The Midwest Regional Node held a virtual Research Symposium for students involved in Bioinformatics research through the GEP on Thursday, April 25, 2024. Twelve faculty and nine undergraduate students were in attendance. The symposium included four research presentations from six undergraduate students. These presentations covered four different GEP projects: F-Element, Parasitoid Wasps, Pathways, and Puerto Rican Parrot. The symposium wrapped up with some time for faculty and students to socialize. The event was organized and led by Regional Node co-leaders Sarah Justice and Jennifer Mierisch.
The schedule of events and details of talks are listed below:
- 6:00-6:10pm Welcome
- 6:10-6:25pm Annotating rolled in Drosophila Species, Anna Pritchett, Marian University
- 6:25-6:40pm Gene Annotation of ANO3 in the Puerto Rican Parrot, Delaney Hare and Mollie Hill, Marian University
- 6:40-6:55pm The effects of sex, behavior, and age on an annotated novel gene G1-vHSPA5-B of Parasitoid Wasps, Katherine Muron and Jordan Nowicki, Saginaw Valley State University
- 6:55-7:10pm Genomic Annotation of Drosophila willistoni Contigs 4 and 58, Zosia Bolde, Albion College
- 7:10-7:45pm Wrap Up and Social Time
What worked well for your event that might help others plan similar events?
Due to a relatively low number of presentations (4), we were able to have students present to the entire group via PowerPoint on Zoom without separating into breakout rooms. This allowed for more questions from the entire group rather than hopping between Zoom rooms. The GEP provided all the technical support that was needed for the event.
What would your Node do differently based on your experiences?
We were hoping for more participation, so it would be good to identify why more people were not able to attend. We didn’t really have challenges in the planning or execution. We would like to promote the opportunity for students to socialize more in future virtual events.
