Hampden-Sydney’s Biology department has been affiliated with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Science Education Alliance-Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science (SEA-PHAGES) program since 2011.  The program has provided a research network centered on viral discovery and research that has given 23 H-SC biologists first-hand research experience in the last two years.  Two of these students, James Hughes ’14 and Daniel Osarfo-Akoto ’15, have been doing independent research projects on phage discovery and characterization and accompanied the departments Dr. Mike Wolyniak to James Madison University to present their research at “Phage Phaire 2013”.

Hughes, Wolyniak, and Osarfo-Akoto after a long day of science

The gathering was organized by the biology department at JMU and consisted of students from JMU, Hampden-Sydney, VCU, and Mary Washington who have been working on the SEA-PHAGES project.  Representatives from HHMI and guest speakers from NC State University were also on hand.

James with a large crowd at his research poster

Daniel explaining his research to JMU undergraduates

The SEA-PHAGES project is continuing at Hampden-Sydney in 2014 in the form of genomic sequence analysis in Biology 313 (Genomics) in the spring semester and the isolation and characterization of a new set of phages in Biology 312 (Molecular Biology) in the fall semester.