Celebration of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity (CURCA)

Artificial light at night (ALAN) is light pollution that can come from phones, television, street lights, or building LED lighting. These sources of light are difficult to avoid throughout the day and night, which disrupts natural light patterns and circadian rhythms. Research has shown that this type of pollution, which many individuals cannot avoid, can disrupt hormones, gene regulation, and reproductive functions. Because the circadian rhythm is intertwined with endocrine systems, ALAN can have significant negative effects on reproductive processes.  

Drosophila melanogaster is a perfect model to study light exposure because of its similarities with humans, specifically its likeness in circadian clocks and endocrine pathways. Their short life cycle and size are the most significant differences, but assist with their easily measuring reproductive outcomes make them a valuable model for studying fertility, development, and behavioral differences. Research has also shown that in Drosophila species, exposure to ALAN can reduce body ratios, including the wing-to-thorax ratio, while also disrupting circadian rhythms.  

This study examines whether different wavelengths of ALAN alter the body size ratios of Drosophila melanogaster offspring. We hypothesize that exposing these flies to red or blue light during their early growth stages will lead to physical shifts in their adult wing to thorax ratios. To test this, we are conducting this research under three controlled conditions: a typical 12-hour white light/dark cycle, red ALAN, and blue ALAN. Once they reach adulthood, we will measure their physical traits to see how different light spectra affect their growth. Most animals are exposed to regular light, which is primarily red and blue because the sun primarily emits blue and red light.  

Understanding these changes in Drosophila further supports the data that researchers and health professionals have known from years of increased digital use in humans. Knowing that a deep understanding of the psychological effects of increasing exposure to blue light from LED lighting can lead to a disruption in sleep patterns and developmental structures, leading to a lack of fertility, development, and differences in behaviors for humans.  

Cultural invalidations are a form of discrimination that come from those of similar and different cultural backgrounds (Durkee & Gomez, 2022). However, much of the existing literature examining cultural invalidations does not include Asian Americans’ experiences. One explanation might be due to the model minority myth where Asian Americans are seen as having achieved success through hard work, creating a higher level of socioeconomic and academic success than other marginalized groups. Furthermore, Asian Americans are often treated as a homogenous group, which minimizes and normalizes discrimination against Asian Americans (Wing et al., 2007). To address this gap, we explored within-group differences in cultural invalidation, belongingness, the acting white accusation, and psychological distress among East Asian, South Asian, and Southeast Asian college students using data from a larger mixed-methods study. Findings revealed no statistically significant differences in cultural invalidation, belongingness, and psychological distress between South Asian, Southeast Asian, and East Asian college students. However, there was a statistically significant difference in the acting white accusation among South Asian, Southeast Asian, and East Asian college students. Specifically, East Asians reported experiencing the acting White accusation the most. Findings reveal that despite similar levels of cultural invalidation, belongingness, and psychological distress across participants, the acting White accusation may function as a distinct within-group stressor, particularly for East Asian students. These findings also underscore the importance of disaggregating Asian American experiences to better understand nuanced patterns of marginalization. 

Generally, religious affiliation is associated with improvements in psychological well-being (Papaleontiou, 2021). However, some sexual minority adults may have more negative experiences in religious settings that are hostile and judgmental (Boppana & Gross, 2019). Religious sexual minority adults may experience conflict between their sexual identity and religious upbringing, leading to differing spiritual trajectories such as disaffiliation from a religion of origin. However, sexual minority adults who remain connected to their religious affiliation may use it as a protective factor for their psychological well-being (Job & Williams, 2020). Indeed, researchers have suggested that levels of religious affiliation may lead to differences in mental health outcomes of sexual minority adults (Battle & DeFreece, 2014). However, less is known about religious continuity, the maintenance of religious affiliation, among sexual minority adults and its impact on mental health.  

Guided by social identity theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1979) and positive psychology approaches, we examined the relationship between religious continuity and psychological distress among sexual minority adults (N=1244) using data from the Generations Study (Meyer, 2023). In the same model, we included several other factors theorized to be protective for psychological distress among sexual minority adults, including life satisfaction, community connectedness, social support, and social well-being. Multiple regression analyses revealed that religious continuity (B = -.844, p < .001), greater life satisfaction (B = -1.233, p < .001), and social well-being (B = -2.031, p < .001) were associated with lower psychological distress. Conversely, greater community connectedness (B = .939, p < .001) was associated with higher psychological distress. Social support (B = .126, p =.242) was not a significant predictor. These findings highlight the complex role of religion in the psychological experiences of sexual minority adults and the importance of identity and belonging in mental health. 

Photoperiodism, the biological response to changes in day length, is widely seen across organisms and plays an important role in seasonal adaptation and reproductive fitness. However, the genetic and molecular mechanisms that allow organisms to sense and respond to day-length changes are still not well understood. In this study, we used the model organism Neurospora crassa, a filamentous fungus known for its well-characterized genetics and strong response to environmental cues. Because phosphorylation is central in signal transduction pathways involving circadian clock proteins, kinases, and phosphatases are good candidates for influencing photoperiodic regulation. Based on previous findings from the Fungal Genetics Stock Center, we examined two N. crassa mutants: the kinase mutant stk-16 (FGSC #13072), which shows reduced protoperithecia formation, and the phosphatase mutant pzl-1 (FGSC #11548), retained the same pattern as wild type. We used the protoperithecia assay (PPA), which counts the formation of female reproductive structures in N. crassa, as a proxy for photoperiodic responsiveness. Based on these findings, we examined how alterations in developmental and molecular rhythms may contribute to the organism’s response to changes in day length. 

Circadian rhythms are endogenous 24-hour cycles that coordinate sleep, locomotor activity, and metabolic processes in response to environmental cues. Dietary compounds are increasingly recognized as modulators of circadian timing, yet the mechanisms underlying these interactions remain unclear. Aspartame, a widely used non-caloric sweetener, has previously been observed to alter circadian phase and sleep patterns in Drosophila melanogaster. However, the extent to which these effects depend on the chemical state of aspartame or its sensory properties has not been fully resolved.  

In this study, we examined whether differences in aspartame preparation influence circadian behavioral outcomes. Flies were maintained under equinox (12:12 light: dark) conditions and exposed to one of three dietary treatments: control sucrose media, aspartame incorporated during media preparation, and aspartame introduced after cooling to preserve its sensory characteristics. Locomotor activity and sleep parameters were assessed using the Drosophila Activity Monitoring (DAM) system.  

By systematically examining these variables, this work aims to clarify how dietary sweeteners interact with the circadian clock and to better understand the interplay between chemical signals, sensory perception, and temporal regulation in a model organism system.

Sphingosine-1-phosphate receptor 3 (S1PR3) signaling has been implicated in promoting stress resilience and reducing anxiety-like behavior. Our lab has found that pharmacological activation of S1PR3 elevates galanin, a neuropeptide known to modulate neuroinflammatory signaling and influence neuronal activity; however, whether S1PR3 activation directly alters galanin-expressing neuronal populations at the cellular level has not been examined. We hypothesize that activation of S1PR3 increases galanin expression and enhances activity of galanin-expressing neurons under baseline conditions. To test this, male C57BL/6J mice received daily injections of the S1PR3 agonist CYM5541 or vehicle control, after which brains were collected and processed using immunohistochemistry to assess galanin expression, neuronal identity (NeuN), and activity-dependent c-Fos expression. Confocal microscopy was used to quantify galanin-positive neurons and evaluate c-Fos co-localization within galanin-expressing cells. We anticipate that S1PR3 activation will increase galanin expression and enhance activation of galanin-positive neurons relative to vehicle-treated controls, providing direct cellular evidence linking S1PR3 signaling to galanin neuron activity and laying the groundwork for future studies examining S1PR3-mediated regulation of neuroinflammatory pathways. 

Between 50 to 70 million Americans live with chronic sleep disorders, underscoring the need for treatments that can safely modulate human circadian rhythms. The circadian rhythms are generated by internal biological clocks with a period of about 24 hours that regulate daily physiological and behavioral processes, including sleep–wake cycles. However, most drug-screening procedures rely on a single endpoint assay, which is fundamentally incompatible with evaluating circadian phenotypes. As circadian oscillators must be monitored over multiple days to accurately detect drug-induced changes in period and phase, an efficient and scalable screening platform is essential. Drug repurposing using FDA–approved small molecule drugs in a fungal system meets this need by offering a rapid and cost–effective approach for identifying compounds capable of altering circadian function. In our screening technique, we applied this knowledge when investigating the ability of 2,600 FDA–approved small molecules to influence circadian rhythms in the successful eukaryotic model organism Neurospora crassa. We developed and optimized a secondary reporter assay in which the core clock regulator FREQUENCY (FRQ)-luciferase fusion protein, driven by the frq promoter, allowed real-time monitoring of clock dynamics through rhythmic bioluminescence for multiple days. To complement this molecular approach, we also evaluated a phenotypic response using a Protopethecia Production Assay (PPA), where the number of protoperithecia formed under different photoperiodic conditions is assessed as a proxy for the organism’s ability to measure day length. Together, these assays allow for the screening of a drug’s effect on the core circadian oscillator and the organism’s ability to measure a day length, a proposed additional function of the circadian clock. Both were adapted and optimized for high- throughput screening, enabling an efficient, unbiased platform for identifying small molecules that modify circadian rhythmicity in N. crassa. Additionally, completion of these screenings will provide the research community with a tangible platform for rapid identification of circadian modulating compounds, which have the possibility of enhancing mechanistic studies and enabling the repurposing of the FDA–approved drugs. More broadly, this work supports the development of new strategies that may ultimately improve treatments for sleep disorders and other circadian–linked health conditions. 

