Two UNM Students Recipients of the American Society for Microbiology Undergraduate Research Fellowship

The Amer­i­can Soci­ety for Micro­bi­ol­ogy (ASM) has selected two Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico stu­dents, Jesse Young and Kaitlin Hughes, as 2012 award recip­i­ents of the ASM Under­grad­u­ate Research Fel­low­ship. This fel­low­ship is aimed at highly com­pet­i­tive stu­dents who wish to pur­sue grad­u­ate careers (Ph.D. or M.D./Ph.D.) in micro­bi­ol­ogy. Both stu­dents are men­tored by UNM’s Diana Northup in the Depart­ment of Biol­ogy and are con­duct­ing bat research.

The title of Young’s research project is “Inves­ti­ga­tion of Bat Viromes and Poten­tial Links to White Nose Syndrome.”

“The Amer­i­can Soci­ety for Micro­bi­ol­ogy Under­grad­u­ate Research Fel­low­ship has expanded my abil­ity to inves­ti­gate White Nose Syn­drome (WNS) and pos­si­ble links to other organ­isms that live on bats,” said Young. “This will be my fourth year work­ing with Dr. Northup and Kait (Hughes) and I have greatly enjoyed the expe­ri­ence of cav­ing and work­ing with bat pop­u­la­tions here in New Mex­ico. I am excited by the direc­tion of this project, and I think it will lead to many more dis­cov­er­ies in bats and very much appre­ci­ate the honor of receiv­ing this Fellowship.

The title of Hughes’ research project is “Bat and Hiber­nac­ula Micro­biota: Poten­tial Con­tri­bu­tions to White Nose Syndrome.”

“Being awarded the Amer­i­can Soci­ety for Micro­bi­ol­ogy Under­grad­u­ate Research Fel­low­ship has given me the oppor­tu­nity to con­tinue pur­su­ing my pas­sion for sci­ence, while pro­tect­ing a won­der­ful ani­mal, bats, from a newly emerg­ing dis­ease, White Nose Syn­drome (WNS),” said Hughes. “I’ve been going in caves since I was 13 and doing research on cave life in Dr. Northup’s lab since I was in high school. Work­ing with cave man­agers across the state to increase aware­ness about WNS has been a great priv­i­lege and I feel as if we are mov­ing in the right direc­tion to pro­tect the bats and enjoy the caves. This ASM award is also open­ing new doors for me into the field of infec­tious dis­ease agents.”

Fel­lows have the oppor­tu­nity to con­duct full time sum­mer research at their insti­tu­tion with an ASM men­tor and present their research results at the 113th ASM Gen­eral Meet­ing in Den­ver, Colo. if their abstract is accepted. Each fel­low receives up to a $4,000 stipend, a two-year ASM stu­dent mem­ber­ship, and fund­ing for travel expenses to the ASM Pre­sen­ta­tion Insti­tute and 113th ASM Gen­eral
Meeting.

This year, 122 appli­ca­tions were received and 56 were awarded. Of the 56 awardees, 34 stu­dents were from doctoral/research universities-extensive insti­tu­tions, five stu­dents was from doctoral/research universities—intensive insti­tu­tions, seven stu­dents were from a master’s col­lege and uni­ver­sity insti­tu­tions, eight were from bac­calau­re­ate col­leges, one stu­dent from a com­pre­hen­sive master’s II insti­tu­tion, and one stu­dent from a spe­cial­ized insti­tu­tion Among the 56 awardees, eight addi­tional stu­dents were rec­og­nized as Hon­or­able Mentions.

The Amer­i­can Soci­ety for Micro­bi­ol­ogy (ASM), head­quar­tered in Wash­ing­ton, DC, is the old­est and largest sin­gle bio­log­i­cal mem­ber­ship orga­ni­za­tion, with over 40,000 mem­bers world­wide. Please visit http://www.asm.org/students for more infor­ma­tion on this fellowship.