Undergraduate ‘Virus Hunters’ Present Research at Conference
From left: Nashrah Pierre-Louis, Maria Paula Farez Ochoa, Melissa Bell and Dr. Julie Torruellas Garcia
This fall, incoming freshman students had the opportunity to participate in real, hands-on research as part of the new Introduction to Biology Research I course, taught by Dr. Julie Torruellas Garcia, professor in the Department of Biological Sciences in the Halmos College of Arts and Sciences.
A team of 12 undergraduate students have been working on a research project to hunt for new viruses that kill bacteria, known as bacteriophage or phage, to potentially be used as new therapies to treat antibiotic resistant bacterial infections.
The project started with collecting a soil sample in hopes of finding at least one that contained phage. Out of the 32 soil samples collected, phage were discovered in three! Their findings were presented at the Southeastern Branch of the American Society for Microbiology Fall 2021 Virtual Meeting.
Freshman biology major, Nashrah Pierre-Louis, freshman psychology major Melissa Bell, and junior biology major Maria Paula Farez Ochoa gave an oral presentation titled “Phage Hunters: The Discovery of Bacteriophage that infect Gordonia rubripertincta.” Next semester, the students will be continuing their research in the Introduction to Biology Research II course where they will analyze the DNA of the viruses discovered and possibly co-author a scientific paper in a peer-reviewed journal.
Posted 12/12/21