UNL 2018 Improving Early Detection of The Emerald Ash Borer

MEET THE TEAM

Members:

Rachel Van Cott

Rachel is a junior chemical engineering major from Hickman, Nebraska. She hopes to go into the biochemical engineering and pharmaceuticals field. In her free time, she enjoys playing the flute and crocheting.

Nic Kite

Nic will be entering his senior year as a Biochemistry major. He grew up in a small town and enjoys the rural life. Nic plans on attending graduate school and hopes to continue pursuing genetic engineering research after his time with iGEM.

Gabe Astorino

Gabe is a senior majoring in Chemical Engineering. He is from Omaha, NE.

Tyler Barker

Tyler is a Senior Computer Engineering undergraduate who plans to get his masters in Computer Engineering or Computer Science. Tyler hopes to better the computer science field and help the public to better understand how they work.

Shreeya

Shreeya is going to be a sophomore in Computer Engineering. She wishes to complete her masters and become significant in the field of Artificial Intelligence.

Drew Kortus

Drew is a Biological Sciences major entering his junior year. He is from Omaha, NE with hopes of attending medical school after undergrad and some day becoming an anesthesiologist. Drew likes to spend his free time working out and watching shows pertaining to extreme medical injury cases.

Advisors:

Colton Harper

Colton is a junior pursuing a B.S. degree in Computer Science and Mathematics. He plans to attend graduate school and then secure a position in academia. His research interests are in molecular communication, information theory, and synthetic biology. Colton’s favorite onomatopoeia is “Whoup-a chyah”.

Professors:

Wei Niu

Dr. Wei Niu is a Synthetic Biologist and an Assistant Professor in the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Her research focuses on the metabolic engineering principles that are used for biological microbial-synthesis of industrial additive chemicals from sustainable feedstocks, which also entails the development of enzymes and auxiliary proteins that are used to develop pharmaceutical and other energy-applied molecules.

Jiantao Guo

Dr. Guo received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Organic Chemistry from Nankai University with Professor Jin-Pei Cheng, and his Ph.D. degree from Michigan State University with Professor John W. Frost. He pursued postdoctoral studies with Professor Peter G. Schultz at The Scripps Research Institute before joining the University of Nebraska – Lincoln, Department of Chemistry as an Assistant Professor in 2010.

Myra Cohen

Myra Cohen is a Professor in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She is a member of the ESQuaReD software engineering research group. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Auckland, New Zealand and her M.S. from the University of Vermont. She is the recipient of both a National Science Foundation Early CAREER award and an Air Force Office of Scientific Research Young Investigator Award. Her research interests are in software testing of configurable systems, search-based software engineering and applications of software testing techniques to biological systems engineering.

Massimiliano Pierobon

Massimiliano Pierobon is currently an Assistant Professor with the Department of Computer Science & Engineering at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Dr. Pierobon holds also a courtesy appointment at the Department of Biochemistry, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, effective from September 2014. Dr. Pierobon received the Master of Science (B.S.+M.S.) degree in Telecommunication Engineering from the Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy, in 2005.

Instructors:

Jaroslaw A. Pankowski

Jaroslaw is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at UNL’s Chemistry department. He specializes in molecular microbiology and bacterial genetics. His research interests are focused on artificial genetic circuits and application of synthetic biology concepts.

Justin Lawrie

I am from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. I came to Nebraska to play soccer at Concordia University. Currently, I am working towards by PhD in Chemistry at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. My research involves sulfoproteomics and protein engineering.

Howard L. Willett III

Howard is a graduate student under the advisement of Dr. Wei Niu at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln. He received his undergraduate degrees from Appalachian State University in Biology and Chemistry. Howard’s interests include microbiology, molecular biology, and protein engineering.