Student Research

Student Research

Student Research

Student research is an integral part of the Biochemistry Major at Bowdoin. Students work with faculty members on cutting-edge research projects using state-of-the-art equipment, and they are often able to publish completed projects. Biochemistry majors may work with Biology and Chemistry Department faculty who are not members of the Biochemistry Program.

Bowdoin Students Attend ASBMB Conference in New OrleansMatt Shew Danielle Dube and Maria Koenigs

A group of ten Bowdoin Biochemistry senior honors students traveled with two members of the Biochemistry faculty to New Orelands in April 2009.  There they participated in the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, at which they presented their honors research, learned about the forefront of biochemistry research by attending seminars, and competed in an undertraduate student research poster competition.  Our students were highly competitive in the poster competition, where Matthew Shew '09 won first place and Maria Koenigs '09 received an honorable mention in the Systems Biology category of the competition (both pictured to the right with Professor Danielle Dube).  The conference was a stunning success, and the Biochemistry Program hopes to continue sending students to conferences in the future.

2009-2010 Biochemistry Honors Projects:

Katharina Biolotti - The Thermal and Photochemical Stabilities and the Excited Electronic States of Natural and Synthetic Polyenes

Shelby Davies - Targeted functional analysis of Fgf/Bmp antagonistic signaling during tooth development in Danio rerio

Erica Ehrhardt - The effect of myosuppressin on nitric oxide feedback in the heart of the lobster, Homarus americanus

Tenzing Lama - Characterization of prdm1a in zebrafish tooth development

Lauren Marshall - Analysis of homolog pairing in Drosophila melanogaster using RNAi knockdowns

Norris Wong - Quantifying microbial contributions to SOM under elevated CO2

A sampling of peer-reviewed scientific manuscripts co-authored by Biochemistry students (students indicated with *):

Christensen RL, Barney* EA, Broene RD, Galinato MG, Frank HA (2004) Linear polyenes: models for the spectroscopy and photophisics of carotenoids.  Arch. Biochem. Biophys.  430:30

Graustein* A, Walters* J, Gaspar* J, Palopoli MF (2002) Levels of DNA polymorphism vary with mating systems in the nematode genus Caenorhabditis. Genetics 161: 99-107

Koenigs MB*, Richardson EA*, Dube DH (2009) Metabolic profiling of Helicobacter pylori glycosylation. Molecular Biosystems. in press

Kohorn BD, Kobayashi M, Johansen S, Riese J, Huang L-F, Koch K, Fu* S, Dotson* A, Byers* N (2006) An Arabidopsis Cell Wall Associated Kinase Required for Invertase Activity and Cell Growth. The Plant Journal 46: 307-316

Kohorn BD, Kobayashi M, Johansen S, Fischer* A, Byers* N (2006) Wall Associated Kinase 1 is Crosslinked in Endomembranes and Transport To The Cell Surface Requires Correct Cell Wall Synthesis. Journal Cell Science 119: 2282-2290

Logan BA, Kornyeyev D, Hardison* J, Holaday AS (2006) The role of antioxidant enzymes in photoprotection.  Photosynthesis Research (2006) 88: 119-132

McBride AE, Conboy AK*, Borwn SP*, Ariyachet C, Rutledge KL (2009) Specific sequences within arginine-glycine-rich domains affect mRNA-binding protein fuction.  Nucleic Acids Res. Epub ahead of print

McBride AE, Zurita-Lopez C, Regis A, Blum E, Conboy A*, Elf S Clarke S (2007) Protein arginine methylation in Candida albicans: Role in nuclear transport.  Eukaryot Cell. 6(7): 1119-29

McBride AE, Cook JT*, Stemmler EA, Rutledge KL, McGrath KA* Rubens JA (2005) Arginine methylation of yeast mRNA-binding protein Npl3 directly affects its function, nuclear export, and intranuclear protein interactions.  J Biol Chem 280(35): 30888-98

Palopoli MF, Rockman MR, TinMaung A, Ramsay C, Curwen S*, Aduna A, Laurita J, Kruglyak L. (2008) Molecular basis of the copulatroy plug ploymorphism in Caenorhabditis elegans.  Nature 454:1019-1022

Stemmler EA, Cashman* CR, Messinger DI, Gardner* NP, Dickinson PS, Christie AE  High resolution direct-tissue MALDI-FTMS reveals broad conservation of three neuropeptides (APSGFLGMRamide, GYRKPPFNGSIFamide and pQDLDHVFLRFamide) across members of seven decapod crustaean infraorders. Peptides. in press

Stemmler EA, Hsu YA, Cashman* CR, Messinger DI, de la Iglesia HO, Dickinson PS, Christie AE (2007) Direct tissue MALDI-FTMS profiling of individual Cancer productus sinus glands reveals that one of three distinct combinations of crustacean hyperglycemic hormone precursor-related peptide (CPRP) isoforms are present in individual crabs. General and Comparative Endocrinology 154: 187-192