Financial literacy is a frequently overlooked social determinant of health. Financial literacy has a long-term, positive impact on health, regardless of an individual’s race, gender, income, education, or employment status. Many low-income students do not receive the financial literacy education they need, compared to their high-income peers, as higher income is a strong predictor of financial literacy, resulting in a disparity in financial knowledge between students from lower- and higher-income backgrounds. Although New Jersey has a state-mandated financial literacy curriculum, Camden students are not getting the education that they need. There is an inequality in academic performance between the Camden schools, which are poorly funded, and the rest of New Jersey. In 2024, 42.1% of students in the Camden City School District were at a graduation-ready level in English Language Arts, compared to the state average of 82.5% [Camden High School. (2023)]. 10.7% of students in the Camden City School District are at a graduation-ready level in math, compared to the state average of 55.6% [Camden High School. (2023)]. This demonstrates a need for support sites such as RARA (Rutgers Accelerate and Renew Academy) which focus on providing students with specialized instruction that they do not receive at school. 

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is one of the leading causes of death and disability worldwide. This condition, which comes about from a blunt force (closed-head TBI) or a penetrating injury (open-head TBI) to the head, creates a tangled web of symptoms that range from cognitive ailments like communication issues to physical symptoms like loss of motor skills to molecular changes that can prove fatal such as increased permeability of the blood-brain barrier. One of these symptoms is hyperalgesia, or an increased sensitivity to pain. Cannabidiol (CBD) is a naturally occurring cannabinoid that acts as a non-psychoactive compound in the plant Cannabis sativa. Though this substance is known to have antinociceptive properties, studies that explore this effect in regards to hyperalgesia stemming from TBI are limited; in Drosophila melanogaster (fruit flies), an effective model for many neurological conditions due to the tools and literature that exist for it, these studies are even sparser. In this study, we will induce TBI in D. melanogaster using the HIT device (Katzenberger et al., 2013) in the standard manner of four strikes at five minutes apart. These flies will then be transferred to a rampable hot plate, and their “jumps” (nocifensive reaction to pain stimulus) will be recorded. As the temperature is increased, we will be able to detect the threshold at which pain is felt for a control, TBI, and TBI + CBD group. We hypothesize that CBD will significantly increase the threshold for nociception, alleviating TBI-induced hyperalgesia. These results could provide further support for the use of CBD in treating hyperalgesia that stems from TBI as well as providing a deeper understanding of this interaction’s effects in Drosophila. 

Positive mental health is recognized as a multidimensional construct essential for successful functioning in society, and for navigating key developmental and occupational pathways, including academic life, relationships, and workforce participation. Instead of defining mental health solely as the absence of psychological difficulties, contemporary public health and psychological frameworks emphasize the presence of cognitive, emotional, and social capacities that enable individuals to thrive in their environment. As interest in strengths-based approaches to well-being grows, the need for robust, culturally sensitive measurement tools has become increasingly critical, particularly for students, who are experiencing a stage of constant change and stress.  

The Positive Mental Health Questionnaire (PMHQ), originally developed in Spain by Lluch and colleagues (2003; 2017), is one of the few instruments designed specifically to assess positive mental health within a Spanish-speaking cultural and linguistic context. The PMHQ evaluates six theoretically grounded components of positive mental health, including personal satisfaction, prosocial attitude, self-control, autonomy, problem-solving, self-actualization, and interpersonal relationship skills. However, despite its use, gaps remain regarding its factor structure across diverse populations and the generalizability of its psychometric properties in university settings outside the original validation context.  

The present study aims to extend the validation of the PMHQ by examining its factor structure, internal consistency, and construct validity in a sample of 300 U.S. college students enrolled at a predominantly bilingual institution, Rutgers–Camden. Participants completed the PMHQ along with measures related to psychological well-being, stress, and academic functioning. We conducted a confirmatory factor analysis to determine whether the original six-factor structure replicates in this population and to identify culturally driven divergences in item loadings. This analysis yielded a strong overall fit (𝝌2 = 1268.21, p < .001; AIC = 5999.3). Internal consistency values (Cronbach’s α) ranged from .55 to .87 (mean = .74, SD = .11), demonstrating reliability across domains.  

Correlations revealed that higher scores on PMHQ were positively associated with lower perceived stress, greater academic engagement, and enhanced self-efficacy (all p’s < .05), supporting convergent validity. Overall, this study supports the use of the PMHQ as a valid and reliable instrument for student populations in the United States and highlights the importance of culturally appropriate tools to promote positive mental health and equitable well-being outcomes. 

Pulsed Laser Ablation in Liquids (PLAL) is a process in which a target material is submerged in liquids and irradiated with a pulsed laser to synthesize nanostructures. Recently, in the case of bismuth, it has been found that controlling dissolved gasses along with laser fluence has a strong influence on the formation of the nanostructure morphology and composition. Specifically, laser fluences above 15 J/cm2 results in bismuth nanoparticles that ultimately assemble to form bismuth oxide nanowires and bismuth subcarbonate nanosheets. However, the mechanisms responsible for the formation of these nanoparticles is not well understood. Thus, the focus of this work is to investigate how fluences above the threshold influence the ablation process. It has been established that nanoparticle formation largely takes place within the cavitation bubble formed at the target-liquid interface upon laser absorption, as it contains ejected material from the ablated target, solvent from the surrounding liquid, and reactive species generated in the laser-induced plasma. In this work, a shadowgraphy technique is used to image the evolution of the cavitation bubble across a range of fluences. Additionally, gold will be used as a non-reactive standard for comparison.  

By comparing the cavitation bubble characteristics of bismuth and gold, such as: max height, number of collapse events, and persistent gas formation, the dominant mechanisms responsible for bismuth nanoparticle surface chemistry leading to the formation of bismuth oxide and bismuth subcarbonate nanoparticles may be deduced. 

Educational inequities in STEM persist in under-resourced communities, limiting early exposure in scientific inquiry, mentorship, and hands-on learning opportunities. In Camden, New Jersey, many K-12 students attend schools that lack laboratory resources, STEM programming, and sustained engagement with scientific role models. Research demonstrates that early exposure to STEM experiences significantly predicts long-term interest, confidence, and persistence in STEM fields. Addressing these disparities requires accessible, community-centered interventions that foster curiosity and belonging in science.  

The Camden STEM Discovery Series is a community-engaged initiative designed to provide fun, hands-on STEM programming to K-12 students through partnerships between Rutgers-Camden student organizations, E3 (Empowering Equitable Education in STEM), and local schools. The program consists of interactive after-school events combining biology, chemistry, physics, and applied mathematics through low-cost, portable experiments and activities. Each session integrates near-peer mentorship, with undergraduate facilitators guiding experiments and sharing pathways into college and STEM careers.  

The initiative aims to serve students from January to May 2026, with a goal of 75% of the participants reporting increased excitement or confidence in a STEM discipline based on reflection assessments. Beyond student engagement, the project seeks to strengthen Rutgers K-12 partnerships, develop undergraduate leadership, and create reusable STEM kits and lesson plans to ensure sustainability.  

By combining experiential learning, mentorship, and institutional collaboration, the Camden STEM Discovery Series advances educational equity while fostering scientific identity formation in historically excluded communities. This model demonstrates how undergraduate-led, community-engaged scholarship can translate research on STEM persistence into actionable, local impact. 

More than half of college students report experiencing mental health challenges during their academic careers, yet fewer than forty percent receive formal counseling or therapy. Barriers such as limited access to services, scheduling conflicts, stigma, and financial constraints often leave students to navigate mental health concerns independently. These gaps highlight the need for accessible approaches that support emotional well-being outside of traditional clinical settings. This project examines the relationship between creative expression and mental health through a literature review and a practice-based implementation. The research component explores the implementation of expressive writing, storytelling, and artistic creation as tools for emotional processing, identity development, and stress reduction. Existing research suggests that creative practices can provide low-barrier opportunities for self-reflection, emotional regulation, and community connection. In connection with this research, the project presents the development of Voices Unheard, a public-facing literary publication that provides a platform for students and community members to share poetry, short stories, and personal narratives. The publication serves as an example of how research on creative expression can be translated into a real-world initiative that encourages storytelling and open dialogue around lived experiences. This project highlights the potential use of creative platforms to complement existing mental health resources and expand accessible opportunities for expression and community engagement. 

Introduction: Access to supportive relationships may be constrained in low-income communities facing limited resources (Brown et al., 2020). Although most research has focused on how support from family and friends predicts health outcomes, far less is known about how existing health experiences (e.g., pain and other physical symptoms) predict support seeking and whether these support needs are adequately met; even fewer studies examine these social support experiences in disadvantaged populations. In this study, we examined how health symptoms are associated with support-seeking and unmet needs among Camden, New Jersey residents. 

