Tanner Aldous has been named one of the Fall 2018 Undergraduates of the Quarter, and we couldn’t be more pleased. Tanner grew up in Drain, Oregon, where his North Douglas High School graduating class was no larger than twenty students. Relative to Drain, Corvallis was a big move for Tanner. He was happy that Oregon State University was in a bigger town, but still felt small like his home town.
Tanner wanted to pursue chemistry because of the great influence from his high school chemistry teacher, and because he knew he wanted to stay in Oregon for college, OSU was the school of choice. Oregon State University seemed to choose Tanner, rather than the other way around. The campus in the fall with the leaves changing colors, was something that the other Oregon institutions couldn’t compare to.
An interest in the medical field combined with a passion for chemistry made it so Tanner’s major choice was pretty simple: Chemistry with a Premed option. Once graduated, Tanner plans to go to medical school.
Currently, Tanner is working in Dr. Burrow’s lab. He got started in this lab by asking professors if they had any openings in their lab, because he wanted to see if research was something he would be interested in. Now, Tanner is working with nanoparticles, specifically nanostars. He aids a graduate student, Lixia, by making nanostars from nanoseeds. He also performs data collection and analysis for this project.
Outside of school, Tanner likes to hang out with friends, and get to know new people, especially if they are also chemistry students. He finds collaboration on school work to help transition into friendships. He is also a part of the professional chemistry fraternity Alpha Chi Sigma. The fraternity is fairly small right now, but Tanner hopes to see it grow by the end of his time at Oregon State.
