Student Projects
Role Title
In this project we apply a basic Kermack-McKendrik ordinary differential equation model to this pandemic in the state of South Carolina and the top high-incidence counties including Beaufort and Charleston counties. Using the known recovery period of COVID-19, the transmission parameter is estimated for the regions through least-square fitting to the daily reported cases. Based on this estimation, we also calculate the projected magnitude of the peak and time needed for the infection to subside if no change in control measures occur.
Role Title
As tuition is rising, more and more students need to take out student-loans to pay their tuition. According to Mary Bromley of Cornerstone University, “due to the increase in demand for degrees and the increase in availability of student loans, the cost of tuition in the United States has risen by 1415.6% since 1972”. This project is an attempt at understanding the phenomenon of rising cost of higher education in selected states in the US by looking at the varying amount of change in tuition over time. From the plethora of interconnected underlying factors that impact this phenomenon, we performed statistical analysis, including multiple regression analysis, on key influential factors such as cost of living and population density by states. This project will show the increase in percent change in different states and if it is possible to predict further increase based on these variables.
Role Title
Make-up for women is a multimillion-dollar industry! Following wide-spread consumer awareness in recent years, make-up companies are quick to advertise and flood the stores with products containing natural, eco-friendly ingredients. And these, ‘superior’ products come at a ‘superior’ price. Everyday use of makeup leaves the faces dry, irritated, and sensitive. It is not easy to identify which chemicals are harmful from reading the back of the bottle. So, when faced with the daunting task of choosing better make-up products, women are conditioned to think that more expensive products have fewer skin irritants. For that, we have selected 4 differently priced brands of 6 everyday use make-up products, (foundation, concealer, eye-shadow, eye-liner, brows and lipstick) and recorded the number of skin irritants contained in each. Then we consider the cost of every possible combination of these products and its relation to total number of skin irritants applied at a time. Mann-Whitney t-test is used to compare the irritants in expensive brands versus affordable brands. We find that there is no statistical difference in the amount of irritants found in high priced make up versus low priced makeup. Only 5% of variation in number of irritants can be explained by price in a full face of makeup.
Role Title
In 2017, diarrhea scored the eighth position of leading cause of mortality around the world and it was responsible for more than 1.6 million deaths. More than a 26% of diarrheal deaths occurred among children younger than 5 years. Although diarrhea is a global problem, it is more persistent in impoverished nations with deficient healthcare systems and fewer resources to manage the burden of this disease. The biological and physiological causes of diarrhea have been well studied. Therefore, we directed this study to analyze co-variants that would be indirectly related to diarrheal death rates, yet directly related to the factors that impoverished nations share. The targeted co-variants analyzed were diarrheal death rates, political stability, socio-economic status by measuring GDP, and level of education of mothers. All the co-variants were individually modeled by linear regression for each county and also modeled using multiple regression analysis for each country to establish the relations.
Role Title
Visceral Leishmaniasis (VL), also known as ‘kala-azar’, is a vector-borne disease that primarily affects developing countries, including the state of Bihar in India (state which hosts 90% of VL cases in India). In this project we used a six-stage, fifth-order, Runge-Kutta method to solve our differential equations. Utilizing least square fitting, which is a method used to fit parameters by minimizing the sum of square residual between the data points and solution curve, we estimated the following parameters in our model for each of the 21 districts of Bihar, India. Bivariate sensitivity analysis is made to test prediction scenarios.
Student Project Posters in Chronological Order
Spring 2020
5. Modeling the Spread of Covid-19 in the State of South Carolina and the High-Incidence Counties. Veronica McLeod, Frank Cazales, Lingtao Chen, Shae Gantt, Brice Adkins, Rasheed Dias
4. Spatial Analysis of Association and Impact of Childhood Obesity Rates on Environmental Factors in Beaufort County Elementary School District. Lily Coutu, Brenna Dickerson, Aliyah Dunn, Sarah Elliott, Audrey Rucker, Davonte Saulsberry
3. Fair Market Rent Trends in South Carolina. Breona Davis, Emani Dente, Deanna Waid, Shane McCarty
2. Deaths by Diarrhea in the America’s. Kevin Balderas, Alex Rendon Jonguitud, Susan Reyes Garcia, Eileen Silva Rayo
1. Impact of Population Increase on Main Rivers of Beaufort County. Chandler Chapman, Tania Pegues, Lincoln Fuller, Donna Daniels, McKayla Cavanagh, Marino Sorbara
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Spring 2019
5. Math Solves the Makeup Mystery. Arcadia Martinez-Canalez and Cierra Chapman. First Prize in SRSD Issue Based category.
