NAMS Research Opportunities
Undergraduate students can conduct research alongside faculty within the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics (NAMS).
Research in sciences is also interdisciplinary. This tool will help you explore existing Research Experiences of Undergraduates (REU) projects within NAMS that you may be able to join or identify an expert in a field of science that you would like to investigate and propose a collaboration. Browse through the tool to find the right match.
Be sure to check out the NAMS Research Experiences for Undergraduates page to learn more about the importance of research, when to do research, and how to request a position on an existing project.
How to Use the Search Tool:
You can search for research opportunities several ways – by faculty last name, expertise, or research description. Use search bar to enter an area of interest, discipline/sub-discipline of science, or any keyword to narrow your search. To sort the columns alphabetically, use the arrows "↑↓" located to the right of the column heading to search. NOTE: The "↑↓" next to the "name" field will sort by last name alphabetically.
| Faculty | Expertise | Research Information |
|---|---|---|
| Neil Aaronson | Psychoacoustic researcher employing models to explain experimental findings for auditory perception. Investigates topics such as psychoacoustic phenomena, audio quality perception, room acoustics, and the intricacies of music perception. | Dr. Aaronson’s primary field of research is acoustics. He has done work in the fields of psychoacoustics, musical acoustics, room acoustics, and underwater acoustics. His recent research has involved projects on musical intonation detection, analysis of the calls of avian raptors, and the mathematical analysis of how sound diffracts around the head. The musical intonation detection study is an effort to understand how well musicians as well as untrained listeners can pick out wrong notes in a musical context. The study of the calls of avian raptors is working towards an automatic way of detecting and identifying those birds in the wild without relying on human spotting. The diffraction study is relevant to models of human perception relevant to, for instance, virtual reality and sound source localization applications. |
| Adam Aguiar | Morone saxatilis; Migration, Behavior, and Population Health of Morone saxatilis (Striped Bass) in the Northeast Saltwater Environment; reef and wreck sites; lecturing; Assessing Combinatorial Approaches of Active and Traditional Lecturing in College Level Biology Courses; Cell biology; Molecular biology and genetics | Species Diversity and Mechanisms of Ecological Succession on Reef and Wreck Sites
off the South Jersey Shore Additional Information: More information about Dr. Aguiar: https://stockton.edu/sciences-math/documents/aguiar_resume.pdf |
| Benjamin Agyare | Condensed Matter Physics and Physics Education | My research interest involves using computational tools to investigate the formation of Intrinsically Localized Vibration Modes (ILMs) in crystallized lattices. This research is crucial for understanding material properties, energy localization, and nonlinear dynamics, with broader implications for advancing materials science, technological applications, and the development of innovative technologies in areas such as phononic and photonic engineering. Additionally, I am interested in applying the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) to explore the integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in physics education. |
| Matthew Bonnan | functional morphology; dinosaurs; vertebrate paleontology; functional morphology; animal kinematics | Dr. Bonnan is interested in three broad but interconnected areas of research: 1) the
evolution of dinosaur locomotion, particularly in the giant, long-necked sauropod
dinosaurs; 2) the evolution of an erect posture from a sprawled posture in dinosaurs
and mammals; and 3) the evolution of pronation and supination in the forelimb of tetrapods.
