{"id":12033,"date":"2012-11-26T09:29:08","date_gmt":"2012-11-26T19:29:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=12033"},"modified":"2021-01-21T16:33:54","modified_gmt":"2021-01-22T02:33:54","slug":"leeward-student-discovers-new-taro-virus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2012\/11\/26\/leeward-student-discovers-new-taro-virus\/","title":{"rendered":"Leeward student discovers new taro virus"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"676\" height=\"380\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/JDhDyk4eFP4?rel=0&amp;showinfo=0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s not every day that a community college student makes a scientific discovery. But that&#8217;s exactly what <strong>James Carrillo<\/strong> did at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.leeward.hawaii.edu\/\">Leeward Community College<\/a>. He sequenced the <abbr>DNA<\/abbr> for a taro virus that had never been identified.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I wasn&#8217;t looking to discover something new,&rdquo; explained Carrillo. &ldquo;I mean it was great, but the experience of actually doing the work and actually learning how to do it was most important to me.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Carrillo came to Leeward with a love of gardening and plants. &ldquo;After I came I got more interested on the molecular side of plants and biology.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>He was recruited to participate in a summer mentoring program through the University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> medical school called <a href=\"http:\/\/inbre.jabsom.hawaii.edu\/\"><abbr title=\"Idea Network for Biomedical Research Excellence\">INBRE<\/abbr>, the Idea Network for Biomedical Research Excellence<\/a>. Its goal is to channel students into <abbr title=\"science, technology, engineering, math\">STEM<\/abbr> fields; science, technology, engineering and math.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;We really want to give students projects that give them in-depth, actual research experience rather than cookbook type of experiences,&rdquo; said Associate Biology Professor <strong>Kabi Neupane<\/strong>, who mentored Carrillo.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Actually working instead of being in a classroom and just learning about it in a textbook&#8211;it&#8217;s very different and it really helps,&rdquo; agreed Carrillo.<\/p>\n<p>Viruses can be found on any plant or in any soil sample. Carrillo discovered this virus in the school&#8217;s taro patch.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;It has a smaller genome than other viruses, larger viruses,&rdquo; he explained. &ldquo;It doesn&#8217;t infect the plant itself, but it infects another host, such as like a fungus, that lives with the plant.<\/p>\n<p>With a certificate in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.leeward.hawaii.edu\/pbt\">Plant Bioscience Technology<\/a>, Carrillo is now at the <a href=\"http:\/\/manoa.hawaii.edu\">University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at M&#257;noa<\/a> pursuing a degree that he hopes will lead to a career involving genetics and plant biotechnology.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Leeward has helped me a lot in planning for my future and college education and career,&rdquo; he said appreciatively.<\/p>\n<p>Since he discovered the virus, he got to name it. He called it the Leeward Taro Virus. &ldquo;It just seemed fitting.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8212;By Jeela Ongley<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>James Carrillo names his taro virus discovery Leeward Taro Virus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,12],"tags":[65,348,731,71,56],"class_list":["post-12033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","category-video","tag-leeward-community-college","tag-plant-bioscience-technology","tag-plants","tag-uh-community-colleges","tag-video-2","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12033"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":134187,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12033\/revisions\/134187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}