During the 2020-2021 academic year, UNLV’s Center for Academic Enrichment and Outreach (CAEO) supported 50 undergraduate student researchers from UNLV’s AANAPISI, NSF LSAMP, and TRIO McNair Scholars programs. Despite the uncertainty caused by the coronavirus pandemic, these students remained fully engaged in their research projects. We are very proud of the accomplishments made by our student researchers this past year, and we are extremely grateful to the UNLV faculty who mentored them and campus partners who supported them in their research efforts.
We are also grateful for the support of UNLV’s Office of Undergraduate Research in our combined efforts to provide a venue for CAEO’s participants to present their work as part of the greater UNLV community.
Please take this opportunity to view the students’ poster presentations and leave questions and/or feedback. Your queries and comments will enhance and accelerate the students’ development as scholars. Thank you.
Welcome from CAEO Deputy Executive Director, Dr. Keith Rogers
CAEO hosts multiple federally funded college opportunity programs that aim to assist students who qualify as low-income, first-generation, and/or underrepresented in higher education to be retained and ultimately graduate from UNLV. These programs include TRIO Student Support Services, TRIO McNair Scholars Institute, Title III AANAPISI, and National Science Foundation’s Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation.
This academic year has been unprecedented. The Center was fortunate to fund and support more than 50 undergraduate students to conduct research under the guidance of professors here at UNLV. I want to thank our students for their resiliency in enduring through the pandemic to finish their research projects. I also want to thank our faculty mentors for their work with our students, especially given the difficult circumstances of the pandemic.
This would not be possible without the generous sponsorship from the U.S. Department of Education and National Science Foundation for their financial support of these students and our institution. Please take time to watch students’ poster videos and leave comments and/or feedback. Thank you.
Title III AANAPISI
The Title III Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-Serving Institutions (AANAPISI) program provides grants and related assistance to enable institutions to improve and expand their capacity to serve Asian Americans and Native American Pacific Islanders and low-income individuals. UNLV’s AANAPISI program serves low-income/first-generation Asian Americans, Native American Pacific Islanders, and other low-income individuals to help them persist and graduate from their undergraduate degree programs.
HNSE-L1-4.
Effects of Recycled Asphalt Binder on the Viscosity of Recycled Asphalt Binder and Mixtures
Abdulrahman Alahdal & Moses Karakouzian, Ph.D.
HNSE-P2-2.
Towards Drone Assisted Inventory Management
Akshay Dave & Paul Oh, Ph.D.
AHS-P6-4.
Morphology of Axon Initial Segments under Normal and Pathological Conditions
Betsua Garcia-Trujillo & Rochelle Hines, Ph.D.
HNSE-P5-3.
Examining the Effects of a Blood Glucose Rescue on Learning and Memory Consistent with Alzheimer’s Disease, in Aged Hyperglycemic Mice
Jevons Wang, Andrew Ortiz, Karen Alcazar, & Jefferson W. Kinney, Ph.D.
HNSE-P3-2.
Electrochemical Detection of Environmental Contaminants
Karen Gonzalez, Vivian Flaum, Dustyn Weber, & Cory A. Rusinek, Ph.D.
HNSE-P6-7.
Compressive Strength for Geopolymer Mortar
Kers Ung-Watson & Moses Karakouzian, Ph.D.
HNSE-P1-3.
Literature Review: Review of Recent Developments of Bioremediation Applications to Ocean Oil Spills
Raquel Jackson & Moses Karakouzian, Ph.D.
HNSE-P3-1.
Augmented Reality (AR) on the Physical Environment and Mobile Platforms
Vanessa Nava-Camal & Jorge Fonseca Cacho, Ph.D.
HNSE-P4-3.
Carnivore Use of Tule Springs Fossil Beds National Monument
Willaine Mae Kahano & Sean A. Neiswenter, Ph.D.
HNSE-O1-6.
Qualitative Analysis on Implicit Bias Against Patients of Color in Healthcare
Raisa Kabir, Sayeda Tazim F. Zaida, & Manoj Sharma, Ph.D.
AHS-P7-7.
It’s a Bird! It’s a Plane! No, It’s a Feminist! Analyzing the Representation of Women in Comic Book Media
Angelica McGee & Lynn Cornella, Ph.D.
National Science Foundation (NSF) Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation (LSAMP)
The Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP) is a federal program funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The purpose of LSAMP is to increase the quantity and quality of underrepresented minority students successfully completing Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) baccalaureate degree programs.
HNSE-P4-6.
