Invasive crabs to baseball stat simulators: Monmouth U. program covered all the bases

WEST LONG BRANCH - There are students who spend their summers on the Jersey Shore doing things that would make Snooki and The Situation proud. But there are also others who spend their free time doing work that could make everyone else proud.

Monmouth University culminated its School of Science Summer Research Program on Thursday, with a symposium that showcased the research projects of 96 students from throughout New Jersey, and beyond.

The students were chosen from more than 250 applicants from across the country for the 12-week program, during which students work on collaborative research projects under the supervision of Monmouth University faculty. The projects were formulated by faculty members and spanned various disciplines, including biology, chemistry, computer science and software engineering, mathematics, and marine science.

"What you see here in the diversity of the projects reflects the area of research interests of the faculty in the Monmouth University School of Science," faculty mentor and interim School of Science Dean John Tiedemann said. "These are research projects that they formulated for the summer specifically or as a continuation of their faculty research that is conducted throughout the year."

The students, however, are the ones who take it upon themselves to apply for the program every year, Tiedemann said.

"These students are students who really took the initiative to say that this summer, instead of just hanging out, getting a part-time job and being at the beach, they'd like to take advantage of an opportunity to do research, maybe figure out what they like or what they don't like in the areas that they're thinking about for careers or graduate school," he said.

Some of the projects tackled broader issues, such as cancer and cloning, while others were specific to New Jersey and it's coast.

Old Bridge resident Kristen Jezycki and Jackson Township resident Taylor Donovan studied post-Sandy flood elevations in Keansburg. They went out to 20 different locations throughout the borough and looked for the high-water marks that were left on some of the buildings by Hurricane Sandy. They used a laser level to measure out how high marks were and then nailed plaques to nearby telephone poles to document how high the water got in those areas.

A baseball statistic simulator was one of the research projects worked on during Monmouth University's School of Science Summer Research Program in 2015. (Rob Spahr | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

"I think just important for people to realize what happened and what could potentially happen again," Donovan said. "They need to know that they are in a flood zone and be prepared for any future incidents."

The student researchers said they were surprised by how much damage from Hurricane Sandy is still visible.

"You can still see that the water mark is still clearly on the side of some of the buildings, there are shops and businesses that are still boarded up. There was one restaurant, if you look in the window you can see that all the chairs and tables were still completely all over the floor and everything was still a mess," Jezycki said. "So it's scary to see that even three years later there is still a lot of damage out there."

Monmouth University students Kylie Johnson, Jeff Webb and Kristen Ranges conducted research to see if the invasive Asian Shore Crab is expanding into Upper Barnegat Bay.

"In 2013, (researchers) only found the crab in one of the three sites. And this year, we found them in all three sites," said Johnson, of Jefferson Township. "So right now we're monitoring it."

A rise in the population of these crabs could have a damaging impact on the Barnegat Bay, the students said.

"It could jeopardize the ecology of the bay, because obviously they don't belong there and could start replacing the native species, like the Green Crab and the Mud Crab," said Webb, of Linden. "And since there's really nothing killing them off, they're going to overtake the area and start creating problems in the bay."

One of the research projects that you didn't have to be a science enthusiast to find interesting was a computer program that tried to predict the outcome of baseball games.

The statistical simulator - which was worked on by the group of Reid Cooper, Philip DiMarco, Mary Menges, Nicholas-Jason Roache, Chengi Zhu, Swethana Gopisetti - used actual batting, pitching and fielding Major League Baseball statistics from the 2014 season to simulate the outcome of games

"In order to make everything work you need to use randomness. However, that randomness also has to be weighted based on each player's statistics. Since no two games are going to be alike, we allow the user view previously run simulations so they can go back and see what the are results were," said Cooper, of Medford. "I wouldn't want to see anyone use this right now for gambling, but you could use this for gambling once more mathematics were involved."

Many of the students said they were glad they took part in the program instead of opting to take the summer "off."

"I think it's great to be able to work so closely with a professor. I's something that people at other schools might not have the opportunity to do," Jezycki said.  "So I think that this program is something that could set me apart in the future."

Rob Spahr may be reached at rspahr@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TheRobSpahr. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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