URECA Faculty Mentors
According to the Council on Undergraduate Research (https://www.cur.org/), one of the key characteristics of excellence in undergraduate research is faculty commitment. The success of the Undergraduate Research Experience and Creative Activity (URECA) grant program is dependent upon our faculty mentors who are highly committed to providing students with a hands-on research experience that includes instruction, guidance and direct modeling. They support student learning in a manner that allows students to develop greater responsibility for his or her own work, develop and demonstrate valuable teamwork skills, and gain experience in critical inquiry.
Below are some of our featured faculty mentors who continuously engage in mentored research through the URECA program.
![]() |
Kevin Bicker, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Jessica Gentry Carter, Ph.D. |
|
|
![]() |
Emily Farris, Ph.D. |
|
|
![]() |
Scott Handy, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Samuel Haruna, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Ryan Seth Jones, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Rebekka King, Ph.D. |
![]() |
David E. Nelson, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Joshua Phillips, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Bill Robertson, Ph.D. Physics & Astronomy URECA Projects: Electrical Analog of a Ring Resonator Structures and an Acoustic Demultiplexe (Fall 2021); Creating Acoustic Diode in Waveguides: Simulation and Experiment (Summer 2021); Acoustic Demultiplexing in Waveguide (Fall 2020); Constructing a novel experimental apparatus for use with acoustics research (Fall 2018); Modeling, Simulating, and Testing an Acoustic Lens (Summer 2018); Testing applications of the Photonic Crystal Based Biosensor (Fall 2017); Improvement of the Photonic Crystal Biosensor Design (Summer 2017) Research Interests: Optics, acoustics, terahertz spectroscopy, computational science, and signal processing |
![]() |
Tiffany Rogers, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Elizabeth A. Smith, Ph.D. Human Sciences URECA Projects: Factors Affecting Older Adults' Fruit and Vegetable Consumption (Spring 2020); Food Security, Coping and Support Strategies, and Diet Quality in College Students from a Moderate Sized University (Fall 2018); Mini Health and Nutrition Screen (Fall 2018) Research Interests: Changing nutrition related health behaviors such as increasing fruit and vegetable intake, food insecurity, and preventing chronic disease through nutrition related health and wellness |
|
|
![]() |
Ben Stickle, Ph.D. Criminal Justice Administration URECA Projects: Why They Died: An expanded analytical examination of details surrounding the 999 officer-involved shooting deaths in 2019 in the United States (Spring 2021); Why They Died: An expanded analytical examination of details surrounding officer-involved shooting deaths in the United States (Fall 2020); Pirates With No Sea: The Rising Rate of Porch Package Theft (Spring 2018); The True Costs of Private Security. (Fall 2017) Research Interests: Crime prevention, environmental criminology and metal theft, private security, police operations, administration and use of force |
|
|
![]() |
Hanna Terletska, Ph.D. |
![]() |
Donald Walker, Ph.D. Biology URECA Projects: Mechanistic interactions between a host, microbiome, and fungal pathogen (Spring
2022); The endosymbiotic bacterial community of the causative agent of White Nose
Syndrome (Pseudogymnoascus destructans) of bats (Summer 2021); The endosymbiotic community
of the causative agent of White Nose Syndrome (Pseudogymnoascus destructans) of bats
(Summer 2019); Endosymbiotic bacteria impact the function of an important wildlife
pathogen of bats (Summer 2019) |
|
|
![]() |
William Yelverton, Ph.D. |
|
|
|
Mengliang Zhang, Ph.D.