Method: Cross-sectional survey data were collected from 586 individuals in Camden via purposive sampling. The participants were predominantly Black/ African American (59.8%) or Hispanic/Latino (32.34%), middle-aged (M=51.81 years, SD=15.481), and women (58.5%). The Brief COPE assessed distinct types of social support-seeking: two items assessed emotional support (Carver, 1997; Spearman-Brown=.62), a single item assessed instrumental support, and a single item assessed advice support. A one-item question (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Service, 2017) was used to measure unmet support needs. The 21-item Symptom Experience Index (Fu et al., 2007; α=.78) assessed participants’ overall physical symptom experience. Linear regressions examined associations between health symptoms (pain severity, symptom experience) and support outcomes, controlling for demographics. 

Results: Greater pain severity was associated with less instrumental support-seeking (β=-.12, p=.046) but was not associated with emotional or informational support-seeking or unmet support needs (ps = .12–.40). Greater symptom experience was associated with more emotional (β=.12, p=.04) and instrumental (β=.14, p=.02) support-seeking and more unmet support needs (β=.25, p<.001), but was not associated with informational support-seeking (p=.17). 

Conclusion: Symptom experience was associated with both greater support-seeking and greater unmet needs, indicating that individuals with more symptoms actively seek support yet still report unmet needs. In contrast, pain severity was only associated with less instrumental support-seeking, suggesting potential withdrawal from social relationships among those in severe pain. These findings highlight the importance of ensuring support needs are met, not simply encouraging support-seeking among those with adverse physical health experiences. Future research should examine barriers to receiving adequate support in underserved communities. 

By now, everybody knows about the rapid rise of generative AI and the impact that it’s had on the education sector. What no one seems to be paying attention to, however, is how ESL students—who are also referred to as multi-language learners (MLL)—throughout the country have responded to this technological breakthrough.  

It’s very easy to feel the weight of the entire world on your back when you have to get acclimated to the customs of an entirely foreign nation, learn to speak its language, and on top of that, attend college classes while managing five different course workloads. These circumstances make tools like ChatGPT and DeepSeek, both of which promise to simplify the lives of those who use it, all the more enticing for international students.  

AI literacy, or the lack thereof, is the main crux of the issue. It’s too often that in the pursuit of alleviating academic stress, students offload too much of their thinking to large language models, which weakens the learning effort. It is essential that colleges and universities encourage their ESL population to embrace the new technology, while teaching them how to use it responsibly. 

In the age of Artificial Intelligence and algorithmic grammar checkers, writers have expressed that maintaining their authentic voice has become increasingly difficult (Giray, 2024). The most prominent AI-powered writing program is Grammarly, founded in 2009 by three Ukrainian students. Grammarly is deeply integrated into the modern academic tapestry, with the pro-version being offered half off to university students and some professors mandating students use it to edit their papers before turning them in. In my experience as a student, choosing your own stylistic intuition over Grammarly’s suggestions can result in points being removed. Of course, certain genres of writing, such as quantitative research writing, typically prescribe uninspired prose to eliminate descriptive persuasion and maintain attention on the results. In these genres, Grammarly’s generic tweaks might be more appropriate than in the Humanities, where cultivating an authentic voice is highly prioritized. With that said, as research by Qub’a et al. (2024) demonstrated, an inordinate amount of the errors that Grammarly detected in academic writing were false positives (95.2%). As writing consultants, our job isn’t just to improve our clients’ writing, but to act as scaffolding for their development as writers. For example, ESL students rated their satisfaction with writing consultants slightly higher than Grammarly, appreciating the attention to compositional direction and ability to negotiate without the expectation of adopting all feedback (Zhang et al., 2020). We believe these findings have pedagogical relevance as well and suggest that professors/teachers endorse Grammarly as a tool to clean up grammar but refrain from mandating students to adopt all its stylistic suggestions, particularly in the Humanities. 

In recent years, AI-generated videos have flooded social media sites, due in part to the increasingly simple manner in which AI videos can be generated using programs such as Sora. While some of the content of these videos are benign (i.e., cats podcasting) others have more sinister intentions, aiming to persuade people into believing misinformation and fostering antisocial behaviors. As this technology continues to improve, it has become nearly impossible to determine if a video is AI-generated. With the prominent use of AI, this could lead to misinformation and deterioration of trust in the media. In the research literature, so far there are few studies that examine whether people are more likely to believe in the content of an AI-generated video compared to one not generated using AI. In order to address this problem, we propose a study where we plan to examine whether participants are more likely to believe the credibility of a video if it was real as opposed to AI-generated. Additionally, we are also planning to examine participants’ retention rates, and if participants are more likely to remember information in a video if it was AI-generated compared to real videos. In our study, people will watch videos on a range of different topics, such as offshore wind energy, soda taxation, and other controversial topics. Additionally, we plan on integrating the element of deception by misleading participants into believing that they are seeing one type of video (i.e., real), when they are really seeing the opposite (i.e., AI). By doing this, we are able to see if participants base their belief on the label of the video as opposed to the content itself. To test for credibility and retention rates, we plan to give participants a likert scale survey after viewing the content. We hypothesize that participants will be able to believe in the credibility of videos that are labeled real compared to being labeled AI-generated, along with remembering their content better. 

Currently I am still in the early stages of my project. This stage consists of reading through my bibliographic references on ancient Roman arches and arches from the Renaissance through the nineteenth century. I am searching through these readings for more information on the materials the builders would have used and the symbolism and imagery they placed throughout a triumphal arch. Since I learned that similar arches were made of ephemeral materials throughout history, I am inspired to make my arch of similar materials, cardboard, paper, paints and a special material that can be sculpted like clay.  

Cooking for Camden is a relatively new student organization dedicated toward connecting students with food service opportunities, which help give back to the city. Over the last year since our induction as an official student organization at Rutgers–Camden, we have had an extreme increase in membership and continual member involvement in the organization. This can primarily be attributed towards two main factors: a strong social media campaign/presence and more encouragement of creativity when it comes to desserts. Our Social Media Officer and Vice President made possible this continued involvement through the use of colors, which both invoke service and the school, as well as regular uploads to our Instagram account and Engage Page, being regularly seen by currently involved students and potential new recruits, both of which feature the use of an overall friendly and approachable tone in their respective promotional materials which encourage an open and safe environment. The aim of this part of the project is to review what exactly has made this level of success possible for this organization through the examination of direct statistics of meeting attendance compared to the frequency of uploads to either one of those sources so that other groups might be able to understand and replicate its success. Additionally, given our more recent application for the XLR8 Grant through DICE, Cooking For Camden has begun to provision more funding towards the purchase of ingredients for a greater dessert variety, which has benefited both our guests, for the need of both variety and more fresh-baked desserts which boost morale, and our members, especially new ones, who have the ambition to plan and make them. This has increased both guest satisfaction and happiness as well as active new-member involvement and retention over time. The aim of this part of the project, dually, is to illuminate how allowing some degree of autonomy, in the form of dessert baking, can impact both of the above metrics. 

In the spring of 2025, a peer team of interdisciplinary consultants at the Rutgers–Camden Writing and Design Lab worked together to create The Writing Center Handbook. The goal of this handbook was to serve as a guide of seven chapters to allow consultants to have on-demand access to advice regarding real-time consultation issues. The aim of this research project is to determine the effectiveness of the current handbook while also assessing what the handbook may be lacking.  

Since the writing of the initial draft of the handbook, the Writing and Design Lab has onboarded new consultants, each in different disciplines. At the same time, the lab offers services to an interdisciplinary population. The intersection of these ideas means that the current draft of the handbook may not reflect all needs of all tutors.  

Through empirical research, the handbook is able to both be assessed for effectiveness in its current use and to find opportunities for new chapters to supplement what has been written. This research serves as a basis for what new chapters have been written and how they will aid any and all consultants who may need them. This also leaves room for more updates and newer chapters, as the handbook may still only benefit certain tutors at certain times.  

In updating The Writing Center Handbook, its main goal remains, which is to serve as a tool for consultants on an as-needed basis. Through the continuation of this project, it is clear that the handbook is an ever-expanding project, with constant opportunities for future revisions.

Camden, New Jersey, experiences significant oral health disparities driven by high poverty rates, limited access to affordable dental care, and a lack of preventive oral health education. These challenges disproportionately affect children and underserved families, leading to high rates of untreated cavities, gum disease, and oral pain. The closure of Cathedral Kitchen’s free dental clinic further intensified this gap in community-based oral health resources. Smiles for Camden was developed to address this unmet need through a preventive, education-focused, and community-engaged approach.  

The project is a collaborative initiative between Rutgers University students, faculty mentors, and local community partners, including Camden school districts, community organizations, and shelters. Its primary objective is to improve oral hygiene knowledge and daily preventive behaviors among Camden residents. Monthly oral health workshops are delivered to children and adults in community and school-based settings. These workshops include interactive games, hands-on brushing and flossing demonstrations using dental models, education on the relationship between nutrition and oral health, and the distribution of hygiene kits containing toothbrushes, toothpaste, tongue scraper, and floss.  

Rutgers student volunteers receive training to effectively deliver health education and engage community members. The project emphasizes early intervention and consistency, operating under the assumption that education paired with access to oral tools can lead to sustained behavior change and long-term reductions in preventable oral disease.  

