S-STEM/TRAIN Scholar Kimberly Merrill's Blog

 I feel now that I am working on two research questions, I should have two parts to my blog. Part One: For the bat project, I picked up the echolocator this week. I haven't used it quite yet mainly because I got the COVID-19 vaccine on Tuesday evening and have been dealing with some of the side effects. Also, last evening it was extremely windy and cold in my area and I'm not sure it's a great idea to take the device out in those weather conditions, nor would it probably be a successful time to find bats. I believe my research question for the bats will be something along the lines of: Why do bats harbor so many diseases? To understand the cycles and transmissions, I started at looking at some of the main zoonotic diseases that bats carry. The image below is from the article, "Why bats are the source of so many disease outbreaks, "  by Anjishnu Das. The artilce was published in Februrary of 2020 on Times of India via  http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow...

 Hello! This week I decided to look into bats. Matt has been really helpful and extended the opportunity to use one of the data collectors for the bat project. To get a good idea of a new research topic, I focused on reading about bats and their importance in varying ecosystems. I learned a lot about how they attain huge importance in moderating pest populations and increase soil enrichment.  It was suggested since my last project was on a zoonotic disease, that I carry that knowledge of the research process into diseases that bats carry. There are likely many factors involved in their involvement as hosts and vectors. This coming week, I plan to look into those factors and hopefully develop a question around that. First, I want to get an understanding of bats in general, including their diet, migrations, and physical make-up. Then, I want to learn what diseases they carry besides the obvious. Lastly, I want to look at the disease cycles and see what's happening there.  A...

 Welcome/welcome back everyone! I hope everyone had a safe, wonderful winter break.  Last semester, I left off with an open ended research project. The Plague vs Temperature analysis was causing many difficulties. Fortunately, I am getting some help on what to do with messy, inconsistent data. I still won't give up on the project and plan to continue on with it this semester. Seeing it through and finding substantial or insignificant results is still the goal. I think I pretty much know the conclusion before the data is even put together. I just need a little help putting it together. Also, I'm in the process of developing a simultaneous research question to involve bats of sometime, while I help collect bat data for Matt and peer STEM/TRAIN students. I am really excited about that.  During winter break, I did a lot. My mum is selling my childhood home/farm so I've been going through all my old stuff that one often leaves at their parents house, such as year books, sports...