chemistry Archives - News and Events

NSF Grant Benefits K’s Tresca, Lab Students

Posted on November 13, 2024November 13, 2024

A National Science Foundation (NSF) grant will help a Kalamazoo College faculty member and his students develop a lab partnership with some of their counterparts at the University of Toronto while performing research with peptoid nanomaterials.

Blakely Tresca, assistant professor of chemistry, has been awarded nearly $250,000 under the NSF’s Launching Early-Career Academic Pathways in the Mathematical and Physical Sciences (LEAPS-MPS). The LEAPS-MPS grant emphasizes helping pre-tenure faculty at institutions that don’t traditionally receive significant amounts of NSF-MPS funding, including predominantly undergraduate institutions, as well as achieving excellence through diversity.

Tresca and his students will create peptoid nanomaterials, which are synthetic molecules that show promise in detecting harmful substances in water or people, for example, or in creating coatings that can impart new properties onto other materials. Their work will dovetail with research at University of Toronto in the lab of Assistant Professor of Chemistry Helen Tran.

“I’ve been working with Dr. Tran on putting an alkyne functional group into peptoids, and then studying how the peptoids can self-assemble into materials,” Tresca said. “And once they self-assemble, we want to know how alkynes react in these materials.”

Tresca explained that his lab’s processes require several repetitive tasks including shaking and rinsing samples five or six times each with 10 to 18 individual steps requiring a total of 18 to 20 hours of work when done by hand. The grant covers the cost of a robot that makes the process faster, easier and safer.

“Dr. Tran’s lab has expertise in doing automated synthesis,” Tresca said. “They have a robot that’s the same as the one we have here now. They also have expertise in characterizing the materials, using instruments like an atomic force microscope or AFM. I’m excited because, if things turn out the way we plan, we will be able to work on some really cool applications to design new ways of sensing, either analytes or toxins.”

The grant also covers funding for Tresca’s students to work in the lab, travel to conferences and visit the University of Toronto over the next two years. He estimates that two K students will assist in his lab during the academic year and five will work during the summer.

Tresca’s grant is one of two NSF awards given to faculty members in K’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry in the past year. The other has allowed Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor of Chemistry Daniela Arias-Rotondo to redesign the lab portion of inorganic chemistry (CHEM 330 at K). It also has helped her and her lab students make compounds that can absorb solar energy and turn it into electricity using manganese, a low-cost, low-toxicity alternative to the materials currently used in solar energy conversion, which tend to be rare, expensive and difficult to mine.

NSF Grant Recipient Blake Tresca in his lab with a student — Assistant Professor of Chemistry Blakely Tresca, a recent NSF grant recipient, works with students in his lab

NSF Grant Recipient Blake Tresca with students — Tresca poses with his lab students in summer 2024.

K Welcomes New Faculty for 2024

Posted on October 1, 2024October 1, 2024

Kalamazoo College is pleased to welcome the following faculty members to campus this fall:

Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Kelsey Aldrich

Aldrich arrives at K from Duquesne University, where she earned a Ph.D. and served as a graduate teaching assistant in biochemistry. Her educational background also includes a Bachelor of Science in chemistry with American Chemical Society (ACS) certification from Grove City College, where she was an undergraduate teaching assistant in organic, analytical and general chemistry.

Aldrich will teach a Shared Passages Seminar course this fall titled Cultured: The History and Science of Fermented Foods. In winter spring terms, she will teach classes in general chemistry and biochemistry. Her professional affiliations include membership in the ACS and the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB).

New Faculty Member Kelsey Aldrich — Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Kelsey Aldrich

Visiting Assistant Professor of English Erika Carbonara

Carbonara recently earned her Ph.D. in English from Wayne State University. She additionally holds a master’s degree from Oakland University and a bachelor’s degree with university honors from Wayne State.

She specializes in early modern literature with an emphasis on gender, sexuality, and kink studies. In her previous teaching positions, she has taught a wide range of courses from introductory composition to literature classes focused on Renaissance literature, children’s literature, and women’s literature. This term she will lead a course on social justice from a literary perspective with a focus on issues, events, movements and historical moments while emphasizing areas of power difference such as race and ethnicity, disabilities, class, gender and sexuality.

New faculty member Erika Carbonara — Visiting Assistant Professor of English Erika Carbonara

Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Rachel Chaiser

Chaiser’s educational background includes a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Colorado Boulder, and a bachelor’s degree with honors in mathematics from the University of Puget Sound.

In Boulder, she served as a part-time graduate instructor in linear algebra for non-math majors and calculus courses, a graduate teaching assistant in precalculus and an advanced undergraduate research mentor. At K this fall, she will teach calculus with lessons in algebra, precalculus and analytic geometry.

New faculty member Rachel Chaiser — Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Rachel Chaiser

Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology Sharon Colvin

Colvin has teaching experience with the University of Pittsburgh School of Education as an instructor, leading students with research methods and applied research; and the University of Maryland First-Year Innovation and Research Experience (FIRE) as an assistant clinical professor. Before getting her PhD., she was a youth services librarian for 10 years. At K, Colvin will teach educational psychology in fall, which applies the principles of psychology to the practice of teaching.

Colvin holds a Ph.D. in learning sciences and policy from the University of Pittsburgh School of Education, Health and Human Development; a master’s degree in library science from the Simmons University Graduate School of Library and Information Science; a master’s degree in mind, brain and education from the Harvard University Graduate School of Education; and a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Wellesley College.

New faculty member Sharon Colvin — Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology Sharon Colvin

Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Caitlin Coplan

Coplan arrives at K from Northwestern University, where they recently earned a Ph.D. in physical chemistry. They also hold a bachelor’s degree with honors in physical and educational chemistry from the University of Utah.

Coplan has prior professional and teaching experience as an instructor as a part of the Arch program for incoming first-year students, and a teaching assistant for general chemistry and nanomaterials courses at Northwestern. They have also served as an interim undergraduate chemistry advisor, College of Science student ambassador, and teaching assistant in general chemistry at the University of Utah. At K, they will teach analytical chemistry this fall.