Program effectiveness is evaluated using pre- and post-surveys to measure changes in oral health knowledge and self-reported hygiene behaviors. Outcomes include increased understanding of proper brushing and flossing techniques, improved daily oral hygiene practices, and enhanced confidence among Camden residents. 

My research focuses primarily on proofreading and adding context to interview transcripts, while noting down anything I find interesting or inspiring. My ultimate goal is to produce a form of artistic output, either a digital mural or ceramic piece. The themes I find most intriguing and inspiring for my project are childhood, movement, education, the history of Camden, and community. 

There exist many resources in Camden that specialize in helping underserved individuals and other minority groups. However, information about these resources and how to use them is often hard to find or confusing, especially for people without internet access. The article “No Digital Divide? Technology Use among Homeless Adults,” published in the National Library of Medicine, argues that technology can help bridge gaps for homeless individuals, noting that “digital technology may be a feasible means of disseminating health and wellness programs to this at-risk population.” However, the struggles individuals face is a lack of internet or a way to constantly charge their phones to be able to find these resources. We aim to increase residents’ awareness of programs. With a clearer, friendlier resource model for displaying information, which is easier for people to understand and use. In addition to condensing the major services onto the guide, there will be a QR code to myResourcePal.com. This website brings together all the services provided in Camden County, NJ, in one place. As we design the guide and determine what information to include, we are conducting surveys and community outreach, especially through the District Council Collaborative Board. These guides will be placed and installed at familiar, eye-catching book arks around Camden, as well as at local food pantries, community centers, & Civic Scholar Partners across the city. The book arks are maintained by The Free Books Project and distributed around the city, making them excellent locations for creating these resource hubs. 

Kansas City is typically excluded from the list of cities that come to mind when thinking of high points of American culture. However, Kansas City reached its zenith in the mid- twentieth century as a crossroads of American culture, in particular, that of Black cultural identity and transforming civic identities. Kansas City is known as one of the earliest homes of Black American Music, in particular, Jazz. Musicians such as Count Basie and Bennie Moten ensured that Kansas City’s vibrant jazz scene would leave a mark on the city’s history. But just a block away from KC’s 18th & Vine nieghborhood on The Paseo, Andrew “Rube’ Goldberg was finalizing the agreement that would launch the ‘NNL,’ the National Negro Leagues. Soon after, Kansas City’s Negro Leagues team, The Monarchs, would find a home at Muelenbach Field.  

Many African American Kansas Citians would spend the afternoon at a Monarchs game and nighttime at the jazz clubs, rubbing shoulders with ball players and musicians along the way. At the crux of America’s two great past times, baseball and jazz, Kansas City’s segregated landscape allowed for innovations in both fields that challenged the United States’ national conception of who it was. This paper asks how Kansas City’s Negro Leagues athletes and jazz musicians co- constructed a shared identity of resistance, mobility, and autonomy within mid-century Kansas City. While historians have studied both the significance of Negro Leagues baseball and the development of Kansas City jazz, social relationships between musicians and athletes, as well as their cultural impacts remain under-researched.  

This paper argues that the intersection of baseball and music in segregated Kansas City was crucial in the formation of that city’s identity as a black economic powerhouse. Drawing on archival research, oral history interviews, baseball statistics, and performance bills, this study analyzes the reciprocal nature of a distinct local culture built around baseball. More broadly, this paper contributes to understandings of the importance of the arts in communities during the Jim Crow era by tying them to the very fabric of the culture, particularly in cities whose cultural identities centered around Negro Leagues baseball. 

In recent years, we have seen an increasing integration of algorithmic systems into public decision-making, which has fundamentally reshaped the dynamics of governance, justice, and democratic accountability. What once seemed like a distant technological innovation is now a present-day reality, embedded in sentencing decisions, predictive policing, welfare administration, hiring practices, credit scoring, and broader policymaking infrastructures across the world. These systems promote efficiency, objectivity, and promise data-driven precision, but their increasing influence also raises a central and urgent question: Can algorithms commit injustice? This research will take into account that while algorithms are not moral agents in the philosophical sense, they have the ability to produce, reproduce, and legitimize injustices through their design and implementation. This paper situates algorithmic injustice at the intersection of technology, public policy, and democratic theory, proposing that algorithms can commit injustice not because they intend harm, but because they operationalize biased data, opaque logic, and unequal power structures into decisions that materially affect lives.

At the center of this question is the criminal justice system, one of the earliest and most consequential adopters of algorithmic decision tools. Risk assessment instruments such as the COMPAS algorithm, which are frequently used to predict the likelihood of recidivism, influence bail, sentencing, and parole outcomes. Despite claims of neutrality, ProPublica’s 2016 and later analyses provide evidence that COMPAS systematically overestimates the recidivism risk of Black defendants while underestimating that of white defendants with comparable criminal histories. The implications of such disparities are profound. The use of AI tools like COMPAS in policy-making presents a complex interplay between the potential for increased efficiency and the risk of undermining democratic principles. This research will draw on findings from the Partnership on AI (2021), which concludes that risk assessment tools suffer from severe validity, transparency, and governance problems, making them unreliable for detention decisions without extensive oversight. These systemic defects reveal that algorithmic outputs are only as fair as the data and assumptions embedded within them, which can be easily manipulated.

Another focal point of this research is predictive policing, especially tools like PredPol (now Geolitica), which claim to forecast future crime hotspots using historical crime data. Scholars such as Kristian Lum and William Isaac demonstrate that these technologies often deepen existing policing inequities by recycling biased data into feedback loops. When police disproportionately patrol minority neighborhoods, more arrests occur in those neighborhoods, generating data that reinforces the appearance of “high crime” areas, thereby justifying continued surveillance. This cycle transforms predictive policing into a self-fulfilling prophecy that legitimizes over-policing under the guise of algorithmic objectivity. Consequently, algorithms are not only capable of reflecting existing biases, but they can also institutionalize and magnify them in ways that can be more persistent than human decision-making.

Beyond criminal justice, this research examines broader policymaking contexts—welfare eligibility systems, immigration risk scoring tools, housing discrimination in automated valuations, hiring algorithms, facial recognition technologies, and credit scoring—each of which carries its own domain-specific risks of producing injustice. From Amazon’s hiring algorithm that demoted applicants with indicators of being female, to facial recognition systems misidentifying Black individuals at far higher rates than white individuals, the evidence consistently demonstrates that algorithmic systems often extend existing hierarchies of privilege and disadvantage. These systems do not merely “mirror” society but actively reshape outcomes in ways that worsen inequality and diminish access to opportunities for already marginalized groups.

Yet this research also acknowledges the potential for algorithms to mitigate injustice when designed and governed responsibly. Scholars like Mirko Bagaric have argued that transparent AI systems could reduce the human biases that currently plague judicial processes. Unlike humans, algorithms can be audited, standardized, and refined. If constructed with fairness constraints, active human input, and democratic oversight, they could theoretically produce more equitable outcomes than inconsistent human decision-makers. This research, therefore, does not reject algorithmic governance outright; rather, it argues that realizing its potential requires confronting the deep structural limitations.

To address these concerns, the paper will primarily look into the following:

1. Examining how biased data, historical discrimination, and unequal social structures shape algorithmic outputs.

2. Evaluating explainability and the governance structures surrounding algorithmic decision-making.

3. Assessing whether systems uphold principles of fairness, due process, and public accountability.

My research study focuses on students with disabilities at Rutgers–Camden who play video games. The research relies on interviews and focus groups to ask questions about students’ personal backgrounds and their experiences in digital spaces. We are exploring how students define disability and how these definitions shape their sense of self and, in turn, how they participate in video game cultures. In what ways, whether positive or negative, do diverse constructions of disability shape participation in digital worlds? We aim to collect data to better understand the barriers students encounter in gaming, as well as the possibilities afforded by different conceptions of disability. Our goal is to better understand the challenges and opportunities students with disabilities face in digital spaces and how these experiences shape their social and personal lives. The findings from this study aim to support efforts to improve accessibility, inclusion, and community support within gaming environments for students with disabilities. This presentation will cover the preliminary results of our research. 

Background: Adults who are incarcerated are disproportionately affected by alcohol use disorder (AUD) and the risk factors for AUD such as adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and intimate partner violence (IPV). Little is known about sex/gender differences in the associations between ACEs or IPV with past-year AUD in this population. This study examined sex/gender differences in the associations between types of ACEs (i.e., child abuse, child neglect, and child household dysfunction) and IPV with past-year AUD among adults who participated in a national study and reported a lifetime history of incarceration (N=3,232; 866 females, 2,366 males). Methods: Past-year AUD was assessed according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-IV. Logistic regression tested the main effects of child abuse, child neglect, child household dysfunction, IPV, and sex/gender on past-year AUD as well as the child abuse-sex/gender, child neglect-sex/gender, child household dysfunction-sex/gender, and IPV-sex/gender interactions while controlling for age, education, and race/ethnicity. Results: The associations between child abuse, child neglect and IPV on past-year AUD significantly differed by sex/gender. Specifically, child abuse was associated with significantly greater odds of past-year AUD for females (AOR=1.61) but not associated greater odds of past-year AUD for males. Child neglect was associated with significantly lower odds of past-year AUD among females (AOR=0.56) but not associated with statistically greater odds of past-year AUD for males. Finally, IPV was associated with significantly greater odds of past-year AUD for males (AOR=1.71), but not females. 

