Valeria Nava, a junior majoring in environmental engineering, has been doing undergraduate w88 online game as part of the McNair Scholars w88 slot at the w88 online game of Nevada, Reno. A federal TRIO program funded at over 150 institutions across the country, McNair is designed to prepare undergraduate students for "doctoral studies through involvement in research and other scholarly activities."
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w88 online game said that she enjoys how personal the engineering program has gotten and the relationships she has built within the civil and environmental engineering department with other faculty and students.
w88 online game, along with her faculty mentor, Yu Yang, have been analyzing carbon nanotubes, or CNTs, and how their widespread use has led to accumulation in the environment. CNTs can become prevalent in agricultural soils, contaminating them, and can be taken up by agricultural plants leading to concerns over food safety.
"It has been great to work with Valeria, who functions like a graduate student. I am proud of her for her work and professional qualities," said Yang.
Recently, Nava gave a well-received presentation at an international conference, the Soil Science Society of America Annual Meeting, and was awarded a fellowship as part of Stanford w88 online game's summer Undergraduate Research in Geoscience and Engineering program.
"For my fellowship, I'll be going to Stanford w88 online game over the summer as part of their School of Earth, Energy, and Environmental Sciences," Nava said. "We'll be researching the arsenic uptake of rice plants and their response to climate change-like conditions, and I'm excited to learn something new and dip my toes into it."
Nava has co-authored a publication with Yang's previous Ph.D. student and is currently working on another one. She has written on topics such as the rapid analysis of CNT-spiked plant tissues using ultraviolet-visible spectroscopic analysis. Her current project focuses on enhancing plant photosynthesis with CNTs. Nava said that she wasn't exposed to a lot of work with plants in her classes, so she continues to w88 online game the topics with Yang.
"My advice is to definitely look into the McNair program, and get involved in w88 online game. Faculty are really willing and open to having you be a part of their labs," Nava said. "If you want experience, and to see what w88 online game can offer, go for it."
In her free time, w88 online game enjoys being outdoors and taking advantage of all the parks in Reno. "I like to play tennis on the weekends and going to get coffee and trying new restaurants with my friends," she said.
Nava is also a part of the w88 online game Water and Environment Association Student Chapter on campus, and likes how many of her classmates are involved, along with the topics relating to her classes.