Systematic Literature Review: Feasibility of Utilizing Cultured Meats in the Food Industry
Abriana Perez & Moses Karakouzian
HNSE-P1-4.
The Potential Health Effects of Bacterial Use in Self-Healing Concrete: A Systematic Literature Review
Brandon Polimeni & Moses Karakouzian, Ph.D.
HNSE-P1-7.
Deep Learning on Field Programmable Gate Array
Datino Dixon, Robert Lonasco, Venkatesan Muthukumar, Ph.D., & Sarah Harris, Ph.D.
HNSE-P4-7.
Determining Organic Content in Soil from the Mojave Desert using Loss-on-Ignition
Edgar Toro, Lindsay Chiquoine, & Scott Abella, Ph.D.
HNSE-P3-4.
An Adiabatic Quantum Neural Network Model
Erick Serrano & Bernard Zygelman, Ph.D.
HNSE-P1-6.
A Review on the Usage of Machine Learning Methods Gait Analysis and Possibility of a Portable Gait Analysis Device
Hassan Adam & Venkatesan Muthukumar, Ph.D.
HNSE-O3-1.
Highly Sensitive Capacitance Measurements of 2D Materials
Justin Alvarez, Kayla Cerminara, & Joshua O. Island, Ph.D.
HNSE-P4-2.
Lead Levels in Rodents Residing on Shooting Ranges
Bijoux Cheun, Maria Martinez, & Sean Neiswenter, Ph.D.
HNSE-P4-1.
The Effects of Male Olfactory Signal in Drosophila Grimshawi
Mayra Camargo, Robin Kee, & Donald Price, Ph.D.
HNSE-P2-8.
The Analysis of VR/AR Cost and Immersion
Yessenia Henriquez & SJ Kim, Ph.D.
TRIO McNair Scholars Institute
The TRIO McNair Scholars Institute at UNLV prepares low-income, first-generation-college, and underrepresented minority undergraduates for admissions to and success in doctoral studies. The program provides a variety of resources and scholarly activities to assist students in building their academic credentials and navigating the graduate school application process.
AHS-P6-2.
Moving beyond Trauma-Informed Approaches to Understanding Social Suffering In and Because of Schools
Alexia Brown & Iesha Jackson, Ph.D.
HNSE-L1-2.
Analysis of High Performance Nanoparticle Based Thin Film Solid Batteries
Anayeli Flores-Garibay & Biswajit Das, Ph.D.
HNSE-P3-6.
Damaging Tobacco Mosaic Virus Using Electrochemistry: A Novel Method to Synthesize High-Quality Vaccines
Angelica Diaz Tremillo, Cory Rusinek, Ph.D., Drake Joseph, Nicholas Pudar, & Michael Pravica, Ph.D.
HNSE-P2-4.
Water Flow Through Hydrogels
Bianca Navarro, Yiwei Gao, & Jeremy Cho, Ph.D.
HNSE-P6-5.
Visual Attention during Observational Learning of Motor Skills: Implications in Rehabilitation after Amputation
Briauna Davis & Szu-Ping Lee, Ph.D.
HNSE-P6-3.
The Experience of Postpartum Depression in African-American Fathers
Darlyn Magana, Lawrence Jackson, Ph.D., & Brandon Eddy, Ph.D.
AHS-P6-1.
Examining the Factor Structure of the Trait Meta-Mood Scale While Accounting for Data Point Censoring
Fitsum Ayele, Orei Odents, & Kimberly Barchard, Ph.D.
HNSE-P4-5.
Regulation of Eye Stem Cells During Regeneration
Iris Nava & Kelly Ai-Sun Tseng, Ph.D.
HNSE-P3-5.
Electrochemical Damage of Biological Matter
Kevin Ayala Pineda, Cory Rusinek, Drake Joseph, Nicholas Pudar, Angelica Diaz Tremillo, & Michael Pravica, Ph.D.
AHS-P6-3.
Resilience in the BIPOC Community: A Systematic Review
Lianelys Cabrera Martinez, Aldo Barrita, M.A., & Gloria Wong-Padoongpatt, Ph.D.
AHS-P7-8.
Teachers’ Experience with Lack of Resources in Classrooms
Susan Florian & Magdalena Martinez, Ph.D.
AHS-P7-3.
Blood on the Brain: A Preliminary Investigation of Endocranial Reactions in the Erie County Poorhouse Cemetery
Silvio Ernesto Mirabal Torres & Jennifer Byrnes, Ph.D.
