Notre Dame alum and current Aquinas College student Bridgette Degenhardt ’12 (NDP) has been conducting research on sea coral.
Beginning last summer, Notre Dame alum and current Aquinas College student Bridgette Degenhardt ’12 (NDP) along with Dr. Robert Peters, Jr., assistant professor of biology at Aquinas, have been studying the different genes involved in the endosymbiotic relationship between the Aiptasia, a sea anemone typically found on corals, and the algae that live within it.
Degenhardt said their research, which is partially funded by a Mohler-Thompson Summer Research Grant, found thus far that variables such as temperature, bleaching, and pH can be manipulated so that they can attempt to explore the different genetic responses within Aiptasia using qPCR. Her team now hopes to clone certain genes of interest into bacterial plasmids and eventually characterize their proteins to better understand the molecular and chemical relationship between corals and their endosymbionts.
More on the Mohler-Thompson Grant:
In 2007, Aquinas College was endowed with funding for student and faculty research by the Mohler family bequest. A year later, the Thompson family made additional contributions to the annual grant, which is now known as the Mohler-Thompson Summer Research Scholarship. The Mohler-Thompson Grant empowers student-faculty collaboration for undergraduate research over the summer months, with each partnership working together on a project in their respective disciplines. The grant funds research expenses and provides student and faculty stipends, though academic credit can, in some cases, be substituted for stipends. Since its birth, the program has featured 57 students and 20 faculty members throughout five different departments: biology, chemistry, mathematics, geography and physics.
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About Notre Dame Preparatory School and Marist Academy
Notre Dame Preparatory School and Marist Academy is a private, Catholic, independent, coeducational day school located in Oakland County. The school's upper division enrolls students in grades nine through twelve and has been named one of the nation's best 50 Catholic high schools (Acton Institute) four times since 2005. Notre Dame's middle and lower divisions enroll students in jr. kindergarten through grade eight. All three divisions are International Baccalaureate "World Schools." The Marist Fathers and Brothers sponsor NDPMA's Catholic identity and manages its educational program. Notre Dame is accredited by the National Association of Independent Schools, the Independent Schools Association of the Central States and the North Central Association Commission on Accreditation and School Improvement. For more on Notre Dame Preparatory School and Marist Academy, visit the school's home page at www.ndpma.org.