Undergraduate Research

Steve DeLoach, professor of economics, has been elected to serve a three-year term as a councilor in the Social Science Division of the Council on Undergraduate Research.

Elon University senior environmental studies major Sam Shoge received a statewide award for innovative undergraduate research using Geographic Information Systems at the 2011 North Carolina GIS conference held this month at the Raleigh Convention Center.

The National Science Foundation has awarded Elon University chemistry professor Joel Karty a three-year, $181,000 research grant to work with undergraduates assisting him in his ongoing study of two types of molecular phenomena that govern chemical stability.

A paper co-authored by assistant professor Amy Overman and three Elon undergraduates, as well as Joseph D.W. Stephens at N.C. A&T State University, has been published in the American Journal of Undergraduate Research.

Kailtyn Fay '11, a music education and music performance double major and a recipient of the Lumen Prize, presented her research Nov. 8 at a poster session for the North Carolina Music Educators' Association Conference in Winston-Salem, N.C.

Senior Bridget Kelly, an independent dance science major, and Caroline Ketcham, assistant professor of exercise science, presented research titled "The biomechanical differences between novice and advanced dancers when performing tendus, dégagés, and battements" at the International Association for Dance Medicine and Science on Oct. 29 in Birmingham, England.

On Oct. 27, the Council on Undergraduate Research and the National Conferences on Undergraduate Research celebrated the merging of their organizations with a gala at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. The event included a slide show highlighting undergraduate research students from various institutions across the country. Because of Elon's commitment to undergraduate research and the recognition its students have received over the years, CUR and NCUR asked to include several Elon alumni in the presentation.

Elon University senior Anthony Rizzuto has been named the recipient of a 2010 Eastern Analytical Symposium Student Research Award, a highly competitive national prize in the chemistry field given each year to six undergraduate researchers.

Churches have always split on doctrinal or political grounds, and prior to the Civil War, that wedge issue, more often than not, was slavery. Elon University senior Amber Woods explored how early churches in Kentucky responded to debates over emancipation, and her undergraduate research is the latest to be featured in a series of E-net profiles on Lumen Scholars in the Class of 2011.

Paul Miller, a professor of exercise science, will serve as the first division chair for the newly approved Health Sciences Division of the Council on Undergraduate Research.