Sophia Staggers (Frostburg State University) presented her poster Understanding the evolution of SARS-CoV-2 non-structural protein 15 (Nsp15) in 3D at the 2020 American Crystallographic Association virtual meeting and was recognized with the 2020 MiTeGen-Society of Physics Students Undergraduate Poster Prize.

Sophia Staggers originally planned to spend her summer with the RCSB PDB team at Rutgers University as part of the Research Intensive Summer Experience (RISE) at Rutgers program.

When RISE moved to a virtual experience, Sophia participated in a one-week Boot Camp hosted by RCSB PDB and the Rutgers Institute for Quantitative Biomedicine explored how the SARS-CoV-2 main protease evolved during the first six months of the COVID-19 pandemic by exploring amino acid sequence and 3D atomic-level structure.

Over the following five weeks, Sophia and other students used their training to study the other proteins in the coronavirus.

Sophia was supported by an NSF REU to the RCSB PDB.