New faculty member Caitlin Coplan — Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Caitlin Coplan

Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology Mahar Fatima

For the past seven years, Fatima has served the University of Michigan, first as a postdoctoral researcher and then as a research laboratory specialist. Her research interests include studies of the sensory neural circuits under physiological or pathological conditions, the molecular mechanisms required to interpret sensory information, and how relations between neural and non-neuronal systems contribute to chronic pain, chronic itch, and pulmonary disorders. This fall, Fatima will teach neurobiology at K, addressing the structure and function of the nervous system with topics including the cell biology of neurons, electrophysiology, sensory and motor systems, brain development, and nervous system dysfunction.

Fatima earned a Ph.D. from the National Brain Research Centre in India along with master’s and bachelor’s degrees in biochemistry and life sciences respectively from the University of Allahabad.

New faculty member Mahar Fatima — Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology Mahar Fatima

Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion Shelby King

King holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. in religious studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) along with a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Texas State University, San Marcos.

Her teaching areas include the history of religion in America, religion and popular culture, religion and American politics, theories and methods in religion, and theories of genders and sexualities. Her professional memberships include the American Academy of Religion, and the UCSB Center for Cold War Studies and International History.

New faculty member Shelby King — Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion Shelby King

Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Cemile Kurkoglu

Kurkoglu comes to K from Denison University, where she had been a visiting assistant professor, teaching undergraduate mathematics and statistics courses since 2021.

Kurkoglu holds a Ph.D. in mathematics from Indiana University Bloomington, where she served as an associate instructor for algebra, calculus and finite mathematics courses and she assisted for graduate mathematics courses. She also has a master’s degree from Bilkent University and a bachelor’s degree from Hacettepe University. Her graduate-level coursework included abstract and commutative algebra, number and representation theory, and ordinary and partial differential equations, real and complex analysis, and topology.

New faculty member Cemile Kurkoglu — Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Cemile Kurkoglu

Visiting Assistant Professor of History Josh Morris

Morris is arriving at K from Wayne State University, where he has been a visiting assistant professor at Grand Valley State University since 2021. Elsewhere, he has served St. Clair County Community College, the University of Toledo and Wayne State University as an adjunct faculty member; a graduate teaching assistant at Wayne State and Cal State University Pomona; and a lecturer for the Los Angeles Workers’ Center and the University of California, Irvine.

Morris holds a Ph.D. from Wayne State, a master’s degree from CSU Pomona, and a bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Santa Barbara, all in history. His professional memberships include the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, the Historical Materialism Society for Critical Research in Marxism, the Labor and Working-Class Historical Association and the Historians of American Communism.

New faculty member Joshua Morris — Visiting Assistant Professor of History Joshua Morris

Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Sociology Koffi Nomedji

Nomedji holds a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Duke University, a master’s degree in economics from Oklahoma State University, and bachelor’s degrees in sociology and economics from the University of Lomé, Togo, West Africa. At Duke, Nomedji taught courses in introductory cultural anthropology, the digital revolution, the anthropology of money, and development and Africa.

New faculty member Koffi Nomedji — Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Sociology Koffi Nomedji

Visiting Assistant Professor of Computer Science Nick Polanco

While recently earning a Ph.D. in computer science at Michigan State University, Polanco conducted research in automotive cybersecurity specific to autonomous vehicles. He also was a teaching assistant in artificial intelligence, computer organization and architecture, software engineering, computer systems, discrete structures, mobile applications and development, and database systems.

At K, Polanco will teach courses in introductory computing and programming basics for JavaScript and web development this fall.

Visiting Assistant Professor of Computer Science Nick Polanco

Director of African Studies and Assistant Professor of Anthropology Dominique Somda

Somda has arrived at K from the Institute for Humanities in Africa (HUMA) at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, where she was a research fellow. She also has past appointments as traveling faculty with the International Honors Program (IHP) at study abroad and world learning sites in the U.S., Spain, Jordan, India, Nepal, Senegal, South Africa, Brazil, Argentina and Chile; as a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at Reed College and the Department of Anthropology and Center for Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania; as a visiting scholar in anthropology at the London School of Economics; as a postdoctoral fellow at the Université Paris Nanterre in France; and as a teaching and research fellow at the University of Paris Nanterre.

Somda has a Ph.D. and two master’s degrees in ethnology and comparative sociology from the University of Paris Nanterre, and a master’s and bachelor’s in philosophy from the University Clermont Auvergne.

Somda will lead a course this fall at K titled On Being Human in Africa. The course will examine the experiences of Africans through racialized and gendered existences, their affective relations, their ways of relating to and caring for each other and the land; and explore what it means to think and write about Africa with representations and discourses including fiction, academic writing and social media.

Director of African Studies and Assistant Professor of Anthropology Dominique Somda

Assistant Professor of Biology Clara Stuligross

Stuligross was a postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, Riverside prior to K. She holds Ph.D. in ecology from the University of California, Davis, and a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies from Earlham College.

Stuligross studies the impacts of environmental stressors on native bee ecology and recently received a federal grant to study the effects of climate change on bees. She also has professional experience as a museum educator at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, where she taught science outreach programs and developed hands-on climate change education lessons. At K this fall, she will teach Biology Explorations.

Assistant Professor of Biology Clara Stuligross

Visiting Instructor of Chinese Ruyuan Yang

Yang has a master’s degree in teaching Chinese to non-native speakers from the Beijing Language and Culture University, and a bachelor’s degree in teaching Chinese as a second language from Yunnan Normal University in Kunming, China.

Yang previously has taught college-level courses in beginning, intermediate and advanced Chinese at K; basic and intermediate Chinese, and Chinese dance and culture at Western Michigan University; and integrated Chinese and Chinese listening and speaking courses at Beijing Language and Culture University. Yang’s courses this fall include beginning and intermediate Chinese.

Visiting Instructor of Chinese Ruyuan Yang

Six Faculty Earn Endowed Chair Honors

Posted on September 27, 2024October 2, 2024

Kalamazoo College has appointed six faculty members as endowed chairs, recognizing their achievements as professors. Endowed chairs are positions funded through the annual earnings from an endowed gift or gifts to the College. The honor reflects the value donors attribute to the excellent teaching and mentorship that occurs at K and how much donors want to see that excellence continue.

