Science Journal June 2014

June 2014

Powering the Future PG 4

The Math BehindDecision-Making

PG 12

Climate & Diversity:It’s All About

Communication PG 26

Melissa RollsAll in a Day’s Work

PG 18

Table of C

ontents

FEATURE STORIES:

4 Powering the Future Understand how researchers are propelling big discoveries on the nanoscale.

12 The Math Behind Decision-Making Discover how one scientist is applying game theory to explain human nature in

his research for Penn State’s Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics.

18 Melissa Rolls: All in a Day’s Work Learn how Melissa Rolls is setting an example as a mentor, researcher, and

leader.

26 Climate & Diversity: It’s All About Communication

Discover how one committee is opening the lines of communication in the Eberly College of Science to facilitate a welcoming, safe environment for those who work and learn here.

COLLEGE NEWS:New Planetarium Planned for the Arboretum at Penn State

Intellectual Property Focus

Welcome Associate Dean Teresa Davis

DEPARTMENT NEWS

FACULTY SPOTLIGHT:Faculty Awards and Honors

New Faculty

STUDENT SPOTLIGHT:Undergraduate Student Awards and Honors

CommencementSpring 2014 Student Marshals

Undergraduate Scientists

Above and Beyond: Focus on Graduate Students

Graduate Student Awards and Honors

Mentoring Dinner

Editor: Tara Immel

Writers: Barbara Collins, Carley LaVelle,

Brenda Lucas, Sam Sholtis, Whittney Trueax,

and Katrina Voss. Special thanks to all of our

other contributors!

Design: Penn State Science Marketing Office

Printer: Watkins Printing

ALUMNI NEWS: Alumni Board Celebrates 40 years

Alumni, Collegues, and Friends Celebrate Dr. Roy Olofson

Brian Geary Receives Alumni Achievement Award

Masatoshi Nei Endows Innovation Prize in Biological Sciences

Snapshot of Philanthropy

Upcoming Events

Penn State Eberly College of Science22

Dear Friends of the College,

This is a time of transition in the senior leadership at Penn State. Provost Nicholas Jones arrived July 1, 2013, and Eric Barron assumed the presi-dency on May 12. Coincident-ly and appropriately, it is also a time of looking back at goals and accomplishments and of

formal strategic planning for the years ahead. As we look back, I am impressed by what the college has accomplished. I also realize that although we have made gains in many areas, we need to main-tain our efforts in order to continue on the track of increasing success for all members of the college community.

In the past five years, we have expanded and enhanced opportunities for our undergraduate students through educational and co-curricular improvements. By building a stronger sense of community in the college, enabling and encourag-ing more students to participate in long-term study abroad and other international academic experi-ences, and improving our academic programs—in part by introducing new modes of teaching and learning, providing more and better career infor-mation and advising, and increasing the number scholarships available, among other things—our college has worked to improve the academic experi-ence and better prepare students for their future in a changing global economy.

We are attracting more students and a more diverse group of students. Undergraduate ap-plications to the Eberly College of Science have increased by 75 percent over the last ten years; enrollments increased by 23 percent in the same timeframe. Over that time, applications from un-derrepresented minority students increased by over 105 percent, and their enrollments have shown a similar increase. Underrepresented minority stu-dents constitute 15 percent of the students who will matriculate in the college this coming summer and fall.

The most dramatic change in applications over

the last ten years is the more than eight-fold in-crease in undergraduate applications from inter-national students. International undergraduate applications went from just a few percent to over 20 percent of the college’s total undergraduate ap-plications, even as the total number of applications grew, and international students now comprise just over 10 percent of the undergraduates enrolled in the college. This dramatic increase in applications from around the world is testimony to Penn State’s increasing visibility as one of the world’s great re-search universities.

We are continuing to develop our strategic plan for the next five years. In the process, we have identified three key themes: enabling research of the highest caliber in the physical, life, and math-ematical sciences; elevating the quality of our un-dergraduate and graduate educational experiences to the level of our research; and increasing our im-pact on society through better translation of our research. We are working to identify specific ini-tiatives in each of these areas so that we can posi-tion our college to improve the world through our students, discoveries, and outreach. The college has also been working with Provost Jones to en-sure that our priorities align with those identified by the University. I will have more specific details of the college’s strategic plan to share with you in the December issue.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed the successes of our initiatives and to those who have been working on the development of the new stra-tegic plan. I greatly appreciate the continued sup-port of the entire college community.

Sincerely,

SCIENCE JOURNAL June 2014 3

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From witnessing the first catalytic nanomotors to advancing the way we think about modern medical treatment and more, Ayusman Sen and Thomas Mallouk are making big discoveries on the nanoscale.

Powering the

Future


Although more than ten years have passed since Ayusman Sen and Thomas Mallouk first started collaborating on nanomotor research, you would think it happened just yesterday when you hear them talk. Their curiosity about the natu-ral world and infectious enthusiasm for discovery have aided them on their long collaborative jour-ney into the world of nanomotors.

In 2003, Sen and Mallouk were both on Wal-ter Paxton’s doctoral thesis committee. Before Paxton’s first-year meeting with his thesis com-mittee, he went to Sen with a few ideas, and Sen encouraged him to think big. “He really left the field wide open. He told me, ‘You can do whatever you want as long as it’s good science,’” said Pax-ton.

Sen’s enthusiasm and encouragement helped Paxton decide that he wanted study the feasibil-ity of a catalytic nanomotor. He thought he had some great ideas to make it work, and Sen and Mallouk were intrigued. “We told him, let’s try it right now, today,” said Mallouk.

A catalytic nanomotor is a tiny particle that is powered into motion by a chemical reaction. Previous research done at Harvard University by Rustem Ismagilov and George Whitesides had found that a macroscopic motor equipped with a platinum strip would move on the surface of a tank of hydrogen peroxide and water like a min-iature boat. Paxton’s nanorod motor idea took this to another level: much smaller motors, go-ing from centimeter-sized to two microns by 350 nanometers; and a much more challenging envi-ronment, as the tiny rods were immersed in the solution instead of on top of it.

Using gold-platinum rods Mallouk had from an

AYUSMAN SEN

THOMAS MALLOUK


unrelated metal project, Sen and Mallouk helped Paxton test his idea. The nanorods moved, auton-omously, in a solution of hydrogen peroxide, and to the team’s delight, bore “an eerie resemblance under the microscope to live swimming bacteria,” Sen and Mallouk wrote in a 2009 article in Sci-entific American.

But why did they move? Sen and Mallouk were curious, and it was then that their mutual inter-est and subsequent research collaboration on na-nomotors was born.

Small Particles, Big Challenge Nanomachines have a bright future. Their imple-mentation could spark innovations in a variety of fields, including modern medicine, technology, energy, and even environmental conservation.

The fact that Paxton’s idea for a nanomotor had worked was significant because for years, scientists had been hitting a scientific wall when it came making nanomachines move. While scientists could envi-sion many ways to build tiny nanomachines and improve upon earlier designs, many sophisticated nanomachine designs were literally sitting idle.

Because of the miniature scale of nanoparti-cles, there are many challenges in making them move. One cannot just shrink down a ship to nanoproportions and expect it to work the same as it does in the normal large size. Not only is wa-ter thick and hard to propel through at that level, but researchers also have to consider Brownian motion.

Mallouk explained Brownian motion as mo-tion that we see caused by random collisions of molecules with solid particles. The effect of Brownian motion is more dramatic as an object is smaller, because a single molecular collision has

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“WITH AYUSMAN’S ENCOURAGEMENT AND

EXCITEMENT ABOUT THE RESEARCH, AND TOM’S

CONTAGIOUS OPTIMISM, WE PRESSED FORWARD

AND LEARNED MANY THINGS...”

a greater impact. “For objects the size of human cells (roughly a 15-micron diameter), Brownian motion is hardly perceptible in water. For objects ten times that small (bacteria or nanorod mo-tors), it is strong enough to reorient the particle every second or so,” he said.

Not only was the environment they were work-ing in challenging, so were their early findings. In 2004, a team including Paxton, Sen, Mallouk, and Department of Physics colleague Vincent Crespi published a paper on the nanorods, ex-plaining their hypothesis that the rods moved as a result of being pushed through the solution by a catalytically generated surface tension gradient. But that’s not exactly how it worked, they would discover.

“There was so much we didn’t understand. This was an entirely new area, not just for me as a graduate student, but also for Ayusman and

Tom,” said Paxton. “They were both undaunted. With Ayusman’s encouragement and excitement about the research, and Tom’s contagious opti-mism, we pressed forward and learned many things about the chemistry and physics of small catalytic objects.”

The nanomotors were powered in a more fasci-nating way, as the team discovered and explained a year after the first paper was published. At the nanoscale level, the law of inertia is outweighed by drag, so that remaining in motion as a “jet propulsion” reaction is nearly impossible for a na-nomotor. A nanomotor can only glide for about a microsecond, which amounts to about one hun-


even have the motors pull plastic sphere “cargo” containers through fluids. But the motors, being fueled by reactions between metals in hydrogen peroxide, were not safe for their ultimate re-search fantasy: a “Fantastic Voyage”-style trip among living cells.

The Journey to the Human BodyMany of the practical applications of nanomotor technology exist in healthcare fields. Possibilities abound in that realm, including nanomachines acting as tiny surgeons and more targeted ap-proaches to curing disease on the molecular scale. But in order for Sen and Mallouk’s nanomotors to be viable for healthcare innovations, they needed to fuel the motors with something other than con-centrated hydrogen peroxide, which can be toxic

dredth of a nanometer. Instead, the nanorods were applying a con-

tinuous force to get through the drag. And be-cause the rods had two different metals on the ends, two interesting reactions were taking place to power the nanorod. At the gold end, protons and electrons were combining with the hydrogen peroxide to create two water molecules. At the platinum end, protons were being formed by the oxidation of hydrogen peroxide to molecular oxy-gen. The two reactions created an imbalance in proton concentration. The resulting electric field exerted a force on the negatively charged nanoro-ds, propelling the nanorod in the direction of the platinum end.

Soon after this discovery, the team learned to steer the nanomotors with magnetic fields, and

THE CATALYTIC NANOMOTORS RESEARCH GROUP FROM 2004.

Back (left to right): Paul Lammert, Jeffrey Catchmark, Vincent Crespi, and Ayusman Sen.

Front (left to right): Yanyan Cao, Timothy Kline, Shyamala Subramanian, Walter Paxton, and Tom Mallouk.

Credit: Sen and Mallouk labs


inside a human body. Where did they look for inspiration? Nature

is full of nanotechnology—small particles ex-ist everywhere, moving on their own without external power to complete biological processes. Cell division, intracellular transport, and mus-cular movement are all examples of autonomous nanoparticles at work. Sen and Mallouk wanted to find out how these processes worked so that their nanomotors could mimic biological pro-cesses and move without toxic fuel for propulsion. Though their project involved synthetic creations, they hoped to understand the natural world bet-ter with their experiments.

Ultrasound PowerA breakthrough on this front came while Mal-louk was on sabbatical at École Normale Su-

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périeure in France in 2010. He was presenting a physics seminar at neighboring school ESPCI (Paris Tech). After the presentation, several ES-PCI researchers interested in the physics of col-loidal particles (like live bacteria, which Sen and Mallouk were trying to imitate with their nano-motors), approached Mallouk.

One of those researchers was French physicist Mauricio Hoyos, an expert in acoustics. Hoyos had been studying the differences between chem-ically powered nanomotors and bacteria when it came to their interactions with cell surfaces, us-ing an ultrasonic transducer to create a standing wave to lift the particles off the cell floor. But the ultrasound did more to the metal nanorods—they started “shooting around like bullets and spinning,” according to Mallouk.

The movement was due to the high acoustic contrast that the met-als had with the sur-rounding fluid. But the idea had taken root with Mallouk—nanomotors could be powered by something used safely in medical procedures already: ultrasound.

Mallouk returned home to Penn State and together with a team that included his graduate student Wei Wang and As-sistant Professor of Engineering Science

OPTICAL MICROSCOPE IMAGE OF A HELA CELL containing several gold-ruthenium nanomotors. Arrows indicate the

trajectories of the nanomotors, and the solid white line shows propulsion. Near the center of the image, a spindle of

several nanomotors is spinning. Inset: Electron micrograph of a gold-ruthenium nanomotor. The scattering of sound

waves from the two ends results in propulsion. Credit: Mallouk lab


and Mechanics Tony Huang, decided to incu-bate the nanorods with HeLa cells, an immortal line of human cervical cancer cells, to test the abilities of ultrasound to power the rods. After twenty-four hours, the HeLa cells had eaten the nanorods, which meant that the rods were physi-cally inside of the living cells. The team still does not understand this phenomenon entirely, but be-lieves it to be similar to phagocytosis, a process where a cell engulfs and digests bacteria before the bacteria can cause an infection.

Inside the HeLa cells, the motor rods were still responding to attempts to power them with ultra-sound. When the ultrasonic power was increased, Mallouk’s team did something no other research team had done—moved a nanomotor from inside a live cell. “And it lived,” Mallouk joked about the cell remaining alive during the process.

So far Mallouk’s team has learned that the motors can scramble a cell’s inner contents, simi-lar to an eggbeater, or act as a battering ram to puncture the cell’s membrane. A potential appli-cation of this idea is that a nanomotor could ef-fectively destroy a cell that ingests it, which could be used in medical treatment. Better yet is that the nanomotors inside the cells can move autono-mously rather than in a group, so the nanomotors could be used in diagnostic or even surgical ap-plications that require them to act independently.

Fixing Bone Cracks While Mallouk was working on moving nano-motors with ultrasound, Sen had been pursuing another way to safely power nanoparticles in a human body with a graduate student in his lab, Vinita Yadav. Together with Yadav and a Bos-ton University biomedical engineering laboratory led by Mark Grinstaff, he was exploring a novel way to use nanoparticles to heal microcracks in bones, a common occurrence for those with osteo-porosis or other bone conditions. Patients with

those types of conditions benefit greatly from healing the microcracks before they turn into ac-tual breaks of the bone.

Current methods to treat microcracks in bones rely on a medicine passively traveling through a patient’s bloodstream, eventually arriving at the microcrack. The problem with this method is that by the time the medicine gets to the crack, the dosage might not be high enough to treat the crack. Sen and his team hoped a nanoparticle ap-proach would prove to be a more targeted way to treat this condition.

When a bone cracks, the bone’s minerals are disrupted, causing charged ions to leach out of the bone and create an electric field. This meant that charged nanoparticles could be attracted to the crack, either to fill in the crack or to treat it with medicine. The pull of the electric field would serve as both the trigger and the energy source for the nanomotor, eliminating the need for any sort of fuel to power it.

“Working on bone crack repair was like ven-turing into uncharted waters,” said Yadav. “Al-

THIS GRAPHIC SHOWS HOW NANOMOTORS are electrically

charged to fill a bone crack. In the dark image, the

fluorescent cells shown are nanomotors carrying an

osteoporosis drug to a bone crack. Credit: Sen lab


At Penn State, many researchers in the Eberly College

of Science and the College of Engineering have been

interested in applications of Sen and Mallouk’s nanomotor

research. Their collaborators agree that it’s exciting and

inspiring to work with Sen and Mallouk.

