Pavel Anzenbacher, chemistry and photochemical sciences, right, confers with Victor Montes, one of the graduate students with whom he works, at the poster session during the second annual BGSU Research Conference Nov. 6.

Conference offered wide perspective on University research

Research in its many aspects was the topic of the two-day BGSU Research Conference last week. Attended by University members and guests from the larger community, the conference comprised an ongoing poster session highlighting faculty and student research, sessions on research-related issues and a luncheon address by Brenda Russell of the University of Illinois-Chicago.

More than 200 people heard Russell’s address, including visitors from the Medical College of Ohio, University of Toledo, Heidelberg College, the Ohio Board of Regents and various governmental agencies such as the Regional Growth Partnership and the Regional Technology Alliance of Northwest Ohio. Representatives from area businesses were also in attendance.

The 140 poster exhibits featured activity in both the sciences and the humanities. Faculty and students were on hand to explain their projects, including Preeti Patil, a doctoral student in biological sciences working in the laboratories of Lakshmi Pulakat and Narasaiah Gavini, who described to visitors her work on decoding the role of the ORF9 proteins in nitrogenase, in hopes of eventually introducing a gene into plants that will enable them to fix nitrogen directly for nourishment.

Other exhibits covered a range of subjects: one featured studies of the consequences of dam removal on the Ottawa River, by BGSU geologists Sheila Roberts, James Evans and Norman Levine; another, by Moira van Staaden. biological sciences, explored the efficacy of grasshopper calls over varying habitats. The arts were represented as well by such exhibitors as Mille Guldbeck, whose paintings reflect the ordering of the natural world.