The honorees are:

Espelencia Baptiste, the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership Senior Faculty Chair
Anne Marie Butler, the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership Junior Faculty Chair
E. Binney Girdler, the Dow Distinguished Professor in Natural Sciences
Sohini Pillai, the Marlene Crandell Francis Endowed Chair in the Humanities
Dwight Williams, the Kurt D. Kaufman Endowed Chair
Daniela Arias-Rotondo, the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science

Espelencia Baptiste, Anthropology-Sociology

Baptiste is currently on sabbatical in Benin where she is working on a book project focused on different ways Africans and Haitians claim each other across time and space. Her research focus centers on the relationship between Africa and its diasporas. She has been active and engaged within the College since her arrival; most recently, she received the College’s Outstanding Advisor Award in 2023 and served as Posse mentor from 2019-2022.

Her courses include Lest We Forget: Memory and Identity in the African Diaspora, You Are What You Eat: Food and Identity In a Global Perspective, Communities and Schools, and Missionaries to Pilgrims: Diasporic Returns to Africa. Within her teaching, she is invested in challenging students to imagine the production of power, particularly as it relates to belonging, as a continuous phenomenon.

Baptiste has a bachelor’s degree from Colgate University, and a master’s degree and Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University.

Endowed Chair Espelencia Baptiste receives a plaque from Kalamazoo College President Jorge G. Gonzalez — Espelencia Baptiste, the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership senior chair, received the College’s Outstanding Advisor Award in 2023 as presented by President Jorge G. Gonzalez

Anne Marie Butler, Art and Art History; Women, Gender and Sexuality (WGS)

Butler has a joint appointment in Art History and Women, Gender, and Sexuality. Her research focuses on contemporary Tunisian art within frameworks of global contemporary art, contemporary global surrealism studies, Southwest Asia North Africa studies, gender and sexuality studies, and queer theory. At K, she teaches at the intersection of visual culture and gender studies, instructing courses such as Art, Power and Society; Queer Aesthetics; Performance Art; and core WGS classes, and this is her fourth season as volunteer assistant coach for the swimming and diving team at K.

Butler is co-editor for the volume Queer Contemporary Art of Southwest Asia and North Africa, which will be available in October (Intellect Press). She has been published in ASAP/Journal, Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies, Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies, and The London Review of Education. She is also an editor for the volume Surrealism and Ecology, expected in 2026.

Butler has a bachelor’s degree from Scripps College, a master’s degree from New York University and a Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Portrait of Endowed Chair Anne Marie Butler — Anne Marie Butler is the the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership junior chair.

E. Binney Girdler, Biology

Girdler is the director of K’s environmental studies program and a biology department faculty member. She focuses on plant ecology and conservation biology with her research involving studies of the structure and dynamics of terrestrial plant communities.

Girdler previously had an endowed chair as the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science. She develops relationships with area natural-resource agencies and non-profit conservation groups to match her expertise with their research needs and the access needs of students. In 2022, she and K Associate Professor of Biology Santiago Salinas contributed to a global research project that proves humans are affecting evolution through urbanization and climate change. The study served as a cover story for the journal Science.

Girdler commonly teaches courses titled Environmental Science, Ecology and Conservation, and Population and Community Ecology along with an environmental studies senior seminar. She earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Virginia, a master’s degree from Yale University and a Ph.D. from Princeton University.

Dow Distinguished Professor in Natural Sciences E. Binney Girdler at Batts Pavilion.

Sohini Pillai, Religion

Pillai is the director of film and media studies at K and a faculty member in the religion department. She is a comparatist of South Asian religious literature, and her area of specialization is the Mahabharata and Ramayana epic traditions.

Pillai is the author of Krishna’s Mahabharatas: Devotional Retellings of an Epic Narrative (Oxford University Press, 2024), a comprehensive study of premodern retellings of the Mahabharata epic in regional South Asian languages. She is also the co-editor of Many Mahabharatas (State University of New York Press, 2021) with Nell Shapiro Hawley and the co-author of Women in Hindu Traditions (New York University Press, under contract) with Emilia Bachrach and Jennifer Ortegren. Her courses have included Religion in South Asia; Hindu Traditions; Islam in South Asia; Dance, Drama, and Devotion in South Asia; Religion, Bollywood, and Beyond; Jedi, Sith, and Mandalorians: Religion and Star Wars; and Princesses, Demonesses, and Warriors: The Women of the South Asian Epics.

Pillai has a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley; a master’s degree from Columbia University; and a bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College.

Sohini Pillai standing in her office with some Star Wars memorabilia — Marlene Crandell Francis Endowed Chair in the Humanities Sohini Pillai displays some of her personal Star Wars memorabilia including a painting of Grogu gifted to her by a student.

Dwight Williams, Chemistry and Biochemistry

Williams previously was an endowed chair at K, having served as the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor of Chemistry from 2018–2020. He teaches courses including Organic Chemistry I and II, Advanced Organic Chemistry and Introductory Chemistry. His research interests include synthetic organic chemistry, medicinal chemistry and pharmacology.

Williams spent a year as a lecturer at Longwood University before becoming an assistant professor at Lynchburg College. At Lynchburg, he found a passion for the synthesis and structural characterization of natural products as potential neuroprotectants.

Williams learned more about those subjects after accepting a National Institutes of Health postdoctoral research fellowship at the Virginia Commonwealth University Medical College of Virginia Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology. During that fellowship, he worked in medicinal chemistry and pharmacology, where his work was published in six peer-reviewed journals.

In 2019, Williams was awarded a Fellowship for Excellence in Teaching grant from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation and Course Hero. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Coastal Carolina University and a Ph.D. from Virginia Commonwealth.

Kurt D. Kaufman Endowed Chair Dwight Williams holding a molecular model in his office.

Daniela Arias-Rotondo, Chemistry and Biochemistry

Arias-Rotondo earned a grant valued at $250,000 last year from the National Science Foundation through its Early-Career Academic Pathways in the Mathematical and Physical Sciences (LEAPS-MPS). The LEAPS-MPS grant emphasizes helping pre-tenure faculty at institutions that do not traditionally receive significant amounts of NSF-MPS funding, including predominantly undergraduate institutions, as well as achieving excellence through diversity. She uses the funding primarily to pay her student researchers, typically eight to 10 per term, and bring more research experiences into the classroom.

This year, Arias-Rotondo earned an American Chemical Society (ACS) Petroleum Research Fund grant, which will provide $50,000 to her work while backing her lab’s upcoming research regarding petroleum byproducts. Her lab traditionally develops molecules that absorb energy from light while transforming that energy into electricity. The grant will allow her and her students to take molecules they have designed to act as catalysts and unlock chemical transformations through a process called photoredox catalysis. In this case, those transformations involve petroleum byproducts and how they might be used.