J. Lloyd Huck Chair in Natural Sciences Paul Cremer, who

worked with them on a project that exploits the heat

generated by enzyme turnover to create particle motion,

said, “They are great collaborators with lots of imaginative

ideas on self-propelled nanomotors. The implications of

Tom and Ayusman’s imagination are far reaching.”

Some, like Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering

Darrell Velegol, feel that Sen and Mallouk’s nanomotor

research has created a new field of study: “Their insights

have raised an entirely new research field that spans fluid

mechanics, catalysis, biology, and many other fields.”

Peter Butler, associate professor of biomedical engineering,

agrees with Velegol’s assessment: “My collaboration with

Tom and Ayusman has presented to me a whole new area

of how forces influence biological function.”

Collaboration

though we were novice in the biomedical field, we succeeded because we played on our strength: nanomaterials chemistry.”

The teams at both Penn State and Boston Uni-versity performed series of tests using bone from a human tibia and femur, starting with synthetic nanoparticles tagged with fluorescence for bet-ter visibility. After successful separate test runs with first synthetic nanomotors and then organic material, the team pushed the idea further to include a combination of the synthetic and bio-logical materials. The idea was that a synthetic material could attach to a biological material and carry it to the bone crack. In this case, the bio-logical material would be a drug used to treat the crack or the condition causing it (an osteoporosis drug, for example), and the synthetic material an FDA-approved substance already widely used in medical devices, polyactic-co-glycolic acid.

Yadav said, “We had expertise in propelling our nanomotors, and we applied the same to a bi-ological environment instead of an inorganic one. This was particularly exciting since nanomotors have for long been touted for their possible impact in medical research.”

To test this idea, the team watched the fluo-rescent motor’s progress through the microscope. The test was successful. “Our experiments show that this bio-safe nanomotor can, in fact, success-fully carry the osteoporosis drug to a fresh crack in a human bone,” Sen said.

In the team’s final set of experiments, done in Grinstaff’s lab at Boston University, the test was performed on live human bone cells, which proved that the method for repairing human bones was viable in the live cells also.

“We can now actively target the damaged sites,” said Yadav. “Our technique also uses the damaged substrate itself as both the trigger and fuel, obliterating the need for an external power supply.”

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The research will need many more tests before it can be considered safe and ready for use, but the implications for future healthcare innova-tions are exciting. “What makes our nanomotors different is that they can actively and naturally deliver medications to a targeted area, such as a bone crack,” Sen said.

And for Yadav, the discovery was only part of the positive experience she had working with Sen, who is her adviser: “It’s an absolute joy to work with him. He gives you the freedom to drive your own research, intervening only when re-quired.” Even when she gets stressed, Sen is able to help her refocus: “Talking to him is a great stress-buster. Not only does he provide the right direction, but also the enthusiasm to push your project to completion.”


Nanomotors as Microscopic PumpsThe applications of Sen and Mallouk’s nanomotor research reach beyond healthcare to other fields and industries. The team has been working with a variety of researchers from all over the country and world on possible other applications.

When a nanomotor is immobilized, its me-chanical force is transferred to the surrounding fluid, turning it into a self-powered pump. The nanomotor can pump any kind of fluid past itself and can even deliver drugs in response. An im-planted pump could deliver insulin automatically in response to high glucose level in the blood, for example. But the pump also opens up other doors outside of healthcare.

The pumping action of the nanomotor could be used to remove valuable substances from hard-to-access places, like the traces of crude oil left in tiny pores in oil wells. Nanomotors can also be used to purify fluids, an example being making fresh water out of brackish or saltwater.

And then there’s the capability for improv-ing public safety: nanomotors could help protect

against agents of chemical warfare. Using the example of nerve gas, a nanomotor could use the nerve agent as fuel and could be programmed to pump an antidote out. Sen and Department of Chemistry colleague Scott Phillips just received a grant from the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency to pursue the foundational research for this idea.

While possibilities proliferate for nanomotors to contribute to society in a variety of life-chang-ing ways, Sen and Mallouk are happy to pursue just one simple goal for their research in the fu-ture: to understand biology better.

“We are trying to mimic the living systems as closely as possible,” said Sen.

As they continue to explore the nanolevel of cell biology and better understand motion as it occurs on that level, they will continue to aim for their goal of making the motors act like real cells. Sen would be happy if the nanomotors could be very much like living cells, except in one way: “I want them to do everything that living cells do but reproduce,” he laughed.

THIS ILLUSTRATION SHOWS THE PROCESS OF AN ENZYME ACTING AS A MICROPUMP. The rate that the enzyme pumps

out fluid is dependent on the level of glucose in the surrounding solution. This enzyme micropump could be a

model for insulin regulation in the body. Credit: Sen lab


The Math Behind Decision-Making


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12

The Math Behind Decision-Making

Mathematics is a language interwoven in the everyday movements of the world around us. It is universal, often surprising in its applications, and can reveal previously hidden patterns and information about the workings of the world. Tim Reluga is an applied mathematician using the language of mathematics across disciplines in his work with the Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics (CIDD) at Penn State.

Reluga, associate professor of mathematics and biology, took an interest in biology at a very young age. As a child, he spent summers wading through tidal pools at the beach with his father, who was a high

school biology teacher. “My father would teach a marine biology

class, and so when we would go to the beach, he would point out, ‘Look at this type of seaweed or that type of animal or shellfish.’ So I spent a lot of my time wandering through tidal pools collecting things and catching things. And I was always sort of fascinated by the huge variety of different things we would find there. And some years there would be new animals there that had never been there before. I was always fascinated by the life that we would find around us,” Reluga said. There on the beach, Reluga knew biology was in his blood.

But when he showed an aptitude for calculations and computers in school, he began to follow a different path. He found that, in high school, the science math paired with was physics, not biology: “You would go into class and learn about Newton’s laws, then you would go and figure out the trajectory of a cannon ball


and get the answer. Then, you’d go into the lab and figure out that ‘Yeah, that answer is about the same’ and the math helped you predict something about it. But, in biology, there never was really any math,” said Reluga.

In college, he skipped over biology his first semester because he felt he never quite fit with the traditional biology major following a pre-med track. So, he leaned more toward physics. Reluga said, “I was sort of debating ‘Do I major in physics or math’ and I was sort of leaning toward physics because it seemed like an exciting area.” Then, an entertaining biology class during his second semester at Tufts University made him decide to double major in his two interests. He recounted, “I took a biology class my second semester. There was a guy who was giving a lecture on Mendelian Genetics the first day of class and it was just fun. It was so much more entertaining than the physics stuff I had been doing. And so I said, ‘Okay, well I’m going to do biology and I’m going to do math. Maybe I can find a way to do both.’”

Merging his roots in biology and his aptitude for math led him to graduate work at the University of Washington, where he was surrounded by faculty with the same interests he had. The research being done at the University of Washington applied mathematics to biology, and the faculty there were discovering how living things work in new and exciting ways. Reluga recalled, “My adviser, Mark Kot, studied ecology. There was a statistician named Elizabeth Thompson who was involved with saving the condors. There was another guy who studied insect flight. There were all these sort of mathematically inclined people who were applying math to biology.” Reluga had found his

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track, and his calling. After postdoctoral work at the Yale School

of Medicine researching disease dynamics, Reluga studied how disease works in the body at Los Alamos National Laboratory, performing research to help make pharmaceutical drugs more effective.

One day, a dream opportunity arose. The Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics (CIDD) at Penn State was forming and they were looking for a mathematician to join the team. Reluga answered the call.

With expertise that crosses the disciplines of math and biology, Reluga adds to the world-renowned expertise of the scholars in CIDD. Some of his research involves applying the language of mathematics, through game theory, to create models that better explain human behavior and how it affects the spread of disease. And his award-winning research in this area is helping to create more effective public policy around the world.

But he sees what he does in a much more simple way: “What I’m really interested in is how living things work. That goes from people down to diseases, and everything in between. I use math as a language to try to describe these things and better understand how they work,” he said.

“WHAT I’M REALLY INTERESTED IN IS HOW

LIVING THINGS WORK. THAT GOES FROM

PEOPLE DOWN TO DISEASES AND EVERYING

IN BETWEEN. I USE MATH AS A LANGUAGE

TO DESCRIBE THESE THINGS AND BETTER

UNDERSTAND HOW THEY WORK.”


Using Math to Describe Human BehaviorRecently, Reluga’s research has focused on using game theory to create a framework for describing how human behavior can impact public health. Reluga explained, “Science gets you so far, but human nature kicks in at a certain point and makes things much more difficult. If you want to actually eradicate diseases, understanding how people react…is going to be essential to future public health efforts.”

To illustrate this point, Reluga cited an infamous policy failure. The federal government approached the problem of the public health crisis nicotine addiction was creating by mandating a lower concentration of nicotine in cigarettes. The thinking was that less nicotine per cigarette meant less exposure to the drug and would result in better national health. But, the government did not account for “policy resistance” created by individuals looking out for their own best interests. Instead of less exposure to cigarettes, smokers were actually smoking more to get the same dose of nicotine and the policy resulted in poorer overall health.

“Good policy takes into account how people will react. It tries to understand the mechanisms of disease transmission and behavior,” says Reluga. His research gives policy makers the tools to create good policy and avoid situations of policy resistance. It is a systematic way of comparing policy options. “The mathematics allows us to set up a framework to compare data instead of a system where the loudest person wins the argument,” Reluga explained.

Winning ResearchAlong with Dr. Alison Galvani of Yale University, Reluga was recently awarded the prestigious Bellman Prize, for their research paper, “A General Approach for Population Games with Application to Vaccination,”

published in Mathematical Biosciences during 2010-2011. The Bellman Prize is judged by a panel of mathematical biologists and is awarded every two years to the best paper published in the journal.

The winning paper explores the interaction of public health initiatives that focus on the best interests of the community and the behaviors of individuals who will act in their own best interests with regard to vaccination. However, Reluga and Galvani created their model to enable more extensive use in the future.

In the past, theoretical epidemiologists would look at ideal vaccination coverage by looking at the entire community and assuming that everyone would act in the best interests of the group. They failed to account for an individual’s choice not to adhere to medical advice and make decisions based on his own personal best interests.

Generally, when there is prevalent disease, the risk is obvious and individuals are more willing and likely to get vaccinated. It makes sense for the group and also for the individual. However, when we begin to eradicate disease, or at least effectively treat it so that it is no longer as visible, the perceived risk diminishes and the choice to vaccinate becomes less obvious. People begin to deviate from medical best practices and act in their own perceived best interest. Traditional theories that ignore individual behavior could not explain mounting resistance to health initiatives and diminishing coverage, nor could they advise how to counteract it.

This is becoming increasingly obvious with diseases like measles and whooping cough which are both experiencing resurgence even though they were nearly wiped out and are both extremely preventable. When everyone knew someone who had been infected, was sick, or who had died, individuals were clamoring for the


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While many people find games to be endlessly

entertaining, game theory is not as purely recreational

as the name suggests. At its most basic, game theory

is a study of strategic decision-making. Mathematical

models are built using game theory to explain the

interactions between two or more rational decision-

makers.

A way to better understand basic game theory is to

look at a classic example: the prisoner’s dilemma.

This “game” examines how two “players” will make a

decision based on an understanding of motives and

strategies.

Two players are accused of a crime. If both agree

to keep quiet and neither confesses to the crime

(known as “cooperation” in game theory terms),

both will receive a punishment of five years in prison.

If, however, one takes a deal offered to him and

confesses (known as “defection” from the cooperative

relationship”), he will be released while the other

suspect will get a 20-year sentence. Finally, if both

defect from the agreement and both confess, each will

receive a 10-year punishment.

Seemingly, both players would benefit the most by

cooperating with each other. But, with the chance

to go free, both players know that the other must be

considering the option to maximize their personal

payoff. But, if both defect, both receive a harsher

punishment. This is the prisoner’s dilemma. The most

common conclusion is that confessing is the rational

choice because each party must assume that the other

will only act in his own best interest.

Reluga explains, “In mathematics, we try to make

models that capture part of reality and study those

models. The models have to start with a set of

assumptions. Game theory assumes that people are

trying to maximize their payoff.”

There are some limitations to the theory. It is extremely

difficult to isolate and account for every factor and

variable that may influence an individual’s strategy.

And there is really no way to account for the “x-factor”

in human behavior. Sometimes, it is even hard to

tell what it means for a person to behave rationally.

However, setting parameters and validating behavioral

models is becoming more feasible with the increasing

availability of “big data.” There is certainly more work

to be done, but the methodologies are improving and,

as they do, there will be more and more applications

across disciplines.

What is Game Theory?


vaccines. Now there are fewer infected people and the diseases are no longer widely visible to the public, so the perceived risk of infection is dramatically lowered. Individuals are now weighing the personal choice of vaccination. Some have found reasons of personal interest not to vaccinate, are deviating from medical advice, and opening the door for these diseases to make a comeback.

When Reluga and Galvani began their

research, they realized that both the population-scale models and the individual-scale models were needed to describe disease management problems. Disease prevalence depends on the behaviors and interventions of the policy-makers and individual behaviors can depend on disease prevalence. Their approach allows the two models to be expressed in parallel to “create population games with explicit ecology dynamics” according to Reluga and Galvani. Reluga explained, “The act of accounting for all the different incentives and choices and how our decisions influence what happens next should give us better insight into what consequences our decisions have, how to hold ourselves accountable for our decisions, and how to make better decisions so that we can deal with these problems that we can foresee but for some reason

can’t quite avoid.”The framework Reluga and Galvani developed

in their 2011 research paper has since been expanded and has been used to investigate the management of several infectious diseases, including HPV and chickenpox, in a variety of contexts. And new possibilities are being explored outside of vaccination.

In 2013, Reluga published a research paper in Bulletin of Mathematical Biology entitled,

“Equilibria of an Epidemic Game with Piecewise Linear Social Distancing Cost.” The paper builds upon the framework Galvani and he created to show how individuals change their behaviors (known as “social distancing”) to balance the cost of prevention against the

risk of infection when faced with an epidemic.Reluga talked about applying his framework

in new areas: “As an applied mathematician, I’m not an expert in all fields, but I bring it all together and create a framework that we can analyze, study and make sense of using the mathematics. Pulling it all together is where the math comes in.” Realizing the massive impact human behavior has on public health, it will be exciting to see just how far-reaching the applications of this framework may be.

“AS AN APPLIED MATHEMATICIAN, I’M NOT

AN EXPERT IN ALL FIELDS, BUT I BRING IT ALL

TOGETHER AND CREATE A FRAMEWORK THAT

WE CAN ANALYZE, STUDY, AND MAKE SENSE

OF USING THE MATHEMATICS. PULLING IT ALL

TOGETHER IS WHERE THE MATH COMES IN.”


