Team

Dr. Gastel teaches subjects like science communications, medical humanities, and medical writing at many institutions. She writes many books and articles on the topic of science communications, and she is also one of the co-directors of the Science Influencers program!

Dr. Gastel was a mentor to Ian Wilhite.

Find out more about Dr. Gastel’s work here.

Martin Castro is involved in many projects and efforts. Some of these include the Monthly River Monitoring, which aims to assess and ensure the health of the Rio Grande’s water quality in Laredo; the Binational River Conservation Project, that focuses on developing a shared vision and scope for a 6.2-mile binational riverfront green space in Laredo/Nuevo Laredo; the STEAM Youth Camps at Lake CasaBlanca State Park, aiming to foster a connection with and understanding of youths and their local environment; the Urban Heat Island Mapping Field Campaign, seeking to understand and mitigate the effects of urban heat islands, contributing to the city’s sustainability and climate resilience planning; the Air Quality Sensor Installation at various Laredo ports of entry; and the 2024 Laredo Climate Cohort Program, which provides a platform for environmental activism, enabling participants to document environmental needs, advocate for change, and engage with the community effectively.

Martin Castro is a mentor to Marisol Vazquez

Find out more about work here.

Dr. Leggette’s research focuses on public engagement in science with a narrowed focus on investigating effective methods for training scientists to communicate with and engage their publics and applying those effective methods to designing and delivering science communication training programs. She also conducts audience analyses to build audience profiles of science constituents and publics to provide scientists with action-based research outcomes they can use to design and develop research projects, educational programs, and production tools. She has ~60 journal publications (as well as numerous abstracts, scientific reports, and conferences presentations) and has served as a PI or Co-PI of ~$69 million in extramurally funded projects.

Dr. Holli Leggette is a mentor to Zoee Nolen.

Find out more about work here.

Dr. Qi’s aim is to understand human health and develop medical technologies. By integrating predictive models and experimentation, she and her team tackle various challenges in biomaterial design and drug development. Dr. Qi and her team are currently researching topics of microphysiological systems, biomaterial design, cellular biomechanics, and engineering.

Dr. Qi is a mentor to Davis Johnson.

Find out more about Dr. Qi’s work here.

Jessica Setnick is conducting an analysis on the 200 reported insurance claim denials for eating disorder nutrition care they received. This is the first study of its kind and will be submitted for publication. With Hope’s help, they will be able to conduct additional research in this area. Dr. Setnick and her team have a current research initiative creating a validated tool to assess patient progress in nutrition counseling for eating disorders

Dr. Setnick is a mentor to Hope Bigbee

Find out more about Dr. Setnick’s work here.

Dr. Barton is involved in multiple projects at the moment. Dr. Barton studies the role of microbial nitrogen cycle in nylon degradation, the microbial CO2 sequestration for green building materials, the energetic limits of photoautotrophic growth in the NIR light range, and aims to understand the role of Mn-oxidizing microorganisms in mineral transformations in the subsurface.

Dr. Barton is mentor to Caleb Crubaugh 

Find out more about Dr. Barton’s work here.

Leighton Gibson is a Communications Specialist at Texas A&M Forest Service. With an agency that covers a broad area of expertise, from forestry to fighting wildfire, the communications office also has many ongoing projects to help the agency with branding and communicating to Texans. Leighton and her team are currently working through a complete redesign of our agency website. She is also working on research projects with invasive species including a publication for the southern region of the country. 

Leighton Gibson is a mentor to JD.

Find out more about work here.

Martin Castro is involved in many projects and efforts. Some of these include the Monthly River Monitoring, which aims to assess and ensure the health of the Rio Grande’s water quality in Laredo; the Binational River Conservation Project, that focuses on developing a shared vision and scope for a 6.2-mile binational riverfront green space in Laredo/Nuevo Laredo; the STEAM Youth Camps at Lake CasaBlanca State Park, aiming to foster a connection with and understanding of youths and their local environment; the Urban Heat Island Mapping Field Campaign, seeking to understand and mitigate the effects of urban heat islands, contributing to the city’s sustainability and climate resilience planning; the Air Quality Sensor Installation at various Laredo ports of entry; and the 2024 Laredo Climate Cohort Program, which provides a platform for environmental activism, enabling participants to document environmental needs, advocate for change, and engage with the community effectively.

Martin Castro is a mentor to Marisol Vazquez

Find out more about work here.

Dr. Shim’s research program focuses on the biology of fungal pathogens of important field crops in Texas, with emphasis on molecular genetic mechanisms of pathogen development, plant-pathogen interactions, and mycotoxins. Recently, he is pursuing innovative collaborations with TAMU engineering colleagues on mixed-plastic waste remediation through the use of environmental microbes. One current project is to elucidate fungal-bacterial interkingdom interactions and its role in plant pathogenesis in an emerging cotton Fusarium wilt disease. The central hypothesis is that soilborne pathogenic fungi are potent ecosystem modulators that can influence the overall microbial functioning. The project team postulates that pathogenic fungi recruits and supports mycosphere bacteria which in turn assists in its pathogenic lifestyle. Another current project will have broad scientific impacts because the developed synthetic biology, microbial engineering, and high-throughput microfluidics strategy will directly contribute to the dramatically accelerating research and development in the broad area of microbe-mediated plastic degradation and re-utilization, as well as microbial bioproduction and biomanufacturing. As a Co-PI, Dr. Shim plays a key role in fungal genetics and biology in characterizing fungal species with potential plastic biodegradation capacity.

Dr. Won Bo Shim is a mentor to Alexandra Ash

Find out more about work here.

