The Office of the Vice President for Research is excited to award 25 2023-2024 SPARC Graduate Research Grants to support graduate student researchers across 17 University of South Carolina academic departments. These SPARC recipients, listed below, will use their funding to engage in research, scholarly and creative projects over a 15-month period beginning this May.
Through SPARC, or Support to Promote Advancement of Research and Creativity, graduate students compete for internal funding of up to $5,000 to support their meritorious research, creative and scholarly projects. The SPARC application process includes many of the same steps involved in developing extramural research funding proposals, like planning a budget, documenting current and pending support, and drafting and refining the proposal narrative. By applying for SPARC, students practice these skills and prepare themselves for a future in research.
Please join the Office of the Vice President for Research in congratulating these bright graduate student scholars and thank you for the mentorship and support of our faculty advisors and departments.
2023-2024 SPARC Graduate Research Grant Recipients
| Recipient Name | Degree Program | Project Title |
|---|---|---|
| Maxwell Akonde | Epidemiology | Evaluating a multi-biomarker panel for the early detection of ovarian cancer |
| Fahmida Akter | Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior | Impact of prenatal cash transfers and nutrition intervention on maternal-infant attachment-substudy to a randomized trial |
| Taylor Berrier | Communication Sciences and Disorders | Emotion Regulation in Children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) |
| Morgan Boncyk | Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior | Human Heat Exposure in Food Markets -- Can Thermal Remote Sensing Be Used to Predict Changes in Food Availability and Cost? |
| Larissa Daniels-Hill | Anthropology | The Intersections of Racialized Stress -- 20th-century “Black” Americans in the Hamann-Todd Osteological Collection |
| Yuwei Geng | Mathematics | Operator Learning for Phase Field Models and Simulations |
| David Horovitz | Biomedical Sciences | The Role of GluN2D in Learning, Cognitive Decline, and Cell Specific Activity |
| Shan Hu | Chemistry | An effective way to immobilize cytochrome P450 monooxygenase using a redox mediator as an electrical wiring to enhance electron transfer efficiency |
| Kaitlen Hubbard | Criminology and Criminal Justice | An examination of the escalation of domestic violence incidents in South Carolina |
| Freda (Ally) Hucek | Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior | Screening for social isolation among older adults -- An in-depth study of healthcare providers' experiences and practices |
| Nikita Kirkise | Biological Sciences | Regulation of local protein synthesis by a laminin-integrin-RACK1 signaling pathway in growth cones |
| Graham McLaughlin | Ecology and Evolutionary Biology | Bridging the Gap Between the Genome and the Environment Using Landscape Genomics |
| Shawn McNally | Social Work | College maladjustment and basic psychological need satisfaction-an exploratory study |
| Ritwik Nag | Electrical Engineering | High-resolution brain imaging system based on multi-pixel CdZnTeSe detector arrays |
| Emily Owens Pickle | Epidemiology | Unearthing the ecological-epidemiological profile of emerging tick-borne arboviruses in South Carolina |
| Daniel Perez | Electrical Engineering | 48 V to 12 V 1 kW LLC Resonant Converter with Planar Transformer |
| Dawson Petersen | Linguistics | The Effects of Linguistic Framing on Anthropomorphism of AI |
| Katelyn Rygel | Biological Sciences | Dysregulation of point contacts and local translation in Down syndrome hiPSC-derived neurons |
| Pradeep Sahu | Exercise Science | Physiological Anxiety to Movement in Chronic Low Back Pain Patients- Testing a Novel Movement Simulation Paradigm |
| Volodymyr Shablenko | Physics | Spin-transfer torque in half metals |
| Zachary Stryker | Pharmaceutical Sciences | Design and Synthesis of Novel Aminated Cannabidiol Derivatives as Dual Serotonin-Cannabinoid Ligands for the Treatment of Depressive Disorders |
| Julia van de Sandt | Business Administration | Impact of Sustainable Product Attributes on Pro-Environmental Consumer Behavior |
| Sarah Wilson | Linguistics | Partner-specific Alignment Across Multiple Linguistic Levels in Interactive Dialogue |
| Courtney Wright | Biomedical Sciences | Studying the role of kynurenic acid and sleep from neurodevelopment to adolescence |
| Xuan Yang | Psychology | Neural representation of hedonic valence across adulthood in naturalistic context |