2026 CANR Research Symposium
About
Undergraduate, master's and doctoral students may participate to present new posters or posters recently presented at a scientific meeting. In addition to research, posters describing internship experiences are also welcome. Prizes will be awarded to top undergraduate, master's and doctoral presentations.
Schedule
- Posters must be displayed by 2 p.m.
- Students will present their posters from 2:30 to 4 p.m. (the event officially begins at 3 p.m., but this will give judges extra time to review posters, if needed).
- Reception will begin at 4 p.m.
- Award ceremony will be from 4:30 to 5 p.m.
Previous awardees
Undergraduate
First place: Joseph Romano — Assessment of Pythium storage stability through maize plant infection assays
Second place: Katie Deitsch — Neighborhoods of 9: Flooding and stormwater
Third place: Julia Stolker — Ixodidn't Ask For This: Monitoring Hard Tick (Ixodidae) Community Composition From Hunter-Harvested Deer
Master’s
First place: Sanya Boby — Hepatic Metabolic Dysregulation and Developmental Changes Induced by Glucose Overload in a Chicken Embryo Simulating Gestational Diabetes Mellitus
Second place: Isabella Ferraro — Acute exposure to micro-nano plastics trigger intestinal oxidative stress and damage in enteroids and broiler chickens
Third place: Peyton Easton — De novo whole genome assembly of the mosquito Aedes grossbecki
Ph.D.
First place: Destiny Mann — Demonstrating Food Waste Upcycling with Black Soldier Fly Larvae
Second place (tie): Thabu Mugala — Environmental Drivers of Carabid-Slug Dynamics: Which Beetles Matter?
Second place (tie): Hadimundeen Abdallah — In Ovo Hyodeoxycholic Acid (HDCA) Administration Enhances Intestinal Development, Enteroendocrine Cells, and Barrier Function in Broiler Embryos
Undergraduate
- First place: Spencer Toth – Exploring Viral Diversity Across Ecosystems: Insights from Soil Bradyrhizobium Phage Genomics
- Second place: Delaney Oeth – An In-Vitro Biocompatibility and Ex-Vivo Histological Analysis of Porous AA-MMA Copolymer Scaffold
- Third place: Joseph Romano – Evaluating early vigor in maize genotypes under Pythium stress
Master’s
- First place: Destiny Mann – Comparing Growth of a Waste Upcycler Using Benchtop and Mass Rearing Methods
- Second place: Marissa Jerden – Effect of Sulfur Amendments on Arsenic Speciation in Flooded Rice Paddy Soil
- Third place: Bali Singh – Method development to optimize production of Pythium graminicola zoospores
Ph.D.
- First place: Abdallah Hadimundeen – Effects of Early Life Stress on Intestinal Development and Enteroendocrine Hormone Expression in Broiler Chickens
- Second place: Brenna DeRocili – Surveillance and AMR detection of Microbial Communities in Farms Across the Mid-Atlantic
- Third place: Jiddu Joseph – Evaluation of the Antibiotic-Potentiating Efficiency of Methyl Trans Cinnamaldehyde against Salmonella enterica Typhimurium
Postdoctoral
- First Place: Jeonghwa Kim – A Comprehensive Overview of Maize Landraces
Undergraduate
- First place: Claire Bernard – Identifying purple martin diet and its effect on nestling development
- Second place: Gabriel Dasilva – Cannibalism in lesser mealworms
- Third place: Madeline Downer – Community resilience plan for the town of Slaughter Beach, Delaware
Master’s
- First place: Emily Morgese – Genomic and phenotypic diversity of 16 novel bradyrhizobium phages
- Second place: Ahamed Zakaria – Estimating the impacts of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination on the housing market
- Third place: Srabone Saha – Fair wage from the lens of consumer empathy
Ph.D.
- First place: Rachel Keown – A single amino acid mutation in coliphage T7 DNA polymerase disrupts in vitro enzyme processivity and in vivo infection dynamics
- Second place: Kathryn Ellwood – The layer hen model of human ovarian cancer
- Third place: Ashleigh Montgomery – Targeting the destabilization of organic matter-bearing Fe and Mn oxides using indicator of reduction in soils (IRIS) films in coastal forests affected by sea-level rise
Postdoctoral researchers
- First place: Jing Yan – Effects of plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) on saltwater evaporation: a case study using bacillus subtilis
Climate change impacts, mitigation and adaptation
Winner: Amanda Crandall, graduate student, Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology
Title: The impacts of climate and anthropogenic change on migrant stopover using weather surveillance radars
Genetics and genomics for plant, animal and ecosystem improvement
Winner: Martina Bordini, Ph.D. student, Department of Animal and Food Sciences
Title: Differential gene expression profiles elucidate molecular pathways associated with wooden breast defect in pectoralis major muscles
Human dimensions of food, agriculture and natural resources
Winner: Carl Nelson-Poteet, undergraduate student, Department of Applied Economics and Statistics
Title: Common pool resource use under heterogeneous risk and impact
One health intersections among animal, plant, human and ecosystem health
Winner: Liang-en Yu, Ph.D. student, Department of Animal and Food Sciences
Title: In-ovo glutamine administration regulates intestinal epithelium development in a broiler intestinal organoid model
Sustainable food systems, landscapes and ecosystems
Winner: Emily Kennebeck, graduate student, Department of Plant and Soil Sciences
Title: Mustard 'amara' benefits from superelevated CO2 while adapting to far-red light over time