Arias-Rotondo teaches Introductory Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry, and Molecular Structure and Reactivity, and commonly takes students to ACS conferences. She holds a bachelor’s degree from the Universidad de Buenos Aires in Argentina and a Ph.D. from Michigan State University.

Portrait of Endowed Chair Daniela Arias-Rotondo — Daniela Arias-Rotondo has been named the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science.

Grant Seeds Petroleum Byproduct Research at K

Posted on August 30, 2024September 3, 2024

A new grant awarded to a faculty member in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry will provide seed money for new research and support Kalamazoo College students performing lab work over the next two years.

Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor of Chemistry Daniela Arias-Rotondo, affectionately known to her students as Dr. DAR, has earned an American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund award. The honor bestows $50,000 to her work while backing her lab’s upcoming research regarding petroleum byproducts.

Arias-Rotondo’s lab traditionally develops molecules that absorb energy from light while transforming that energy into electricity. The grant will allow her and her students to take molecules they have designed to act as catalysts and unlock chemical transformations through a process called photoredox catalysis. In this case, those transformations involve petroleum byproducts and how they might be used.

“When you extract petroleum, you get crude oil, and crude oil gets refined to make things like diesel fuel and the gasoline that you put in your car,” Arias-Rotondo said. “The petroleum byproducts that come with it are compounds that we cannot use in our cars or to generate electricity. But if we can turn those molecules into plastics, pesticides or medicines, for example, we would add value to the byproducts. It’s a highly desirable research avenue because we can potentially turn this waste into something we can use.”

Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor of Chemistry Daniela Arias-Rotondo, pictured with her lab students this summer, has earned an American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund award. The honor bestows $50,000 to her work while backing her lab’s upcoming research regarding petroleum byproducts for the next two years.

The grant requires that at least 40% of the funds be used to support students. Some students currently working in Arias-Rotondo’s lab note how grateful they are, not only to work alongside her, but to be paid for their efforts thanks to similar grants. Will Tocco ’26, for example, said that being able to do summer lab work prepares him for classes and labs during the academic year and can set him apart on grad school applications when institutions look for research experience.

“The grants that Dr. DAR has received in the past have made it possible to be here this summer,” Tocco said. “They paid for me to attend the national American Chemical Society Conference this last spring and present a poster there. They have sponsored my research and all of the expenses that go along with that. They’re the reason why I’m able to be do this work.”

Unayza Anika ’26 added that the lab work reflects the kind of experience students can expect at K.

“It’s obviously rigorous, and it’s teaching me so much more than what I would have learned in classrooms,” Anika said. “It also involves a lot more personal attention that I can get from a faculty member who has a Ph.D. I’ve personally grown a lot.”

“What I really appreciate about this grant is how much of a focus there is on supporting students,” Arias-Rotondo said. “It’s going to help us give students the chance to be in the lab and not have to decide between that and affording something else. The grant helps them do exciting research, and they will learn a lot that’s not just about chemistry. It will also teach them how to conduct themselves in a lab, how to manage their time and how to think like scientists. That’s going to be super important for the future.”

Grant Supports Inclusivity, New Chemistry Lab Experiences

Posted on December 6, 2023December 12, 2023

A National Science Foundation grant for almost $250,000 is boosting inclusivity and access to lab experiences in the Kalamazoo College Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

Assistant Professor of Chemistry Daniela Arias-Rotondo, known around campus as Dr. DAR, was awarded $249,972 under the foundation’s Launching Early-Career Academic Pathways in the Mathematical and Physical Sciences (LEAPS-MPS). The LEAPS-MPS grant emphasizes helping pre-tenure faculty at institutions that do not traditionally receive significant amounts of NSF-MPS funding, including predominantly undergraduate institutions, as well as achieving excellence through diversity.

Arias-Rotondo will use the grant funding primarily to pay her student researchers—typically eight to 10 per term, known as DARlings—and to bring more research experiences into the classroom.

While the chemistry and biochemistry department is typically not able to pay students to work in the lab during the school year, “This grant lets me do that, so my students can work in the lab instead of having to take another job on or off campus,” Arias-Rotondo said. “That’s a great way to ensure that more people can have access to this experience, as opposed to only the people who have free time they can volunteer.”

The grant will also pay students who work in the lab over the summer (usually four or five), freeing up departmental and College funding that would normally pay those stipends.

“Not having to pay those four or five students through the provost’s office or the chemistry and biochemistry department means we will have money for other students to do research with us here in our department, or maybe in biology or physics, so that benefits not just my group, but the department and the College as a whole.”

The other primary focus of the grant is a re-design of the lab portion of the inorganic chemistry course CHEM 330.

“While we have some good lab courses here in our department where students get to learn a lot of techniques and a lot of concepts, many of those lab experiences are what we call canned experiments, meaning that they are not open ended,” Arias-Rotondo said. “You are making X compound, or you’re running Y experiment, and we know what you’re going to get in the end. We have some courses where we do more open-ended labs, which the students tend to enjoy more because there’s more of the unknown and problem solving. It’s very transformative because it shows you a different side of chemistry.”

Inspired by the work of colleagues in the department, particularly Dorothy H. Heyl Professor of Chemistry Regina Stevens-Truss, Arias-Rotondo has been able to use the grant to revamp the lab for CHEM 330, inorganic chemistry, to more closely resemble research.

“That’s really good for the students,” Arias-Rotondo said. “It’s more work, but it’s also more rewarding, because now they are doing things that are new, and they are making molecules that no one made before.”

Providing access to lab experiences for more students at K truly changes lives.

“It gives them the opportunity to see what research is really like,” Arias-Rotondo said. “It also gives them a challenge that is theirs. I’ve seen students who were very unsure of what to do—not because they are not good, but because they’ve never had the opportunity to prove themselves—and you give them this task. You support them, you tell them, ‘This is hard, but I trust that you can do it,’ and they rise to the challenge. It’s amazing to see the transformation in them. They learn a lot about chemistry. They learn a lot of techniques. They get a better idea of what a career in research could look like. And they learn a lot about themselves, about asking for help and working independently, but also working as part of a team, about troubleshooting, and they gain a lot of confidence.”

Working in a lab also increases students’ sense of belonging.

