Kilachand UROP Student Feature

Can you provide us with a brief description of your summer research work?
My summer research, broadly, was concerned with bubbles (particularly, large ones) and a phenomenon they exhibit when rising through a fluid called “particle scavenging,” whereby particles incident to the path of the bubble on its barrel upwards become stuck to its surface. This effect, compounded over the lifetime of the bubble, can lead to particle concentrations on the surface of the bubble which are orders of magnitude higher than the ambient fluid. My work over the summer consisted of designing an experimental setup capable of measuring the particles on the surface of individual bubbles after their rise through particle-laden water, collecting and analyzing the data, and then developing a new analytic model capable of predicting the observed particle concentrations.

Please provide us with a brief statement about how you got involved with this research project – also please mention if this work is tied to your Keystone or other work through KHC.
While fluid mechanics is not ordinarily treated under either of my majors (Physics and Applied Math), I’ve had an interest in it since I was a kid on summer swim team, so I sought out research labs in the Mechanical Engineering department and decided to cold-email one Professor Jacy Bird. He graciously took me on, and after a semester working in his lab as a part-time research assistant for work study, UROP allowed me to dedicate myself to the work full time. This work was not tied to my KHC work in any way, though I do believe it inherits the spirit of interdisciplinarity.

How did you find out about the UROP funding opportunity, how has this funding made an impact on your project (or you), and do you have any advice to students hoping to apply for this funding opportunity in the future?
I found out about UROP before I got to BU, but I only considered it after getting involved with Professor Bird’s lab. The funding allowed me to stay in Boston over the summer (the city is so green and beautiful!) to do this research, which wouldn’t have been possible otherwise. Through this experience, I learned that research isn’t for everyone, and some people might find pipetting bubbles into a tiny box then spending weeks graphing and re-graphing the results to be miserable, but I am not one of those people (so much so that I am doing research on a seperate 2-phase fluid flow system this semester abroad at CERN). The advice I would give to anyone looking to get involved in UROP would be to get involved with a lab early –even if just through shadowing once a week– and to write out a draft application early to provide to your mentor so they can make suggestions and help you communicate what is really important about your project.

Can you provide us with a brief description of your summer research work?
Over the summer I worked in the Nano-Bio lab in the photonics center under Dr. Bjoern Reinhard. I studied the electrostatic interactions between lipid-wrapped gold nanoparticles and S. Epidermidis bacteria with a potential future application as an alternative to antibiotics.

Please provide us with a brief statement about how you got involved with this research project – also please mention if this work is tied to your Keystone or other work through KHC.
I have been involved with the Reinhard Lab since the spring of my freshman year and I plan on doing Honors in Biology for my thesis. I got involved in this lab because I plan on pursuing a PhD post-grad, and wanted some real-life lab experience. I so value Dr. Reinhard and my graduate student mentor Koustav Kundu for all of their support and advice in this research project, and for trusting me to handle it majority on my own over the summer.

How did you find out about the UROP funding opportunity, how has this funding made an impact on your project (or you), and do you have any advice to students hoping to apply for this funding opportunity in the future?
I found out about UROP funding through the UROP office. I first reached out to them in the fall of my freshman year as I knew that research was important to me and something I wanted to get involved with right away. This funding allowed me to work on this project that I am so proud of full-time, to live in boston over the summer, and to get real experience of what pursuing a PhD in the future could look like for me. It solidified my love of scientific research and made me sure that that was the path I wanted to take. For any students hoping to pursue this path, the UROP office is an amazing resource. They have testimonials from past UROP winners, and examples of successful applications. I highly recommend reaching out to them.

Can you provide us with a brief description of your summer research work?
Summer 2025, I started working with Pamela Joshi and her team at the Institute for Equity in Child Opportunity and Healthy Development at BU School of Social Work on a project examining ways to improve access and take-up of Massachusetts’ Paid Family and Medical Leave program among Hispanic and immigrant working families. I’m still working on this project as of Spring 2026. My role is to help conduct and transcribe interviews in both English and Spanish and collect and organize data that will eventually help policymakers improve this program for immigrant workers.

Please provide us with a brief statement about how you got involved with this research project – also please mention if this work is tied to your Keystone or other work through KHC.
I found this position on the BU job board, and was interested right away. The whole Institute has been incredibly welcoming to me, and this experience has strengthened my intentions to go to social work school after graduation.

How did you find out about the UROP funding opportunity, how has this funding made an impact on your project (or you), and do you have any advice to students hoping to apply for this funding opportunity in the future?
I’ve known about UROP funding — and that I wanted to take advantage of it — since I got to BU, but I had no idea that Kilachand would help fund my research too. It’s truly made all the difference. I was able to use UROP funding, first with a full research award and then a faculty matching grant, for both the summer and fall semesters, which has now led me to be hired at the Institute for the spring, and I’ve learned so much from that experience so far, particularly from interacting directly with workers through qualitative interviews. Beyond me as an individual though, this research is especially important right now. Immigrant working families are the backbone of the US and MA economies, and this research can help the state strengthen its social safety nets to support them at a time when the federal government is directly targeting them. I’m grateful that BU and Kilachand are willing to invest in this effort and I hope UROP continues to fund similar studies.

Can you provide us with a brief description of your summer research work?
Over the summer, I did research with Professor Kirill Korolev where I ran simulations to find the morphological and organization effects that interactions between mutant and non-mutant microbes have on one another and microbial communities overall. These simulations use a pre-established model, adding an additional global interaction term that encodes the type and strength of interactions the mutant microbes have with the population.

Please provide us with a brief statement about how you got involved with this research project – also please mention if this work is tied to your Keystone or other work through KHC?
I first got interested in this research because I wanted to be able to apply principles I had learned in my physics and math classes to other fields. The field of biophysics felt like a natural first step to accomplish this, and I do not regret making that decision. This work forms the basis of my Kilachand Keystone, and I will also be writing a senior thesis with the physics department on this work.

How did you find out about the UROP funding opportunity, how has this funding made an impact on your project (or you), and do you have any advice to students hoping to apply for this funding opportunity in the future?
I found out about UROP funding through my research advisor. This funding allowed me to put all of my focus into my research, giving me a huge jumpstart on my thesis and Keystone. In terms of advice to other students, I would say just reach out to professors. Many professors would be thrilled to take on students, and if not, most will tell you what you need to complete (like coursework) in order to work with them.