Discussion: Findings address gaps in the extant literature and warrant replication to inform related interventions. 

Stress-related mental health disorders like depression and anxiety affect millions in the United States alone. The treatments that are on the market currently are associated with negative side effects and are not always effective for each individual. Therefore, there is a need to develop novel treatments for stress-related disorders. We previously found that sphingosine-1-phosphate receptor 3 (S1PR3) promotes resilience to stress by mitigating stress-induced inflammation. We recently found that treating mice with an S1PR3 agonist increases sociability, an anxiogenic-like behavior. However, the effects of S1PR3 on the activity of excitatory or inhibitory neurons in stress-related brain regions is not known. Here, we quantified the number of cells immunoreactive for the neuronal activity marker c-Fos in the hippocampus, a brain region important for depression- and anxiety-like behavior. Mice were treated with an S1PR3 agonist, and brain tissue was collected and sectioned. The expression of c-Fos in both neuronal groups was observed and quantified with the Leica DMi8 Fluorescent Microscope. We are assessing neuronal activity marker expression in inhibitory and excitatory neurons in the hippocampus. We hypothesize that S1PR3 activation reduces c-Fos in excitatory neurons in the ventral hippocampus, which regulates anxiety-like behavior. Our findings will provide important insights into the mechanisms by which S1PR3 promotes neuronal activity. 

Socioeconomic disadvantage is linked to lower psychological well-being. Yet, not everyone facing economic hardship experiences low well-being. Dispositional mindfulness, characterized by a present-focused awareness with acceptance, is associated with greater life satisfaction, eudaimonic well-being, and lower psychological distress, positioning mindfulness as a stress-buffering resource. Less is known about whether dispositional mindfulness moderates the association between income and psychological well-being.  

In a secondary analysis of U.S. adults (N=390), participants completed an online survey in March 2025 that assessed dispositional levels of mindfulness (Mindful Attention Awareness Scale) and perceived well-being (Psychological Well-Being Scale-18) and reported annual household income (using an ordinal scale from “$0-$9,999” to “$200,000+”). We conducted multiple linear regression analyses in which we tested the relationship between income and well-being, and the potentially moderating role of dispositional mindfulness. We then probed the income x mindfulness interaction using simple slope analyses to examine the association between income and well-being at low (−1 SD), mean, and high (+1 SD) levels of mindfulness.  

The regression model predicting well-being from income, mindfulness, and their interaction was statistically significant (R²=.22, F (3, 385)=35.46, p<.001). Lower income was associated with lower well-being (b = 0.07, p=.007), and higher dispositional mindfulness was associated with greater well-being (b = 0.39, p<.001). The income x mindfulness interaction was significant (b=−0.07, p=.013), such that the association between income and well-being weakened as mindfulness increased. Specifically, at low mindfulness, lower income was significantly associated with lower well-being (b = 0.14, p<.001). At high mindfulness, income was no longer significantly associated with well-being (b = 0.01, p=.87).  

These findings suggest dispositional mindfulness may be a buffer for income-related differences in well-being. Limitations include the cross-sectional, self-report, non-probability sample; future longitudinal and experimental work is needed to clarify causal pathways and core mechanisms of action. 

New advancements in biomaterials have generated a wider field of applications, however the understanding behind how and why these materials perform in a specific way is still being studied. This study aims to create a multilayered, self-healing, human-like “Bio-Skin” by crosslinking porcelain clay, hydroxyethyl cellulose, and glycerol together, therefore producing a flexible film with skin-like qualities that can be shaped into various designs. Bio-skin has the potential to be applied to robotic limbs and faces, or at the interface between human skin and robotic interactions, providing lifelike appearance and enabling natural movements due to its flexibility. The material is also breathable, hygroscopic, and biocompatible, making it similar to human skin, and capable of absorbing and retaining water from the atmosphere, allowing it to have applications in the medical field. Additionally, when exposed to water, the material becomes self-healing being able to repair small cuts and scratches. In this study, the fabrication and performance of the Bio-skin will be investigated with a focus on the flexibility, water retention, thermal properties, and self-healing properties. Different concentrations of clay and glycerol will be used to optimize material properties. To understand how the properties vary with different mixtures, we will perform chemical and material characterization tests, including tensile testing, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray scattering, and FTIR. 

Political memes have gained intense popularity in the past two decades, especially with the expanding capacity of Internet communications and the advent of social media. Scholars of communications, digital studies, and sociology have long emphasized the discursive, participatory, ironic, coalescing, and subsequently radicalizing elements of memes since their onset in the early 2000s. However, political science has not effectively examined this new medium of political communication. This project employs a literature review, survey data, and interviews to ask how political memes shape political opinions. It concludes that memes are uniquely equipped to expose and familiarize users with niche political ideas due to their visual messaging, ironic thematics, and participatory (rather than consumptive) discourse culture. In particular, the findings suggest that memes are powerful in shaping attitudes toward the political economy. Likewise, political memes have proven to serve as a gateway to radicalization, familiarizing users with extremist sentiments in a palatable fashion. Findings also indicate that when coupled with vast political and economic uncertainties, memes prove a powerful tool, offering a sense of community and social stability to a distrustful and civically disengaged population, thereby engendering political expression and civic participation. With this understanding, we may consider the implications of memetic opinion-formation on our political society: posing risks of violence and anti-egalitarian sentiments, while also reflecting the efforts of a generation that is deeply invested in political reimagination. 

Through literature research and a campus-wide survey, we were able to identify a lack of student-led well-being communities rooted in mental health and emotional support for students on campus. Research indicates that poor social integration is among the common reasons why students struggle. (Maunder, 2016) Further, research demonstrates that a foundation of well-being is essential to students thriving both inside and outside of the classroom. Prior studies, including a 2020 peer support initiative at UCF’s School of Medicine (Abrams et al., 2020) found that peer-led support groups reduce stigma and increase students’ confidence in discussing negative emotions.  

With grant funding, we implemented peer-to-peer support groups by forming communities of peers, mentors, and novices connected on shared interests. These groups, working alongside existing student organizations and campus partners, incorporate a structure for community building activities along with wellness check-ins to foster belonging and well-being for students. This initiative creates spaces for students to grow their interests while also strengthening peer connections.  

The campus-wide survey indicated that over 66% of students expressed interest in participation in these peer-to-peer support groups. Initial outcomes reveal improved access to available peer-led communities that support students’ mental health and well-being. This project also serves as a blueprint for the University to further provide for and implement accessible programs that support wellness and inclusivity for all students. 

Understanding how crowds move, respond to stressors, and make collective decisions is central to both psychology and public safety. Mathematical modelling has become a critical tool for studying these processes, but the field has expanded rapidly and across multiple disciplines – including psychology, engineering, computer science, and applied mathematics – making it difficult to see how these areas intersect. To clarify the structure and evolution of this research landscape, we conducted a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of the scientific literature on mathematical modelling of crowd mobility.  

Using publication records from Web of Science, OpenAlex, and Scopus (1990–2024), we extracted metadata, citation networks, and author keywords to map intellectual trends and identify key interdisciplinary linkages. Our analysis shows that mathematical approaches to crowd mobility have become more behaviorally grounded, increasingly data-driven, and more integrative across disciplines. For psychology researchers in particular, this landscape reveals expanding opportunities to connect cognitive and social theories with quantitative models, ultimately improving our understanding of how individual behaviors give rise to emergent crowd dynamics.  

Key research clusters include using developing collision avoidance models for path planning and navigation, Understanding how the Internet Of Things could assist in data curation, and understanding the social forces involved in pedestrian flow and how these forces can be used to increase pedestrian safety. 

When asked to immerse myself in a digital community for research purposes, I could think of no better community than one I’d already observed for nearly a decade. The Phandom is a community that has curated in online spaces over the last 20 years, stemming from the content produced by two internet personalities, Daniel Howell and AmazingPhil. Said community is incredibly diverse, loyal, and has formed its own culture that has shifted repeatedly in its lifespan. This project aims to study the evolution of that culture, with a special focus on identity and authenticity. As a part of the broader lens of Well Played, this project also examines moral and political messaging that exists within the community. My process has mostly been a form of content analysis, in which I watch content produced by YouTubers and take notes on what appealed to the audience, key markers of cultural change, and most importantly the behavior/conduct in the comment sections beneath the videos. This has included use of the WayBack Machine to study the community’s culture in its infancy, due to a spike in engagement in the mid-2010s throwing off the ability to study early comments. This has also naturally included a periodization to categorize different eras of the community, resulting in a timeline to map key events and their associated cultural shifts, which led to my observation of the aforementioned engagement spike. I found a strong parasocial culture within the community, but it has evolved over time towards more respect for the content creators as individuals and firm boundaries set and upheld by both them and the community. 

Across three studies, we looked at how one’s own gender can affect preferences for humor based on who produced it.  