Cover Story


All in a Day’s Work

Scientists have different motivating factors when it comes to deciding what exactly they are going to study. For some, the thrill of discovering something new pushes them to pursue research in a particular field; for others, passion or experience in an area makes the topic an easy choice. For Melissa Rolls, one direction of her research at Penn State was guided by a suggestion from one of her lab technicians.

Melissa Rolls Excels as Researcher, Mentor, and Leader


Rolls, an associate professor of biochemistry and molecular biology, came to Penn State in 2007 with the intent to continue her research in neuronal polarity. After getting this work off the ground and publishing her first paper, Michelle Stone, a research technician and part-time graduate student in Rolls’ lab, approached Rolls with a suggestion. Stone’s father had suffered a stroke that left him unable to work and function normally. Stone thought that the system the Rolls lab was using could be adapted to study how neurons, or nerve cells, respond to damage or injury; she wanted Rolls and her team to study neuronal injury to better understand it and potentially make a discovery that could aid future stroke victims.

Rolls considered the idea and together she and Stone came up with a strategy to add the study of neuronal stress and injury to the lab portfolio. She organized her lab into two parts in order to gain a full perspective on neurons and nervous system repair: half of the lab focused on the foundation, which included studying how neurons develop and function normally; the other half of the lab investigated how neurons behave when injured.

Experimenting with Fruit FliesRolls chose to use Drosophilia, or fruit flies, as her model organism rather than mammalian cells. “On the molecular level, many of the

processes associated with nerve-cell growth and regrowth are the same in humans as in fruit flies,” Rolls said. “Discoveries can be made much more quickly and economically in flies. They also don’t bleed!”

Using fruit flies, the team discovered that the neuroprotective pathway initiated in response to injured or stressed neural axons serves to stabilize and protect the nerve cell against further degeneration. Neurons have a single axon that transmits signals to other neurons or to output cells. Because the axons often extended long distances within a cell, they are prone for damage. So, if an axon is damaged, its parent neuron can no longer function; and since

Cover Story

Person-to-person: M

ichelle Stone

During the day, you can find Michelle Stone hard at work

in Melissa Rolls’ lab while simultaneously working on

her graduate degree in genetics. In the early mornings,

evenings, and weekends, you’ll find Stone feeding calves,

milking cows, and helping her husband work on their 100-

cow dairy farm, all while chasing after their three-year-

old daughter.

Stone, a research technician in Rolls’ lab since 2007,

initially started in the lab with the intention of only staying six months to help set

up the lab and then leaving to attend a medical technology school.

“After working with Dr. Rolls for several months, I changed my mind and asked if I

could stay working in her lab. She agreed and I have been here ever since. Her

enthusiasm for science and research is inspiring,” Stone said.

For Stone, the most rewarding part of working in the lab on several projects from

start to finish and seeing the end result in the form of several published papers.

“The first project I worked on in the lab was to map microtubule polarity in

Drosophila neurons. After that, I helped develop the neuronal injury assays we

currently use in the lab to look at the cellular responses to axon and dendrite

injury. My latest project is to help develop a way to map microtubule polarity

in the neurons of the model organism Nematostella vectensis or sea anemone,”

Stone said.

Stone considers the lab as not only a place to learn and discover, but for her to

teach as well. “We have a lot of people in the lab right now, including what we

call our ‘army of undergrads’, but everyone teaches and helps one another in

order to get things done.”

After she finishes her degree, Stone intends to remain in Rolls’ lab and continue

her work on microtubule polarity in sea anenomes, as well as neuronal injury.


many animals develop only one set of neurons, those neurons will mount major responses to axon injury.

Working in vivo, Rolls and her team severed fruit fly axons and discovered that neurons responded to the injury by increasing production of microtubules in order to stabilize the neural dendrites. The pathway represents an endogenous neuroprotective response to axon stress—and could potentially be developed into a diagnostic tool for the detection of early stages of neurodegenerative disease, or even utilized in novel therapies for such illnesses.

Axons ideally survive throughout an animal’s lifetime. To be able to survive, nerve cells need to be resilient and, in the event of injury or simple wear and tear, repair damage by growing new axons. These microtubules might need to be rebuilt as an important step in this type of repair.

“In order to grow a new part of a nerve, raw materials will be needed, and the microtubule highways will need to be organized to take the new materials to the site of growth,” Rolls said. With this thought in mind, the team began to study the role of microtubule-remodeling proteins in axon regrowth after injury. In particular, the team members focused on a protein named spastin, which is a key player in axon regeneration.

Rolls and her team found that a mutation in a single gene could entirely stop the axon growth process. “The fact that the spastin protein plays a critical role in regeneration is intriguing because, in humans, it is encoded by a disease gene called SPG4,” Rolls explained. “When one copy of this gene is disrupted, affected individuals develop hereditary spastic paraplegia (HSP), which is characterized by progressive lower-limb weakness and spasticity as the long-motor axons in the spinal

cord degenerate. Identifying a new neuronal function for spastin may help us to understand this disease.”

The scientists also found that an impaired spastin gene affected only how the axons regrew after being severed. In addition, the researchers found that, while the gene affected the flies’ axons, their dendrites continued to function and repair themselves normally.

“Now that we know that spastin plays an important role in axon regeneration and also that this gene is dominant, we have opened up a possible path toward the study of human diseases involving nerve-cell impairment,” Rolls said.

The Rolls lab’s latest discovery involves a pathway for repairing nerve cells that could have implications for quicker and improved

IN FRUIT FLIES WITH TWO NORMAL COPIES OF THE SPASTIN

GENE, Rolls and her team found that severed axons

were able to regenerate. However, in fruit flies with two

or even only one abnormal spastin gene, the severed

axons were not able to regenerate.

Credit: Rolls lab


healing. These findings reveal that dendrites have the ability to regrow after an injury. Despite it being a seemingly basic question, other scientists had not asked whether or not dendrites could regenerate.

Again using the fruit fly, the researchers took a radical approach by cutting off all of the dendrites in neuron cells. “We wanted to push the cells to the furthest limit,” she said. “By cutting off all the dendrites, the cells would no longer be able to receive information, and we

expected they might die. We were surprised to find that the cells do not die. Instead, they regrow the dendrites completely and faster than they regrow axons. Within a few hours they’ll start regrowing dendrites, and after a couple of days they have almost their entire arbor.”

Based on this experiment, it was also apparent that dendrite regeneration happens independently of axon regeneration. When Rolls and her team blocked the key signaling molecules that are required for axon

Cover Story

regeneration, they found that dendrites were unaffected and continued to regrow. “These neurons have an incredible ability to generate. We also discovered that they have two different regeneration pathways: one for axons and one for dendrites,” she said.

As with her other research, this project yields an important real-world application. For example, when a person has a stroke, a region of the brain has blood loss, and dendrites on brain cells are damaged; these cells can only

be repaired if blood loss is minor, otherwise the brain cells die. However, if those cells are able to regenerate dendrites, and if researchers learn how dendrite regrowth occurs, they may be able to encourage this process.

Each step along the research pathway leads Rolls and her group to their long-term goal: use the basic knowledge of neuronal cell biology and neuronal responses to injury to improve outcomes in neurodegenerative disease and neuronal injury. With each research discovery,

THIS IMAGE SHOWS A SINGLE NUERON in a whole animal five hours after dendrites were removed with laser surgery

(left). The same cell was imaged at 48 hours and 96 hours after the dendrites were removed. At 48 hours (middle)

a new dendrite arbor extends from the cell body, and by 96 hours the new arbor fills the entire space normally

occupied by the cell. Credit: Rolls lab


the team gains a better understanding of neuronal biology, which could someday be used in a practical application.

Mentoring Undergraduates in the LabWhile labs at some universities only employ faculty, graduate students, and research staff, the Rolls lab, and a number of others across the college, regularly invite and encourage undergraduates to participate in the lab work. At any given time, you can find about 10-15 undergraduate students either working alongside Rolls or doing their own independent research. Knowing that students need research in order to go to graduate school or to pursue a research-related occupation after college, Rolls opens her lab to students who are willing to make a commitment to research.

“I really love working with undergraduate students in the lab if they are truly motivated about research,” Rolls said. “I believe in giving students the opportunity to work in the lab, along with the tools they need, and a research question to pursue, but u lt i mat e ly it’s up to each student to succeed.”

The knack for research and discovery has been engrained in Rolls from a young age.

Both of her parents were Oxford researchers—her father Edmund in computational neuroscience and her mother Barbara in nutritional physiology. Rolls had her own experience as a fledgling scientist participating in a research lab at a young age.

As a high school student, she secured a spot in Carolyn Machamer’s cell biology lab at Johns Hopkins University, despite her age and inexperience. After that initial summer, Rolls was invited back for three more during her summer breaks as an undergraduate at Yale. Despite being young and inexperienced, Rolls was given a chance to prove herself, and did. Because of this, Rolls recognized the need to give undergraduates an opportunity to make discoveries, develop a lab work ethic, and be successful as a researcher.

Rolls has also recognized the need to help change-of-location students obtain the research experience they need to apply for graduate school. She has been working with Carl Sillman, a senior lecturer in biochemistry and molecular biology, on a course that is offered for juniors including those who have just moved to University Park from a Commonwealth campus or other university. “Students come to University Park as juniors and have not yet

had the opportunity to participate in research. This makes it difficult for them to apply for a Ph.D. program because they are behind their University Park peers in lab participation,” Rolls said.

Rolls and Sillman give these students an opportunity to take the “fast track” into research by taking a class offered by Rolls

“I BELIEVE IN GIVING STUDENTS THE OPPORTUNITY

TO WORK IN THE LAB, ALONG WITH THE TOOLS THEY

NEED, AND A RESEARCH QUESTION TO PURSUE, BUT

ULTIMATELY IT’S UP TO EACH STUDENT TO SUCCEED.”


that puts them in the lab immediately and teaches them how to answer questions in the lab. As with any undergraduate student doing research, they learn pretty quickly whether or not research is something they enjoy or loathe. “Research isn’t for everyone, but it’s important to provide the opportunity to experience it,” Rolls said.

Taking the LeadWhen she’s not mentoring undergraduates or helping them integrate into her lab, Rolls wears several hats with graduate students, serving as the department’s graduate program

Cover Story

liaison officer, working as an ombudsperson for students, and helping them with research in her lab.

Despite the time that going out of her way to work with students takes, Rolls still finds time to pursue another initiative, serving as founder and director of The Center for Cellular Dynamics.

“I started this in 2008 soon after I arrived at Penn State because I realized that there were a lot of people here with shared scientific interests, but it took me a long time to find them because they are scattered in different departments and colleges,” Rolls said.

MICHELLE STONE at a confocal microscope equipped with a pulsed UV laser for

severing fruit fly neurons, in the Rolls Lab. Credit: Seth Palmer


The center brings together scientists who study the cytoskeleton and intracellular transport, cellular changes during development and disease, cell-cell communication and interactions, and who use live imaging. This interdisciplinary group of faculty meets monthly to brainstorm science ideas. Additionally, Rolls helps center faculty organize workshops and mini-meetings throughout the year. Their most recent event, a workshop on a new genome engineering strategy that makes use of clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats, included nearly 100 people from across campus. This type of interdisciplinary engagement and collaboration is one of the reasons that Rolls chose Penn State.

“I wanted to come to Penn State for its research-centric community. The college and the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences have been great for supporting interdisciplinary research,” Rolls said. “Being closer to my mother, who is a professor of nutritional sciences at Penn State, also enticed me to settle here.”

Penn State Science was a natural fit for Rolls. When Rolls was considering where to start her lab, she had a one-year-old and knew that she could only succeed in a place where the environment was supportive of families and children. After talking with other Penn State faculty and visiting the Bennett Family Center (the child care facility on campus), she knew that Penn State was the only place where she could juggle family, run a lab, teach, and have opportunities for leadership.

Rolls also has interests that extend beyond the lab and classroom. She has served as a chair and co-chair of the Eberly College of Science Climate and Diversity Committee for several years, where she helped guide the committee toward undertaking numerous climate-related

initiatives. “Melissa was a driving force in the

distribution and display of the college Code of Mutual Respect and Cooperation and of the establishment of the digital signage now found in eight key locations in college buildings around campus,” said Chuck Fisher, professor of biology and co-chair of the committee. “Her energy and commitment to improving the climate for all members of the college, coupled with her considerate but aggressive approach with new projects, has been a major factor in the success of the committee for the past several years.”

In her seven years at Penn State, Rolls has been able to undertake and effectively manage an impressive number of initiatives. From establishing a successful lab, to mentoring students, to managing multiple leadership roles, Rolls has committed her energy towards making an impact and excelling everywhere she is involved. Although only time will tell what is on the horizon for her next big discovery or project, the college community is looking forward to seeing what Rolls sets out to accomplish next.


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Climate &


Climate outside the office can affect us everyday, whether it is winter weather making transpor-tation difficult or a warm sunny day lifting the mood. But what about the other type of climate? People experience climate everyday in the work-place, in school, and in social situations; the at-mosphere in each situation has a profound effect on a person’s mood, productivity level, and men-tal well-being. So what can be done to improve this type of climate?

Enter the Dean’s Climate and Diversity Com-mittee. Every month, this committee of people from all over the college, including faculty, staff, students, and postdocs, meets to talk about is-sues of climate in the Eberly College of Science.

How do they define climate? Climate is how someone would describe the atmosphere in the college. Climate encompasses how a member of the college feels in regard to acceptance, safety, and support. Do you feel that your background and beliefs are respected in your work unit? Do you feel safe and comfortable? Do you feel you have all of the resources you need in your unit, and would be comfortable asking for them if you

didn’t? All of these factors contribute to climate. The Dean’s Climate and Diversity Committee,

comprised of two to three representatives from each department in the college, meets frequently to discuss ways to improve the climate and di-versity of the college, and to ensure that every faculty member, staff person, and student feels safe, comfortable, and accepted.

Dean Daniel Larson formed the college’s Climate and Diversity Committee in 1999, charging the committee “to develop and sustain a welcoming environment that is inclusive of all groups with an emphasis on underrepresented populations and inter-group relations.” The dean’s plan was to gather information that could help further the college’s vision of providing a supportive and welcoming environment where all members can carry out missions of research service, teaching, and learning to the best of their abilities.

In addition to the committee members from each department, the committee includes other staff around the college. Hank McCoullum, di-rector of the Office of Diversity Initiatives and

Climate & It’s All About Communication

Diversity:


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Multicultural Programs, and Amanda Jones, manager of the college’s human resources office, sit on the Climate and Diversity Committee on behalf of their areas in the college. Other repre-sentatives on the committee not from academic departments include staff from the dean’s office and delegates from Science LionPride, the col-lege’s student ambassador program. In addition to the college’s main committee, each depart-ment has its own Climate and Diversity Com-mittee.

Improving CommunicationNo matter what issues the committee tackles, committee co-chairs Chuck Fisher and Melis-sa Rolls say that communication is their biggest issue.