“They make friends,” Arias-Rotondo said. “They meet people within our department, further ahead or behind, depending on who they are. They meet more professors and students, and they feel more a part of the department, even before they declare their major. They’re like, ‘Oh, this is my place. These are my people.’ And it helps them see themselves as scientists.”

In addition to paying student researchers and improving lab coursework experiences, the grant is paying for supplies in Arias-Rotondo’s lab, where she and her DARlings work on making compounds that can absorb solar energy and turn it into electricity using manganese, a low-cost, low-toxicity alternative to the materials currently used in solar energy conversion, which tend to be rare, expensive and difficult to mine.

The grant will also provide a summer salary for Arias-Rotondo’s research, help fund travel for students to attend conferences and share their results, and potentially purchase or update small instruments for the lab.

Arias-Rotondo applied for the LEAPS-MPS grant in January 2023, with the help of Director of Grants, Fellowships and Research Jessica Fowle and colleagues in the chemistry department.

“Jess is amazing; I don’t think I could have done this without her,” Arias-Rotondo said. “I also had a lot of support from my department with writing, reading drafts, giving feedback.”

In August, she learned she had been awarded the grant, and it started Sept. 1. Arias-Rotondo has two years to spend the money, with an option to extend it to a third year if needed.

“It’s just under a quarter million,” Arias-Rotondo said. “Sometimes I can’t believe that anyone would trust me with that. I say this because a lot of times, I look around and think, ‘Who thought that I could do this?’ It’s a dream come true, and this grant is amazing, but it’s also like, ‘Wow, someone thought that I could do it.’

“A lot of times students don’t trust themselves. Imposter syndrome is a real thing, and students look at me and think, ‘Oh, she’s got it. Professors know what they’re doing.’ It’s important to me to let people know that’s not true. It’s not like one day your feelings of inadequacy just lift off, and now you feel so confident that everything is great. You keep having doubts. I care about letting them know that, so if they get to grad school, or they get their Ph.D., or whenever, and they still feel like they are faking it, they still feel like they are not good enough, they know that doesn’t mean that they are not good enough. That’s just the way our brains work. You can be great and still feel like you’re not. I keep talking about that because it’s important to normalize it.”

Experiences like those afforded by the LEAPS-MPS grant go a long way toward building students’ confidence in themselves.

“I’m really excited for all the things that this grant is doing for students,” Arias-Rotondo said. “It gives them a lot of opportunities. You can see how excited they are when they present posters, or when they talk about research with their friends, not just learning chemistry, but also self-confidence that they can do hard things. You can see the progression. It doesn’t matter how good they were when they started. At the end of it, they are so much tighter with each other, they have learned so much, and they are so much better.”

Two students work with chemistry professor supporting their lab experiences — A grant from the National Science Foundation will help Assistant Professor of Chemistry Daniela Arias-Rotondo pay students who work in her research lab, such as Maxwell Rhames ’25 (left) and Caelan Frazier ’23, pictured during the summer of 2022.

Chemistry students in holiday outfits surround Daniela Arias-Rotondo — Arias-Rotondo took a holiday photo before the end of term with her fall 2023 student researchers, the first group to be paid for their school-year work in her lab.

Chemistry students accompany Daniela Arias-Rotondo at the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership — Arias-Rotondo is pictured with her summer 2023 lab group, (from left) Maxwell Rhames ’25, Maddie Coffman ’24, Deepa Jha ’24, Arias-Rotondo, Sam Ewald ’24, Mirella Villani ’24 and Will Tocco ’26.

Daniela Arias-Rotondo poses for a picture with a model of a molecule — Arias-Rotondo is pictured with a 3D-printed version of one of the molecules her lab has made.

Students and faculty in graduation attire — Arias-Rotondo is pictured at Commencement 2023 are graduating DARlings (from left) Shay Brown ’23, Chloe Lucci ’23, Arias-Rotondo, Mia Tucci ’23, Zekie Mulder ’23 and Caelan Frazier ’23.

Medicines for All Founder to Deliver Dreyfus Lecture

Posted on September 25, 2023September 25, 2023

The chair at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Department of Chemical and Life Science Engineering will deliver the Dreyfus Lecture, sponsored by Kalamazoo College’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, this Thursday.

B. Frank Gupton—whose research group is focused on the development of continuous processing technology to facilitate the discovery, development and commercialization of drug products—will discuss public access to essential medicines in a post-pandemic environment. He is the founder of VCU’s Medicines for All institute, which focuses on improving global access to lifesaving medicines.

Before joining VCU, Gupton’s 30-year industrial career centered on the development and commercialization of chemical processes for pharmaceutical applications. That time included years he served as the executive director of North American process development for Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, where he led the commercialization of the HIV drug nevirapine.

Dreyfus Lecture speaker B. Frank Gupton — Medicines for All Institute Founder B. Frank Gupton will speak Thursday at Kalamazoo College’s Dreyfus Lecture.

In 2018, Gupton received the American Chemical Society Award for Affordable Green Chemistry and the Presidential Award for Green Chemistry. In 2019, he earned the Peter J. Dunn Award for Green Chemistry and Engineering Impact in the Pharmaceutical Industry from the ACS Green Chemistry Institute Pharmaceutical Round Table. Gupton holds a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the University of Richmond and graduate degrees in organic chemistry from Georgia Tech and VCU.

The public is invited to the lecture, which will begin at 6:30 p.m. in the Dalton Theatre. For more information, contact the chemistry and biochemistry department at 269.337.7007.

Student Openly Shares Her Research to Tackle Chagas Disease

Posted on September 21, 2023December 4, 2023

When scientists perform research, what they discover is often proprietary and kept in close confidence until results are published or patented. Erin Somsel ’24, however, would rather share her research with the world.

Somsel, a biochemistry major at Kalamazoo College, is working on her Senior Integrated Project with Associate Professor of Chemistry Dwight Williams and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative, which engages top students from about 25 global institutions in research through the Open Synthesis Network. Their combined efforts provide shared, open-source information, allowing entire teams to look into the molecules and compounds that present the most promise for developing medicines that fight neglected tropical diseases (NTDs).

NTDs are a diverse group of 20 conditions that disproportionately infect women and children in impoverished communities with devastating health, social and economic consequences. Many are vector-borne with animal reservoirs and complex life cycles that complicate their public-health control. Plus, drug companies often don’t see the benefits of helping impoverished communities that are less profitable.