In the first study (N = 600), we examined people’s preferences for male or female professional comedians. Men and women demonstrated an overwhelming preference for male comedians (males: 355/367; females: 382/440, χ2(1) = 23.58, p <.0001, φc = 0.18). So, we decided to replicate these initial results by including a secondary list of comedians with an equal number of male and female comedians on the list. This accounted for the possibility of the effect in study one being due to base rate differences in the number of male versus female comedians. In this study, we asked 575 people (354 Women, 221 Men) to choose their favorite comedian from a list. A substantial majority (78%; 169/214) of men selected a male comedian as their favorite (Figure 2, right bars). As in Study 1, the percentage of women selecting a male comedian was smaller (46%, 160/349). In fact, the 95% confidence intervals for women overlap, which suggests that women as an aggregate do not have a clear sex preference. This interaction between the gender of the participant and that of the comedian was significant χ2(1) = 58.58, p <.0001, φc = 0.32.  

In a third study, we examined whether people choosing people they know in their real life were funnier if they were men or women. In this study people were asked to report the funniest, second, and third funniest people they know. We also asked for their genders. 515 people (300 Women, 215 Men) completed the survey, and their mean age was 32.58 years (range: 18-85, SD = 14.93). Overall, 91% (195/215) of individuals named by men were also men, whereas only 54% (164/300/840) of individuals named by women were men. This was true for funniest, second funniest, and third funniest rankings (see Figure 3). This difference was highly significant χ2(1) = 171.26, p <.0001, φc = 0.33. We discuss this bias toward men being judged as funnier by other men, but a more equitable distribution of preferences among women. 

The Junior Civic Scholars (JCS XLR8) project addresses critical educational gaps in Camden, New Jersey, by delivering civic, financial, and AI literacy to 40–50 low-income, predominantly Hispanic youth (grades 3–12). Partnering Rutgers–Camden Bonner Civic Scholars with community organizations IGNITE, the phased program begins with bilingual parent/guardian workshops to build trust and contextualize local challenges like low graduation rates and systemic underfunding. These sessions use strength-based language, acknowledging diverse family structures while introducing nontraditional literacies.  

Student workshops follow, tailored by age band: younger learners (grades 3–6) explore foundational concepts like needs vs. wants, basic civics, and AI as a “tool rather than a crutch”; older youth (grades 7–12) engage advanced topics including budgeting, credit risks, local governance, AI ethics, bias, privacy, and environmental impacts. Hands-on methods like Kahoot quizzes, mock economies, City Hall field trips, art-infused civics, and student-led projects to prioritize authentic voice over rote learning.  

Rooted in Camden’s realities, JCS XLR8 fills voids left by New Jersey’s non-mandatory K-12 civics curriculum. It fosters critical thinking, informed decision-making, and confident civic participation, creating a sustainable pipeline to Rutgers Bonner programs. By collecting data and stories from this intentional pilot, the initiative scales toward lasting community impact. We want to equip youth to navigate inequities, lead locally, and break cycles of disadvantage.  

The goal is to build something that can last beyond this semester: a Jr. Civic Scholars Lane focused on civic literacy, financial literacy, and AI literacy, rooted in Camden and our existing partners (IGNITE, LUCY, RARA, etc.). The idea is to start small and intentional now, collect data and stories, and then grow it out over time. 

Our lab is investigating the use of polymersomes as vehicles for controlled drug delivery. Polymersomes are synthetic vesicles composed of diblock copolymers that form a bilayer membrane with a hydrophobic region and an aqueous lumen. This structure allows hydrophobic substances to be embedded in the membrane while hydrophilic cargo can be encapsulated in the core. Previous work has shown that incorporating gold nanoparticles into the membrane renders the polymersomes light-responsive, meaning they rupture and release their cargo in response to pulsed laser irradiation. However, it has been challenging to accurately quantify the amount of cargo both encapsulated and released due to light absorption by the gold nanoparticles as well as scattering from the vesicles. To address this challenge, we are developing multiple quantification strategies. First, a subtraction assay separates unencapsulated cargo from vesicles formed during self-assembly, allowing the free cargo to be measured. Second, fluorescent cargo is quantified directly within the vesicles. Third, short path-length cuvettes are used with UV/Vis spectroscopy to reduce scattering effects and reveal absorbance features. The combination of these methods will allow accurate quantification of cargo encapsulation and release in light-responsive polymersomes. 

Signal Detection Theory, hereafter SDT, has proven to be a successful explanation for several observed regularities in the experimental data. However, the skeptical reader might note that the classic results analyze data that have been averaged across trials. We had difficulty locating publicly available trial-level datasets. We design two experiments where participants engage in a binary judgment task and strive to indicate the longer of the lines. In every trial, there is a line on the left of the screen and another on the right. In one between-subject treatment, the longer line is on the left with probability 0.8 and in the other treatment the longer line is on right with probability 0.8. SDT clearly predicts that participants will learn the distribution and incorporate this information to improve their judgments. Specifically, SDT predicts that the longer-left treatment participants will have a bias toward lines on the left and the longer-right participants will have a bias toward the right. However, we do not find evidence of this in our learning-by-experience experiment. To our surprise, the literature contains results analogous to ours (Parducci & Sandusky, 1965, 1970; Tanner, Haller, & Atkinson, 1967). In our learning-by-description experiment, we find that aggregate behavior is consistent with SDT. However, the effect increases across trials, despite that no information is being learned. We hope that our results prompt renewed attention toward these apparently still-unresolved problems with SDT and that researchers consider the dynamic effects in their data. 

The 2026 STEM Olympiads Competition is an experiential learning initiative designed to increase STEM confidence, engagement, and identity among students from RU IGNITE in Camden. Led by the student organization RUC STEM Olympiads, this event builds upon three years of successfully implemented collegiate STEM competitions and adapts the model to meet the developmental and motivational needs of younger learners. The initiative addresses a persistent challenge in STEM education: students often disengage due to limited access to interdisciplinary, hands-on learning environments that foster belonging and self-efficacy.  

The event will bring RU IGNITE students to the Rutgers–Camden Campus Center for a themed STEM competition. Participants will work in teams of three to four and rotate through structured challenges on Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Mathematics, Computer Science, and Psychology. Each activity will emphasize applied problem-solving, collaboration, and critical thinking while being facilitated by undergraduate volunteers.  

The theory of change guiding this initiative is that immersive, team-based STEM engagement will increase students’ confidence and likelihood of future participation in STEM coursework and programs. Impact will be assessed through post-event surveys measuring STEM self-efficacy, sense of belonging, and interest in pursuing further STEM opportunities. Target outcomes include participants reporting increased STEM confidence, greater likelihood of pursuing STEM, and stronger connection to the STEM community.  

With a projected budget of $1,250 allocated to supplies, food, decorations, and prizes, the competition is designed to be scalable and sustainable. This initiative aims not only to promote STEM learning, but to cultivate lasting academic identity and community belonging. 

Background: Little is known about sex/gender differences in the associations between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), racial discrimination, and alcohol use disorder (AUD) among Asian adults. This study examined sex/gender differences in the associations between types of ACEs and racial discrimination with lifetime AUD among Asian adults. Methods: This secondary data-analytic study examined participants in a national study who identified as Asian (N=1706; 808 male and 898 female). The following types of ACEs were included: child abuse (psychological, physical, or sexual), child neglect (emotional or physical), household dysfunction (mother treated violently, household mental illness, household substance abuse, household incarceration), and lifetime racial discrimination. AUD was assessed according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5). Logistic regression tested the main effects of child abuse, child neglect, household dysfunction, racial discrimination, and sex/gender, as well as interactive effects of ACEs and racial discrimination with sex/gender, controlling for age and education. Results: The average age of participants was 43 years, and most (89%) had at least a high school education. Significant sex/gender differences were observed in the associations between child abuse and household dysfunction with lifetime AUD, but not child neglect or racial discrimination. Specifically, child abuse was associated with greater odds of AUD for females (AOR=4.39, 95% CI=2.20–8.77, p<.001), but not males. Child household dysfunction was associated with greater odds of AUD for males (AOR=3.32, 95% CI=1.90–5.80, p<.001), but not females. 

Discussion: Findings highlight meaningful sex/gender differences in adversity-related risk for AUD and underscore the importance of gender-informed approaches to prevention and intervention among Asian adults. 

Melanoma affects more than 100,000 people in the United States each year and remains a leading cause of skin cancer related mortality, with patient outcomes closely linked to early immune recognition and effective T-cell activity within the skin. The melanoma antigen MART-1 is widely expressed in normal melanocytes and primary tumors and has been studied as a target for CD8+ and CD4+ T-cell responses in vaccine platforms, though clinical responses to MART-1 based vaccination have been limited. DNA vaccination uses plasmid DNA delivered intramuscularly by electroporation so that host cells express and present antigen, driving robust antigen specific T-cell responses. Molecular adjuvants are additional encoded factors co-delivered in the vaccine to increase immunogenicity. Cutaneous T-cell attracting chemokine (CTACK/CCL27) is produced by keratinocytes, binds CCR10 on lymphocytes, and supports T-cell homing to the skin. We have recently reported that DNAencoded CTACK enhances trafficking of antigen-specific lymphocytes to epithelial and mucosal surfaces, providing 100% protection in a SARS-CoV2 challenge model. We hypothesize that codelivery of DNA-encoded CTACK and MART-1 antigen will  enhance immunogenicity and improve the cutaneous localization of MART-1 specific T-cells. Previously, we immunized wild-type mice with plasmid-encoded mouse (pMuMART1), human (pHuMART1), or synthetic consensus (pSynConMART1) MART1 immunogens and observed MART-1 specific IFNγ secreting T cells in spleens.