“All of the issues we deal with are ultimately about bettering communication,” said Fisher, “whether it’s letting someone know about exist-ing resources, dealing with a difficult situation, instituting best practices in mentoring, or get-ting the word out about a new policy.”

One method the committee uses to communi-

cate is the embedding method. They use their committee members, ombudspeople, and de-partmental committees to help spread the word about an important policy or initiative in their area.

At the request of the committee, the college purchased digital signage for nine buildings fre-quented by the college’s faculty, staff, and stu-dents. Digital signage will be a primary means of disseminating information about the commit-

tee’s initiatives, the college’s Code of Respect and Mutual Cooperation, and information about poli-

cies that can make staff, faculty, and students feel more comfortable in the college. Build-ings with digital signage include Chemistry Building, Davey Laboratory, Frear Building, McAllister Building, Mueller Laboratory, Os-mond Laboratory, Ritenour Building, Thomas Building, and Whitmore Laboratory. Signage

is managed by the college's marketing office.“We hope that by putting the information in

spaces people pass through every day, we can get them information on things they may not have even thought to look up,” said Rolls.

Another way to communicate the importance of work in climate and diversity is to reward in-dividuals for their achievements in this area. Since 2009, the Climate and Diversity Awards have been recognizing three individuals per

“ALL OF THE ISSUES WE DEAL WITH

ARE ULTIMATELY ABOUT BETTERING

COMMUNICATION...”

Digital signage like the one shown here in Thomas Building, is

one way the Climate and Diversity Committee communicates

initiatives to the college community.


year for their work to improve the college’s cli-mate and diversity. In addition to recognizing the winners, the committee also recognizes ev-ery person who was nominated for a Climate and Diversity Award at the annual awards pre-sentation, even if they did not win.

Rolls believes these awards are important: “Hearing about what our college members have worked on is inspiring. We have recognized ac-complishments ranging from increasing recruit-ment of underrepresented students in the chem-istry graduate program to working to improve the postdoc community.”

So what are some of the commit-tee’s big initiatives? What are some examples of their work in action?

College Climate SurveyOne of the most important initia-tives of the committee is the College Climate Survey. In 2007, the committee conducted a sur-vey to assess the climate in the college. The re-sults of the survey helped to inform the commit-tee’s initiatives in the years following the survey. In 2012, a follow-up survey was developed and given to the college community. The committee compared the results from 2007 to the results from 2012 to determine where progress has been made in relation to the college’s climate, and where attention should still be focused to improve climate.

A few areas that the 2007 and 2012 surveys identified as areas in need of improvement in-cluded postdoctoral and graduate student men-toring, graduate student and staff confidence in our commitment to protect them from harass-ment, and the general lack of knowledge about existing resources. The climate committee has taken these results to heart and have initiat-ed activities to address these needs on several fronts.

OmbudspeopleEach department in the college has its own om-budspeople, which is the result of an important initiative of the committee. The committee’s goal was to identify people in each department who were trusted and approachable, someone who all members of the department would be comfortable talking to about climate or other job-related issues. Rather than letting a minor issue fester or waiting until an issue escalates to the point that serious intervention is needed,

the ombudspeople are available for counseling, to intervene gently, or sometimes just to be a sympathetic ear.

Working with an ombudsperson is a confiden-tial process. Unless a crime has been committed or there is a risk to someone’s health or well-be-ing, the ombudsperson does nothing without the permission of the person seeking their help. The ombudspeople have been trained by the college’s human resources office to best serve the faculty, students, and staff in their department and are aware of the range of resources available to as-sist people in need. The ombudspeople work with those who approach them to solve problems, or more often, to head potential problems off early.

How are ombudspeople chosen and vetted? Each department nominates their ombudspeo-ple, and the nominations are brought to the college’s human resources office. The human resources office then reviews the nominations. What is the most important quality they look for in an ombudsperson?

THE OMBUDSPEOPLE WORK WITH THOSE

WHO APPROACH THEM TO SOLVE

PROBLEMS, OR MORE OFTEN, TO HEAD

POTENTIAL PROBLEMS OFF EARLY.


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“Whether they are approachable,” said Rolls. “We want you to feel comfortable coming to the ombudsperson with any issues you might have, so they need to be approachable.”

There is one tenure-track and one non-ten-ure–track faculty member in each department to help diversify the ranks of ombudspeople.

Fisher, who is an ombudsperson for the De-partment of Biology, said, “Fortunately it is not a very time-consuming job, as we are rarely need-ed. I’ve met with only 3-4 people a year in my roll as ombudsman. In most cases, the problems were still minor and were taken care of quickly by clarifying misunderstandings or miscommu-nications. In a couple of cases, more serious situ-ations were identified early and also dealt with quickly and productively.”

Mentoring ProgramsThe Eberly College of Science employs more postdoctoral researchers, fellows, and scholars than any other college in the University, with 52 percent of all University postdocs working in the college. The large number of postdocs in the col-lege made the concern about insufficient mentor-ing a priority for the committee.

To improve postdoctoral mentoring, the com-mittee first formed a postdoctoral subcommittee in 2010 to investigate the needs of postdoctoral fellows, scholars, and researchers in the college. When the subcommittee discovered an inconsis-tent approach to mentoring postdoctoral fellows, researchers, and scholars, they decided to do some research to see if a better model existed somewhere else.

After reviewing recommendations from the


National Science Foundation, the National Insti-tutes of Health, the National Postdoctoral Soci-ety, and a number of peer universities, the com-mittee concluded that development and use of Postdoctoral Individual Development Plan was a centerpiece of the best practices in the nation. They then worked to modify plans developed by these other groups to best fit the needs of post-doctoral scholars in the college. The result is an instrument that helps postdocs to identify areas of personal and professional development that would benefit them while providing a mecha-nism to facilitate open communication between a postdoc and his or her mentor about their indi-vidual needs and aspirations.

According to Will Horton, a postdoctoral scholar in neuroscience and member of the committee’s postdoctoral subcommittee, not all postdocs want the same things out of their ex-perience, which can make mentoring a postdoc challenging. “Postdocs can have different goals: some may want to teach, some may want to per-form research, some may want to go to industry,” he said.

Opening up a line of communication about what is desired from the experience is key, which he says the Individual Development Plan helps to do: “The Individual Development Plan gets you to communicate with your mentor even if you are shy.”

The College Climate Survey also brought up concerns about the lack of consistent mentoring for the college’s graduate students. Using a simi-lar process as they did with postdoctoral men-toring, the committee researched best practices for graduate student mentoring from peer uni-versities, such as the University of California, Berkeley and Stanford University. The commit-tee then took those best practices and custom-ized them for the diverse needs of the students in the college, based on information from the

College Climate Survey and with help from the committee’s graduate student subcommittee.

Mathematics Graduate Student WorkshopAfter the release of results from the 2012 College Climate Survey, some individual departments decided to take action on the items they saw in the survey results. One of these departments was the Department of Mathematics. Diane Henderson, professor in the Department of Mathematics and college Climate and Diversity Committee member, helped to arrange a town hall meeting in the Department of Mathematics to have a discussion of some of the survey re-sults.

After the town hall meeting, a few students approached Henderson privately to talk about some of their personal concerns about climate in the department. One of those students was Diego Chaves, now a third-year Ph.D. student in mathematics.

“We discussed some inappropriate comments that we’ve heard in the department,” Chaves said. These comments included sexist jokes and slurs against homosexuals, as well as some con-cern about cultural integration issues. Hender-son suggested setting up a student-given work-shop to address these issues.

Chaves and seven other graduate students in the Department of Mathematics identified eight major issues of climate for which they wanted to raise awareness and start a departmental dia-logue. The issues were: inclusion, humor in the workplace, sensitivity to human identities, re-actions to behaviors, academically disparaging attitudes, respecting our students, gossip, and professionalism.

Each graduate student on the small team pre-pared a presentation and discussion on one of the eight issues. The students then put on four workshop sessions, each session combining two


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of the eight issue areas. The students who signed up were randomly assigned to a workshop rather than choosing it, which meant that first-year graduate students were often in workshops with third- and fourth-year graduate students, creat-ing a more well-rounded discussion.

The students who gave the workshop also cre-ated a social contract for the department which students could voluntarily sign, stating they would respect other students and their cultures, identities, and beliefs, with suggestions for how to handle difficult situations.

Chaves had personal experience with the workshop topic of inclusion. Chaves, who is Bra-

zilian, said that as an international student, there is a tendency to stick with students from your own nationality or background when you come to graduate school. He himself experienced this during his first year of his Ph.D. program. Because the Department of Mathematics at-tracts students from many countries around the world for whom English is not a first language, language can be a huge barrier to integrating with other members of the department.

“It’s so easy to go back to your first language,” Chaves said, admitting that for his first year, he did this rather than socialize with those outside his culture. It wasn’t until a chance encounter

Climate and Diversity Committee co-chairs Chuck Fisher and Melissa Rolls speak at this year’s Climate and Diversity

Awards reception


with fellow graduate students outside of campus that he began to try to meet other people from the department and truly integrate.

The workshop on inclusion encouraged inter-

national and American students to get to know each other. The workshop included strategies for native English speakers to help non-native speakers and encouragement to make learning about other backgrounds a priority. A key mes-sage in the workshop was that “talking to some-one from a different part of the world will enrich your life,” said Chaves.

Both the team of graduate students and Hen-derson were awarded a Climate and Diversity Award for this work to improve the climate in their department.

The Department of Mathematics would like to continue the workshops every year, with the hope that participation by first-year students will help to quell some of the issues brought up by the climate survey.

Workshops like the one created in the Depart-ment of Mathematics embody the spirit of the Climate and Diversity Committee, said Fisher and Rolls.

“We want to inspire all members of the college to do their part to create a good climate in the college,” said Fisher.

Without an inclusive climate and fair treat-ment for all members of the college community, the college would not be recognized as one of the premiere institutions for science across the

country; a healthy climate is imperative to the overall suc-cess of the college. While the committee is pleased with the success that they have had with their climate initiatives in the last 15 years, they con-tinue to work hard to identify areas that need improvement. With support from the dean and other administrators in the college, the committee will continue its efforts to im-

prove communication and make the Eberly Col-lege of Science a positive place for all members of the college community.

THE WORKSHOP ON INCLUSION ENCOURAGED

INTERNATIONAL AND AMERICAN STUDENTS TO

GET TO KNOW EACH OTHER. THE WORKSHOP

INCLUDED STRATEGIES FOR NATIVE ENGLISH

SPEAKERS TO HELP NON-NATIVE SPEAKERS AND

ENCOURAGEMENT TO MAKE LEARNING ABOUT

OTHER BACKGROUNDS A PRIORITY.


New Planetarium Planned for The Arboretum at Penn State

New, technologically ad-vanced digital visions of the night sky on campus? With the completion of a new plan-etarium as part of The Arbore-tum at Penn State’s Education Center expansion, this fantasy could become a reality.

The current 30-seat plan-etarium in Davey Laboratory, built in the 1980s, is a popu-lar facility that balances many varied uses. The facility, be-ing the closest planetarium to many areas of the state, attracts numerous local and not-so-local school and scout-ing groups, and also receives requests to partner with com-munity organizations.

Balancing educational, com-munity, and elementary school trip usage at the small plan-etarium is tough, and doesn’t factor in the planetarium’s orig-inal purpose: an education and research facility for Penn State students, researchers, and fac-ulty. The planetarium serves the students, faculty, and re-searchers in the Department

of Astronomy and Astrophys-ics, and provides planetarium shows for very popular science general education astronomy courses with many hundreds of students each semester.

This leaves demand for shows at the planetarium high, and resources in the current facility struggling to meet the demand. The small seating capacity and central campus location make access to plan-etarium shows challenging. In-

stead of being able to seat an entire group for a planetarium show at once, the planetarium staff may have to run mul-tiple shows to accommodate all members of a group. And then there’s the issue of a bus dropping off a class of elemen-tary-school children near the entrance to Davey Labora-tory—in the center of campus on the HUB mall, where traffic flow is limited.

Knowing the current fa-

College N

ews


cility’s limitations, Larry Ramsey, then head of the De-partment of Astronomy and Astrophysics, came up with the concept of the new planetarium at the Arboretum in 2007 after a conversation with members of the Department of Astrono-my and Astrophysics’s Board of Visitors. Ramsey took the idea to Kim Steiner, director of the Arboretum, and Deb Howard, director of facilities resources and planning for the Univer-

sity. Steiner and Howard were interested in the idea, and the trio worked together on a for-mal program statement, which enabled architectural studies of the project to begin.

The new planetarium at the Arboretum would be built on the grounds of the proposed Education Center, which is still awaiting funding. The new planetarium would be able to seat 125-150 people, more than four times as many as the

current planetarium’s capacity. And the Arboretum’s location makes loading and unloading buses of students easier than the current location on the HUB mall.

The new facility would pro-vide increased technology, an upgrade that is long overdue, said Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics Senior Lec-turer Christopher Palma, who helps to manage the plan-etarium. “Many other univer-sities with planetaria (Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State, Colorado) have either already upgraded or are in the process of doing so.”

According to Ramsey, the new planetarium plans include a fully modern and upgradable full-dome 2D and 3D digital projection system, making the planetarium a capable digital theater that several depart-ments on campus could use for innovative educational and re-search activities.

Increased technology in the upgraded facility will provide more up-to-date career prepa-ration for the department’s astronomy majors interested in science education. Many of the students who work at the campus planetarium go on to careers managing other plan-etarium or science education facilities as a result of the valu-able hands-on experience they


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receive before they graduate. Modern, upgraded plane-

tarium facilities are capable of much more than just astrono-my-based programming. The new digital projection technol-ogy makes it possible to feature shows and projections on sub-jects ranging from meteorolo-gy, life sciences, and geoscienc-es, to art, history, and music, while also providing hands-on career preparation for other disciplines, like education and film majors.

Another possibility is a new stream of revenue. While the planetarium does not charge admission for planetarium shows (and has no plans to change that), they could rent the new space for events. And digital projection allows for the

creation of new shows featur-ing Penn State astronomy re-search that could be licensed to other institutions, another way to generate revenue.

The proposed Education Center at the Arboretum, of which the planetarium would be part, brings a host of op-portunities for learning to the Arboretum.

“When the Education Cen-ter is completed at the Arbo-retum, it will make that part of campus not only a gateway to the rest of the University, but it will also be a destina-tion learning center for K-12 classes and the community at large,” said Palma.

The new planetarium would continue a long history of hav-ing a planetarium on campus.

Palma and his colleagues found evidence of a planetarium pre-dating the current facility: a 1940s planetarium in Osmond Laboratory started by Henry Yeagley, a former professor of physics and astronomy.

Ramsey, Palma, and their colleagues in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics are eager to continue this tra-dition at the Arboretum’s Edu-cation Center.

“We have had a long tradi-tion of welcoming the commu-nity to our campus for educa-tional events, and look forward to being able to expand our capacity for these sorts of pro-grams in collaboration with the Arboretum,” said Palma.

