ONU chemistry major and Bluffton High School graduate Elvira Tatarkov has been awarded a $2,500 grant from the Mindlin Foundation’s Undergraduate Mentored Research Program in support of a summer research project.

Tatarkov will work under the direction of Dr. Christopher Spiese, Assistant Professor of Chemistry. The project is titled “Membrane Permeation Enhancement by Perflorinated Surfactants”;  it will investigate how the presence of perfluoro compounds can enhance or prevent uptake of other compounds from the environment, and to what extent perfluoro compounds can enter cell membranes to better understand the potential impacts of these compounds on wildlife and human health.