{"id":5798,"date":"2016-10-21T18:09:04","date_gmt":"2016-10-21T18:09:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=5798"},"modified":"2016-10-21T18:09:09","modified_gmt":"2016-10-21T18:09:09","slug":"utrgv-biology-major-earns-first-place-for-research-poster-on-zika-virus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=5798","title":{"rendered":"UTRGV Biology Major Earns First Place for Research Poster on Zika Virus"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Brenda<\/a>

Brenda Hernandez-Barron, a senior biology major at The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, is shown here with her first place poster in the Undergraduate Student Poster Competition: Medical and Veterinary Entomology category, at a joint meeting of the 25th International Congress of Entomology and the Entomological Society of America in Orlando, Florida. Courtesy Photo<\/p><\/div>\n

by Vicky Brito<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>RIO GRANDE VALLEY, TEXAS \u2013\u00a0<\/strong>Brenda Hernandez-Barron, a senior biology major at The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, was awarded first place in her category in the Undergraduate Student Poster Competition: Medical and Veterinary Entomology, at a joint meeting of the 25th International Congress of Entomology<\/a> and the Entomological Society of America<\/p>\n

The conference, \u201cEntomology without Borders,\u201d held recently in Orlando, Florida,\u00a0is the largest congregation\u00a0of scientists and experts\u00a0in the discipline and attracted more than 6,000\u00a0delegates worldwide.<\/p>\n

Hernandez-Barron\u2019s research poster, \u201cZika Virus Infection and Dissemination within South Texas Mosquito Vectors,\u201d\u00a0focused on\u00a0Zika virus<\/a> transmission and infection rate capacity.<\/p>\n

\u201cI experimented on one species of mosquito, Aedes albopictus<\/em>, which is one of the species that transmits dengue, West Nile, chikungunya, and now Zika virus,\u201d Hernandez-Barron said.<\/p>\n

As part of her research, she sampled 32 mosquitos exposed to the Zika virus over a period of time. Every 24 to 48 hours, a certain number of mosquitos were withdrawn and tested for infection.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe exposed the mosquitos to the virus under temperatures and humidity rates from the Rio Grande\u00a0Valley, to see how fast they would begin to test\u00a0positive for\u00a0the virus in\u00a0certain body\u00a0parts,\u201d Hernandez-Barron said. \u201cThis study\u00a0helps us determine the speed\u00a0with which Zika\u00a0virus disseminates throughout this species of mosquito,\u00a0and the amount of time it takes for them to become infectious under local conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n

The next stage of the study\u00a0will be conducted on the both\u00a0Aedes aegypti<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Aedes albopictus\u00a0<\/em>species, using a larger sample.<\/p>\n

Hernandez-Barron has been working with Dr. Christopher Vitek, UTRGV associate professor of biology, in the Medical Entomology laboratory for two years.\u00a0She is now also working with\u00a0Dr. John Thomas, UTRGV assistant professor of biology, in the virology laboratory.<\/p>\n

The team of three has been working on this specific research since January.<\/p>\n

\u201cBrenda has actively engaged in her own research projects, and the quality and excellence of her performance has been obvious to me for quite some time,\u201d Vitek said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is very rewarding, as her mentor, to see her recognized in this fashion, as I know the level of dedication and effort she has put into her research.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t be prouder of her performance, and expect continued greatness from her in the future,\u201d\u00a0he said.<\/p>\n

Hernandez-Barron\u2019s goal is to publish the next phase of her research in early 2017. She will her Bachelors of Science in biology, with a minor in chemistry, this December.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Vicky Brito \u00a0RIO GRANDE VALLEY, TEXAS \u2013\u00a0Brenda Hernandez-Barron, a senior biology major at The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, was awarded first place in her category in the Undergraduate Student Poster Competition: Medical and Veterinary Entomology, at a joint meeting of the 25th International Congress of Entomology and the Entomological Society of America […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":5799,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-valley"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5798"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5798\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5800,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5798\/revisions\/5800"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}