Undergraduate research highlighted in leading journal
A senior’s research into privacy concerns of linking large numbers of personal computers to tackle huge computations and the work of a group of chemistry majors on binding metal particles to film has earned the University of Richmond students citations in CUR Quarterly, the journal of the Council on Undergraduate Research.
“This is the leading undergraduate research journal in the United States,” said Kirk Jonas, director of Richmond Research Institute.
Summaries of two published research projects conducted at the University appear in the journal’s September 2006 “Undergraduate Research Highlights” section. A research highlight consists of publication information and a short synopsis of the principal conclusions of the research, explained Charlotte Otto, journal editor. To be considered, undergraduate students must be co-authors of the paper and the paper must have been published in a peer-reviewed, professional journal. Projects not selected for publication are posted on the Quarterly’s Web site.
“Typically 12–15 highlights are selected from more than 60 submissions from all areas of science,” Otto said. “CUR and the editorial staff of the Quarterly want to celebrate and recognize the research achievements of students and faculty. Publication of these highlights is one way we achieve our objective.”
Mike Pohl, ’07, of Cross, S.C., is named along with Richmond faculty members Dr. Doug Szajda, Dr. Jason Owen and Dr. Barry Lawson for research on enhancing data privacy in some distributed volunteer computations.
Dr. Mike Leopold, assistant professor of chemistry, also is cited with Richmond graduates Rebecca Pompano, Phillip Wortley, Leslie Moatz and D.J. Tognarelli for their work on crown ether-metal sandwiches as linking mechanisms in assembled nanoparticle films. Pompano, Wortley, Moatz and Tognarelli were undergraduates at the time the research was conducted.
Jonas said other Richmond students and alumni have been cited on CUR’s Web site and in the “Highlights” section, but it is unusual to have two citations from University of Richmond students published in the same journal issue.