The Bethany Lutheran College Science Department will host their annual Science Symposium on April 20, 2018. The theme and topic of this year’s symposium will cover frequency and causes of transmissible diseases, and will consist of three speakers who will each discuss their research.

Session One at 10:30 a.m.

Bethany Lutheran College alumna Jenny (Lohmiller) Shaw (’14) is a research technician at the Center for Infectious Disease Research in Seattle, Washington. Shaw is a 2016 master of arts graduate in environmental health from the University of Washington. She will present work relating to her master’s thesis centered on new ways to diagnose tuberculosis in children. She will also discuss her experience as a graduate student at the University of Washington.

Session Two at 1 p.m.

Elizabeth (Beth) Atkinson is an assistant professor of biostatistics and statistical geneticist in the Department of Health Sciences Research at the Mayo Clinic research facility in Rochester, Minnesota. Her work has included understanding the role genetics plays in various gastroenterology and neurology diseases and recently studied gradient boosting as a way to produce improved prediction models using population data to understand the interrelationships between various medical conditions. She collaborates with a number of investigators across a wide range of medical areas. Her presentation will be focused on analytical models and methods as they relate to the spread of disease.

Session Three at 2:30 p.m.

Dr. James Henkel is an assistant professor of biology at Wisconsin Lutheran College in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He will discuss his main area of research, which is determining how Chlamydia can survive in mammalian host cells through small GTPase recruitment. Chlamydia trachomatis causes blindness worldwide and is more commonly known in the U.S. to be the leading cause of bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STI).

All presentations will be held in Meyer Hall, Room 101. The talks are free and open to the public.