{"id":1123,"date":"2019-09-19T10:26:49","date_gmt":"2019-09-19T17:26:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nau.edu\/undergraduate-research\/?page_id=1123"},"modified":"2022-05-31T09:03:17","modified_gmt":"2022-05-31T16:03:17","slug":"daryn-erickson","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/student-research-stories\/daryn-erickson\/","title":{"rendered":"Daryn Erickson – Faculty mentors inspire undergraduate researcher to focus on mosquito-borne viruses"},"content":{"rendered":"

Faculty mentors inspire undergraduate researcher to focus on mosquito-borne viruses<\/strong><\/h1>\n

\"UndergraduateDespite the fact that Daryn Erickson\u2019s<\/strong> research regularly involves making what she refers to as \u201cmosquito smoothies\u201d\u2014preparing mosquito samples in the blender for testing\u2013she loves her work. Daryn has been working at NAU\u2019s Pathogen and Microbiome Institute<\/a> (PMI) for two years testing mosquitoes for the viruses that cause West Nile, Zika and dengue fever.<\/p>\n

Erickson, who is majoring in microbiology and minoring in chemistry, will graduate in December. When she began her research, she worked with assistant professor Crystal Hepp<\/strong> to test Culex mosquitoes to identify the different strains of West Nile circulating in the Southwest.<\/p>\n

\u201cI broke off from the larger West Nile virus project about a year ago to start studying a different mosquito\u2014Aedes aegypti\u2014that does not transmit West Nile virus,\u201d Erickson said. \u201cI wanted to see if these mosquitoes are currently transmitting or even just carrying viruses such as Zika or dengue fever. They aren\u2019t, but we did identify a new insect-specific virus\u2014one that does not infect humans. We wonder if this virus could prevent viruses like Zika and dengue from infecting Aedes aegypti.\u201d<\/p>\n

The mosquitoes Erickson studies are collected from traps in Maricopa County and taken to a lab in Phoenix. After being separated by species and by sex\u2014because only the females feed on blood, they are the ones that can spread disease\u2014the samples are shipped to NAU.<\/p>\n

Erickson\u2019s research enables her to explore her enthusiasm for viruses. \u201cI love the fact that viruses are, in my opinion, more complex than bacteria in a lot of ways,\u201d she said. \u201cThe virus lifecycle is really fascinating to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Research work helped undergraduate grow, develop skills<\/strong><\/p>\n

After graduating, Erickson will work at PMI through the spring semester, and will follow her aspirations by applying to NAU\u2019s Interdisciplinary Health Ph.D. program in the fall so she can continue her research with mosquitoes. She said her research work has helped her grow both academically and personally.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s been an amazing experience,\u201d she said. \u201cI’ve grown a lot and improved my problem-solving skills, having to troubleshoot different experiments. I\u2019ve also grown by developing my leadership skills. My research work has made me into a more independent person, but also able to lead a group of people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Erickson said her mentors, Hepp and assistant professor Viacheslav Fofanov<\/strong>, created a \u201creal family-like lab group. They were always there to talk to me and help me out with anything. And they’ve also helped me decide where I want to go in my career and what kind of a path I want to take to further my education.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

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Student spotlight<\/h3>\n <\/div>\n
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Daryn Erickson<\/p>\n

Major<\/strong>: Microbiology<\/p>\n

Mentor<\/strong>: Crystal Hepp<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Faculty mentors inspire undergraduate researcher to focus on mosquito-borne viruses Despite the fact that Daryn Erickson\u2019s research regularly involves making what she refers to as \u201cmosquito smoothies\u201d\u2014preparing mosquito samples in the blender for testing\u2013she loves her work. Daryn has been working at NAU\u2019s Pathogen and Microbiome Institute (PMI) for two years testing mosquitoes for the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"parent":15,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"_oasis_task_priority":"","ring_central_script_selection":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1123","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1123"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1148,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1123\/revisions\/1148"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/15"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/office-undergraduate-research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}