Marked by ritual games and sacrifices, the Ludi Saeculares, the Secular Games, mark a new age within the Roman empire, one of which was famously held by Emperor Augustus in 17 B.C.E.. The emperor then commissioned the lyric poet, Horace, to create the Carmen Saeculare, which contains much information contributing to these ritual practices during the games. In…
Tag: Spring 2021
Studying Health Care in Pittsburgh’s Jewish Community
Hi everybody! My name is Corey Schultz and I am a junior here at Pitt. I am double majoring in History and Neuroscience and am a current BPhil candidate in the Honors College. For this spring semester, I have been selected as a Chancellor’s Undergraduate Research Fellow (CURF). My project, working under the mentorship of…
Improving Trigger Rate Monitoring Tools at ATLAS – CURF Introduction: Connor Menzel
This semester, I will be working on a project with Dr. Tae Min Hong in the Department of Physics and Astronomy for the ATLAS Experiment, which is one of the four main experiments at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. To understand what my specific project entails and why it is important,…
Where have all the plant species gone? Using herbaria, iNaturalist, and Google Earth to track biodiversity loss in Western Pennsylvania
Plant biodiversity is crucial in maintaining stable interactions among all species ranging from insects to humans. As the base of the food chain, it is of paramount importance that plants maintain an appropriate level of biodiversity in the ecosystem surrounding the Pittsburgh region. However, as whitetail deer (Odocoileus virginianus) populations and human development patterns continue to fluctuate and increase in the area, certain plant species…
Chemistry: The Language of Atoms – CUTF introduction : Shourya Mukherjee
Hello! My name is Shourya Mukherjee and I am a junior at Pitt pursuing a Molecular Biology with a specialization in Biochemistry for my major in addition to chemistry and music minors. A fun fact about me is I love playing different musical instruments; I primarily play the piano and trombone but have been learning…
Hamilton: The Man and the Musical – CUTF Introduction: Emily Mensing
Hello! My name is Emily Mensing, and I am currently a Junior at the University of Pittsburgh. I am pursuing majors in History and Political Science with minors in Legal Studies and Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies. At Pitt, I am involved across campus as a Resident Assistant in a First-Year Residence Hall, a Peer…
A Girl From Another World
Hi! I’m Mikayla Beardsley, a current sophomore at Pitt studying Civil Engineering. I was born Tokyo, Japan but spent the majority of my life growing up in Dallas, Texas until I moved to Harare, Zimbabwe in 2017. What drew me back to the States was Pitt! The opportunities that Pitt offers to its students is…
This is the Televisual Way – CUTF Introduction: Fidel Anderson
My name is Fidel Anderson and I’m a soon-to-be graduating senior at the University of Pittsburgh, in which I’m double majoring in Film & Media Studies and Natural Sciences, as well as minoring in Creative Writing. Though I’ve bounced around within a few different departments during my initial year-and-a-half at the school, I feel like…
CURF Introduction – Jordan Kuwik
My project, directed under the guidance of Dr. Kabirul Islam, focuses on the alpha-ketogluterate-dependent hydroxlyse (AlkB) class of proteins. These proteins demethylate a variety of different mRNA, tRNA, ssDNA, and dsDNA constructs. In doing so, they play a role in the stability of proteins and DNA/RNA fidelity within the cell. More interestingly, recent research has…
Fending Off Imposter Syndrome: My Pitt Honors Experience
Hello everyone! My name is Catalina Feistritzer, and I am a junior majoring in both Neuroscience and English Literature with accompanying minors in Linguistics and Chemistry. I am originally from York, PA, but I spend practically all my time here in Pittsburgh. The Honors College has extensively shaped me as a student, and I have…