4. Association of Race, Gender, and Age to Blood Pressure Within Children of Hampton County, SC. Shrader Doray, Carolina Heaton and Sarah Queen
3. Association of body-mass index, gender and race to choice of lunch item among middle-school students in Jasper County, SC. Hannah Johnson and Elizabeth Peritt
2. Rising Tuition of Higher Education in Relation to Cost of Living and Population Density. Jacob Fischer
1. Stepwise shifts in the abundance and size of microplastic particles in Beaufort County municipal wastewater and drinking water. Justin Davies, B. Evans, C. Dobrivska, S.A. Borgianini, PhD
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Spring 2018
4. Kala-azars Correlations with Structural Differences. Robert Lanier and Daniella Borjas.
3. Active Bacterial Core Development into Meningitis. Derek George and Sierra Britt.
2. Fecal Coliform Bacteria and Oysters in Okatie RIver. Haley Sutcliffe and Ryan Reynolds. Third Prize in SRSD Issue-based Category
1. Childhood Obesity in the Lowcountry. Shae Gantt. (SRSD, Discovery Day and Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics Conference on Life Sciences in Minnesota, MN).
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Spring 2017
5. Associations between Body Mass Index, Gender, Grade and Food Choice among Middle Schoolers in Jasper County, SC. Monique Whitely, Demetrius Rhodes, Kwesi Lincoln, Valerie Meuhleman, Lydia Breland and Alan Warren. (First prize in Discovery Day in Public Health category and Third prize in SRSD in Hypothesis-driven category)
4. An Educational Intervention to Promote Healthy-lifestyle choices among Middle Schoolers in Jasper County, SC. Madison Johnson, Monique Whitely, Valerie Meuhleman, Lydia Breland and Alan Warren.
3. Mathematical Model to Characterize Childhood Obesity in Schools. Demetrius Rhodes (Discovery-Day in Public Health category and SRSD Hypothesis-driven category)
2. Comparing Spatial Significance to Estimated Asymptomatic Cases of Visceral Leishmaniasis in Bihar, India. Kyana Grimball and Michael Cook (SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
1. Acoustic Propagation of Fish Calls in the May River, South Carolina. Shaneel Bivek, Austin Roller and Eric Montie (SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
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Spring 2016
7. Mathematical Model to Estimate Underreporting and Asymptomatic Visceral Leishmaniasis Cases in Bihar, India. Austin Mishoe (Second prize at Discovery Day in Math and Engg category and SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
6. Characterize the decline in percentage of overweight and obese children in Beaufort County school children. Demetrius Rhodes, Alan Warren, MPH, PhD, Valerie Muehleman (Discovery Day in Public Health Category and SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
5. Mathematical modeling of a decade of MRSA infection in Beaufort SC. Trong Duc Le (SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
4. Modeling of Spotted Seatrout (Cynoscion nebulosus) Egg Production in May River, South Carolina and Impacts of Storm water Runoffs on Reproductive Output. Bradshaw McKinney and Eric Montie. (SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
3. Statistically Analyzing Inuence of Socio-economic Factors on Prevalence of Juvenile Crime in Eastern Counties of SC. Shauna Patrick (SRSD, Issue Based/Descriptive category)
2. Statically Analyzing the Impact of a Six-week Strength and Speed Building Training Program on High-school Football Lineman. Humberto Delatorre (SRSD, Issue Based/Descriptive category)
1. The Reemergence of Pertussis. Jessica Taylor (SRSD, Issue Based/Descriptive Category)
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Spring 2015
5. Mathematical Model to Estimate Underreporting of Visceral Leishmaniasis in Bihar, India. Austin Mishoe (SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
4. Health Watch: Obesity among Juveniles in Hampton and Jasper Counties. Demetrius Rhodes and Alan Warren (SRSD, Descriptive-Issue based)
3. Health Watch: Obesity among Juveniles in Beaufort County school children. Monique Whitely, Kwesi Lincoln, Demetrius Rhodes, and Alan Warren (SRSD, Descriptive-Issue based)
2. MRSA, the super-bug Among us: Lessons learned in Beaufort. Karla Fornear, Magdalena Madera (SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
1. The effect of Incubation time and clutch size on the emergence success of sea turtles. Rebecca Persons, Daniel Charles Northcut, Danielle Scolaro and Steve Borgianini (SRSD, Hypothesis-driven category)
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Spring and Fall 2014
4. Estimating the Effect of Ezemetibe and Interferon-alpha on hepatitis C Viral RNA in vitro. Austin Mishoe won (First Prize in SRSD Hypothesis Driven category)
3. Systematically Applying Research to Address Visceral Leishmaniasis in Poor Communities. Peter Mize for GIGS Conference
2. Mathematical Model to Estimate Underreporting of Deaths due to Visceral Leishmaniasis in Bihar, India. Austin Mishoe for GIGS Conference
1. Duration of SIL treatment in HCV patients using Mathematical Model. Demetrius Rhodes for GIGS Conference
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