Chemistry URECA Projects: Investigation of Weathering Effect on Less-Volatile Component Profiles in Ignitable Liquids (Spring 2021); Novel Method for the Forensic Dye Analysis by Direct Analysis in Real Time Mass Spectrometry (Spring 2020); Novel method for the detection and quantitation of organic ligands bonded to CdSe quantum dots using direct analysis in real time mass spectrometry (Fall 2019); Fast Screening of Explosives by Ambient Ionization Mass Spectrometry (Spring and Summer 2019); Prolysis DART-MS Analysis of Ignitable Liquids for Forensic and Environmental Applications (Summer 2018); Analysis of local water samples for Algal Toxins: Saxitoxin and Microcytsin-LR (Summer 2018). Research Interests: Analytical chemistry, forensics, material science, chemometrics
|
|
Kathryn Blankenship, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Health and Human Performance URECA Projects: Vocabulary Learning in College Undergraduate Students (Summer/Fall 2022).The Effects of a Pandemic on Speech Therapy for Children (Fall 2021);The Effect of Language Sample Length as a Function of Varying Age Groups (Summer/Fall 2019-Spring 2020) Research Interests: Understanding the factors that contribute to college students' vocabulary abilities
and enhacing understanding of the strategies that work best for college students to
learn and retain new vocabulary, which will provide information to assist faculty
in developing specific activities for vocabulary learning and retention within their
courses.
|
|
|
|
Mark Abolins, Ph.D.
Geology URECA Projects: Snail Shell Cave Preserve, central Tennessee (Spring 2022), Structural controls on cave passage orientation (Spring 2022), Assessment of the Relation between Hydrology and the Appearance of Bons near Tuiliere, Switzerland (Spring 2022), Assessment of the relationship between hydrologic conditions and the appearance of springs on satellite images of Biere, Switzerland (Fall 2021), Accuracy Assessment of Digital Geologic Maps of Part of the Nashville Dome, Central Tennessee (Fall 2020), Research Interests: Caves, Karst, Remote Sensing, Spatial Analysis, Structural Geology and Tectonics
|
|
|
![]() |
April Weissmiller, Ph.D.
Biology URECA Projects: Investigating the Significance of N-MYC-WDR5 Interaction in Neuroblastoma (Spring 2022), Probing the N-MYC-WDR5 interaction in neuroblastoma (Summer 2021), Investigating the Significance of SWI/SNF on MYC-dependent Transcription in Malignant Rhabdoid Tumor (Summer 2021), Investigating the Interaction of the Oncogene MYC with the pBAF Chromatin Remodeling Complex (Spring 2021) Research Interests: Basic mechanisms of cancer, chromatin biology, regulation of gene expression, genomics
|
|
|
![]() |
Timothy N. Odegard, Ph.D.
Psychology URECA Projects: Child-level reading variables and gist-based memory: An interactive model (Fall 2021), A Systematic Review of the Comorbidity of ADHD and Dyslexia (Fall 2020), An EEG Investigation of Cognitive Resilience Factors in College Students (Fall 2019), Examining the Automaticity of Vowel Letter Speech-Sound Integration Using Mismatch Negativity (Fall 2019), The Examination of Neural Connectivity with Resting-State EEG (Summer 2019), Using ERP to Explore The Relationship Between Letter-Speech Sound Associations and Reading Ability (Summer 2019) Research Interests: Risk and resilience factors that predict and impact outcomes for students in literacy.
Interventions for students with reading disabilities. Screening and identification
of students with reading disabilities.
|
|
|
![]() |
Katie Goodwin
Theatre URECA Projects: Play Space: A New Play Development Initiative (Summer 2021) Research Interests: Theatre Education, Stage and Production Management in the Performing Arts, New Play
Development, Theatre as a documenting and processing the human experience, and Script
Analysis
|
|
|
![]() |
M. Elizabeth Barnes, Ph. D.
Biology URECA Projects: A Comparison of Religious Cultural Competence in Evolution Education (ReCCEE) Online versus In-Person and its Effects on Student Outcomes , A Literature Review on Students’ Attitudes and Science Communication about Climate Change, Exploring Undergraduate Biology Students’ Attitudes and Science Communication about COVID19 and COVID19 Vaccines Research Interests: Biology education research, science communication research, history and philosophy
of science, evolution education, vaccine education, climate change education, inclusive
teaching.
|
|
|
![]() |
Hongbo Zhang, Ph. D
Mechatronics Engineering
URECA Projects: Optical Farm: Use of Light to Increase Soybean Yield, 3D Imaging of the Weed Cell
Structure for Effectiveness of UV Light Weed Removal
Research Interests: Dr. Hongbo Zhang’s research interests include robotics, computer vision, and 3D imaging.
He has secured a few external research grants related to robotics navigation, smart
farming, and computer vision related smart object detection.
|