Quantum mechanical surface effects are usually ignored in numerical simulation of electromagnetic phenomena. We applied a recently developed method to simulate the characteristic electrodynamic resonances of nanometer sized metallic spheres and showed that quantum mechanical surface plasmonic effects can be successfully produced within a classical electrodynamics calculation scheme, exactly to the first order and efficiently. 

Background: Hispanics are disproportionately affected by risk factors for mood disorders including discrimination and intimate partner violence (IPV). However, it is unclear whether associations between discrimination and IPV with mood disorder vary by nativity. This study examined whether nativity moderated associations between ethnic discrimination and IPV with past-year mood disorder among Hispanic adults. 

Methods: Data were used from participants in a national study who identified as Hispanic (N=6,296; 2,694 male, 3602 female). Gender-stratified logistic regression tested the main effects of racial discrimination, IPV, and nativity on past-year mood disorder along with the racial discrimination-nativity and IPV-nativity interactions while controlling for age and education. 

Results: Ethnic discrimination was associated with significantly greater odds of AUD among Hispanic females born outside the United States (AOR=3.67) than those born in the U.S. (AOR=1.91). IPV was associated with significantly higher odds of AUD among Hispanic males born outside the U.S. (AOR=2.92) than those born in the U.S. (AOR=2.04). 

Discussion: The findings suggest that the modifying effects of nativity on the associations between racial discrimination and IPV with AUD differ by gender among Hispanic adults. Future research is needed to replicate these findings to better understand the epidemiology of mood disorders among Hispanic adults. 

This project is divided into two parts: historical research and chemistry. The historical research explores the cultural world of the Edo period (1603-1868) and examines how the classic novel, The Tale of Genji, was reimagined in the 19th century as A Rustic Genji, a parody of the original narrative that made a huge cultural impact on the Edo people. The novel featured illustrations by the renowned artist Utagawa Kunisada, who later created ukiyo-e woodblock prints depicting scenes from the story. The particular Kunisada print selected for this project, Scene from the Story of Cherry Blossoms on Higashiyama, depicts a Kabuki theater adaptation of A Rustic Genji which highlights the actor Iwai Hanshirō VIII. This research also examines the complex history of the usage of red pigments in Edo, Japan, and considers the history of a red pigment called Japanese Madder (also known as Akane). Madder was one of the first pigments used in early woodblock prints, and sources reveal that madder was in fact present in other Kunisada prints. The project then focuses on the chemical composition of selected red pigments from the print through the application of non-invasive, External Reflectance Fourier-transform infrared (ER-FTIR) spectroscopy. This analytical technique was selected for its ability to yield detailed molecular information while avoiding physical contact with the delicate surface of the print. Reference materials were prepared from madder roots using several methods in order to compare with the possible pigments on the print. Varying pH conditions are related to the color and composition of the madder pigments. Chemistry research focuses on identifying both organic and inorganic compounds characteristic of nineteenth-century Japanese woodblock printing. Overall, this research demonstrates the complexity of this print through its historical context, cultural influences, and chemical variation. 

Categories systematically influence how individuals estimate and remember stimulus magnitudes. When stimuli vary along a quantitative dimension, small members of a category are typically overestimated, whereas large members are underestimated. Huttenlocher et al. (2000) proposed the Category Adjustment Model (CAM), a Bayesian account suggesting that individuals combine a noisy fine-grain memory trace with category-level knowledge (i.e., learned distributional information). This integration produces responses biased toward the category’s central tendency and can reduce overall mean squared error.  

Most prior tests of the CAM have used symmetric stimulus distributions (e.g., uniform or normal). The present study examined whether category-based distortions depend on the underlying frequency distribution by using U-shaped, V-shaped, positively skewed, and negatively skewed distributions. Eighty participants (20 per condition) viewed line lengths and reproduced them after a delay.  

Multiple regression analyses with dummy-coded conditions and polynomial regressions of bias curves indicated that over- and underestimation patterns did not significantly differ across distribution types (all p’s > .05). However, variability differed by distribution: standard deviations were lower for more normal-looking distributions and higher for bimodal distributions (p’s < .01).  

These findings contrast with predictions derived from the CAM, which assumes sensitivity to distributional frequency structure. If participants encoded detailed distributional information, asymmetric and irregular distributions should have produced distinct bias magnitudes or directions. Instead, bias patterns were robust across conditions.  

One interpretation is that participants in an unincentivized task may not have encoded distributional structure in detail. Alternatively, category effects may rely less on fine-grained statistical knowledge and more on broader perceptual boundaries (e.g., inferred minimum and maximum values). If so, category-based distortions may reflect simplified heuristics rather than Bayesian integration of full distributional information, suggesting important boundary conditions for the CAM.  

Huttenlocher, J., Hedges, L. V., & Vevea, J. L. (2000). Why do categories affect stimulus judgment? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 129(2), 220–241. 

Religiosity is a source of strength in Latinx immigrant communities, where it provides social support, moral guidance, and meaning-making in the face of immigration-related stressors and acculturative stress (Gonzalez, 2018). Research suggests that religiosity functions as a protective factor against adverse mental health outcomes, including substance use (McGovern & McMahon, 2006); however, this relationship varies depending on mental health outcomes (e.g., depression and anxiety) and attitudes toward help-seeking. This study, therefore, examined the associations between religiosity and substance use among 159 Latinx immigrants from Richmond, Virginia. We also examined whether depression, anxiety, and help-seeking attitudes moderated this relationship. Results indicated that religiosity was negatively associated with substance use (r = -.234, p = .003). Results also revealed a significant interaction between religiosity and depressive symptoms in predicting substance use (B = -.006, p = .026), such that religiosity was associated with lower substance use among individuals reporting elevated depressive symptoms. A significant interaction also emerged between religiosity and help-seeking attitudes in predicting substance use (B = .004, p = .045), indicating that religiosity was more strongly associated with lower substance use among individuals with less favorable attitudes toward professional help-seeking. Religiosity did not interact with anxiety in predicting substance use (B = .003, p =.356). Findings highlight the protective role of religiosity for substance use, especially for those Latinx immigrants reporting elevated depression and those with less favorable help-seeking attitudes. 

Our research begins 3,000 years ago with the discovery of neolithic clay figurines from Crete, a small island off Greece. These figurines are believed to be made by children due to their small size and their association with domestic, and not religious, contexts. Found on the figurines are remnants of fingerprints, also known as friction ridge detail. This detail led us to several articles in which previous researchers claim to be able to determine the age of the fingerprint owner by measuring the distance between ridges. In order to test this and determine if age can be identified by measuring fingerprints, we utilized an experimental archaeology approach. We prepared a lesson on archaeology for elementary students ranging from 5-11 years of age. They were given a short lecture about the typical day of a child in Ancient Greece to provide them with a better understanding of Crete and the similarities between children from the modern and ancient world. After the slide show, students were given two small pieces of clay and asked to make one small figurine and a “token”. The figurines they created allowed us to observe the sorts of imagery the students were inclined to make, as well as where friction ridge detail was most prominently left on the objects. The “token,” made from a ball of clay and an indent of their right thumb, was done to create a “control” fingerprint, which would then be used for measuring and age determination. We found that the younger group of children made smaller, more detailed figurines, while the older children made larger, bulkier figures. Showing the children how to make the tokens and figurines was a learning experience: we found that more adult supervisors at the tables helped the children follow instructions better, which led to better outcomes. Overall, the figurines produced by this group of children were much larger and less sophisticated than the figurines from ancient Crete, suggesting that the ancient makers possibly had better fine motor skills. We are replicating this exact study in Greece throughout the month of March, hoping to gather more accurate results from children with a closer genetic makeup to those from Ancient Crete. Measurements of the friction ridges will be taken for the next phase of this project. 

The AI & Human Rights Index is a global research collaborative focused on how artificial intelligence (AI) can violate or advance human rights. Editors from three continents are working with contributors from around the world to develop this comprehensive legal framework, which will serve as guiding principles for evaluating AI’s impact on human rights across societal sectors. The Index maps AI’s influence on international laws and instruments, ensuring accountability for safeguarding rights throughout AI’s lifecycle. This work emphasizes harm prevention (nonmaleficence) and measurable good outcomes (beneficence), holding societal sectors accountable for ensuring AI benefits humanity and the environment. Ultimately, the Index fosters technical, cultural, and legal literacy about how AI intersects with human rights through multimedia encyclopedia entries accessible to the public. This makes way for the Bellagio Protocol, a proposed technical taxonomy combining the existing Ontology Web Language (OWL) and Simple Knowledge Organization Systems (SKOS) to directly train AI models. In advancing this mission, the Index is organized around the following research questions: Which specific human rights are most at risk, and which ones could AI benefit? What cultural contexts and regional approaches to human rights are used to interpret these risks? What ethics and guiding principles help create responsible AI? How do these principles intersect with laws and professional codes of practice across industries? What international laws and frameworks can be used to assess AI’s impact on human rights at every stage of its lifecycle, from development and deployment to monitoring? Which sectors of society, across all cultures, are responsible for ensuring that AI systems protect and promote human rights? In answering these questions, the Index establishes a structured, interdisciplinary framework for assessing and guiding AI in accordance with international human rights standards. 