The open-source initiative, though, is more interested in cooperative work and says its participating researchers have developed 12 treatments for six deadly diseases, potentially saving millions of lives.

“That’s appealing to me because there are scientists from everywhere that work on this project,” Somsel said. “I think that’s a cool way of getting everyone involved in the scientific community to come up with a solution to a big problem.”

Somsel hopes her work will contribute to a treatment for a seventh affliction, Chagas disease. The inflammatory condition is most common in South America, Central America and Mexico with rare cases in the southern United States. It spreads through the feces of a parasite often called the kissing bug, as it damages the heart and other vital organs when the bug bites humans.

“A lot of the work on the drugs for Chagas disease was done in the 1960s, so there’s an urgent need for new ones,” Somsel said. “Chagas has two phases, acute and chronic. The acute phase has common symptoms such as fever, headache and fatigue, but if it turns chronic, it can cause cardiomyopathy and serious gastrointestinal problems. The drugs only work in the acute phase, so if it’s not caught, it’s life-threatening. There’s also no vaccine against Chagas disease.”

In the lab, IC₅₀ values represent the concentrations at which substances inhibit parasites through biological and biochemical processes. The hope is to find IC₅₀ values through molecules and compounds that warrant further research.

“I’ve been working on optimizing our processes and I got the procedure down so that we could start generating some of the compounds that we wanted to,” Somsel said. “The next step is to continue building the library of the chemicals we want to make and send them into the Open Synthesis Network, where it will test them for the activity against the parasites.”

Erin Somsel researching Chagas disease in the lab — Erin Somsel ’24 hopes her research will contribute to a treatment for Chagas disease, an inflammatory condition most common in South America, Central America and Mexico with rare cases in the southern United States.

Erin Somsel researching Chagas disease — Somsel first was introduced to NTD research when she was on study abroad in Costa Rica. While there she studied Latin American health care systems in an environment that challenged her to grow.

Somsel first was introduced to NTD research when she was on study abroad in Costa Rica. While there she studied Latin American health care systems, including Costa Rica’s, in an environment that challenged her to grow.

“I think K has a unique culture of pushing students beyond their comfort zone,” she said. “I don’t think that I would have had that experience at any other place.”

Now, with that experience—plus a K-Plan that involves student organizations such as the Health Professions Society and the Sisters in Science, athletics through the women’s soccer team, and academics as a teaching assistant for introductory chemistry—Somsel feels like she’s prepared to one day succeed in medical school, where she will continue pursuing lab research. Hopefully, that will involve further research involving NTDs.

“Success for me used to be going to class, getting A’s and stuff like that,” Somsel said. “Then, I started working in the lab. I found that there are many little things that build up to success. When I had a reaction that wasn’t successful, it was easy for me to say, ‘I was unsuccessful today.’ But Dr. Williams helped me put it in a different perspective. He could say, ‘No, you were unsuccessful in generating this compound, but you were successful in realizing this solvent didn’t work, so we can try something else and move forward.’ I think that has really shaped me as a student. It helped me understand that if at first something doesn’t work for me, I’m going to keep trying and persisting to find something that does.”

K Receives $2M Grant for Dow Science Center, Electrical Infrastructure

Posted on June 27, 2023June 27, 2023

The Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation is continuing a legacy of philanthropy toward higher education and Kalamazoo College with a $2 million grant that will support K’s science facilities.

The College’s Dow Science Center, completed in 1992, is named in recognition of another generous grant from the Dow Foundation. At the time of its completion, the 33,290-square-foot science center introduced K students to the latest technology and equipment in biology and chemistry instructional programs and offered a practical and attractive environment for teaching, learning and research. The mission of the facility continues today, and this new grant will help the College maintain the center’s excellence as it replaces the roof, retrofits the lab airflow management systems throughout the building, upgrades the fire system and installs new carpeting.

Additionally, the grant will help fund an ongoing project to modernize the College’s electrical grid. This initiative is set to be completed by August 2025, with the College actively engaging in fundraising efforts to bring it to fruition. The Dow Foundation’s support will help move this project forward, allowing the College to ensure a reliable and sustainable energy infrastructure across the entire campus.

Student works in Dow Science Center — A $2 million grant from the Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation will benefit students and help Kalamazoo College maintain the Dow Science Center by replacing the roof, retrofitting the lab airflow management systems throughout the building, upgrading the fire system and installing new carpeting.

For nearly four decades, the Dow Foundation’s commitment to STEM programing at K has benefitted generations of students. Its latest grant adds to its legacy, building upon previous support that funded two endowed professorships and enabled the replacement of a nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectrometer, allowing students to analyze and identify chemical compounds and structures with state-of-the-art equipment.

“We’re grateful for the Dow Foundation’s generous support, which will enable students, faculty and staff to continue pursuing science and research that benefits the world,” Kalamazoo College President Jorge G. Gonzalez said. “The College has a long history of success in the sciences and this grant shows a continued and shared optimism in the exceptional work of our students, and what they will accomplish long after they leave K.”

The Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation was established in 1936 for religious, charitable, scientific, literary or educational purposes for the public benefaction of the inhabitants of the City of Midland and the people of the State of Michigan.

“The State of Michigan has always benefited from strength in higher education,” said Ruth Alden Doan, president and trustee of The Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation. “The Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation is proud to have played a role in that strength and continues to value the high performance of Kalamazoo College as a liberal arts college with excellence in chemistry and other sciences.”

Family Science Night Fun Brings Community to K

Posted on June 5, 2023December 14, 2023

Students participate in Family Science Night — Kalamazoo College students demonstrate how oranges can be used to pop balloons during Family Science Night.

Family Science Night 14 (2) — K students helped K-12 students explore density by using oil, water and Alka-Seltzer to make lava lamps.

About 160 community members, consisting of kindergartners through 12^th graders and their families, came to campus to engage with fun, hands-on experiments at Family Science Night on May 18, hosted by students from the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the Department of Biology at Kalamazoo College.

The Family Science Night “Science Surrounds Us,” conducted at Dow Science Center and supported by funding from the Mary Jane Underwood Stryker Center for Civic Engagement, featured 15 interactive science booths with 39 undergraduate student volunteers and a four-student planning committee, consisting of Crystal Mendoza ’23, Elizabeth Wang ’23, Maxwell Rhames ’25 and Onora Lancaster ’23. The event gave K students the opportunity to practice their science communication skills while nurturing children’s interest in the sciences.