Intellectual Property F

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Research Leading to Practical Benefits for SocietyOne yardstick for measuring the quality of a University

is by measuring its beneficial impacts on society. The

Eberly College of Science is justifiably proud of the

impacts our students have made on Pennsylvania, the

nation, and the world. Often overlooked, however,

are the impacts of our college through the transfer of

our research from the lab bench into economic and

societal benefits. Each issue of the Science Journal will

highlight a faculty member whose recent intellectual

property has real potential to benefit society.

Scott Phillips, assistant professor and Martarano Career

Development Professor of Chemistry, has developed

elegant and deceptively simple tests for analytes that

are inexpensive to produce, require no refrigeration,

and provide reliable quantitative data using no

electronic readers or specialized equipment. A simple

watch will suffice. Consequently,

Phillips’s technology could be

used, for example, to develop

diagnostic tests for water quality,

health-related point-of-care

tests, and tests for food-borne

bacterial contamination in rural

areas around the world. Such

diagnostic tests would meet the

World Health Organization’s (WHO) ASSURED criteria

for diagnostic tests: affordable, sensitive, specific,

user-friendly, robust and rapid, equipment-free, and

deliverable.

—Andrew Stephenson, associate dean for research

and graduate education

Speed and simplicity are two words we don’t usually associate with tests, particularly effective diagnostic tests used for human health. But what if diagnostic tests could be both simple, meaning easy to perform, without multiple steps to complete the measurement; and quick, as in the ability to measure a chemical species quickly and effectively?

The goal of point-of-care diagnostic tests—examples include personal glucose meters, pregnancy tests, and breathalyzer tests—is that the person performing the test can easily complete the process while obtaining the most accurate data. Phillips and his team have developed many new strategies to advance point-of-

This paper testing device,

designed by Phillips, measures

the levels of lead and mercury in

water. The levels are measured

by counting the time between

when the green appears on the

left and the red appears on the

right. Credit: Phillips lab

care diagnostic tests, including modifying existing tests for new purposes.

The team repurposed a personal glucose meter so that it could measure relevant concentrations of enzyme biomarkers. Without changing the glucose meter or the strips that go into it, Phillips and his team were able to merely change the reagents and assay strategy of the meter to repurpose it. They tested the system to measure a marker of liver function with success. For patients going through treatments that could damage their liver, this simple test could be a life changer.

But repurposing the glucose meter isn’t even their most promising strategy. They are researching using paper as a diagnostic platform. By embedding new reagents into paper, Phillips’s team is able to perform very sensitive tests that detect trace quantities of analytes with ease. And the paper diagnostic test is easy to perform, too—Phillips and his team have set up the test so that the user merely has to add a sample to the paper and the reagents do the work and provide a definitive readout. The paper can even quantify how much of an analyte is in a sample: the user can either count the number of colored regions that appear on the paper, or time how long it takes the affected part of the paper to change color relative to a region of the paper not subject to the sample. The user does not need any specialized electronic devices to perform these tests or analyze the results.

Phillips said the goal of this research is “to make tests exceedingly simple, but still quantitative and high performance.” The idea of simpler, more effective diagnostic tests that anyone can perform and analyze could revolutionize healthcare testing. Not only are the tests Phillips and his team are coming up with simple, effective, and easy to perform, but they also have the ability to be mass produced and more readily available than electronic testing devices.

Intellectual Property F

ocus


With a reputation around Penn State of “no shrinking violet” and 18 years of leadership ex-perience at the University, it’s not surprising that Teresa Davis was selected to fill the vacant associate dean of administra-tion in the college. The position, which was previously filled by Karin Foley, is unique because it requires a skillset that cannot just be learned from a textbook or in a classroom. From facilities planning, to IT and marketing management, combined with interacting and communicating with people at all levels in the University and beyond, her du-ties make for a challenging, yet rewarding, job.

As Davis can attest, since her first day in early February, no day has been “regular.” Between attending meetings, making decisions, handling problems, and dealing with faculty, staff, and other administrators, there is not a typical daily schedule; every day brings something dif-ferent to the table. Despite what the job throws at her, Davis has the experience and knowledge to handle it.

Davis, who began her career in the U.S. military as an enlist-

ed soldier in the Army military police corps in the mid-1980s, quickly learned that discipline, hard work, and perseverance were necessary to do the job well. Those character traits have served her well, enabling her to advance in various civilian po-sitions in the Department of the Army around the globe, ending her career with the Department of the Army at the United States Military Academy at West Point as the Provost Marshal office’s plans officer.

In 1996, Davis joined Penn State as director of transporta-tion services, where she over-saw the transportation needs of 41,000 students and 16,000 em-ployees while managing the us-age of 17,000 parking spaces, a 500-vehicle rental fleet, campus bus and shuttle services, and 10 informational kiosks. Addition-ally, on any given day, she was responsible for establishing and enforcing plans, supervising staff, managing budgets, negoti-ating contracts, and serving on commissions and committees, among other duties.

Administrators across Penn State recognized Davis’s strong work ethic and talents for plan-ning, organization, and cus-tomer service, and invited her to participate in the University’s Administrative Fellows pro-gram in 2009. She joined Craig Weidemann, Vice President of

Outreach, and worked along-side him for a year, shadowing his daily activities and serving on multiple committees work-ing to improve the University’s outreach program.

All of her work and life expe-riences, along with her master’s degree in public administra-tion and her doctoral degree in workforce education and man-agement, have prepared Davis for her new role as associate dean of administration. In this role she oversees information technology, facilities, market-ing, outreach, and a number of budget and leadership-related processes for the college. Areas of focus include planning for renovations on our instructional laboratories, restructuring and re-visioning the outreach efforts of the college, and a number of budget-reduction and process-improvement-related initiatives.

Outside of work, Davis can be found spending time with her son, Connor, who will be start-ing at Penn State in July. She also is active in the State College Downtown Rotary Club, and of-ten spends free time helping to plan or attend Rotary activities.

The college community is looking forward to the positive changes and fresh perspective that new leadership will pro-duce. We hope that you will join us in welcoming Teresa Davis to the college.

Penn State Science Welcomes Teresa Davis, Associate Dean of Administration

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Many genes in prokary-otic genomes are regulated by changes in RNA structure. Plants, because of their sessile nature, are exposed to extreme abiotic stresses such as tem-perature fluctuations, drought, and light, and these stresses are prone to alter the fold of RNA. However, the nature of RNA structure as it prevails in the living organism was previ-ously unknown in any organ-ism at the genome-wide scale. A team led by Professors Sally Assmann in biology, Philip Bevilacqua in chemistry, and Yu Zhang in statistics, along with postdoctoral fellow Yil-iang Ding and graduate stu-dents Yin Tang and Chun Kit Kwok, has developed new approaches to determine RNA structure in vivo in a genome-wide fashion by applying ex-perimental and statistical ap-proaches.

Ding and Kwok carried out chemical probing of intact seedlings from Arabidopsis thaliana, a small model plant species related to mustard. The chemical used, dimethyl sulfate (DMS), modifies nu-cleotides that are not tied up in Watson-Crick base pairing. Genome-wide patterns of DMS reactivity were determined by deep sequencing and were then mapped back to the genome. These patterns were used to constrain reactive nucleotides to be single-stranded, and the fold of each RNA in the genome was predicted. Computational analysis then helped identify key structural and regulatory patterns across the transcrip-tome. Among the patterns iden-tified were a triplet periodicity in DMS reactivity in mRNA and secondary structures near polyadenylation sites and al-ternatively spliced introns. In

addition, the team developed techniques to study the struc-tures of low abundance RNAs by using a ligation-mediated PCR method.

The research team reported their findings in two papers recently published in Nature and Nature Communications. Currently, the team is apply-ing these techniques to study changes in the patterns of RNA when plants are exposed to en-vironmental stresses, broadly applying these studies to crops. Their long-term goals are to learn how plants respond to abiotic stresses at the level of RNA folding and to develop crops with improved tolerance to stress.

You can read more about the research in Nature: nature.com/nature/journal/v505/n7485/full /nature12756.html.

Philip Bevilacqua, professor of chemistry

Yin Tang, Chun Kit Kwok, and Yiliang Ding,

who carried out the research.Chemistry Chemistry Meets Plant Biology: Genome-wide Probing of RNA Structure Reveals Novel Mechanisms of Gene Regulation


Sarah Ades, associate professor of biochemistry and molecular biology, was selected by

GlaxoSmithKline PLC (GSK) as a winner of its discovery Fast Track competition, which is designed to accelerate the translation of academic research into novel medical therapies. Ades is one of eight winners in the competition.

G. Jogesh Babu, profes-sor of astrono-my and astrophysics and statistics, has been

awarded, along with Eric Feigelson, the American Publishers Award for Profes-sional and Scholarly Excel-lence (PROSE) in cosmology and astronomy for his book Modern Statistical Methods for Astronomy with R Applica-tions. The PROSE award was established in 1976 to recog-

nize the best in scholarly publishing as judged by publishers, librarians, and academics.

Ottar N. Bjørnstad, professor of entomology, biology, and statistics, has been named a

Fellow of the American Association for the Advance-ment of Science (AAAS). Election as an AAAS Fellow is an honor bestowed by peers upon members of the AAAS, the world’s largest general scientific society and the publisher of the journal Science.

Squire J. Booker, professor of chemistry and of biochemis-try and molecular

biology at Penn State Univer-sity, has been named a Fellow of the American Association

for the Advancement of Sci-ence (AAAS). Election as an AAAS Fellow is an honor bestowed by peers upon members of the AAAS, the world’s largest general scien-tific society and the publisher of the journal Science.

Dimitri (Dima) Burago, Distinguished Professor of Mathematics, and two

co-authors, Yuri Burago and Sergei Ivanov, have been awarded the Leroy P. Steel Prize for Mathematical Exposition by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) for their book A Course in Metric Geometry. The AMS recognized the book for making available a novel approach to differential geometry.

Faculty

Spotlight

Faculty Awards & Honors


Meredith Defelice, senior lecturer of biochemis-try and molecular biology,

received the George W. Ather-ton Award for Excellence in Teaching. The award is presented each year to four faculty members across the University who have devoted substantial effort to under-graduate teaching.

Eric Feigel-son, professor of astronomy and astrophys-ics and statis-tics, was awarded the

Faculty Scholar Medal in the Physical Sciences. This award is given in recognition of scholarly excellence demon-strated by a single contribu-tion or series of contributions focusing on a coherent theme.

Feigelson has also been awarded, along with G. Jogesh

Babu, the American Publish-ers Award for Professional and Scholarly Excellence (PROSE) in cosmology and astronomy for his book Modern Statistical Methods for Astronomy with R Applications. The PROSE award was established in 1976 to recognize the best in scholarly publishing as judged by publishers, librarians, and academics.

Kateryna Makova, a professor of biology, has been honored by the Univer-sity’s Eberly

College of Science by being appointed the Francis R. and Helen M. Pentz Professor of Science. The Pentz professor-ship was established in 1989 to provide outstanding faculty members with the resources necessary to further their teaching, research, and public service.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences has honored Péter Mészáros by awarding him the 2013

Einstein Professorship. Mészáros, who is the Holder of the Eberly Family Chair in Astronomy and Astrophysics and a professor of physics, was honored for his contributions to science during ceremonies from 17 to 27 October in China, where he gave a series of lectures at conferences in Shanghai and Nanjing.

Raymond E. Schaak, professor of chemistry, has been appoint-ed as the DuPont

Professor in Materials Chem-istry in recognition of his distinguished contributions in research and education.


Facu

lty Spotlight

B. Franklin Pugh Named an Evan Pugh Professor

B. Franklin Pugh, Willaman Professor in Molecular Biology and professor of bio-chemistry and molec-ular biology at Penn State University, has been named an Evan Pugh Professor, which is the highest honor the University bestows on its fac-

ulty. The Evan Pugh Professorships, named for Penn State's first president, are awarded to fac-ulty members who are acknowledged pioneers in their fields of research or creative activity; have demonstrated significant leadership in raising the standards of the University with respect to teaching, research or creativity, and service; and have demonstrated excellent teaching skills with undergraduate and graduate students who have subsequently achieved distinction in their fields.

Pugh has built a research program that in-vestigates how all genes of an organism are controlled by its environment. He uses both hu-man and yeast cells as model systems. Pugh’s research takes advantage of cutting-edge new technologies such as "next-generation" DNA se-quencing which produces billions of data points. Computational modeling of the data allows his research team to integrate biochemically-grounded regulatory mechanisms to produce more unified concepts on gene-regulatory net-works. His laboratory’s work on gene regulation as resulted in more than eighty scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals.

He manages an academic research laboratory

having 15-20 students, postdocs, and techni-cians. Significant visibility of his work has come through the invention of the ChIP-exo assay in his lab, which allows the genomic binding loca-tions of gene regulatory proteins to be identified with pinpoint accuracy. A patent for the process was issued in 2013. In 2012, he co-founded a company called Peconic, LLC to provide wider access to the assay.

Pugh was named a Leukemia Society of America Postdoctoral Fellow in 1988, a Searle Scholar in 1992, and a Leukemia and Lym-phoma Society Scholar in 1996. At Penn State, he was honored with a Daniel Tershak Facul-ty Teaching Award in 1996, a Faculty Scholar Medal in 2006, and in 2007 became holder of the Verne Willaman Chair in Molecular Biology. He was a member of the American Cancer Society peer-review committee on Genetic Mechanisms from 1999 to 2003, and was a member of the peer-review panel for the Florida Department of Health from 2001 to 2003. He currently is di-rector of the Center for Eukaryotic Gene Regu-lation at Penn State, and editor for the journal Molecular and Cellular Biology.

Pugh received a bachelor's degree in biology from Cornell University in 1983 and a doctoral degree in molecular biology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1987. He was a post-doctoral research associate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1987 to 1988 and at the University of California, Berkeley from 1988 to 1991. He joined the faculty at Penn State as assistant professor of biochemistry and molecu-lar biology in 1992. He was promoted to associ-ate professor in 1998 and to professor in 2005.


Andrew Read Named an Evan Pugh Professor

Andrew Read, Alumni Professor in Biological Sciences and professor of entomology, has been named an Evan Pugh Professor, which is the highest honor the University bestows on its faculty. The Evan Pugh Professorships, named for Penn

State's first president, are awarded to faculty members who are acknowledged pioneers in their fields of research or creative activity; have demonstrated significant leadership in raising the standards of the University with respect to teaching, research or creativity, and service; and have demonstrated excellent teaching skills with undergraduate and graduate students who have subsequently achieved distinction in their fields.

Read is the director of Penn State's Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics. He works on the ecology and evolution of infectious disease. Read is perhaps best known for his research on how natural selection shapes the virulence of malaria and how the "unnatural" selection im-posed by medicine shapes the evolution of dis-ease-causing organisms. This evolution causes drugs to fail and can create "super-bugs" that are resistant to pharmaceuticals. Because evo-lutionary responses to drugs, insecticides, and vaccines are the main causes of problems in pre-venting and treating infectious diseases, Read's research, which provides an improved under-standing of pathogen evolution, can be used to inform public-health decisions.

