By Kenneth Mullinax/ASU
The inaugural regional "Cyanobacteria and Algae Research and Education" (CARE) Conference was hosted recently at Alabama State University. The CARE workshop award committee selected four outstanding student winners attending the event, including one from ASU.
Eryn Griffin, a Forensic Biology major, won the award category titled "Three-minute Talk." She is a native of Waldorf, Maryland, and graduated from North Point High School. The other three winners are students from Yale University, the University of Colorado, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Louisiana State University, explained Dr. Harvey Hou, an organizer of the event, and professor of Forensic Science and head of ASU’s Laboratory of Forensic Analysis and Photosynthesis.
"We are especially excited to have one of our very own students from ASU, Ms. Griffin, stand out among the top students honored at this important scientific conference and workshop. She is among our most impressive STEM students on campus and I am proud that the award's committee also noted her brilliance," said Hou. "The award committee was led by Dr. Colin Gates from Loyola University in Chicago and the five other award committee members were from Yale University, Auburn University, The National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Alabama State University."
Dr. Hou explained that the CARE Workshop was a conference focused on energy sciences, including photosynthesis and cyanobacteria research.
The sessions featured 27 speakers from 10 universities and from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. The speakers included world-leading experts and students, and provided a snapshot of the most recent advances in Energy Sciences.
"The CARE Workshop Conference provided an excellent platform for energy science research, especially on the presentation of the latest progress in cyanobacteria and algae research...and it promoted collaboration between the teams and inspired the young research students, like ASU's Ms. Griffin, to enter the workforce in energy research," Hou stated. "We were thrilled and honored to have had two world leaders as the Plenary Speakers, Dr. Gary Brudvig, Yale University's Silliman Professor of Chemistry and Dr. Rachael Morgan-Kiss, the chair of Miami University's Microbiology Department and its O'Toole Family Professor, who shared her amazing stories of the microbial ecology of photosynthetic organisms in the polar desert of Antarctica."