Dr. M. Teresa Fernández-Abedul has over 30 years’ experience in Analytical Chemistry research and education. Her current research focuses on the development of devices and methodologies for decentralizing (bio)analysis, approaching it to the places where is needed. At this moment is collaborating with neurologists in the development of immunoelectroanalytical methodologies for fast and differential diagnosis of stroke. In the clinical field is also interested in the analysis of biomarkers of infectious diseases, also for on-site diagnosis. Regarding the environmental field is also working on the development of methodologies for the monitoring of emerging contaminants in waters.

Dr. M. Teresa is a mentor to Ava Takenaka

Find out more about work here.

Dr. Adams studies bat ecology for conservation, researching through Bat Conservation International. She strives to bridge the gap between research and implementation using collaboration and outreach. Currently, she is working on bat conservation in Texas, specifically combatting white-nose syndrome in bats.

Dr. Adams was a mentor to Jeremiah Wright.

Find out more about Dr. Adams’ work here.

Blair Fannin works for Texas A&M AgriLife in executive and internal communications as part of Texas A&M AgriLife Marketing and Communications. He has been with the Texas A&M University System for more than two decades and is a Vice Chancellor’s Award recipient. He has served in a variety of roles within Texas A&M AgriLife involving news, media relations and public affairs serving the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service and Texas A&M AgriLife Research. He has written extensively about agriculture and natural resources programming in agricultural economics, animal science, foreign animal diseases and production agriculture. He has a bachelors of science in journalism from Sam Houston State University.

Mr. Fannin was a mentor to Fatyma Lawal.

Find out more about Mr. Fannin’s work here.

Dr. Gastel teaches subjects like science communications, medical humanities, and medical writing at many institutions. She writes many books and articles on the topic of science communications, and she is also one of the co-directors of the Science Influencers program!

Dr. Gastel was a mentor to Fernanda Arcos.

Find out more about Dr. Gastel’s work here.

Dr. Polcyn is a paleontologist whose research involves exploration of evolutionary patterns and development of explanatory models. In his research, he sets out to understand why animals may have evolved the way they did, focusing broadly on marine amniotes and specifically on mosasaurs.

Dr. Polcyn was a mentor to Jared Cooke.

Find out more about Dr. Polcyn’s work here.

Dr. Qi’s aim is to understand human health and develop medical technologies. By integrating predictive models and experimentation, she and her team tackle various challenges in biomaterial design and drug development. Dr. Qi and her team are currently researching topics of microphysiological systems, biomaterial design, cellular biomechanics, and engineering.

Dr. Qi was a mentor to Camryn Couvillion.

Find out more about Dr. Qi’s work here.

Dr. Jennifer Dulin is an assistant professor in the Department of Biology at Texas A&M University. The goals of the Dulin lab are (1) to gain new understanding about the pathophysiology underlying central and peripheral dysfunctions after spinal cord injury, and (2) to develop robust new therapies that can improve quality of life for those living with spinal cord injury. Specifically, her group is working to develop optimized neural stem/progenitor cell transplantation approaches to restore neural circuitry controlling motor, sensory, and autonomic functions. They strive to combine a high level of scientific rigor with transparency and collaboration in order to drive the field forward toward the development of powerful clinical therapies.

Dr. Dulin was a mentor to Josh Moses.

Find out more about Dr. Dulin’s work here.

Blair Fannin works for Texas A&M AgriLife in executive and internal communications as part of Texas A&M AgriLife Marketing and Communications. He has been with the Texas A&M University System for more than two decades and is a Vice Chancellor’s Award recipient. He has served in a variety of roles within Texas A&M AgriLife involving news, media relations and public affairs serving the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service and Texas A&M AgriLife Research. He has written extensively about agriculture and natural resources programming in agricultural economics, animal science, foreign animal diseases and production agriculture. He has a bachelors of science in journalism from Sam Houston State University.

Ms. Massey was a mentor to Kiara Carrasco.

Find out more about Ms. Massey’s work here.

Dr. Katelynn A. Perrault was an Assistant Professor of Forensic Science and Chemistry at Chaminade University of Honolulu when she served as a Science Influencers mentor. She earned her B.Sc. (Hons) in Forensic Science from the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) in 2011. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) in 2015 with a focus on forensic chemistry. Following her doctoral work, Dr. Perrault performed doctoral studies at the University of Liège, applying novel analytical approaches to challenging matrices in various fields such as food science, archaeology and forensic science. Through her research, Dr. Perrault has cultivated an international network of collaborators in academia, police and government agencies.

Dr. Perrault was a mentor to Steven Graham.

Find out more about Dr. Perrault’s work here.

Dr. Victor J. Viser is an instructional associate professor at Texas A&M University at Galveston in the Department of Liberal Studies. His area of research is primarily in communication theory, particularly as it intersects the socio-cultural forces at work in hegemonic systems. This includes media history, activism communication practices, communicating science, environmental science, and cultural artifact and content analysis. He has taught courses in international communications, history of rock and roll, public speaking, advertising and public relations.

Dr. Viser was a mentor to Lucie Hartman.

Find out more about Dr. Viser’s work here.

Dr. Marisa Tellez is the executive director of the Crocodile Research Coalition, a Belizean non-profit that promotes the conservation of crocodiles, their habitat and adjacent wildlife throughout Central American and the Caribbean through research, education and community involvement. Her team conducts various research that includes population biology, environmental toxicology, wildlife disease, habitat preservation, and using drone technology and game camera traps to monitor local wildlife. Additionally, community outreach is important to the coalition.

Dr. Tellez was a mentor to Aanjaneya Chaturvedi.

Find out more about Dr. Tellez’s work here.