Ronan Tiu — the URECA researcher of the month for January — is a sophomore double majoring in physics and math, and a member of Simons STEM Scholars. As a freshman, he began doing research in the Department of Physics and Astronomy under the mentorship of Distinguished Professor Abhay Deshpande. Within the Quantum Chromodynamics/ QCD spin group, Tiu dedicated his time to working on the design of specialized transport boxes for the shipment of delicate high energy physics detectors, called Gas Electron Multiplier (GEM) detectors, to Jefferson National Laboratory. He also started a second software simulation project analyzing CERN ROOT data files within the Electron Ion Collider (EIC) software environment.
Last summer, Tiu participated in a Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program in Mathematics at Indiana University, where he had the opportunity to work on modeling cellular dynamics using CompuCell3D and modeling lipid membrane dynamics using the CHARMM package. He presented “Quantification of Cell Spheroid Morphology in Glucose and Lipid Bilayer Dynamics” at the Indiana Undergraduate Math Research Conference and IU Summer Research Symposium at the conclusion of the program and continued to work on his project virtually after the summer program finished.
Tiu was first author on an abstract, “Computational Simulations of Object Engulfment by Cellular Aggregates (Spherophagy),” submitted to the annual Conference of the International Society for Biofabrication (ISBF) in November 2024 in Fukuoka, Japan, and had the opportunity to present this work at the meeting. He also received a travel award to support his attendance at the Biofabrication conference in Japan and was invited to co-chair a speaker panel, a rare honor for an undergraduate.
Tiu shared some advice about research for his fellow undergraduates: “My biggest piece of advice is to talk about your research interests, whether it be with peers or graduate students that you meet, or professors. Go out of your way to talk about your interests! You really never know where it’s going to take you.”
On campus, Tiu serves as a teaching assistant for physics and has been active as treasurer of the SBU Chapter of the National Society of Black Physicists; he is also co-chair of the Black and Latinx Initiatives Student Success Council, where he is working on piloting a new mentoring initiative.
Read the full interview with URECA Director Karen Kernan.
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