Read has been honored for his research achievements with an American Academy of Mi-crobiology fellowship in 2014, an American As-sociation for the Advancement of Science fellow-ship in 2012, an Institute for Advanced Studies in Berlin fellowship in 2006, a Royal Society of Edinburgh fellowship in 2003, and a scientific medal from the Zoological Society of London in 1999. He has served on the scientific advisory boards for the Finnish Centre of Excellence in Evolutionary Research and the School of Biolog-ical Sciences at the University of Cambridge, as well as on other international scientific commit-tees. He currently serves on the editorial boards of PLoS Biology, Trends in Ecology, Evolution and Evolutionary Applications and he is a se-nior editor of the journal Evolutionary Medicine and Public Health. Read has co-authored more than 180 scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals such as Science, Nature, PLoS Biology, Evolution, and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.

Before joining Penn State in 2007, Read was at the University of Edinburgh in the United Kingdom, where he was the 13th Professor of Natural History, an endowed Chair established in 1767. He was an adjunct professor in evolu-tionary ecology at the University of Tromsø in Norway from 1992 to 1997, and a lecturer in zoology at St. Catherine's College at Oxford University in the United Kingdom from 1989 to 1990. He earned a doctoral degree in evolution-ary biology at the University of Oxford in 1989 and a bachelor's degree with honors in zoology at the University of Otago in New Zealand in 1984.


Facu

lty Spotlight

Raquel Assis, assistant professor of biology, studies the role of gene duplication in

the evolution of novel traits. She focuses on understanding how the functions of duplicate genes change over time, and the evolutionary forces, such as natural selection, that are responsible for these changes. To uncover the timing and mechanisms of evolutionary innovation, Assis compares the genetic sequence and expression profile—where and when a gene is active—of duplicate genes within and between species. Before joining Penn State, Assis was an NIH postdoctoral research fellow at the University of California, Berkeley. She earned a doctoral degree in bioinformatics at the University of Michigan in 2011 and a bachelor’s degree in psychology and zoology at the University of Florida in 2006.

Eugenio Bianchi, assistant professor of physics, studies the role of quantum

entanglement—a phenomenon in which the individual quantum state of interacting particles cannot be described—in gravitational events such as the evaporation of a black hole and the dynamics in the primordial state of the universe. The main objective of his research is to understand the quantum nature of space-time and the entanglement between its elementary constituents. The ideas and methods he works with have applications in the theories of loop quantum gravity and quark-gluon-plasma thermalization, as well as in other areas of physics. Before joining Penn State, Bianchi was a postdoctoral scholar at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Canada and at the Centre de Physique Théorique de Marseille, France. He earned his doctoral degree at the Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa in 2010.

Michael DeGiorgio, assistant professor of biology, uses mathematical and

computational approaches to study evolutionary relationships within and among species. He works on both theoretical and applied problems in statistical population genetics, human evolutionary genomics, and phylogenetics. Within these research areas, DeGiorgio is specifically interested in constructing mathematical models of human evolutionary history, designing statistics to search for genomic regions under natural selection, and developing and evaluating computational methods for estimating species relationships using data from multiple regions of the genome. Before joining Penn State, DeGiorgio was an NSF postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley. He earned bachelor’s degrees in mathematics and computer science at the University of Central Florida in 2006, and his master’s and doctoral degrees in bioinformatics at the University of Michigan in 2008 and 2011, respectively.

New Faculty


Chad Hanna, assistant professor of physics, is a gravitational-wave astrophysicist

who focuses his research with the Laser Interferometric Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) on detecting gravitational waves emitted by compact, binary neutron stars or black holes. Hanna hopes to detect the gravitational waves that are predicted to be observable just prior to the merging of two neutron stars or black holes. Along with his LIGO Scientific Collaboration colleagues, Hanna aims to conduct real-time, gravitational-wave searches, which will enable joint electromagnetic and other astroparticle observations in order to learn more about these extraordinarily powerful events. Before joining Penn State, Hanna was a postdoctoral fellow at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics and a postdoctoral scholar in the LIGO Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology. Hanna earned his bachelor’s degree in physics at Penn State in 2004, and his master’s and doctoral degrees in physics at Louisiana State University in 2006 and 2008, respectively.

Edward O’Brien, assistant professor of chemistry, is focused on understanding,

modeling, and predicting the behavior of macromolecules inside of cells through the development of theoretical and computational tools rooted in the fields of chemistry, physics, and computer science. His current research efforts include the development of a molecular perspective and a theoretical framework to describe protein synthesis and its effect on newly synthesized proteins. Before joining the Penn State, O’Brien was a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Christopher Dobson at Cambridge University. As a graduate student, O’Brien studied processes of protein folding and amyloid formation at the University of Maryland College Park, where he earned a doctoral degree in chemical physics in 2008. He attended the University of the Sciences in Pennsylvania and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry with minors in mathematics and physics.


Undergraduate Student Awards and Honors

Nora Ackerson Ryan Ahn Nathan Arnett Vrianna Arrell Kerstyn Auman Rohan Basu Sarah Bevilacqua Alice Cai Mia Casale Ravi Dalsania Amber Delhagen Tiffany Dharia Paolo Dugo Declan Evans

Jia Fan Cruz Finnicum JingJing Fu Casey Graham Kirby Graham Tong Guo Qinglan Huang Morgan Keegan Anne Klepeiss Karishma Kodia Michelle Li Wanni Lin Xinyue Liu Yangyu Liu

Caitlin Lynch Jacob Mascaro Nicholas McCarroll James O’Hara Mit Patel Ruhiben Patel Tanmay Patel Turner Pecen Brent Perry Joseph Puthenpurayil Carrie Reesman Erica Sidorowicz Pallavi Sindhu Mark Smeraldo

Grant Smith Emily Sterbis Ryan Stronach Shuhan Tian Sankia Udyaver Jarrett Venezia Zhiyu Yin Cassidy Young Siavash Zamani Hankun Zhang Jikai Zhang Yichuan Zhang

Student Spotlight

Shahroz FatimaTerry HaferMaren HealeyZiqi KanGrace LeeEllie McKinstry

Karthik NatarajNeal PatelJacqueline PattersonHaley RandolphLaura ReeseCorinne Renner

Joshua ReynoldsNicholas RizerSpencer SchrockLauren UlshEmily CeryFrancesco Volo

Anna WingLingjuan ZengArtemis Zhu

Adeline AnswineTesia ChuderewiczStephanie CrillyPeter Hohman

Matthew LeeCharles LevinKelly McGillMichelle Pistner

Anthony RomanCaleb ShervinskieZachary SnyderHan Wen

Brendan Wood

Nicholas AnzaloneBridget BackerJacob BoyerRene Clark

Christian ConlonJessica CunningCharles DefrancescoGeoffrey Gao

Audra KellyWan Ying LianElisabeth PaulsonChristopher Rae

Kristin RomutisBryan TornabeneAmy WeidertLianfei Yan

2014 President’s Freshman Award

2014 Evan Pugh Scholar Award (Junior)

2014 President Sparks Award

2014 Evan Pugh Scholar Award (Senior)


DANIEL ABERCROMBIEDaniel Abercrom-bie graduated from Penn State with a 4.0 grade-point aver-age and bachelor’s degrees in physics and nuclear engineer-ing and a minor in mathematics. He was

a member of the Schreyer Honors College and was on the Dean’s List every semester of his un-dergraduate career.

During his time at Penn State, Abercrom-bie was named an Undergraduate Fellow and a Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering Scholar by Toshiba-Westinghouse; was the recipient of scholarship awards from the Department of Energy University Program and the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation; and recognized with a national conference award for Best Under-graduate Presentation in Reactor Physics and an Accelerator Applications Division Scholar-ship from the American Nuclear Society. Ab-ercrombie also won a slew of Penn State awards

Daniel Abercrombie of Linden, Pennsylvania, and Laura Krecko, of Hershey,

Pennsylvania, were honored as student marshals during the Penn State Eberly

College of Science’s spring commencement ceremonies on May 10, 2014.

Sarah Shandera, assistant professor of physics, served as Abercrombie’s faculty

escort. Krecko’s faculty escort was James Strauss, senior lecturer in biology.

Spring 2014 Student Marshals

and scholarships, including the University-level President’s Freshman Award and President’s Sparks Award. Other Penn State scholarships and awards Abercrombie received were the John J. Brennan Excellence in Nuclear Engineering Award, the College of Engineering Research Symposium Poster Award, the Klevans Schol-arship in Nuclear Engineering, the Schreyer Honors College Bain Family Scholarship, the Florence and Charles Haines Memorial Schol-arship, the Paul Morrow Endowed Scholarship, the Monty Schultz Memorial Scholarship in Nuclear Engineering, the Professor H. A. Ev-erett Memorial Scholarship, and the Ralph B. and Eleonora K. Strawbridge Memorial Trustee Scholarship.

While he was an undergraduate at Penn State, Abercrombie had the opportunity to con-duct research under Philip Harris, a staff phys-icist at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. Abercrombie assisted Har-ris’s team at CERN and researchers from MIT and Northwestern University in the search for hypothesized dark matter that is produced in the decay of the Higgs boson particle. In par-ticular, Abercrombie’s research tried to charac-terize the spray of hadrons (particles made of


Student S

potlight

quarks) that emerge during some collisions that generate a Higgs boson. Successful character-ization will help find the Higgs, even when it decays into invisible dark matter.

Outside of the classroom and research lab, Abercrombie was a member of the Penn State Chapter of the American Nuclear Society. Ac-tive at the society’s national level, Abercrombie participated in the planning of the 2014 Ameri-can Nuclear Society National Student Confer-ence as Technical Lead. In his home chapter at Penn State, he was involved with the chapter’s outreach activities, including educating Boy Scouts groups and high school students about the field of nuclear science and engineering.

When informed he had been selected as stu-dent marshal, Abercrombie said he was “very surprised and honored to be selected as a rep-resentative for the entire college.” His time at Penn State taught him many important lessons, including learning to embrace change: “I came to Penn State thinking that I would obtain an engineering degree and get a job in design. However, I was drawn to pure science. Now I will be attending graduate school for physics, even though it was only partway through my ju-nior year that I started to realize that was what I wanted to do.”

Abercrombie plans to attend the Massachu-setts Institute of Technology to obtain a doctor-ate degree in experimental high-energy physics. A graduate of Williamsport Area High School, Abercrombie was accompanied by his parents, David and Diane Abercrombie, at the com-mencement ceremony.

LAURA KRECKOLaura Krecko, a member of the Schreyer Honors Col-lege, graduated with a 4.0 grade-point av-erage and a bachelor’s degree in biology. She was on the Dean’s List every semester of her undergraduate

career. Krecko won many awards during her time

at Penn State, including the University-level honors of the President’s Freshman Award, the President’s Sparks Award, and the Evan Pugh


Scholar Senior Award. The Schreyer Honors College recognized her achievements with an award from the Pre-Eminence in Honors Edu-cation Fund and multiple Academic Excellence Scholarships. She also was the recipient of the Virginia L. Corson Headings Scholarship in the Eberly College of Science and inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society.

Krecko has served as a teaching assistant for James Strauss in his mammalian physi-ology and histology classes and also performed research in the Vascular Health Interventions Laboratory under the guidance of Sheila West, associate professor of biobehavioral health. Krecko’s research involved assisting with a va-riety of tests that measure or assess glucose me-

tabolism, insulin sensitivity, endothelial func-tion, and cardiovascular responses to stress at the Penn State Clinical Research Center. She completed a Schreyer Honors College thesis in-vestigating the association of clinic and 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure measurements with cardiovascular disease risk factors in adults with type-2 diabetes mellitus.

Krecko split her free time between two stu-dent organizations, Peace.Love.Lyrical Dance Company and Global Medical Brigades. She was vice president of Peace.Love.Lyrical Dance Company and was selected as a THON dancer for the organization this year, helping the com-pany to raise $26,000 this year for pediatric cancer research. As part of Global Medical Bri-gades, Krecko spent her spring break in 2012 on a medical service trip to Panama, where her group helped to organize a mobile clinic to pro-vide medical assistance for underprivileged ru-ral Panamanian communities.

Krecko will attend the Penn State College of Medicine to pursue a career as a physician. Krecko says she was “surprised and extremely honored” to be selected as a student marshal for the college. “The people I’ve met throughout my four years at Penn State are some of my great-est sources of happiness and inspiration. The warmth, pride, and strength of the Penn State community will continue to shape me for years to come.”

Krecko, a graduate of Hershey High School, was accompanied by her parents, Valentins and Anne Krecko, along with her sisters Kristina and Ingrid, at the graduation ceremony. Her sis-ters are also Penn State graduates, with Kris-tina expected to graduate from the Penn State College of Medicine this year.


Samantha Berlet: Cruising for Corals Penn State has al-ways been a part of my life. My grandfa-ther and father both obtained their un-dergraduate degrees from Penn State. I grew up going to Penn State games and learned to love

the State College area. When my interests turned to marine science, I thought attending Penn State was out of the picture. It wasn’t un-til I saw the numerous research labs on campus that Penn State became my first choice.

When I first arrived at Penn State, I wanted to take full advantage of the amazing research opportunities available to me as an under-graduate student, so I investigated several re-search labs with a focus on marine science. Dr. Charles Fisher’s deep-sea laboratory immedi-ately caught my attention.

One interest of Dr. Fisher’s lab is the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, which I had read about before coming to Penn State, however, I had not encountered anything about the particular species he was researching. Little is known about the deep-sea community, mainly because this previously in-accessible area is now beginning to be explored.

Research Cruise in the Gulf of Mexico

Samantha Berlet and Danielle McKean

recount their experiences studing coral

health as part of Charles Fisher’s deep-

sea lab research.

Undergraduate Scientists

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potlightDanielle and Samantha aboard the E/V Nautilus.


The novelty of this research drove me to work in the deep-sea lab starting in Janu-ary 2012.

As an undergradu-ate researcher at Penn State, I orga-nized and compiled data from seven years of research ex-

peditions, consisting of photographs from nearly 400 corals located at nine different sites in the Gulf of Mexico. Forward-looking photos of each coral were taken, digitized, and categorized to produce proportions of different health levels. Software programs called Fiji Is Just ImageJ (FIJI) and Inkscape were used to digitize each coral branch, and different colors were utilized to represent the different health categories. After proportions were computed, analysis be-tween multiple time periods was conducted to understand the ongoing impact of the 2010 oil spill.

While working on this project, I participat-ed in two different research expeditions: one aboard the RV Falkor in November 2012 and another aboard the E/V Nautilus in June 2013. I was particularly impressed by the technology used on the Nautilus for education; innovative telepresence capabilities were used to collect and transmit data from the ship to the general public viewing online. The technology played a key part in educating the viewers. My respon-sibilities on the E/V Nautilus research trip in-cluded collecting photographs of corals, leading the remotely operated vehicle (ROV) pilots to each of the sample sites, and answering real-time questions from the public.