Imposter syndrome refers to a persistent feeling of self-doubt and the belief that one’s achievements are undeserved, despite everything else that would say otherwise (Dueñas, 2021). This experience is common among college students, but especially pronounced among Latinx/Latin students due to underrepresentation, first-generation college status, and attendance at Predominantly White Institutions (Wright-Mair, Ramos & Passano, 2023). These factors can intensify feelings of not belonging and contribute to negative mental health outcomes (Mendoza, 2023).  

This study explores how Latinx college students experience imposter syndrome and identifies institutional, social, and cultural factors that contribute to these feelings. Using a survey-based approach, the study examines the relationship between self-doubt and academic efficacy, as well as students’ perceptions of variables that may play a role in developing imposter syndrome, such as the institutional climate towards diversity and inclusion, their own experiences of underrepresentation and bias, and family expectations. It also explores how all these factors may impact students’ psychological well-being and their sense of belonging. The survey implemented to gather the data included 27 items in the form of Likert-scale ratings and yes/no questions, and was distributed among self-identified Latinx undergraduate students of diverse genders and majors, including first-generation students and continuing students across many academic years enrolled in different universities in NJ, but primarily Rutgers–Camden. While data collection is still ongoing, we predict that imposter syndrome will likely affect Latinx students beyond their individual self-perception, highlighting the role of structural and cultural factors that come with being college students. It is proposed that this study will highlight the importance of moving away from a narrative focused on individuals’ “deficits” and acknowledging the institutional responsibility that higher education institutions have in supporting Latinx students’ mental health, their sense of belonging, and academic persistence. 

Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that is characterized by the accumulation of toxic amyloid beta plaques. This leads to neuronal communication disruptions, neuronal death, and cognitive decline that effects 7.5 million people aged 65 and older and is the sixth leading cause of death in the united states, and mortality rates have increased from 142% from 2000 to 2022. Without major breakthroughs, the number of Americans living with Alzheimer’s disease is projected to reach over 13 million by 2050. A key challenge with Alzheimer’s research is that symptomology only occurs once significant neurodegeneration has occurred. This means that we need to find novel ways of identifying this disorder early. Clinical evidence suggests that flicker fusion frequency (FFF) changes in Alzheimer’s disease patients earlier then other behavioral symptoms. FFF is the frequency at which flickering light is perceived as continuous, and is used to assess temporal vision processing, and visual symptoms have been documented in Alzheimer’s disease patients. However, these symptoms have been observed in later stages of Alzheimer’s disease and cognitive decline is already occurring. The overall mechanisms of these visual symptoms are not well understood, specifically the degradation of temporal cognitive processing. To address this gap, we adopted a well established Alzheimer’s model of Drosophila using the Gal4-UAS system to drive expression of APP and/or Abeta, the pathological portion of APP, in either neurons or photoreceptors of Drosophila. We hypothesize that expression only in photoreceptors will be sufficient to cause changes to FFF that is seen in the pan-neuronal expression of APP and/or Abeta. To confirm the successful development of these flies, we will validate offspring with the negative geotaxis assay, the photosensitivity assay, and a learning and memory assay. Once this has been confirmed, we will then use a Extracellular Electrophysiology Recording System to measure electroretinograms within the eyes of these drosophila lines to assess levels of impairment to FFF. We will then also modulate the temperature of these genetic lines to modify the GAL4 expression to induce greater symptomology in the Drosophila. Following this study, we will further characterize the FFF mechanisms within the photoceptors and identify mechanisms to identify Alzheimer’s well before learning and memory deficits occur. 

Offshore wind energy holds enormous potential for harvesting electrical energy by placing wind turbines off coastal waters. Various countries have increased their supply of green energy significantly by installing wind farms off the ocean, where reliable winds consistently prevail without the limitations of terrestrial wind farms, such as location near populated areas or sound pollution. Yet offshore wind frequently faces enormous pushback and resistance from communities near the shoreline, where they are perceived as unsightly, invasive, and dangerous. One such location where controversy arose from 2020-2024 (at which point the Trump administration cancelled all offshore wind projects) was off the coast of New Jersey, where there were plans to install almost 500 wind turbines in the Atlantic coast. Before this cancellation we conducted a survey of over 400 residents of New Jersey, measuring their opinions and beliefs regarding wind energy in a new survey instrument we developed measuring three factors of offshore wind energy support: based on environmental, economic, and ecological issues, and their correlations with several measures of environmental concerns (Schultz, et al., 2001; Dunlap, 2004). We also measured the big 5 personality traits and recorded demographic data such as people’s housing in proximity to the shore and frequency of visiting the shore. We found that proximity and frequency to the shore was negatively correlated with support for OSW, a positive association between openness to new experience and conscientious with support for OSW, and the strongest correlations with environmental measures were with the environmental and ecological subscales of the OSW scale but not the economic scale. In this poster we plan to discuss these interrelationships and other weaker associations that arose in the data. Even though there are no current plans to expand OSW in New Jersey due to federal restrictions, these data may at a future point provide data and guidance for future installations in New Jersey as well in other locations in the world. 

Morphological diversity is found across the animal kingdom, even in closely related species, like the Drosophila clade. However, mechanisms underlying this morphological diversity are poorly understood. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) signaling controls posterior patterning of the Drosophila melanogaster egg chamber in oogenesis. One downstream target of this pathway is Midline (Mid). Previous work has shown changes in EGFR expression patterns are linked to morphological diversity in eggshell structure, including the dorsal ridge, across Drosophila species. However, no studies have investigated the expression of this signaling pathway’s downstream targets, like Mid and H15, across multiple species. This raises the question: is the posterior patterning by Mid conserved across different Drosophila species? Another focus of the project deals with enhancers identified for Mid and H15. Enhancers control the precise spatiotemporal expression of genes in development. We hypothesize the life cycle and egg laying of D. melanogaster are negatively impacted by the deletion of the Ventral Leg Enhancer (VLE). Using small molecule inexpensive fluorescence in situ hybridization (smiFISH), we aim to capture expression patterning of Mid and H15 throughout various stages of development across Drosophila species. Consequences of enhancer deletion are analyzed through a life cycle assay in which fitness markers are observed. A smiFISH protocol was established in oogenesis, with some posterior patterns found across species. Having developed a method to follow the life cycle, egg laying and pupation were reduced in enhancer deletion backgrounds, indicating VLE as a positive regulator of fertility and pupation. Future work includes further smiFISH protocol adjustments across species and further analysis of fitness markers impacted by enhancer deletion. 

Michelangelo’s renovation of the New Medici Chapel was left unfinished when he raced out of Florence, and in it was left the statues of Night, Day, Dawn, and Dusk on the floor. When discovered, his apprentice Tribolo mounted and modified the statues, leaving them in the spots where they rest today. Sadly, the true origin and inspiration of these sculptures has been lost to time. This unknown truth has led many scholars to theorize about the truth behind these statues. The main theory that seems to be mentioned is that Michelangelo took his inspiration from Dante Alighieri, one of the most prolific poets of all time and someone Michelangelo looked up to with reverence, and who has been referenced through Michelangelo’s other works, whether it be directly or indirectly through Dante’s characters. While this is a potential theory and has been decided definitively by some people to be the case, there is still the potential of other concepts to be the case. I will also be bringing forward the idea of a potential reference to different depictions of the times of day seen within calendar manuscripts and zodiacal charts used within medieval times, as well as possible Grecian influence. 

Microplastics (MP, plastics <5mm) are emerging contaminants. Studies showing MP found within the human body and in our water sources have raised concerns about the impact of microplastics on human health and the environment. To understand occurrence and removal of microplastics from drinking water in the United States, sampling was performed at multiple water treatment facilities. The objective of this study was to identify microplastics with Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy in the 50-5000 μm range for samples supplied by various water treatment facilities. Sample preparation occurred with modified ASTM D8333 protocols including wet peroxide, cellulose digestion, and enzyme digestion for analysis with attenuated total reflectance (ATR) FTIR. The results obtained demonstrate the identity and size of the microplastics present. Overall, these results can help inform the effectiveness of microplastic removal from drinking water and may inform of opportunities to improve water treatment. 

Facial expressions and the emotions they represent are valuable signals because of their common use by people to convey meaningful information about internal mental states and the environment to others. As such, abstract face processing features (i.e., expressed emotion and social contexts) can provide insight into specific psychological mechanisms, including action and embodied cognition. Embodied cognition is reflected in how we perceive the emotions of others in our environment, as this perception can trigger a corresponding physical response. Within embodied cognition are theories of approach-related emotions (i.e., anger and happiness) and avoidance-related emotions (i.e., fear and disgust). Here, we aim to investigate the link between approach and avoidance emotions and arm movements (flexion and extension) using an emotion categorization task. Participants were presented with facial stimuli representing a given approach or avoidance emotion and followed instructions to move their arm forward (flexion) or backward (extension) across different trials. This manipulation allowed us to test whether the perception of approach-related emotions triggers approach-related actions and whether avoidance-related emotions trigger avoidance-related actions. The results of our study further speak to the viability of theories of embodied cognition during emotion perception, and may open the door for investigating this link in diverse populations, including neurotypically and atypically developing children.