helen Bader School of Social Welfare

  • Jana Plotkin working with Rebecca Konkel: “The Influence of Eviction Court Outcomes on Quality of Life, Housing, and Employment of Milwaukee’s Eviction Court Clients”