OARDC Honors Grad Student, Staff Research

WOOSTER, Ohio — The Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center (OARDC) has announced the winners of its annual research poster competition, which took place at the center’s 2014 annual research conference April 24 in Wooster.

OARDC is the research arm of Ohio State University’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences (CFAES).

The competition recognized outstanding posters -- displays detailing research projects -- by OARDC-supported Ph.D. and master’s degree students, postdoctoral researchers, and research assistants and associates.

Ph.D. Students

• First place: Cindy Barrera Martínez, Food, Agricultural and Biological Engineering, “Effect of bio-based fillers on Hevea and guayule natural rubber mechanical properties”; Katrina Cornish, adviser.
• Second place: Patrick Sherwood, Plant Pathology, “Mechanisms of drought-induced susceptibility of Austrian pine to Diplodia pinea”; Pierluigi Bonello, adviser.
• Third place: Neda Ahmadiani, Food Science and Technology, “Anthocyanins contents, profiles and color characteristics of red cabbage extracts from different cultivars and maturity stages”; Monica Giusti, adviser.

M.S. Students

• First place: Kayla Perry, Entomology, “Ash mortality caused by emerald ash borer impacts forest floor invertebrate communities”; Dan Herms, adviser.
• Second place: Carlos Esquivel Palma, Entomology, “Transcriptomic evidence of a dramatic functional transition of the Malpighian tubules after a blood meal in the Asian tiger mosquito Aedes albopictus”; Peter Piermarini, adviser.
• Third place: Xinjie Tong, Food, Agricultural and Biological Engineering, “Development of waterborne polyurethane film from soymeal and crude glycerol”; Yebo Li, adviser.

Postdoctoral Researchers

• First place: Victor Ujor, Animal Sciences, “Exploiting glycerol metabolism for in situ detoxification of furfural during butanol production by Clostridium beijerinckii NCIMB 8052”; Thaddeus C. Ezeji, adviser.
• Second place: Rumana Yasmeen, Human Sciences, “Aldehyde dehydrogenase-1a1 is an oncogene suppressor in B cell populations”; Ouliana Ziouzenkova, adviser.
• Third place: Shirin Mohammad Ali Monadjemi, Food, Agricultural and Biological Engineering, “Comparison of Parthenium argentatum and Hevea brasiliensis rubber: Effect of non-rubber constituents on rubber intrinsic properties”; Katrina Cornish, adviser.

Research Assistants and Associates

• First place: Sarah McNulty, Horticulture and Crop Science, “Effects of planting density on plant survivability, root size and rubber concentration in Buckeye Gold dandelion, Taraxacum kok-saghyz”; Katrina Cornish, adviser.
• Second place: Wenshuang Xie, Plant Pathology, “Magnesium affects rubber biosynthesis in Ficus elastica”; Katrina Cornish, adviser.
• Third place: Nuris Acosta, Entomology, “Impact of agronomic practices on soil invertebrate communities”; Casey Hoy, adviser.

The first-place winners in each category received $500; the second-place winners, $300; the third-place winners, $150.

OARDC’s annual conference, which included speakers from CFAES, Purdue University, and Ohio State’s colleges of Public Health and Arts and Sciences, focused on the theme “From Biology to Business -- The Transformational Power of Big Data.”

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