18th Student Research and Creative Activity Fair Showcases Innovation Across UNO

➡️ What’s new: The University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) hosted a two-day celebration of student research and creative activity March 26–27, featuring a keynote speaker, expert panel, and a full day of student-led presentations and performances.

🔎 Zoom in:

• March 26: Johns Hopkins University neuroscientist Alex Kolodkin, Ph.D., kicked off the event with a lecture on neural circuit assembly in the Milo Bail Student Center Ballroom.
• March 27: The Weber Fine Arts Building/CEC spaces/Strauss Performing Arts Center transformed into a hub of discovery, with undergraduate and graduate students presenting research through posters, presentations, performances, and interactive exhibits.
• March 27: A keynote and panel discussion brought together leaders in business, engineering, and cancer research to explore the impact of interdisciplinary collaboration.

💡 Why it matters: Pragmatic Research and Discovery is one of four pillars UNO’s strategic plan.

• Investigators secured more than $40 million in external funding for research in FY 2024-2025, including more than $600,000 in student awards.
• Ten current and emeritus UNO faculty members are among the top two percent of cited scholars in the world, according to a ranking of 100,000 researchers from Stanford University and Elsevier.

Award Recipients

Undergraduate Performance

• Best: Nicole Stander, “Head Sky, Me Much Snout”
• Outstanding: Salvador Becerra “Comprehensive Musical Experience exhibiting synthesis of pedagogical ideas and real-world musical practices on keyboards”
• Meritorious: Lexi Axiotes, “Religion and Other Catastrophes: Stories Performance”
• Honorable Mention: Marcus Kriener, “FUSE Student Creative Activity - Senior Piano Recital for May 2026”

Undergraduate Exhibit or Demonstration

• Best: Ana P. Lopez-Zurita, “Hasta la Piel Collection (Down to My Skin Collection)”
• Outstanding: Rachel Cloeter, “Deconstruction: Saint John's Chapel
• Meritorious: Simon Miller, “Charlie Vessel”
• Honorable Mention: Marie-Claire Broohm, “I'll change the name later”

Undergraduate Poster Presentation

• Best: Claire Wing and Jayden Smith, “Cytotoxic Effects of Ethanol on the OVCAR-8 Ovarian Carcinoma Cell Line”
• Outstanding: Chris Schinzel, “Examining Long Term Effects of Antibiotic Administration in Callithrix jacchus”
• Meritorious: Clara Wallace, "Do feeding patterns explain greater energy use observed in cold-adapted prairie lizard (Sceloporus consobrinus) populations?’
• Honorable Mention: Kaitlyn Parker, “Effects of dietary protein during zebrafish (Danio rerio) development on stress expression and cortisol after exposure to chronic stress during adulthood”

Graduate Poster Presentation

• Best: Brandon Doehne, “The Role Of Physiological Metrics in Baseball Pitching Performance”
• Outstanding: Chukwuma Adinchezor, “Gastrointestinal Transit Time in Captive Common Marmosets (Callithrix jacchus): Associations with Stool Consistency and Gut Microbiome Structure”
• Meritorious: Nagesh Palukuru, “Analyzing Trends and District-Level Disparities in Chronic Absenteeism in Douglas County, Nebraska (2019–2020 to 2024–2025)”
• Honorable Mention: Brian Schlattman, “Direction-specific wobble-board instability as a rehabilitation strategy to restore orthogonal postural geometry in older adults”

Undergraduate Oral Presentation

• Best: Wells Johnson, “IRE1 and Filamentation in C. albicans”
• Outstanding: Dominic Koperski, “Investigation of Antimicrobial PA-12 in Selective Laser Sintered Prosthetic Sockets”
• Meritorious: Victor Rivero, “Validation of a human-specific, multiplex platform for detecting common marmoset (Callithrix jacchus) inflammatory analytes”
• Honorable Mention: Kaitlyn Oswald, “The Impact of Chronic Stress, Cortisol Dysregulation, and Lifestyle Adaptation on Informal Caregivers: A Literature Review”

Graduate Oral Presentation

• Best: Danae Greig, “Effects of environmental pollutant exposure on mitochondrial function”
• Outstanding: Jeffrey Zimmerly, “Repurposing FDA-Approved Drugs Against the Pathogenic amoeba Naegleria fowleri”
• Meritorious: Josephine Parker, “Creative Arts Impact on Identity Formation within Nebraska Communities”
• Honorable Mention: Emilie Whitehouse, “Support for Survivors of Sexual Misconduct: Comparing Accommodations and Student Perceptions Across Institutions of Higher Education”