Journal of Undergraduate Research

Mark Wadsworth and John S. K. Kauwe, Biology Introduction Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) is a debilitating disease that has increased the hardship of many lives. Many people above the age of 65 have been diagnosed with this genetically complex disease, which financially and emotionally burdens those diagnosed and their families. Earlier this year a study was […]

Greg Taylor and Jack Sites, Biology The focus of this project was 1) to determine sexual dimorphism in head and body structures in the lizard family Corytophanidae 2) analyze phylogenetic relationships between the species within the family, and 3) analyze the relationship with other lizard clades. Research started in October of 2014 with writing letters […]

Eleni Tukuafu and Dr. John S. K. Kauwe, Biology Introduction It is estimated that 5.2 million Americans have Alzheimer’s disease. It is currently the 6th leading cause of death in America, killing around 500,000 seniors every year. A 68% increase of death from Alzheimer’s disease was observed from the year 2000 to 2010. These numbers […]

Brian Davis and Dr. John S.K. Kauwe, Biology Introduction Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a chronic neurodegenerative disorder that occurs predominantly later in life and represents the fourth most common cause of death in the developed world. Given the absence of curative treatment, discovering the factors related to the development of AD and the conversion from […]

Samantha Smith and Dr. Riley Nelson, Biology Introduction Mount Timpanogos, with an elevation of 3,582 meters, is home to an amazing array of insect species. Through much previous effort, many have studied the insects found in American Fork Canyon leading up to Mount Timpanogos. They have still barely scratched the surface of the abundant biodiversity […]

Josue David Gonzalez Murcia and John Kauwe, Biology Department Introduction Alzheimer’s disease is one of the top 10 causes of death in the world and the 6th leading cause of death in the United States, with 5.5 million people diagnosed with the disease. Alzheimer’s cannot be cured, prevented or slowed. Most research with Alzheimer’s disease […]

Yelena Pacheco and Dr. Seth Bybee, Biology Introduction Fireflies are well known for their bioluminescent flashes causing them to be a particular group of interest concerning insect vision research. Their flashes are used for both sexual communication and as an aposematic warning to predators. Bioluminescent fireflies are known to use either a yellow-green flash or […]

Sarah Brown and C. Riley Nelson, Department of Biology Introduction The Freshwater Aquatic invertebrate Identification Guide (FAIIG) was a computer program created by the C. Riley Nelson lab in 2006 to help students with the identification process of various aquatic invertebrates throughout Utah. It has been used in Bio 100 classes at Brigham Young University […]

Parker Hollingsworth and Stephen Piccolo, Biology Introduction Machine learning classification is a type of artificial intelligence that learns from data and makes predictions. There are many different algorithms that can be used to develop predictive models for machine learning. Generally the algorithm looks for patterns in the data and uses those patterns to make predictions […]

Emily Sears and Dr. John Kauwe, Biology Introduction Vascular dementia (VaD) is a neurodegenerative disease caused by atherosclerosis, or inadequate blood flow to the brain as a result of the build-up of fat deposits, dead cells, or other cell debris on the inside of arteries. It shortens the lifespan of those affected, and severely impairs […]