My interest in biology and marine science has grown and developed throughout my un-

dergraduate studies at Penn State and while working in Dr. Fisher’s deep-sea lab. These ex-periences have molded my interests in marine science toward research, especially in marine biology and conservation. After my participa-tion on two research cruises during my under-graduate career, I am especially interested in opportunities to gain more research experience aboard other vessels.

Samantha Berlet is a senior majoring in bi-ology, ecology option, with a minor in marine science. After graduating in August 2014, she plans to attend graduate school to study marine science or marine biology.

Danielle McKean: Exploring the Depths of the Ocean

Last summer, I had the amazing opportunity to travel to the Gulf of Mexico and be part of a two-week research cruise aboard the E/V Nau-tilus. Along with another undergraduate stu-dent and two Penn State graduate students, we set sail with researchers from other universities to investigate the deep sea. This opportunity al-lowed me to meet people from all parts of the world, observe picturesque sunsets, and witness


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the remarkable communities of the deep ocean. During my sophomore year, I became involved

in Dr. Charles Fisher’s deep-sea marine biol-ogy research lab. I was looking to do research in a field I knew little about and hoped it would be something that captured my interest. Besides, who wouldn’t jump at the opportunity to explore the depths of the ocean? As a researcher in this lab, I’ve gained teaching experience, the ability to hone my interpersonal skills, and had oppor-tunities to go on two cruises within two years.

Our main goal at sea was to study the im-pacts of the Deep Water Horizon oil spill on deep-sea coral. Aboard the ship, we navigated a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to the ocean floor. We then used this to sample and image the coral, and obtain water data. In imaging the corals year after year, we are able to determine if health is improving or declining. This is an extremely important undertaking that illus-trates what will happen to these corals if an-other occurrence, such as the oil spill, were to take place.

Being out at sea was an adventure! The days were filled with the hustle and bustle of many people, including crewmembers, engineers, ROV pilots, educators, and other researchers, busy at work. Imaging the corals varied frequently, ranging from daylong efforts to work being done in the early hours of the morning. The vessel

was alive with research activity, and someone always needed help somewhere, which was a great opportunity to learn about the research of the other scholars on board. When I was not doing work, I would find myself out on the deck overlooking the ocean. The beautiful skyline on the horizon was peaceful and unchanging ex-cept for the occasional oilrig, and when the day finally came to an end, it was easy to fall asleep from the ebb and flow of the ocean waves.

My favorite memories from the cruise hap-pened after midnight when we would explore the bottom of the ocean. Seeing the unique in-teractions between all the creatures of the deep was breathtaking; whether it was squid attack-ing our ROV, witnessing fish and crabs fight over food, multiple sharks swimming by, or, of course, the beautiful jungle of corals inhabit-ing the deep sea—I could not get enough of the beautiful ocean. Ultimately, my time out at sea has shown me the importance of research, and given me a deep appreciation for the sea and all the creatures that call the ocean home.

Danielle McKean is a senior majoring in biol-ogy. After graduating in May 2014, she hopes to perform research at the National Institutes of Health before applying to medical school.


Tiffany Cole: Traveling the World to Improve Public Health

A LOVE FOR WORLD TRAVEL AND

INTEREST IN MEDICINE DREW TIFFANY

COLE TO JOIN THE PENN STATE

CHAPTER OF GLOBAL BRIGADES

DURING HER FRESHMAN YEAR. FOUR

YEARS LATER, AS COLE LEAVES PENN

STATE, SHE PLANS TO CONTINUE HER

HUMANITARIAN WORK BY PURSUING

A MEDICAL DEGREE, AS WELL AS A

MASTER’S DEGREE IN PUBLIC HEALTH.

Cole, a first generation college graduate from Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, was recently fea-tured by BusinessInsider.com, which focused on 18 “incredibly impressive” undergraduates at Penn State, for her extensive work with Global Brigades.

Global Brigades is the world's largest student-led global health and sustainable development movement. It was initiated in 2003 by students from Marquette University who traveled with doctors to provide medical care to rural commu-nities in Honduras. Penn State Global Brigades, which began in 2007, provides students with the opportunity to volunteer abroad through one of seven programs, ranging from architecture to public health, or volunteer locally in State Col-lege through two local initiative committees. The group also organizes and co-sponsors edu-cational events to spur awareness of global is-sues such as poverty, the global water crisis,

and global health disparities. Cole served as the campus chairperson during her senior year.

Although her academic strengths lie in math-ematics and numerical computations, Cole de-cided to pursue a general science degree that al-lowed her to include more human elements into her studies, particularly with a medicine and global health focus. Trips to Ghana, Honduras, Panama, and Nicaragua with Global Brigades helped Cole understand more about global med-ical needs and narrow the focus of her future career. These service trips also gave her the op-portunity to volunteer at health clinics abroad, where she worked triage, shadowed doctors, and presented educational materials. Additionally, she helped construct schools, community health centers, and water systems.

Although Cole gets satisfaction knowing that she is really making an impact with her efforts, she also gets enjoyment out of seeing the influ-ence that these trips have on her fellow students.

“The most rewarding part of being involved in Global Brigades is, hands down, the students. Knowing how Global Brigades is very much re-sponsible for my own realization that ‘health’ is more complex than a simple disease + medicine = cure equation. The most rewarding part is see-ing this same revelation take place within other members. During my summer medical/dental brigade to Panama in May 2013, a member ex-


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Ryan Henrici: Understanding the Molecular Basis of Human Diseases

Recently selected as a Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship recipient and featured by BusinessInsider.com, which focused on 18 “incredibly impressive” undergraduates at Penn State, Henrici has a bright future ahead of

him both inside and outside of the lab. Henrici, a junior biochemistry and molecular biology major, conducts research in the Center for Eukaryotic Gene Regulation to understand the molecular basis of human diseases while

also finding time to volunteer for THON and participate in sports.

Henrici, who is also a Schreyer Honors Schol-ar, decided to join the center because of his in-terest in studying how gene regulation proteins interact with their chromosomal targets and so that he could work alongside Song Tan, a pro-fessor of biochemistry and molecular biology.

“Dr. Tan is a highly respected crystallogra-pher, and his laboratory works to determine the structures of gene regulatory proteins bound to their targets, and in doing so, gain insights into how these proteins may cause disease. It was

plained during our final evening reflection that when I had originally said that the trip would change the way he felt about medicine, he didn't believe me. He had gone into the trip thinking it would be a good excuse to travel and gain physi-cian-shadowing experience. However, because of this experience, he now sees how our traditional view of medicine may not be enough to address the health needs around the world, particularly with rural, developing regions that are in more dire need of quality health care. Although not everyone has this sort of visceral response to Global Brigades, with even one member who is truly impacted to their core like this student,

my continued work within Global Brigades feels validated,” Cole said.

Cole plans to continue her work with Global Brigades in Nicaragua for the next year as an adviser to university chapters. “After that, I plan to attend medical school and public health school to get a combined M.D. and a master of public health. Once I complete my degrees, I’d like to work in a nonprofit organization or government agency to create programs that ad-dress health disparities and needs in rural, de-veloping regions of the world,” Cole said.

Outside of her advocacy efforts, Cole enjoys yoga, mountain biking, and pastel artwork.

AFTER SPENDING NEARLY 30 HOURS IN THE LAB EACH WEEK, IN ADDITION TO

CLASSES AND COURSEWORK, BEING SUCCESSFUL AND HAVING “FREE TIME”

DOES NOT SOUND LIKE A POSSIBILITY. RYAN HENRICI PROVES IT IS DOABLE.


the perfect blend of clinical and biochemical rel-evance for me,” Henrici said.

Although Henrici helps Tan and the other re-searchers in the lab with their projects, he also currently has a project of his own, which focuses on crystallography. His work involves charac-terizing gene regulatory enzymes bound to their chromosomal substrates.

“Over the past year, I cloned, expressed, and purified a 3-subunit chromatin-modifying en-zyme complex. At the end of last spring, I crys-tallized the complex bound to its nucleosome target. To my knowledge, this is the first chro-matin enzyme ever crystallized in complex with its nucleosome target. This year, I am trying to similarly characterize another chromatin-modi-fying enzyme that has been directly implicated in breast and other cancers,” Henrici said.

The type of research that Henrici is doing can potentially reveal novel targets for early-detec-tion assays and therapeutic intervention.

In addition to his research, Henrici is also a co-author on a paper about avian influenza, which will be used by leaders in policy and intel-ligence communities around the world to learn about avian influenza research. He presented his findings at the Five Eyes Analytic Training Conference, a twice-yearly event between five

countries’ intelligence communities.For Henrici, the most rewarding part of work-

ing in a lab is seeing hard work pay off as mean-ingful results.

“I’m driven by the pursuit of knowledge so everyday results are exciting, but the big, and sometimes unexpected, results are the best. One example was seeing the crystals of that complex for the first time,” Henrici said.

Medical school is the next step for Henrici when he finishes his undergraduate work in 2015. He has plans to continue doing research and pair it with clinical medicine to learn more about the biology of cancer and gene regulation.

“I am really interested in pediatric oncology because of my involvement in THON and my re-search interests. My ultimate goal would be to unite the laboratory and clinic to improve qual-ity of life for both patients and families,” Henrici said.

Outside of the lab and his coursework, Henri-ci is involved with THON, most recently serving on a hospitality committee and working as the graphic design chair.

Despite this seeming like a full schedule, Henrici still finds time to serve as a youth min-istry leader, where he plays play guitar in a band, and participate in cycling and swimming.


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Penn State Science Dances For the Kids

Nicholas Lyktey, senior Forensic Science majorWhy did you decide to dance in THON, and what organization did you dance for?I have wanted to dance ever since my freshman year. I am currently the president of Science LionPride, and have been in the organization since my freshman year. Science LionPride is extremely fortunate to have a THON family, where we essentially sponsor Colton Watson and his family. The determination and strength Colton shows on a daily basis is something that really drove me to want to dance even more. The "troubles" a college student has everyday are absolutely nothing in comparison to what some children unfortunately have to endure with dif-ferent types of pediatric cancer. I danced for Science LionPride, an organization I love more than anything, and an opportunity to show how much I love and support the Watson family.

Describe your experience at THON. THON is a very challenging mental game, in my opinion. Those who are positive and optimis-tic throughout the weekend can fight through any physical pain, but people who are negative may have had a tougher time.

Emily Skonecki, senior Biology majorWhy did you decide to dance in THON, and what organization did you dance for?I danced for Science LionPride. We have been paired with the Colton Watson family for three years now. Colton was considered cured last May, so this was a really special THON for us.

What was the best or most memorable part?The best memory I have from THON is danc-ing with my good friend, Nick Lyktey. We were able to represent an organization we both love

FOUR PENN STATE SCIENCE STUDENTS WHO

DANCED IN THON THIS YEAR CHOSE TO SHARE

THEIR THON EXPERIENCES. THE STUDENTS ARE

NICHOLAS LYKTEY, EMILY SKONECKI, JOYCE LEE,

AND NATALIE DAPAS. WITH THEIR HELP, THON 2014

RAISED $13,343,517.33 FOR THE FOUR DIAMONDS

FUND AT PENN STATE HERSHEY CHILDREN’S

HOSPITAL. THE FOUR DIAMONDS FUND SUPPORTS

PEDIATRIC CANCER RESEARCH AND HELPS

RELIEVE THE FINANCIAL BURDEN FAMILIES FACE

WHEN A CHILD IS DIAGNOSED WITH PEDIATRIC

CANCER.Joyce Lee, Natalie Dapas, Nick Lyktey, and Emily

Skonecki pose together at THON.


and have been a part of since freshman year. It was a great way to end our senior year at Penn State. Besides Nick, the rest of the club's members were so supportive of us, and there's no way we could have done it without them. Nick and I were so thankful we could share the experience with them.

Was it difficult to stay awake all weekend? What motivated you to dance for 46 hours? In the moments that I felt down, I used the energy from the stands, especially our club, to put me in a better mood. Our THON fam-ily came on Saturday, and that made me feel great. Colton's unwavering optimism de-spite all he has faced gave me the strength to continue.

Joyce Lee, senior Biochemistry and Mo-lecular Biology majorWhy did you decide to dance in THON, and what organization did you dance for?I danced for Springfield, a special interest organization. My passion is science and I want my science to make a difference in this world by increasing our understanding of human disease. I felt that dancing at THON would inspire me and allow me to always re-member the responsibility that members of the research and medical community have toward families who live day by day on the hope that someday someone will discover a cure or treatment for the disease that has devastated their lives.

What was the best or most memorable part?One of my favorite moments during THON was when my dancer partner, my moraler, and I dressed up in Star Wars costumes and took pictures with all the characters during Star Wars hour. I was wearing an inflatable

Jabba the Hutt costume. My costume resulted in many smiles and laughs from other dancers, kids, and people in the stands, and I was really excited that something so silly could bring joy to others.

Natalie Dapas, senior Chemistry majorWhy did you decide to dance in THON, and what organization did you dance for?When I first came to Penn State, I quickly be-came involved by joining a THON committee and Sailing Club. When my last THON ap-proached, I wanted to dance to celebrate the lives of the ones, like my mom, whom we have lost to cancer, and I wanted to dance for a cure for the kids who continue to fight. It meant so much to me to be dancing for the members of Sailing Club and for the kids.

What was the best or most memorable part?I'll never forget walking up to the BJC before THON in the human tunnel. It was an incred-ible feeling to be surrounded by such inspiring families and supported by so many peers. I car-ried their enthusiasm and encouragement with me all weekend.

I would like to extend a huge thank you to ev-eryone who supported me as I stood for 46 hours at THON 2014 in the fight against pediatric cancer. $13.3 million raised for the kids! I love my school.

Joyce Lee dressed as Jabba the Hutt.


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Matthew Lee:Gaining Real Experience in the Business World

I knew that I would not have nearly as much experience in the corporate world as compared to my future classmates when matriculating into the MBA por-

tion of the Science BS/MBA program. To gain some real-world business experience, I decided to apply for a co-op within the Global Strategic Sourcing (GSS) department in the Product Sup-ply Organization (PSO) at the Clorox Company in Atlanta, Georgia. I chose Clorox in particular because of the company culture. Clorox is not a large consumer packaged goods company, as compared to businesses like Proctor & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson, or Unilever. Clorox only has a little north of 7,500 employees around the world. Thus, working for a smaller, yet very suc-cessful company, made it enjoyable to come to the office everyday because I was able to net-work with not only people within my depart-ment, but across the company as a whole. It is rare to have the chance to build close relation-ships with VPs, as well as have opportunities to work on projects with the senior management of a corporation.

I had the opportunity to work on a diverse number of project management tasks, data management projects, and personnel projects. Within GSS, I worked with a team on multimil-lion-dollar cost-savings projects, organized and managed Clorox E-sourcing events, and even helped with Clorox’s college recruiting efforts. I developed a wide range of technical skills that I

most likely would not have had a chance to learn in my classes through these types of projects. I became familiar with various systems that are commonly used in sourcing departments, which include SAP, IASTA, PPM, and CMS. Beyond technical skills, I was able to develop my profes-sional skills through presentations, mock inter-views, and simply being in the business setting.