To these ends, he has utilized traditional anatomical approaches as well as state-of-the-art
computer modeling to understand and infer how the limbs of both extinct and extant
tetrapods have evolved and adapted. Currently, he has begun to utilize XROMM (X-ray
Reconstruction of Moving Morphology) to produce three-dimensional animations of small
animal bones in vivo. His current research focuses on the three-dimensional kinematics
of lizard and mammal forelimbs, as means to reverse engineer how early dinosaur and
mammal relatives may have moved and stood.evolution of dinosaur locomotion; evolution
of erect posture dinosaurs and mammals; evolution of pronation and supination in forelimb
of terapods Additional Information: More information about the research and Dr. Bonnan: Matthew Bonnan website https://www.matthewbonnan.com/ |
| Erin Brown | Organic synthesis and methods, continuous flow chemistry, natural product synthesis; Organic synthesis; asymmetric synthesis; continuous flow | My research is based in synthetic organic chemistry and continuous flow technology. Our lab concentrates on synthesizing heterocyclic compounds, studying their properties (e.g. optical), and using continuous flow to improve reaction efficiency. Currently, our efforts focus on synthesizing and studying the structure-property relationships of several carbazole derivatives and also utilizing continuous flow technology to synthesize various heterocycles in a single step from simple phenol precursors. Students can expect to be involved in all aspects of the research and have opportunities to learn synthetic chemistry skills, such as running reactions under inert atmosphere or in a continuous flow reactor, performing product purification via flash-column chromatography, and characterizing compounds. |
| David W. Burleigh | Reproductive biology; placental physiology; gene expression | Dr. Burleigh has studied various aspects of placenta physiology and development. In an effort to further the understanding of gestational diabetes on fetal development Dr. Burleigh has studied the effects of glucose on the secretion of placental growth hormone by placental cytotrophoblast cells, examined the temporal expression of Growth Differentiation Factor 15 in rodents during development, and studied the physiological impact of advanced glycation end products (AGEs) on placental trophoblast cell development and gene expression |
| Tait Chirenje | Trace metal chemistry, surface water chemistry, indoor air quality assessment, Brownfields characterization, Phase I and II site assessments, urban geochemistry. | My research interests include indoor air quality, urban trace metal geochemistry,
environmental remediation, surface and ground water chemistry. Lately I have been
getting involved with brownfields characterization. More information about my research
projects are in a separate tab. Additional Information: More information about the research and Dr. Chirenje: https://taitstockton.weebly.com/ |
| Pamela Cohn | Materials Science and Physical Organic Chemistry; Organic Chemistry | My projects broadly fall under the category of physical organic chemistry, wherein principles underlying an organic molecule’s structure and reactivity are studied in a bulk material. These structure-property relationships allow for a deeper understanding of how a structural feature of a molecule gives rise to its observed properties. Natural systems apply this “bottom up” approach to build large stimuli-responsive assemblies from individual molecules by incorporating information-rich structural units (e.g. hydrogen bonding and aromatic stacking motifs). I seek to expand on this approach by incorporating principles of bottom-up assembly to create new classes of “smart” materials (materials that can perform a specific task in response to an external stimulus). Students will learn state of the art organic synthetic techniques in order to generate libraries of structural analogs of a particular molecule. Then these analogs can be characterized at the molecular and macroscopic levels in order to establish how changes to molecular structure affect a material\'s observable properties. |
| Phillip Eaton | Primarily works in Physics Education assessment analysis, and construction of learning resources like online lectures and recorded demonstration videos. Also, dabbles in introductory General Relativity and Quantum Field Theory projects with interested undergraduates. | I am interested in the statistical functionality (i.e. psychometric properties) of assessments used to probe students\' understanding of physics. I use tools like network analysis, exploratory/confirmatory factor analysis, and item response theory to extract information about assessments from student response data. This information is used to help future instructors/researchers better interpret students\' results from these assessments and to offer suggestions on how assessments can be improved in the future. |
| Bradley Forrest | My mathematical research focuses on Geometric Group Theory, which is roughly the study
of symmetries. Most recently I have been investigating symmetries of fractals, and
trying to produce a mathematically rigorous way to understand these symmetries. I
am also passionate about recreational mathematics, specifically the mathematics of
puzzles and games. This passion motivates my work as faculty advisor to Stockton’s
Gaming Club, and has led me to develop a general studies course: Games, Puzzles, and
Mathematics. Additional Information: More about Dr. Forrest: https://stockton.edu/sciences-math/documents/forrest_cv.pdf I take great joy from working with students on research projects, and regularly have 2 or 3 research students. Most of the projects that I advise are centered in Geometric Group Theory or Recreational Mathematics, though I occasionally advise projects in Graph Theory or Combinatorics. My research students have studied the Rubik’s Cube, Self-intersecting polygons, knot theory, braid based cryptography, knight’s tours, the Vicsek fractal, self-avoiding walks, polyominoes, and graphs made by replacement rules. |
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