Prof. Trapani joined Amherst College in 2011. He is an Associate Professor in the Biology Department and also contributes to the Neuroscience program. He has chaired the Biology department since July this year. His research involves the use of the model organism larval zebrafish to look at how hair cells encode information which leads to…
On September 17th, 20 students hopped onto a Zoom call to learn about how COVID-19 has impacted children’s social and emotional development. Professor McQuade of the psychology department was joined by Amherst alum Adaora Achufusi ‘13. Specializing in play therapy, Achufusi works in New York as a treatment coordinator at a therapeutic preschool for children…
Updated: Oct 1, 2020 A chance encounter at the Texas Medical Center Bus Stop years ago led to the first BIO191 Stories in STEM talk on Wednesday, September 9. For it was at that bus stop that Professor Kim, a new Assistant Professor of Biology, met the Honorable T. Bella Dinh-Zarr, Ph.D., MPH, the first speaker…
Introduction This post is the first of a series highlighting the fantastic summer astronomy research Amherst students conducted. For more information on the series, visit this post. This week, Astronomy Department Editor William Balmer (that’s me) interviewed three of the six Follette Lab students who presented at the Colloquium. Beck Dacus ‘22, Cailin Plunkett ‘23,…
Updated: Oct 16, 2020 On September 8th and 15th, the Physics and Astronomy Department colloquium showcased the summer research of 21 Amherst students during a series of “Flash Talks.” These three-minute presentations gave the students the opportunity to demonstrate their newfound knowledge and share their summer experiences. Despite COVID-19, students worked at a variety of labs…
What’s the one thing that STEM students obsess over for a whole summer, spend eons in the lab trying to figure out, and lose hours of sleep over? Data collection. And yet what’s one thing that STEM students put off doing until their poster presentations, slapping together a few graphics in Photoshop and calling it…
With final exams coming up, students are looking for all the extra help they can get. This help can be found at the Moss Quantitative Center, where undergraduate tutors and staff can help with STEM subjects. The Q Center has an interesting history, as Dr. Innes explained: “It actually was created, in its earliest form,…
The following statement comes from Claire Hawthorne ‘21, a Social Media coordinator for the Amherst College STEM Incubator Program. The Incubator is a 6-week skills-development program based on a multidisciplinary STEM-focused curriculum that fosters a stronger sense of belonging, strengthens research and career-readiness, and increases the retention and success of our underrepresented minority (URM) and…
Hi everyone. It has been a while since I posted my last blog. I am editing this blog from my dorm room at Amherst College. I moved in a few days ago and it has been wonderful reconnecting with this lovely campus. I will provide some updates on what happened in the virtual Trapani lab…
Going into the summer, I hoped that my research would not be entirely remote. I hoped I would be able to go into the lab towards the end of the summer. That I could go on a research cruise. I had no idea that the pandemic would get worse. However, I also was surprised by…