The campus library at Ohio State Lima buzzed with intellectual energy at the 2026 Lima Undergraduate Research Forum as a showcase of the next generation of scientific leaders. Twenty students presented 15 different research and student projects.
Zoology major Jesse N. Gunsett was named the Charles River Labs Outstanding Student Researcher. The award recognizes exceptional rigor and contribution to the undergraduate research community.
Gunsett’s project, "Uncovering relationships among Central Asian white-toothed shrews in the genus Crocidura," tackles a notoriously difficult pocket of mammalian taxonomy. Working under the guidance of Dr.Ryan W. Norris, associate professor of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology, Gunsett has spent the last academic year diving into the genetic makeup of the Crocidura genus, a group with more than 180 species that are often indistinguishable to the naked eye.
“Jesse enjoys overlooked and underloved animals and was excited to tackle it," Norris said. "He is a great addition to any classroom, always knowing the answer yet remaining generous and helpful with his peers.”
Gunsett has been performing complex DNA extractions and amplifications on more than 70 tissue samples from Pakistan. His research aims to:
- Identify samples currently unknown at the species level.
- Clarify evolutionary clades within the region.
- Construct a detailed phylogeny to understand within-species relationships.
Gunsett plans to complete an honors research thesis using his work.
The Lima Undergraduate Research Forum is an annual event open to the public, designed to bridge classroom theory and real-world scientific discovery.
This year’s participants represented biology, English, physics, psychology and Lima’s Second Year Transformational Experience Program, or STEP. Read the students’ abstract here.
