By the Numbers: Undergraduates share their research
Work by a record 436 students was featured in the Fall Research Expo sponsored by the Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships.
Sponsored by the Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships, the 2023 Fall Research Expo showcased work by a record 436 undergraduates, their 381 posters set up on three floors of Houston Hall. Daniella Oyenuga, a second-year in the College of Arts & Sciences, presented her research on the neurobiology of stress resilience.
Setting new participation records, 436 undergraduates presented their research during the Fall Research Expo, this year expanding to three floors of historic Houston Hall.
Sponsored by the Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships (CURF), the Expo featured 381 posters highlighting student research projects involving faculty from all 12 of Penn’s Schools. The event, which started in 2007 with 18 posters, is open to all Penn undergraduates who want to share their research with their peers and the Penn community.
Houston Hall was filled with animated conversations during the Sept. 18 event, as student researchers stood by their posters and answered questions posed by some of the 1,000 attendees.
“These students have been given the opportunity to work with world-class faculty to address some of the biggest, most important crises and challenges we're facing in the world today, and to make real headway in solving those problems,” says Ann Vernon-Grey, CURF’s senior associate director for undergraduate research. “When you step into the room you can feel the excitement and, frankly, hope for being able to effect change. It’s exhilarating and inspirational.”
Countries where students conducted research: the United States, Argentina, Australia, France, Greenland, Netherlands, New Zealand, Peru, Philippines, Switzerland, Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, and the United Kingdom.
Griffin Pitt, right, works with two other student researchers to test the conductivity, total dissolved solids, salinity, and temperature of water below a sand dam in Kenya.
Griffin Pitt’s upbringing made her passionate about water access and pollution, and Penn has given her the opportunity to explore these issues back home in North Carolina and abroad.
Rashi Sabherwal, a doctoral student in political science, explores how women engage politically in society in informal roles through her research in India.
Helping robots work together to explore the Moon and Mars
Penn Engineers, NASA, and five other universities tested robotic systems designed to help unmanned explorers cooperate in the dunes of White Sands, New Mexico, paving the way for Moon and Mars exploration.
