News
Aug. 22, 2019
#IAmScience Henry Wan
Henry Wan | Photo by Roger Meissen, Bond LSC By Mariah Cox | Bond LSC Every year we all tend to pay a visit to the doctor to get ahead of cold and flu season. Nothing could be worse than being in the midst of a hectic time at work or school and being out of commission. Many don’t think twice about the annual flu shot, it just becomes a part of their autumnal routine. But for Henry Wan, a new primary investigator in the Bond Life Sciences Center, a significant portion of his life revolves around understanding…
Aug. 16, 2019
Robots and Africa: Tech transfer accelerates data collection
Ke Gao and Sam McInturf reveal Sun Bear to presidents and administrators of UWC and MU. By Mariah Cox | Bond LSC Fourteen days. That’s how long it took Sam McInturf and Ke Gao to put together a root imaging machine named ‘Sun Bear’ at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa this past June. The pair, a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Bond LSC’s David Mendoza and a computer science Ph.D. candidate, brought the automated approach to capturing data on root growth abroad as part of a technology transfer collaboration under…
May 16, 2019
A program that pushes science forward
By Danielle Pycior | Bond LSC It’s the little things we take for granted, and for science experiments, one of those are enzymes. French chemist Anselme Payen discovered the first enzyme, diastase, in 1833, but it wasn’t until 1877 that the word enzyme was used. While it’s a compact name, it’s really a category of proteins produced by living organisms that speed up chemical reactions regardless of whether it’s in the body or the test tube. The way these proteins are folded make their chemical interaction very specific, but when they bind with the right molecules,…
May 16, 2019
Three years in a lab
As Rosenfeld’s students graduate, awards and future plans celebrate excellence Brittney Marshall, a graduating Biological Sciences major, and mentor Cheryl Rosenfeld. Marshall has done undergraduate research in Rosenfeld’s lab for three years. | photo by Roger Meissen, Bond LSC By Mariah Cox | Bond LSC Brittney Marshall, a soon-to-be-graduating senior from MU’s College of Arts and Sciences with a degree in biological sciences, received one of 15 University of Missouri Awards for Academic Distinction as well as the 2019 Outstanding Senior in Biological Sciences Award. Marshall started research three years ago in Bond Life Science Center as a…
May 12, 2019
Understanding a hijacker
Figuring out how a virus takes over cells could help with gene therapy Kinjal Majumder and David Pintel | photo by Roger Meissen, Bond LSC By Mariah Cox | Bond LSC When we catch a cold or contract the flu, we usually attribute it to picking up a virus from a friend or someone we know. Our bodies’ built-up immune systems have a way of attacking viruses to help us stay healthy, but sometimes viruses can hide. A study published in eLife by lead researcher Kinjal Majumder, a postdoctoral fellow in the Bond LSC lab of David Pintel,…
May 3, 2019
#IAmScience Ethan Myers
Ethan Myers is a senior biochemistry major studying oil production in soybeans. | photo by Mariah Cox, Bond LSC By Mariah Cox Preparing home-cooked meals regularly and maintaining houseplants can oftentimes be too time-consuming for stressed-out college students, but not for Ethan Myers. At Myers’ student apartment you can find a bonsai tree and a plethora of herbs such as catnip, basil, mint and even some pepper plants. This love of plants comes from his childhood when he spent his summers helping his grandma plant shrubs, flowers and trees in her garden. Using the herbs she…
April 27, 2019
#IAmScience Chris Pires
By Danielle Pycior | Bond LSC Through Chris Pires’ eyes, science isn’t an unconnected ideology in which scientists hold the proper way of understanding the world, it is an answer-seeking process in which humans strive to understand existence and the things around and within it. “I don’t think science is a thing, it’s a way of thinking” Pires said. “I like to think I live the life of the mind.” As a kid in a rural northern California town, he dreamt of exploring the universe and alien landscapes, but enthusiastically settled for the unobserved below the…
April 25, 2019
DNA Day
A time to celebrate the thing that makes us who we are By Danielle Pycior | Bond LSC In 1865, after a decade long search into patterns of inheritance, Gregor Mendel discovered how individuals receive traits from their parents. Through working with pea plants, he found that genes come in pairs and are inherited as distinct units. He tracked those genes through dominant and recessive traits. Like many vital scientists throughout history, Mendel wasn’t appreciated in his own time due to his unpopular ideas. Now seen as the “father of genetics,” Mendel is recognized as the scientist…
April 24, 2019
Let’s Talk About Fake News
The Science, Health and Environmental Journalism club at MU hosted a fake news panel on April 3. | photo by Mariah Cox, Bond LSC By Mariah Cox What do CBD, climate change, flat earthers, and anti-vaxxers have in common? All are prevalent in the propagation of ‘fake news’ in science. Truthful and accurate reporting is crucial in the field of journalism to create a well-informed society. You may have heard the term ‘fake news’ a time or two, but what does fake news really mean, what does it look like and how does it arise? “It’s…
April 22, 2019
A week in visuals: Missouri Life Sciences Week 2019
Missouri Life Sciences Week 2019 wrapped up on Friday. It brought us a taste of science across our broad research community at Mizzou. From students presenting their hard work in labs to core facilities showing what they do to advance the work of scientists across campus, Bond LSC was bustling with energy. If you missed the action, get a taste of what it all in the photos from the week’s events below. Alexandra Diller Costello explains her research poster Monday morning during the Missouri Life Sciences Week 2019 poster session. | photo by Roger Meissen, Bond LSC…
April 16, 2019
#IAmScience Haritha Dhanikonda
Haritha Dhanikonda is a first-year Ph.D. student studying the evolution of RNA in Donald Burke’s lab. | photo by Mariah Cox, Bond LSC By Mariah Cox There is no shortage of complexities to be solved on Earth, but for Haritha Dhanikonda our discoveries here can be used to further our knowledge of the celestial bodies in the universe. That interest landed her in the lab of Donald Burke in Bond LSC where their RNA work is funded in part by NASA, but her interest beyond this planet started much earlier. From a young age, Dhanikonda was fascinated…
April 11, 2019
The problem with placentas
MU scientists develop model to study complex pregnancy disease Here, stem cells have undergone differentiation. The green shows the hormone used to diagnose pregnancy in humans and the ovals are nuclei, some of which stain a pinkish color, representing the protein GATA2. By Danielle Pycior | Bond LSC Researchers have been exploring the complicated and difficult world of pluripotent stem cells for 15 long years on the second floor of the University of Missouri’s Bond Life Sciences Center. A type of stem cell that can be turned into any cell in the human body and…