What a great day! I was placed with my first choice research topic, the urban heat effect and heat islands. I will be working with Professor Dana Habeeb and fellow undergraduate researcher, Kiarra Pratchett. We met with Dr. Habeeb in the morning, before heading off to the ProHealth meeting. It is great to see everyone’s excitement about finally starting on their research for the summer. After meeting with Dr. Habeeb and Dr. Clawson, Kiarra and I had a chance to adapt our “elevator pitch” to include our research topic for the summer. We broke in Dr. Habeeb’s new office with blocking out the research overview on her white board:
https://iu.box.com/s/47v4d9x7z4yrbuflc3fkead3wv70q523
In the afternoon, we had our first “ProHealth Tea”. These will occur every other week and each will focus on a different topic. This week we had a chance to meet several more faculty and staff from the School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering and the undergraduate researchers had a friendly competition presenting their elevator pitches. Mine did not come out quite as eloquently as I had hoped, but I still was awarded first place! (I was captured on film as well!)
https://iu.box.com/s/si269zzbo0qqkm5l6sgddqe4y8h53ukz
My “elevator pitch” was intended to say:
Hi, my name is Susan Monsey and I am a computer science major with a specialization in systems at Indiana University. I am studying how the environment impacts health and how cities impact the environment by researching how temperatures change in an urban environment. In our study, we will be deploying two different types of environmental sensors: on-site environmental sensors and wearable on-body sensors. The environmental sensors will be capturing near-surface air temperature and soil moisture. The wearable on-body sensors will capture both near-surface air temperatures as well as skin and core body temperatures. Developing a better understanding of an individual’s exposure to extreme heat as they move throughout the urban environment will help us to design solutions to protect individuals’ health. Exposure to extreme heat is higher in urban environments and more people die from extreme heat than any other type of natural disaster.
Since we finally are matched with our faculty and graduate student mentors, as well as paired with our undergraduate research partner, we were able to settle into our cubicles for the summer. Home sweet home for the next nine weeks:
