News
Oct. 26, 2018
#IAmScience Will Costigan
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC When Will Costigan came to MU he knew he wanted to do research, but wasn’t sure what exactly. Costigan joined Freshman Research in Plant Sciences (FRIPS) the first moment he could his freshman year to explore his research options. “When I started, I didn’t think I was interested in plants very much,” Costigan said. “But after getting some experience working in the lab, I found that plants are more important and complex than I could’ve imagined.” So, he started working in Scott Peck’s lab a year ago, earlier than many of his…
Oct. 19, 2018
#IAmScience Amanda Blythe
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC You could credit a high school career fair to Amanda Blythe’s early success or simply luck. Either way, Blythe was younger than most when her research was first published. “I found a program at Washington University over the summer before my senior year of high school,” Blythe said. “They gave me a research project at the med school focusing on a rare genetic bone disorder. I did a lot of genetic sequencing looking for mutations, which led me to discovering a novel mutation, and we ended up publishing the data. It was…
Oct. 15, 2018
New faculty eager to enhance collaborative mission at Bond LSC
Wes Warren (left), Bing Yang (middle) and Ron Mittler (right) recently joined Bond LSC as primary investigators. | photos by Erica Overfelt and Roger Meissen, Bond LSC By Roger Meissen | Bond LSC Like with any family, a new addition brings possibility and excitement. For Bond LSC, three new faculty promise to enrich research at the University of Missouri by working together across disciplines. Ron Mittler, Wes Warren and Bing Yang all joined Bond LSC recently to continue their research careers. Bond LSC Interim Director Walter Gassmann said these strategic hires are years in the making and represent…
Oct. 12, 2018
#IAmScience Toni Morcos
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC Science and spaghetti are an unlikely combination. For Toni Morcos, this combination led her to research. “Growing up, my dad researched muscular dystrophy and my mom was an OB-GYN,” Morcos said. “Every night, my mom would talk about her surgeries that day then my dad would talk about this gene targeting thing. I would be eight years old, just eating spaghetti wondering what the heck they are talking about. And now I’m here studying biology just to understand and be a part of that dinner table conversation.” Morcos is more than just…
Oct. 4, 2018
#IAmScience Juexin Wang
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC Boring may not be the first word that comes to mind when you think of someone’s research story. But for Juexin Wang, it was a dull job that steered him toward research. “My undergrad was in Beijing, I was studying computer science,” Wang said. “After I finished my undergrad I went to work in the industry for two years as a software engineer, and I realized that work was so boring to me and I wanted to discover something new.” Wang…
Sep. 30, 2018
#IAmScience Ron Mittler
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC Ron Mittler always thought he would be a veterinarian, until he was exposed to the lab. “I went to school to be a vet,” Mittler said. “I made the mistake of working in the lab to make money in the summer and I got hooked on research. I worked with plants and I realized it is the best job to have for me.” That “mistake” has turned into a career of research and teaching in academia. The latest chapter in that journey started in July when Mittler joined Bond LSC as a…
Sep. 24, 2018
MU researchers develop gene therapy vector in quest to conquer devastating childhood disease
For scientists, studying a disease presents a puzzle looking for an answer, but there are real people behind the research that may one day cure the illnesses that turned their lives upside down. Chris Lorson and Monir Shababi work on one of these puzzles in Bond LSC. Find out more about their work and the faces behind SMARD, a rare, often fatal, genetic motor neuron disease in the following story courtesy of the College of Veterinary Medicine. Monir Shababi, an assistant research professor in veterinary pathobiology, and Christian Lorson, Bond LSC principal investigator, College of Veterinary Medicine professor…
Sep. 21, 2018
#IAmScience Wes Warren
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC When you walk into Wes Warren’s office you may notice the Charles Darwin bobble head, or the platypus on the cover of Nature magazine or even the shelf of colorful books in the corner. At every glance, you’ll probably see a picture of a different kind of animal. Animals aren’t just a passion for Warren, they are the target of his research. Over the past 17 years, he has worked with around: 10 mammals, 6 bird species, 10 fish genomes, five different species of Tsetse fly, sand fly, even the common house…
Sep. 14, 2018
#IAmScience Bing Yang
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC Rice ties together much of Bing Yang’s life. From his childhood in China where his father farmed the crop to more than 20 years of research on the staple, it’s more than just food. “Rice by itself is the major crop in the world,” said Yang, one of Bond LSC’s newest researchers. “It provides more than half of the population’s food. Rice is a model crop species and can be used for other crop plants. It can be applicable to other crop species since it is easy to study.” Originally from Southwestern…
Sep. 7, 2018
#IAmScience Brittany Cruzan
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC When Brittany Cruzan does her laundry, she can’t stop thinking about science. “Science controls our everyday life,” Cruzan said. “Coffee, tea, the way you cut your hair, it’s all science. I’ve liked science since I was a kid. I am obsessed with knowing how things work. I don’t care why but I care for how. Cruzan applies that desire to know how things work to work in the lab. From her first semester of freshman year to now as a junior, Cruzan been in Mannie Liscum’s lab chasing the how behind the…
Aug. 31, 2018
#IAmScience Gilberto Perez
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC Research is like a puzzle, and figuring out how the pieces fit together is Gilberto Perez’s favorite part of research. “In research you have to think about the steps,” Perez said. “Most likely, I’m not going to complete the puzzle in my lifetime, but it will help someone else put a piece in it and hopefully, down the road, it will be finished.” Before coming to Mizzou, Perez had mindless jobs in high school and that’s why he likes the idea of a puzzle. He came here unsure of what he wanted…
Aug. 24, 2018
#IAmScience Alex Marx
By Erica Overfelt | Bond LSC Sometimes there’s a deeper meaning behind why we do the things we do. Whether it be what we study, or research, the meaning is always there. Alex Marx always knew he would go into medicine, but didn’t expect to do research. Growing up with two parents who are in health care, and a great grandmother with Alzheimer’s Disease, medicine and certain neurological diseases intrigued Marx. When Marx came to college he became friends with Dr. Setzer, professor in Biological Sciences, who soon introduced him to research and, more specifically, Anand Chandrasekhar’s lab…