Eric Miller

Our AFRI ELI (Undergraduate Research and Extension Experiential Learning Initiative) focuses on building student awareness and fundamental skills in the areas of microbiology and honey bee and other pollinator biology. We will educate participating students in the importance of honey bees as pollinators, the role of pollinators in crop productivity, and teach students the overall importance of microbes in earth ecology and the specific role of microbes in pollinator health and disease. This new BeeMORE (Bees and Microbes in Organized Research & Extension) proposal builds on our prior years of offering a successful summer REEU program for diverse students with limited exposure to agricultural research. The proposed program retains successful elements while enhancing the extension and science communication components of the program.

Our proposed AFRI ELI (Undergraduate Research and Extension Experiential Learning Initiative) focuses on building student awareness and fundamental skills in the areas of microbiology and honey bee biology. We will educate participating students in the importance of honey bees as pollinators, the role of pollinators in crop productivity, and teach students the overall importance of microbes in earth ecology and the specific role of microbes in honey bee health and disease.

Molecular tools will be developed to enable editing the genomes of antibiotic-producing microbes.

Terrestrial cyanobacteria are known to be veritable treasure-troves of secondary metabolites, many of which have important properties of value to human health, animal health, agriculture, and energy sciences. Selected strains of cyanobacteria will be cultured and examined for production of metabolites, including chlorophyll derivatives. Genomic analyses will be carried out when deemed informative.

This Exploratory Research Project will develop new phage-based detection systems for monitoring Vibrio spp. of food safety and shellfish health concern. Lytic phages infect viable cells where gene expression and phage amplification from nominal levels of vibrios can generate detectable biomolecules adaptable to convenient assay systems. Reporter phages and Quantum Dot nanocrystal technology will be configured for specificity in detecting V. parahaemolyticus, while employing parameters that reduce ?false positives? from the non-pathogenic vibrios in marine samples.