K students showed Family Science Night attendees how to make DNA bracelets using the DNA sequences from various animals.

K students showed taught community members about the life cycle of plants by planting herb seeds for kids to take home.

Assistant Professor of Chemistry Josie Mitchell joined the faculty at K last fall and had been thinking since about ways she could connect her students with the community. Science outreach events with K-12 students had been the way she loved doing similar community engagement as a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

“One of the skills I hope my students develop is to be able to communicate the scientific concepts they learn about in class in an exciting and accessible way to the public,” Mitchell said. “As students planned their science booths, we talked about the scientific topic each group hoped to convey and then designed hands-on experiments that K-12 students would do. Ultimately, we all learn better and have more fun when we’re actually doing something versus being told about it.”

Stickers helped K-12 students keep track of which experiments they saw — Kids used stickers in a Family Science Night passport to keep track of which experiment stations they visited.

K students assist community members — · K students showed Family Science Night attendees how to extract the iron content from cereal using magnets

Students tend to a booth showing homemade volcanoes — K students helped community members investigate acid/base chemistry with baking soda and vinegar to make mini-volcanoes.

The K students developed ideas using household ingredients that ranged from experiments such as creating miniature volcanoes with baking soda and vinegar, exploring the freezing point of water by making ice cream and learning about the life cycle of plants by planting herbs, to creative activities such as removing the iron from cereal with magnets, extracting DNA from strawberries and investigating rubber polymers by using oranges to pop balloons.

“The planning committee and I worked together with groups to hone their scientific concept and think creatively about how students could get their hands wet and learn through experimentation,” Mitchell said. “For example, one group was learning about acids and bases. There is a chemical in red cabbage called anthocyanin that serves as a pH indicator and it will change color depending on how acidic or basic the solution is. K students prepared a red cabbage pH indicator solution and then had K-12 students add it into acidic and basic solutions and observe a color change. Many of the parents would also engage with the science booths, and I believe events like this can bring out the inner child-like curiosity in all of us.”

Family Science Night attendees explored protein folding using a computer program and origami.

Family Science Night 9 — K students taught K-12 students and parents about genetics through taste inheritance by using a PTC test.

The K community made the night possible with involvement from the planning stages all the way through cleanup after the event.

“We had a lot of help, especially with funding from the Center for Civic Engagement and donated prize items from K Admissions and the K Bookstore,” Mitchell said. “I communicated with (CCE Director) Alison Geist throughout the planning stages, and (Associate Director for Community Partnerships) Teresa Denton tapped into the CCE’s amazing network of local schools and programs to invite community members to the event.”

Student organizations such as Sisters in Science and the College’s chapter of the American Chemical Society also assisted.

“I think our student involvement was the most rewarding part,” Mitchell said. “I’ve already known how amazing our students are, but they went above and beyond to make this event possible. I wanted to start smaller and more focused this year to see how it went, and next year I would love to invite other K students from science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) disciplines to host a booth.”

Family Science Night 4 — K students showed Family Science Night attendees how to test the pH of household items using cabbage water.

K students helped K-12 students explore density by using oil, water and Alka-Seltzer to make lava lamps.

Family Science Night 13 — K students taught community members how to extract DNA from strawberries during Family Science Night.

Family Science Night Experiments

Magnetic Munchies: extracting iron content in cereal using magnets
Fold It: exploring protein folding using a computer program and origami
Dancing Drawings: learning about density by watching dry erase drawings float
Butterfly Wings: creating colorful butterflies using coffee filter paper chromatography
Mini Volcanoes: investigating acid/base chemistry with baking soda and vinegar
Strawberry DNA: extracting DNA from strawberries
Ice Cream: exploring the freezing-point of water by making ice cream
The Lifecycle of Plants: planting herb seeds and taking them home to watch them grow
Magic Milk: investigating polarity of molecules using milk, food coloring and detergent
Lava Lamps: exploring density using oil, water and Alka-Seltzer to make lava lamps
Oranges and Balloons: investigating rubber polymers using oranges to pop balloons
Bitter or Bland: exploring the genetics of taste inheritance using a PTC test
DNA Bracelets: making DNA bracelets using the DNA sequence from various animals
Acid or Base: testing the pH of various household items using cabbage water as a pH indicator
Spies in Disguise, Invisible Ink: learning about acid/base chemistry by writing hidden messages

Volunteer Feedback

“I had so much fun running this booth and it was fun to be able to teach kids about chemistry. I feel like everything was running smoothly with some rush of people, but it was manageable.”
“This was a wonderful time! I heard phenomenal things from parents as they came out!”
“I had so much fun and would love to do it again! I loved seeing all of their reactions to our volcanoes!”

Parent Feedback

“The Family Science Night was absolutely wonderful. My children had the best time! My son is very interested in science, but my daughter has approached it more cautiously, although last night really made her more interested in it so I am grateful to you all!”

K’s Banner Year Elates Faculty, NSF Fellows

Posted on May 19, 2023December 14, 2023

Kalamazoo College STEM-related academic departments are celebrating a banner year as the overall number of current students and alumni receiving National Science Foundation (NSF) graduate research fellowships reaches four, the most since 2016.

The Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) recognizes and supports outstanding students who pursue research-based master’s and doctoral degrees at accredited U.S. institutions. A five-year fellowship covers three years of financial support, including an annual stipend and a cost-of-education allowance to attend an institution along with access to professional-development opportunities.

About 2,000 applicants are offered a fellowship per NSF competition in fields such as chemistry, biology, psychology, physics and math. This is the first year since 2013 that two current K students, Claire Kvande ’23 and Mallory Dolorfino ’23, have earned awards. Two alumni also have earned fellowships, Cavan Bonner ’21 and Angel Banuelos ’21.

“The NSF Graduate Research Fellowship is a highly competitive program that is only awarded to about 16% of the applicants, who represented more than 15,000 undergraduates and graduate students across all STEM fields,” Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor of Chemistry Blakely Tresca said. “Approximately 2,500 awards were offered this year across all STEM fields and the vast majority of them go to students at large research universities and Ivy League schools. It is rare to see more than one or two awards at an undergraduate-focused college, particularly at a small liberal arts school like K. It is exceptional for schools in the GLCA (Great Lakes Colleges Association) to have one award in a year, and four awards is a truly outstanding accomplishment for these students.”

