Edited from Tech Today:
Two graduate students in the Department of Biological Sciences received poster presentation awards at the Midwest Aquatic Plant Management Society conference Tuesday, 8 March, in Grand Rapids.
Carmen Leguizamon (advised by Casey Huckins) received a second place award. Ryan Van Goethem (advised by Amy Marcarelli) received a third place award. 
Graduate student, Travis Wakeham was recently honored with numerous awards by the Graduate Student Government , including:
Outstanding Teaching Award for his involvement and development of our Anatomy and Physiology laboratories working closely with Dr. John Durocher and Brigitte Morin.
Best oral presentation at the recent Graduate Student Colloquium that includes an award of $300.
Best attended oral presentation at the Colloquium that includes an award of $50.
In addition, his picture was featured on the TV website reporting on the Colloquium.
Travis is a Masters student working in the lab of Dr. John Durocher and conducted much of the research for his presentation in the lab of collaborating colleague Dr. Stephen Elmer in the Department of Kinesiology and Integrative Physiology.
From Tech Today:
Thomas Werner (Bio Sci/LSTI) is the principal investigator on a project that was awarded a $363,359 research and development grand from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services-Nation Institutes of Health. The project is “The Role of Toolkit Gene in Generating Complex Color Pattern in Drosophila.” This is a three-year project.
Dr. Kerfoot was one of many Michigan Technological University faculty and staff to present at the recent Torch Lake Watershed Project Public Meeting
An account of the meeting can be found in the 9 February 2016 blog post from Keweenaw Now
LAKE LINDEN —
What do you know about the Torch Lake Watershed, the Torch Lake Superfund and stamp sand, the Torch Lake Area of Concern, PCBs and fish advisories, ongoing research and remediation of contaminated sites in the area? The Torch Lake Watershed Project public meeting is one way to learn about these issues and to become involved in a community effort to plan the future of this area.
http://keweenawnow.blogspot.com/2016/02/torch-lake-watershed-project-public.html
Xiaoqing Tang (Bio Sci), was one of the authors of the paper, “Essential RNA-Based Technologies and Their Applications in Plant Functional Genomics,” in the Journal Trends in Biotechnology by the Cell publishers. [From Tech Today]
Charles Kerfoot (Bio Sci) with Susan C. Savage was published in “Limnology and Oceanography“.
The article covers experiments done on anti-predation defenses in a group of cladoceran taxa over 20 years, both in the New World and Old (Max Planck Center for Limniology, Ploen, Germany). The article emphasizes the importance of evolution in aquatic food webs, and begins to explain why exotic predators may have disproportionate effects on naive prey species. [From Tech Today]
A PhD position is available with Dr. Amy Marcarelli at Michigan Technological University to join a 5-year, NSF-funded study of the balance between nitrogen fixation and denitrification in streams and rivers across the United States.
Candidates with an M.S. in aquatic ecology or related discipline are preferred.
Interested applicants should contact Dr. Marcarelli (ammarcar@mtu.edu) immediately for full consideration. More information on the Marcarelli lab can be found at http://marcarelli-lab.bio.mtu.edu/.
Christina Lehman, Kinesiology and Physiology: Congratulations to Andrew Chapp for receiving a Predoctoral Fellowship from the American Heart Association. Andrew is a Biological Sciences PhD student working in Dr. Qinghui Chen’s electrophisyiology lab. Andrew will continue to work in Dr. Chen’s lab focusing on a project titled, “Acetate as an Active Metabolite of Ethanol: Neural and Cardiovascular Implications.”
Andrew recently published a portion of his ethanol research in the American Journal of Physiology-Heart and Circulatory Physiology and has given several oral presentations pertaining to the effects of acetate on neuronal excitability. The project Andrew has proposed is expected to have a positive impact on providing insight into the neuronal mechanisms of an alcohol associated hypertension and stroke. Additionally, this proposed study will provide not only a known cellular mechanism for pharmacological intervention of alcohol induced hypertension, but also broader implications to future studies in the alcohol research community related to acetate on learning/memory, motor control, and addiction/depression.
More information on Dr. Chen’s research can be found on his lab page.
The October 15th edition of the Michigan Tech Lode features an interview with Dr. John Durocher. Dr. Durocher discusses some of his research, as well as the research of his graduate student Travis Wakeham, and gives advice to undergraduates who are interested in working in a faculty’s research lab.
Dr. Thomas Werner and Dr. Xiaoqing Tang are featured in two separate articles in the last couple of week in the Michigan Tech Lode.
The article on Dr. Werner’s research titled “Inside Look: Fruit Flies, Color Patterns and Cancer” can be found in the 8 October 2015 issue.
The article on Dr. Tang’s research titled: “Solving the mystery: what connects microRNA and proteins to the pancreas” can be found in the 1 October 2016 issue.