Welcome to the RIT College of Science Research Highlights page. The goal of this page is to highlight faculty-student research projects. The two stories below provide examples of the content we will begin updating in early 2012. Please visit again.

Physics

Relativistic Stellar Dynamics

Faculty: David Merritt, Dept. of Physics and CCRG 

Student: Fabio Antonini (AST) Postdocs: Eugene Vasiliev, Alessia Gualandris (Physics, CCRG)
 URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GravitySimulator

The centers of galaxies contain supermassive black holes (SMBHs), as well as dense clusters of stellar remnants: neutron stars and stellar-mass black holes, the end-states of the evolution of massive stars.  The interactions of the remnants with each other, and with the SBH, are believed to drive a number of important processes, including capture of stellar BHs by SMBHs, a process that could be observed via its generation of gravitational waves. Using a new computational approach, my group has achieved the first direct simulations of such systems over long (Myr) time scales.

This figure shows how the motion of stars very near to a supermassive black hole (SMBH) is affected by their self-interactions, and by general relativity. Each frame plots the evolution of the orbital planes of eight stars as they orbit about the Milky Way SMBH, for an elapsed time of two million years. The SMBH is rotating, which causes the orbital planes to precess; this is called "frame dragging" and appears in the plots as circular motion. When the masses of the stars are increased, their self-interactions cause the motion to deviate from the smooth precession induced by frame dragging.
(Credit: D. Merritt et al., Physical Review D, vol. 81, id. 062002, 2011).

Submission date: January 18, 2012

 Chemistry

Surface Modification of Multi-walled Carbon Nanotubes with Gaseous Oxygen and Chlorine Atoms

 Microwave Discharge of Ar/Oxygen Mixture

Luciana Oliveira, MS Chemistry Graduate, Currently Ph.D. student at Clemson U.

Faculty Advisor:  Gerald A. Takacs, Professor of Chemistry, Department of Chemistry,Center for Materials Science & Engineering

Multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWNT) paper was surface modified with gaseous oxygen and chlorine atoms, and analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The oxygen atoms were produced by a low-pressure microwave (MW) plasma discharge of an Ar-O₂ mixture and the results were compared to a previous study using VUV photo-oxidation. The presence of VUV (λ= 104.8 and 106.7 nm) radiation showed higher levels of oxidation (ca. 7.4 at% O) than the MW results (ca. 6.3 at %) which were conducted in the absence of radiation from the plasma. Oxygen atoms reacted with the π-conjugation of the MWNTs to primarily produce the ether/epoxide groups. Chlorine atoms, which were generated by UV photolysis of Cl₂, readily reacted with the nanotubes to yield saturation levels of ca. 13 at% Cl.
Accepted for publication in Journal of Adhesion Science and Technology (2012).

Submission date: January 12, 2012

School of Life Sciences

Bacterial diseases disrupted by natural products from the beehive

Zackery Bulman, Biotechnology Graduate, 2011. 
Currently in the PharmD Program at University at Buffalo School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Buffalo, NY

Faculty Advisor: Mike Savka, School of Life Sciences Laboratory A355 Gosnell Hall

Recent Publication: Zackery Bulman, Phuong Le, André O. Hudson and Michael A. Savka. A novel property of propolis (bee glue): anti-pathogenic activity by inhibition of N-acyl-homoserine lactone mediated signaling in bacteria. Journal of Ethnopharmacology. 138 (2011) 788-797. doi:10.1016/j/jep2011.10.029

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378874111007689

A complementary or alternative approach to antibiotic agents to control bacterial diseases is the identification and development of anti-pathogenic control agents. Such anti-pathogenic agents could target a gene regulatory system known as quorum sensing (QS). In the above publication, we show that the natural product from the beehive called propolis or bee glue disrupts quorum-sensing systems. In this regard, anti-pathogenic compounds from bee harvested propolis could be identified and isolated and thus will be valuable for the further development of anti-pathogenic therapeutics to disrupt QS signaling systems which regulate the disease causing factors in many pathogenic bacteria.

Submission date: January 12, 2012

Chemistry

Using structural analysis and biochemical techniques to study protein vaccine candidates 

Faculty Advisor:
Lea Vacca Michel (RIT, Department of Chemistry)

Collaborators:
Dr. Michael Pichichero (RGHS, Research Institute)

Dr. Leslie Kate Wright (RIT, School of Biological Sciences)                                                            

Student Researcher(s):

• Anthony Mangan (MS student, Chemistry)
• Kyle Grimaldi (5^th year, Chemistry)
• Melody Frink (4^th year, Biochemistry)
• Breanna Kalmeta (3^rd year, Biochemistry)
• Joy Snyder (3^rd year, Biochemistry)
• Rachel Schmidt (3^rd year, Biochemistry)
• Bethany Novick (2^nd year, Biochemistry)
• John Bettinger (2^nd year, Biochemistry)

 http://www.rit.edu/cos/chemistry/Michel.html

Nontypable Haemophilus influenzae (NTHi) causes otitis media (ear infection), sinusitis, and acute exacerbations of chronic bronchitis. The outer membrane lipoprotein P6, discovered 30 years ago, is currently one of the leading protein vaccine candidates for NTHi. Although P6 has been studied for its immunological properties, not much is known about its structural orientation or localization in NTHi. Therefore, we used structural and biochemical techniques to elucidate the orientation of P6 in the outer membrane of NTHi, with surprising results (Vaccine 2011, 29: 1624-1627). Currently, we are finishing work on P6 and are starting the characterization of other protein vaccine candidates. 

Submission Date: January 10, 2012

 School of Life Sciences

Role of the Pyrroline5-Carboxylate Synthetase gene

Mohammed Andres Mostajo Radji, Biotechnology - Bioinformatics Student

Presbycusis, or age-related hearing loss, is a common hearing disorder that affects much of the elderly population, particularly men.  Several environmental factors are associated with this type of hearing loss. However, only a few genetic factors have been found to be correlated with the phenotypes and severity of this syndrome. Variations in the expression of the Pyrroline 5-Carboxylate Synthase (PYCS) gene appear to be associated with the early onset of Presbycusis. PYCS encodes an enzyme that breaks down glutamate to synthesize proline and ornithine.  Since glutamate is the key neurotransmitter in the  auditory system, subtle differences in regulation of PYCS could be important to hearing.  Recent work has provided evidence of gender-specific genetic regulation of the PYCS gene and its significance in age-related hearing-loss.

Submission Date: June 13, 2011

Perception of Colorfulness for Display Design

Hao Li, Color Science M.S. Program