Claire Kvande ’23

Kvande has been a double major in physics and chemistry with minors in math and French at K. She credits faculty members such as Dow Distinguished Professor of Natural Science Jan Tobochnik and Associate Professor of Physics David Wilson, along with a wide range of courses, for preparing her to receive an NSF fellowship.

“I like the nitty gritty of sitting down and figuring out how to approach a problem within physics even though it’s often hard,” she said. “I really like work that is grounded in real-world problems and it’s part of why I’m interested in the subfield of condensed matter. There’s a lot that stands to be applied to technologies that I think could improve our world and help a lot of people.”

Kvande will attend the University of Washington this fall, where she plans to extend her Senior Integrated Project (SIP) work, which examined how charge-density waves relate to superconductivity within condensed matter.

“Superconductivity is a tantalizing physics concept,” she said. “If we could realize superconductivity at room temperature, it would allow us to do a lot with energy saving and revolutionize how we use electricity. There are schools of thought that say charge-density waves would be helpful in achieving that and others that say it would be hurtful. Since we really don’t know how superconductivity works, this is worth investigating so we can hopefully better understand this powerful phenomenon.”

NSF fellow Claire Kvande presenting her SIP — Claire Kvande ’23 will attend graduate school at the University of Washington as a National Science Foundation fellow.

Mallory Dolorfino ’23

Dolorfino, a computer science and math double major, also will attend the University of Washington, where they will pursue a doctorate in math.

“I didn’t really like math until I came to K,” Dolorfino said. “I took calculus in high school and I was just not going to take any more in college until one of my senior friends told me when I was a first-year student to take linear algebra. I took that and Calculus 3 online during the first COVID term and I just kept doing math, so I switched my major. It’s not like other subjects because you can work for hours and not get anything done. That’s frustrating at times, but it’s fun to understand it enough to prove things logically.”

Dolorfino credits several faculty members for their growth and success at K, leading to their NSF opportunity. They include Tresca, who helped students keep track of their NSF application timelines and materials; Associate Professor of Mathematics Michele Intermont, who provided letters of recommendation and application assistance for research opportunities and graduate school; and Assistant Professor of Mathematics Stephen Oloo, who provided invaluable feedback regarding their research proposal and many conversations about math.

Dolorfino remains in contact with a professor they worked with in a math-focused study abroad program in Budapest. The two of them conducted a monthlong research project in algebraic number theory, which is a foundation in applications such as encryption and bar codes. Their NSF application proposes group theory work, which is what she based some research on last summer at Texas State University. They hope their NSF work will help them become a college professor one day. “There are a lot of math institutions on the West Coast and specifically in the Northwest, so I will have really good connections there,” said Dolorfino, who agreed the award is an honor. “I was grateful for the people at K who helped me apply.”

NSF fellow Mallory Dolorfino — Mallory Dolorfino ’23 will attend graduate school at the University of Washington as an NSF fellow.

Cavan Bonner ’21

Bonner has spent the past two years working as a research staff member in industrial and organizational psychology at Purdue University. His NSF fellowship will take him to another Big Ten school.

“My area of research involves personality development and how personality changes over the lifespan,” he said. “It’s a pretty small sub field and there are only a few doctoral programs where you can study the topic with an expert. The University of Illinois is one of them.”

Bonner further hopes the fellowship will propel his career toward a tenure-track job at a research university. He said K helped prepare him well for that trajectory through a broad range of subjects, not only in psychology, but in adjacent fields such as sociology and statistics. Bonner also credits his experience working as a research assistant for Ann V. and Donald R. Parfet Distinguished Professor of Psychology Gary Gregg, and Associate Professor of Psychology Brittany Liu for training him in skills that he frequently uses in his research work after graduation.

“I was drawn to personality psychology because it provides an integrative framework to study many of the research questions I have about human development, aging and change over time,” Bonner said. “My SIP and research assistant experiences at K helped me realize that I could address these questions from a personality perspective, but my professors also exposed me to so many other fields and perspectives that inform my research. I primarily identify as a personality and developmental psychologist, but ultimately I hope that this fellowship helps me contribute to the broader science of aging and development.”

Portrait of Cavan Bonner — Cavan Bonner ’21 will attend the University of Illinois as an NSF fellow.

Angel Banuelos ’21

Banuelos, a biology major and anthropology/sociology minor at K, is in his second year at the University of Wisconsin, where he said he studies genetics—specifically the construction of the vertebrate brain and face—under an amazing mentor, Professor Yevgenya Grinblat.

“Live beings are built by cells that are informed by DNA,” Banuelos said. “At the beginning of embryonic development, the cells split into groups. One of those groups is called the neural crest cells. Those cells go on to contribute to a whole bunch of things such as pigment cells in the skin, and cartilage and bones in the face. My project is trying to understand how neural crest cells contribute to stabilizing the very first blood vessels of the developing eye.”

Ultimately, when his graduate work is finished, he would like to steer his career towards education.

NSF fellow Angel Banuelos in the lab — Angel Banuelos ’21, a newly-named NSF fellow, is in his second year of graduate school at the University of Wisconsin.

“I would like to bring research opportunities to people who don’t have higher education experience,” Banuelos said. “I would imagine starting with programs for middle schoolers, then high schoolers and adult learners. I want to be part of research addressing community problems and conducted by the people who live there.”

Banuelos credits inspiration for his career goals to the many mentors he had at K. Natalia Carvalho-Pinto, former director of the intercultural center, and Amy Newday, who provided guidance in food and farming justice, served as role models for applying theory to meet material needs.

“In my NSF application, I described meeting community needs as a central component of my scholarship,” he said. “Natalia and Amy are people who literally fed me while I was at K. They saw the student and the human. They handed me books, handed me plates, even welcomed my family. During a very difficult transition to grad school, they were there for me. When I’m a professor, I want to be like them. I’m grateful for the growth opportunities I had at K through the Intercultural Center and food and farming.”

‘It doesn’t happen every year’

Faculty members as a whole across STEM departments are taking great pride in these K representatives earning fellowships as it speaks to the quality of students at the College and their studies, especially as the number of recipients stands out.

“At K, it is exciting when even a single student wins a fellowship, and it certainly doesn’t happen every year,” Professor of Physics Tom Askew said. “It’s special to have four in one year.”