Research to Watch
For a glimpse into the future of scholarship, look to DU's graduate students.
Graduate students represent what’s to come in research and scholarship. With the support of their faculty advisers and the grants and travel awards they receive, students are leaving a mark on their field all while earning an advanced degree.
"Graduate student researchers are our next generation of innovators. Even as students, they bring a rich diversity of thought that can rapidly advance ideas,” says Corinne Lengsfeld, senior vice provost for research and graduate education at DU. “I love watching how they light up when they realized they discovered something new!"
Here’s peek into what graduate students are up to at the University and which research projects should be on your radar.
Webcam-Based Eye Tracking to Support Neurodivergent Learners
Grace D. Jaiyeola
Ritchie School of Engineering & Computer Science
This project utilizes a webcam-based eye technology—a less expensive alternative to traditional eye tracking—to detect mind wandering in neurodivergent learners by analyzing gaze fixations and gaze movement patterns.
Queer Life in the 19th Century
Michelina Nelson-Olivieri
College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences
Michelina’s “The Sin That Dared Speak Its Name: Queer Life After the Ladies of Llangollen” explores how in the 19th century, queer women faced a cultural shift in the treatment of their relationships, from innocuous "romantic friendships" to something that was treated as a threat to heteronormative life.
Mayan Poetry Translation
Manuel Calvillo de la Garza
College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences
Manuel received a Travel Research Award from CAHSS to meet with Mayan poet Briceida Cuevas Cob in Chiapas, Mexico, and translate her work into English. Manuel’s final project consists of a bilingual collection of Cuevas Cob’s work, featuring the poems in the original Yucatec Mayan and in their English translation.
Climatic Influence on Subsistence Strategies
Andrew Rogers
College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences
Andrew is analyzing a collection of stone artifacts from the Sage Hen Springs site in Nevada and investigating how fluctuations in climate in the last 10,000 years impacted how people gathered food and moved through their environment. Results indicate people in the Great Basin were able to adapt to harsh climates and maintain ties with their landscape for millennia.
Poetics and Politics of Natural History Specimen
Jan Verberkmoes
College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences
“if Felsen” is a poetry project that explores the poetics and politics of the natural history specimen. It centers around the birds that zoologist Ernst Schäfer and American naturalist Brooke Dolan II collected during their second expedition to Tibet and China in 1934-35.
Side Effect-Free Treatments for Cancer
Alfred Akinlalu
Ritchie School of Engineering & Computer Science
Alfred utilizes innovative biomedical engineering techniques to develop side effect-free treatments for cancer. Using proteomic profiling of proteins from tumor-derived extracellular vesicles, he identifies certain amino acids that are selectively cytotoxic to pancreatic tumor cells with no side effects on healthy cells. His ongoing work is to evaluate these amino acids in metastasis and research other compounds that can target pancreatic cancer selectively.
Music Theory, Mathematics and Data Science
Kevin McFarland
Lamont School of Music, College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences
Kevin composes music as an application of his research, which lies in the overlap between music theory, mathematics and data science. Recent topics of interest include musical structures that exhibit fractal-like self-similarity, mapping tuning systems using graph theory and microsound synthesis.
Understanding Influential Composers
Mark Winston
Lamont School of Music, College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences
Mark’s research focuses on the development of compositional styles of keyboard music within the historical and social contexts of the lives of influential composers including Bach, Haydn, Schubert, Chopin, Fauré and Manuel Ponce.
The Embodiment and Experiences of Gender Euphoria
Brendon T. Halloway
Graduate School of Social Work
Brendon (he/they) uses community-engaged participatory methods to examine the health care needs and desires for trans and nonbinary communities. Brendon’s scholarship centers the health and well-being of trans and nonbinary individuals with specific focuses on health care access, mutual aid, health liberation and gender euphoria.
Care Practices, Mutual Aid and Racial Formation
Annie Zean Dunbar
Graduate School of Social Work
Annie is a researcher and artist whose practice centers Black feminist theory traditions to examine interstitial experiences of displaced peoples. Her dissertation project looks at the personal and professional lives and experiences of Black newcomers who work with other newcomers in the United States.
Student Empowerment in Unequal School Contexts
Stephanie Nisle-Mikos
Graduate School of Social Work
Stephanie has spent the past four years working as a licensed school-based therapist at a Colorado Title 1 elementary school, where she assesses mental health diagnoses and provides individual, group and family therapy. Stephanie has presented her work nationally and has published research on student empowerment, youth voice and critical consciousness; first-generation college students; substance abuse; and multiculturalism.
Advancing Health Equity
Manuela Orrego Luque
Graduate School of Professional Psychology
This qualitative research project implemented through a community-based research approach is a powerful and essential tool in advancing health equity and antiracist efforts for marginalized populations within a healthcare system. The study is part of a larger effort to examine how to improve rates of identification and treatment adherence of latent tuberculosis for immigrant and refugee Denver Health patients.
Brain Injury and Overdose
Sam Martin, MPH
Graduate School of Professional Psychology
Traumatic brain injury is a risk factor for overdose, and overdose also commonly results in acquired brain injury—creating a bi-directional increase in risk. Screening is a key first step in improving treatment strategy and outcomes, especially amid an opioid and overdose crisis. A wider range of accessible treatment options available after leaving inpatient care, alongside increased access, will be fundamental in developing an anti-racist approach.
Brain Injury in Veterans
Maddy Pontius, MA
Graduate School of Professional Psychology
The goal of this study was to determine the prevalence of significant reported traumatic brain injury (TBI) history among veterans involved in a veteran treatment court, as TBI can lead to health and behavioral issues that make individuals more vulnerable to criminal legal involvement. Of the 111 veterans included in the study, 47 (or approximately 42%) reported a significant history of TBI. Identifying the overrepresentation of TBI in this population quantifies the need for tailored brain injury screenings and interventions for veterans in criminal legal settings to improve rehabilitation and reduce recidivism.
Improving Brain Injury Training in the Justice
System
Spenser Nye, MA
Graduate School of Professional Psychology
The study’s goal is to increase awareness of and training around brain injuries, expand brain injury screening and identification in the justice system, and integrate the Colorado brain injury model more broadly throughout the justice system.
