Checking in on the Multidisciplinary Undergraduate Research Institute (MURI) program: Innovative projects by students, staff, and faculty

The Multidisciplinary Undergraduate Research Institute (MURI) project supports research teams of undergraduate students, graduate students, post-docs, senior staff, and faculty, which gives undergraduate students opportunities to gain research skills and solve real-world problems. 

Elizabeth Thill, the faculty mentor for the Great Marble Map of Rome project, said her team of six MURI students and one student volunteer worked on processing and making 3D scanned models of an ancient Roman map available through an open-access website.

Although the research results have not been disseminated yet, the project is anticipated to be published following the opening of a new museum by the team’s Italian research partners. Along with fully processing 210 fragment models and gathering and defining Latin and architectural terms, Thill said the students were able to overcome the challenges that arose from working together virtually due to COVID-19. 

“Some students were clearly hesitant to speak up in the beginning, but felt much more comfortable by the last few weeks,” Thill said. “They also struggled with learning new technology and software virtually, but once they got the hang of it, they enjoyed learning a new skill.”

Nicanor Moldovan, the faculty mentor for the Computational and Experimental Support for 3D Bioprinting project, also found that students gained a lot from the project, despite the initial road bump involved with remote work.

“By reading students’ weekly and final progress reports, it was obvious that all students found the experience very informative and gratifying, in spite of a brief period of surprise and accommodation to the remote learning model,” Moldovan said.  

Students ended up having to rely a lot on their own study and peer interaction during the project. Still, Moldovan said this approach ended up being both an asset to the project and to the students’ future careers, as it allowed them to learn skills they otherwise would not have. 

One group of students redesigned, printed, and tested objects such as a mobile hydrogel extruder, a single-use stethoscope, a hydrogel beads generator, and a model implant matching the shape of an oral bone defect.  

Along with this work, another group of students performed computer simulations to predict the fusion behavior of normal or tumor cell aggregates as dependent on available glucose in their environment. These students also performed the propagation of a viral infection in a model of histological human lung sections.   

All this research resulted in being able to publish the paper “Biofabrication of spheroids fusion-based tumor models: computational simulation of glucose effects” by David J. Bustamante, Elijah J. Basile, Brady M. Hildreth, Nathan W. Browning, S. Alexander Jensen, Leni Moldovan, Horia I. Petrache and Nicanor I. Moldovan. Furthermore, the abstract “Computational Simulation of Glucose Effects for Biofabrication of Spheroids-Based Tumor Models” was accepted as a virtual poster presentation at the World Congress of the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine Society.  

Hamid Dalir, another one of the faculty mentors for the MURI project, emphasized how great the experience was for both students and faculty.

“This was a great experience for me and my team to interact with the MURI students. They quickly merged with the rest of the team and were keen and involved in every aspect of the project,” Dalir said.