Using Gels to Help Purify Fuel Sources

Marie Thomas, Ph.D., an assistant professor of chemistry, has done a lot of research on ionic liquids—salts that take the form of liquid at room temperature—and how they can be used to break down materials. This year she worked on a project with some of her students, including seniors Maria Nettgen, who is majoring in environmental science, and Julia Milczanowski, who is majoring in natural science, to use these liquids to create ionic gels that could be used in environmental remediation efforts.

For their research project, they created a variety of gels that will eventually be tested for their effectiveness.

“The eventual goal is to see if those gels would be able to purify petroleum fuel sources by removing nitrogen and sulfur from petroleum,” Milczanowski said. “Because when you burn petroleum with those things in it, it gets into the atmosphere, can lead to acid rain and basically overall bad things to the environment, so our goal is to prevent that from happening.”

Nettgen said that these gels, if they work at capturing the nitrogen and sulfur, could prove helpful in a world that isn’t going to stop burning fuels any time soon.

“If we’re trying to create a greener environment, the idea is then if we’re still going to be burning fuels, let’s make them as green as possible so that they’re impacting our atmosphere in the most minute way,” she said.

‘Risky Behaviors’ in Adolescents

Janessa Rangel, a senior majoring in integrative neuroscience, focused her research on adolescent life experiences and the transitions that come with them.

“There are a lot of social and psychological changes, and with that come negative life events, inevitably,” said Rangel, who was particularly interested in adolescents in New York City.

She said previous research shows that compared to their higher-income peers, lower-income adolescents “experience more overall negative life events, based on the amount of chronic stressors that they have [and] neighborhood disadvantages.”

She wanted to build on that research and explore the connection between adolescents’ life experiences and their willingness to engage in “risky behaviors.” Oftentimes, Rangel noted, lower-income adolescents are depicted in the media as “the bad influences” and the ones engaging in risky behaviors, such as drug use.

But her research, using data from two separate questionnaires, found lower-income adolescents did not engage in as many risky behaviors, something she said might come from a desire to not “lose it all” and face negative consequences. On the other hand, she found that higher-income adolescents “don’t have a lot of chronic stressors, and there is that wealth cushion, so they’re able to engage in risky behaviors.”

Homeless Shelters: A Local Perspective

Bennett Reinhardt, a senior majoring in urban studies, has been involved with local housing justice and homelessness-related organizations for the last five years.

“I knew that I wanted to bring an academic perspective to this issue,” said Reinhardt, who will be working as a community organizer around housing and homelessness after graduation. “Homelessness is one of the biggest crises facing the contemporary city.”

Reinhardt embedded himself with a local organization running a respite shelter one day a week in a church basement in Manhattan. Up to 14 people stay in the volunteer-run shelter each Sunday, and they’re provided with a bed, home-cooked meals, and other resources.

Through his research, which included observations and interviews, Reinhardt tried to show “what’s good about this model, [which]is that people feel it’s a protected environment, it’s a safe environment, and that the food is far better because it’s cooked by volunteers,” he said. “What’s challenging about this model is that it’s difficult to replicate at a [large] kind of scale.”

How Queer Arab International Students Are Finding Community

Minwa Alhamad, a senior majoring in anthropology and political science, said she was inspired to do her research project after taking a class with Professor Aseel Sawalha, her mentor, on the anthropology of gender and sexuality.

“That’s where I started wanting to write ethnographic research on queer and Arab people specifically and the intersectionality of that—I’m queer and Arab—and so I wanted to know more about it because there’s not a lot of academic research out there.”

Alhamad said that she started this research focusing on “nonbelonging.”

“I wanted to talk about how they didn’t belong in their origin countries because of their queerness, and they didn’t belong here because of their Arab-ness,” she said.

But as she started conducting interviews with international students from Arab countries, her respondents inspired her to shift her theme from one of identity to the idea of forging community.

“They told me how they use social media and other various mediums to create a queer Arab community,” Alhamad said. “They have slang that’s specific to that community so that if someone’s using it, you know that’s a safe place for you.”

Developing a More Affordable Way to Measure Air Quality

Presenting at the symposium’s Earth Day panel was Santiago Plaza, a senior who works as a research assistant for Project FRESH Air, an initiative where Fordham students and faculty visit middle and high schools in the Bronx and New York and install air quality monitors to teach the children about how pollution affects their environment. Unfortunately, those monitors aren’t cheap. The price of the Project FRESH Air monitors ranges from $179 to $259. 

Plaza’s goal was to create sensors that perform similarly, if not better, than the sensors currently on the market—and for a much lower price. He developed a successful prototype that cost about $70 to make (though he stressed that it will require more testing in the future). 

“Being able to have lower-cost monitors will allow us to work with more schools. It’s also really important to have a low-cost means to measure air quality so that people who don’t have as much financial support can take their health and care for their environment into their own hands,” said Plaza, an integrative neuroscience major who plans on applying to graduate or medical school. 

The Role of ‘Magic’ in Early Modern Russian and Ukrainian Societies

Grace Powers, a senior who double majors in sociology and history and minors in Russian, presented her research on the role of “magic” in Russian and Ukrainian societies during the early modern period. Powers defined magic as anything unexplainable. 

“It was a way of understanding the world and to claim agency or knowledge during a time when many people didn’t have any,” she said.  

Notions of magic permeated many parts of life, including healing practices, politics, and warfare.

Some events perceived as “magical” were so powerful that they could lead to riots and the murder of neighbors, said Powers. In 1547, the city of Moscow experienced a devastating fire that killed about 1,700 people. The citizens blamed the fire on the tsar’s grandmother and uncles, claiming that they had caused the destruction by sprinkling blood from a stolen heart over the city. As a result, the people rioted and demanded the execution of the royal family. 

In her research presentation, Powers, who studied primary documents and scholarly articles, argued that magic was a powerful tool and resource during that time period—and has implications for today’s world.  

“This is really important for understanding the culture at that time, which is the basis of culture for many Eastern and Slavic European countries now. Understanding their mindsets better is also important for us in the United States, since we have diplomatic ties with them,” said Powers, who was recently awarded a Fulbright to teach English in Estonia for a year. 

Several members of the Fordham community were also celebrated at the symposium’s awards ceremony. The Faculty Mentor of the Year award was given to Molly Zimmerman, Ph.D., associate professor of psychology, and Nathan Lincoln-DeCusatis, associate professor of music. The inaugural Anne L. Geiger Award, awarded to a student whose contributions and research bring together diverse people and perspectives, was given to senior Sophia Maier. The Fordham College Alumni Association Award was given to senior Miguel Sutedjo.