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Team:Penn State/Team
From 2014.igem.org
WELCOME TO PENN STATE iGEM 2014! |
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| Ashlee Smith- Project Lead, Supersenior in Chemical Engineering
Completing Honors Thesis in Chemical Engineering |
Clay Swackhamer- Project Lead, Senior in Biological Engineering
Completing Honors Thesis in Biological Engineering |
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| Ashlee is a supersenior Chemical Engineer in the Schreyer Honors College and is also completing a minor in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. She has worked in the laboratory of Dr. Howard Salis for two years and started her second project in January 2014. In her first project, she determined the ribosome binding footprint of Escherichia coli ribosomes to help improve Dr. Salis' Ribosome Binding Site Calculator. These results will be published in an upcoming paper. During the school year she works as an exam proctor for the Penn State Chemistry Department and is involved in the Penn State Outing Club. She loves to run, hike, bike, backpack, rock climb, ski, and play any outdoor sport. When she isn't in lab, she is most often found adventuring in the woods around Penn State or at Centre County PAWS animal shelter where she leads volunteer shifts and trains dogs. Her plans after graduation in December 2014 are to pursue a career in the pharmaceutical industry. She hopes to move out to California or Colorado and thru-hike the Appalachian Trail after graduation (despite the picture below, she has not yet graduated). | Clay Swackhamer is a senior majoring in Biological Engineering with a bioprocesses option. He is a Schreyer Honors Scholar and is using this codon optimization project as an honors thesis. Clay has been part of the Salis Lab for one year. He serves as a committee chair on Agricultural sciences student council, and is active in tennis club. Clay is minoring in Spanish and will be spending the fall semester taking courses in Alicante, Spain. Clay enjoys baseball, mountain biking, playing tennis, skiing, fishing, grilling food on a charcoal grill, and learning new software. Clay is interested in synthetic biology because of its enormous potential to advance many fields of science. His dream career would be engineering microbes useful for human colonies in space. | |
| Emily Sileo | Sam Krug | |
| Emily is a Junior studying Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. She is also pursuing a minor in Microbiology. iGEM is Emily's first research experience of her undergraduate career, but she hopes to continue working in a lab for her remaining two years. Outside of class Emily is very involved in Penn State's Dance Marathon, known as THON. She has been a part of a committee, helping to run security all of THON weekend, and is also an active member of a TETRA, a special interest THON organization. Emily serves as a leader for the NEXUS club which mentors new and transfer students in the Eberly College of Science at Penn State. When Emily isn't busy with classes or clubs, you can find her downtown at a local dance studio where she continues to pursue her favorite childhood hobby. After graduation, Emily would like to further her education and work in a research lab. She plans to remain in the State College or Greater Pittsburgh area as she considers both of these places home. | Sam is going into his senior year studying Chemical Engineering. Additionally, he is pursuing a minor in music performance and is an active member of the Penn State Clarinet Studio. He continues to develop his academic skills throughout the year by conducting research in the metabolic and genetic engineering lab under the direction of Dr. Howard Salis. He had his first exposure to research last summer and was trained in one of the Four Diamonds Research Labs in Hershey headed by Dr. Sinisa Dovat. This summer, he is a curriculum mentor for Penn State’s Science U, which is a series of camps that members of all different departments of the university have an opportunity to design a weeklong curriculum for grades 2-12 to help inspire lifelong learning. He is currently serving as the Pride Events Director for Penn State Homecoming 2014 and has recently been appointed as the Special Events –Event Management Director for the Special Interest Association for the 2014-2015 school year. Throughout his time at Penn State, he has enjoyed participating in the Symphonic Band, Clarinet Choir, and THON. | |
Team Instructors
| Dr. Howard Salis - Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering and Assistant Professor of Agricultural and Biological Engineering | Dr. Tom Richard - Professor of Agricultural and Biological Engineering; Director of Penn State Institutes for Energy and the Environment |
| Research Area: Synthetic Biology - click here to view his research! | Research Area: Bioenergy and Bioresource Engineering - click here to view his research! |
