‘Summer vacation’ in the research lab

SMU students are spending their summers doing research at laboratories.

 From left: front, Thomas Briese, Jennifer Koezly; back, Brian Kasel, Timothy McDonald and Luke Baertlein.

Five SMU science students are spending their summer doing research at laboratories in Minnesota, Michigan and Illinois. Jennifer Koezly, a double major in chemistry and engineering physics, was accepted into the Lando/NSF Summer Research Program in the chemical sciences at the University of Minnesota. Brian Kasel, a biophysics major, landed a position in the University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center Summer Fellowship Program. Luke Baertlein, a biophysics major, is working at the Mayo Clinic in the Department of Health Sciences Research - Epidemiology Division. Timothy McDonald, a double major in chemistry and engineering physics, and Thomas Briese, a biochemistry major, are both working with Father Paul Nienaber, SJ, Ph.D, chair of SMU's Physics Department, as part of the MicroBooNE neutrino experiment at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory.

Funding for these students is provided by a Research at Undergraduate Institutions grant from the National Science Foundation.
 “This is a singular contribution to undergraduate research in the sciences at Saint Mary’s,” noted Father Nienaber. “These students are talented and motivated, and they’ve worked hard to get where they are. Placing this many students in these sorts of research projects at major universities and laboratories speaks volumes about the quality of the science program at Saint Mary’s University.”