Bringing you the latest news from the Gerdon Research Group
Junior Jason Miech is using his experience in research on campus in applying to external summer internships at NASA and Department of Energy National Research Labs. Meanwhile, junior Krista Meserve has locked up a unique summer internship opportunity at the FBI (pending background check and other security measures), but hopes to stay engaged in research on campus as...
Congratulations to Keith and Krista, Sarah, Sam, and Hillary on their recent publication in Chemical Communications! They were able to develop and demonstrate the success of a new approach to DNA aptamer selection. This work has taken many years, but we finally have some interesting aptamer sequences. Prof. Padraig Deighan, in the Biology Department at Emmanuel College, was a tremendous help in DNA sequencing and data collection. This was a great team effort! Check out the abstract here: Baillargeon, K.R.; Meserve, K.; Faulkner, S.; Watson, S.; Butts, H.; Deighan, P.; Gerdon, A.E. “Precipitation SELEX: identification of DNA aptamers for calcium phosphate materials synthesis” Chem. Comm. 2017....
A holiday wish from our group to yours!
Professor Aren Gerdon is the Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Physics and an Associate Professor of Chemistry at Emmanuel College. He leads his own chemistry research group, focusing on biomaterials, and works closely with other research groups across campus. Professor Gerdon is passionate about sharing his deep knowledge of chemistry with his students, guiding them from class work to practical, real-world lab...
One of my favorite things about research is getting to use instruments that I wouldn’t have gotten to use otherwise. Last week, I learned how to use the Dynamic Light Scattering instrument (pictured here). DLS utilizes the scattering of light by a particle in solution to calculate the radius of the particles. It will be useful to us as it can measure the size of the mineral formed during a mineralization...
Emmanuel College junior Jason Miech participated in the Big Man on Campus competition in memory of Dr. Christine Jaworek-Lopes. All proceeds from the event will go towards colon cancer research and awareness efforts. Jason got “runner-up” while David Tracy, a fellow chemistry major, won it...