Although this co-op was not directly related to my undergraduate major, it made me more versatile by giving me a chance to get my feet wet in a different field of interest. The skills I took away from this internship have helped me during school with time management, team-work, and networking. I would highly recom-mend doing a co-op because you gain skills that are hard to develop inside the classroom. I also encourage students to branch outside their re-spective majors because you can develop a wide range of skills and will have a multifaceted ex-perience. I was a bit skeptical before going to Atlanta to work for Clorox, but I can say with complete confidence that it was an extremely valuable experience.

Matthew Lee is a third year in the Science BS/MBA program. The program is a five-year, dual degree program where students study gen-eral science during three years, and then enter into the Smeal MBA program for the remaining two years. Lee is starting the MBA portion of the program in the fall and intends to graduate in the spring of 2016. After completing the Science BS/MBA program, Lee plans to attend medical school.


Lauren Quevillon, a second-year Ph.D. student in biology, is a 2012 re-cipient of a Campbell Distinguished Graduate Fellowship. This fellowship recognizes outstanding first-year doc-toral students who exhibit academic excellence in the Eberly College of Sci-ence.

Quevillon, who is a member of the David Hughes lab, knew that pursu-ing graduate school in infectious dis-ease ecology was in her future before she finished her undergraduate work in biological sciences at Cornell. How-ever, with her father as a teacher, and being the oldest of three children, Quevillon wanted to try teaching before starting gradu-ate work. Prior to starting her Ph.D., she taught chemistry at high schools in Connecticut and Maryland for two years.

“I began teaching chemistry knowing that I would ultimately be returning to graduate school, but I had no idea how much that experi-ence would benefit me as a graduate student,” Quevillon said.

However, with multiple offers on the table, making the decision on where to attend gradu-ate school was not an easy one for Quevillon. A combination of research prospects and funding

were both factors in her final decision.“The Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics

(CIDD) was the number-one reason why I came to Penn State. CIDD is a think tank of leading infectious disease ecologists and theoreticians —interacting with such incredible faculty is a grad student’s dream. There is also a very active graduate student organization (the CIDD GSA) that provides many opportunities for profession-al development. I knew that if I did my Ph.D at

Distinguished Graduate Fellowships and Strong Research Opportunties Recruit Outstanding Scientists

Above&BeyondFocus on Graduate Students

Lauren Quevillon, a graduate student studying biology,

reviews footage of ants taken overnight in the lab.

Photo credit: Clair Poletti


Penn State, I would be trained by the best in the field and I would be extremely competitive in the future job market.”

In addition to the opportunities within the CIDD, the Campbell Distinguished Graduate Fellowship offer helped to seal the deal and di-rect Quevillon to Penn State.

“Coupled with the presence of CIDD, receiv-ing the Campbell DGF made choosing Penn State a no-brainer. It would have been a much more difficult decision if I didn’t receive the Campbell,” Quevillon said.

Quevillon’s research focuses on the co-evolu-tionary dynamics of social structure and disease transmission in ant societies. She studies this using carpenter ants and their many parasites (including the infamous zombie ant fungus) as a model system.

“Through studying the interplay of ant soci-eties and disease, I hope to make broad gener-alizations about how social behavior and infec-tious disease impact one another. I think that ant societies can inform us about many other complex societies, including humans. The ben-efit of studying ants is that I can actually infect them with disease, which (ethically) isn’t a pos-

sibility when working with humans,” Quevillon said.

One project that she finds particularly inter-esting is studying nest architecture and its im-plications for the human world. “I’m currently tackling how nest architecture impacts ant so-cial network structure and thus the potential for disease transmission. This has direct applica-bility to other systems—for example, how does our design of buildings impact the spread of the flu?”

After Quevillon completes her studies at Penn State, she plans to complete at least one post-doctoral fellowship that studies the intersection of disease and sociality.

“After my future postdoctoral work, I’m keep-ing my options open—I’m game for anything that allows me to doggedly pursue open ques-tions. I have immensely enjoyed my time as a teacher and TA, so my future will also need to integrate education and mentoring at some lev-el,” Quevillon said.

Outside of the lab, Quevillon enjoys hik-ing with her two dogs, yoga, running, and crafting.

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Graduate Student Awards and Honors Alumni Association Dissertation AwardChun Kit Kwok, ChemistryShan Gao, Physics

Harold F. Martin Graduate Assistant Outstanding Teaching AwardEhssan Khanmohammadi, MathematicsDaisy Phillips, Statistics

Rustum and Della Roy Innovation in Materials Research AwardAnthony DiLauro, Chemistry


Every February, Penn State Science alumni mentors make the trip to snowy Happy Valley to meet their protégés for the annual Alumni Mentoring Kickoff Dinner and Workshop. This year the dinner was held on Feburary 8 at the Nittany Lion Inn, and 95 alumni mentors from seven departments attended.

The Alumni Mentoring Program pairs stu-dent protégés with an alumni mentor to provide them with guidance as they finish their educa-tion and prepare for a career. The Mentoring Kickoff Dinner and Workshop is an important chance for mentors and protégés to meet in per-son and set goals for their mentorship.

This year at the dinner, two student protégés and one alumni mentor spoke about their expe-rience with the program.

For students Sabrina Walley (biology) and Matthew Casey (pre-medicine), the Alumni Mentoring Program has made a huge impact. Casey has gained invaluable support and guid-ance from his mentor into his chosen career of dentistry. Because Casey’s mentor had few re-sources when he applied for dentistry school, he wanted to ensure that resources are in place for students like Casey, and has offered him guid-ance and job-shadowing opportunities. Wal-ley wasn’t sure of her career direction yet, but her mentor widened her perspective to include careers in research and the pharmaceutical in-dustry. Walley’s mentor also shared ideas for internships Walley might enjoy to help her dis-cover a career path that is right for her.

The mentors also reap benefits from the men-toring relationship, as the group heard when Lisa Collins (’79 Bio) spoke about her experi-ence. Collins loves being an alumni mentor to

Penn State Science students. She has mentored three undergraduates over the past five years, and says her protégés have enriched her life. Her relationships with her protégés have ex-tended beyond graduation through graduate school to employment.

During the workshop segment of the evening, the mentors spoke about career topics, including the importance of asking the correct questions in an interview, how to prepare an “elevator speech,” and networking opportunities among the database of mentors.

The Science LionPride ambassadors also gave a workshop to help student protégés make the most out of their mentoring relationship. Four Science LionPride ambassadors spoke about addressing the important questions with your mentor, asking for help, taking criticism, finding career focus, and grabbing opportunities wher-ever possible. Another topic of this workshop discussed how to form meaningful relationships with mentors despite infrequent meetings, and how even when the career trajectories of the stu-dent and mentor diverge, mentors can be helpful in redirecting the protégé to another relevant contact via their own professional networks.

At the end of every Alumni Mentoring Kickoff Dinner, the mentor and protégé pairs set goals for the future to keep the relationships on firm ground going forward.

To join the program as a student protégé, visit science.psu.edu/alumni/for-students/be-coming-a-student-protégé. To participate as an alumni mentor, visit science.psu.edu/alumni/get-involved/becoming-a-mentor or contact Mary Hudson at [email protected].

Alumni Mentoring Kickoff Dinner and Workshop Connects Students and Mentors


Alum

ni N

ews Eberly College of Science Alumni

Board Celebrating 40 Years

Who Are We?We are Penn State Science alumni who volun-teer our time to serve a three-year commitment, with re-election possible for another three-year term. Twice a year, we travel to University Park to meet and discuss, plan, and implement activities to enhance the college. We have the opportunity to meet with and receive updates from the dean, associate deans, and department heads. The opportunity to interact with current students is always a highlight of our time on campus and this engagement helps us to deter-mine areas of support.

MissionTo connect alumni to the Eberly College of Sci-ence and to each other; to provide valued service to members; and to support the college’s mission of providing a rich educational experience that will motivate and enable all of our students and alumni to seek the highest levels of intellectual achievement and personal growth; and sharing our knowledge, discoveries, and inventions with the people of the Commonwealth, the nation, and the world.

In June of 1974, a planning meeting was held to form the College of Science

Alumni Society. With the leadership of Dean Thomas Wartik and William Van

Pelt (’48 B.S. Commercial Chemistry), the Eberly College of Science Alumni

Board was launched! Since its beginning, this group has been a vital part of

the college throughout the last 40 years.

What We DoDuring the past 40 years, alumni board events and activities have evolved and grown within the college. While on campus for meetings, we have held student events such as a career in sci-ence fair, a research poster contest, senior send-off breakfasts. We also actively engage with stu-dents from the Science LionPride and Science Student Council. Individually or as a group, we also participate in undergraduate classes or ca-reer development initiatives.

From the Winter 1992 issue of the Science Journal: Daniel Reilly,

'73 B.S. CompSc, vice president of the Board; Ronald B. Kessinger

and Norman Freed, recipients of the Eberly College of Science

Distinguished Service Award; Charles Sweeney, '60 B.S. Chem,

president of the Board; and Dean Gregory Geoffroy.


Major milestones along our way:• In June 1974, a planning meeting to form

the College of Science Alumni Society un-der the direction of William Van Pelt and Dean Wartik, was held and by 1977, the first constitution of the society was written.

• Alumni Society Career Day first took place in 1979, and has since been a mainstay event for the board and students.

• The College of Science Alumni Society Dis-tinguished Service Award was established in 1979 to recognize individuals who have made significant and outstanding leader-ship and service contributions to the College of Science over a sustained period of time.

• In the early 1980s, the College of Science Student Council began their representation of the student body at alumni council board meetings.

• In 1985, a science expo with 3,000 attend-ees, including 300 minority high school stu-dents was held.

• The Outstanding Science Alumni Awards were started in 1995 and today have recog-nized over 80 alumni who have made sig-nificant contributions to the field of science.

• In 1999, the Alumni Society Board En-hancement Endowment was endowed at $100,000. The endowment was created to support activities and programs to enhance the educational and research missions of the college.

• Beginning in 2004, the Alumni Society be-gan sponsorship of one of the two C.I. Noll Teaching Awards at $2,500 each year. The C.I. Noll Award was initiated in 1974 by the College of Science to recognize one faculty

member who took a special interest in stu-dents, and who, through their interactions, had a positive impact on them.

• Science LionPride is a student ambassador group charged with representing the Eberly College of Science to prospective students, parents, and college alumni. The Alumni Board created this organization in 2008.

• The Science Alumni Society Trustee Schol-arship was established in 2009 and provides financial assistance to an undergraduate student with a demonstrated need for funds.

• The board began funding grants for science students to participate in a study abroad program in 2010.

• In 2013, both the Science Student Council and Science LionPride representatives were granted a vote on the alumni board.

How Can Science Alumni Become Involved?• Become a mentor for a science student• Volunteer for speaking in courses or other

speaking engagements at University Park• Contribute to an alumni endowment • Participate in the college alumni bio and

video projects• Volunteer to speak at a Millennium Schol-

ars program event• Participate in networking events• Attend regional advertised events

Thanks to the commitment and action of a few individuals forty years ago, we have an active and thriving board today. To learn more, visit science.alumni.board_members.com or contact Barbie Collins at [email protected].

From the Spring/Summer 1990 issue of the Science Journal:

Eberly College of Science Alumni Society directors Chip

Paradise (second from right), ’73 B.S. CompSc, and Fred

Shaffer (far right), ’60 B.S. Phys, greet fellow science alumni

at the Penn State Alumni Society’s Homecoming Hospitality

Tent, November 4, 1989.


Alu

mn

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More than 50 alumni, col-leagues, and friends gathered on December 10, 2013 to sur-prise and celebrate Roy A. Olofson at the Nittany Lion Inn. The luncheon illustrated the influence Olofson has had through the years on so many: from students at all levels, to colleagues, to many profession-al organizations.

Receiving his B.S. and M.S. in Chemistry from the Univer-sity in Chicago in 1957, and Ph.D. from Harvard in 1961 (where he had the opportunity to study with Robert Burns Woodward, a Nobel Laure-ate in Chemistry), he became an instructor, then assistant professor of chemistry, at Har-vard. In 1965, he arrived at Penn State to begin his career as an associ-ate professor, becoming a professor in 1972, leading to his current role as professor emeritus, which began in 1996. Throughout these decades, he provided organic chemistry lec-tures that inspired thousands of Penn State undergraduates. Today, he continues to assist with review sessions and the preparation and grading of or-ganic chemistry exams.

Alumni traveled from all

over the country to celebrate and share their memories in person. Many of his Ph.D. stu-dents shared memories and events on how Olofson influ-

enced their lives. Even more sent emails such as this one: “I was a student in your first- semester sophomore organic chemistry course way back in 1986…and I loved it. It just clicked. You made it come alive and I just loved to go to class. Those two courses, and you as the professor, had a significant impact on my career and life.

I want to thank you for being such a great teacher and posi-tive influence on me and my classmates.”

Olofson’s deep and abiding love of the history of chemis-try brings the subject to life by relating rich stories about the lives and personalities of key figures in the field whose work built the foundation of our present knowledge. As he often said in Chem34 organic chem-istry lectures, “To know where we’re going, you have to know how we got here.”

Throughout his career, along with guiding the organic chemistry research of dozens of undergraduate and gradu-ate students, he published over 100 articles and monographs. He also patented a number of chemical processes. Olofson initiated, promoted, and orga-nized celebrations, marker in-stallations, and displays of his-torical significance for many professional chemical organi-zations.

This luncheon, organized by his colleagues and alumni, provided a wonderful opportu-nity to honor and share with Olofson how his critiques, les-sons, mentoring, and leader-ship reached so many lives on campus and far beyond.

This is Your Life: Dr. Roy Olofson

“...I WANT TO THANK YOU FOR

BEING SUCH A GREAT TEACHER

AND POSITIVE INFLUENCE ON

ME AND MY CLASSMATES.”


Brian Geary (’01 B.S. Mi-

crobiology) has been

honored with the Penn

State Alumni Achieve-

ment Award, which rec-

ognizes alumni 35 years

of age and younger for

their extraordinary pro-

fessional accomplish-

ments. The award win-

ners are nominated by

an academic college

and are invited by the

President of the University to return to cam-

pus to share their expertise with students,

faculty, and administrators.

Geary is director of business development

for OnDeck, Inc., a technology-enabled fi-

nancial firm that provides financing to small

and medium-sized businesses. OnDeck was

named to Forbes Most Promising Companies

in America and to the Inc. 500 List of Fastest

Growing Companies in America for the last

two years.

During a five-year tenure at Citigroup,

Geary developed cutting-edge products for

both consumer and small business finance.

Among the financial tools that he imple-

mented were Citi’s first mobile wallet for

the iPhone, Google Wallet, which led to the

connection of smartphones and payments,

and the CitiBusiness ThankYou® Card. Geary

excelled at Citi’s “fast track” executive pro-

gram and was promoted to vice president of

product development.

Geary led a successful career as an officer

in the U.S. Navy from 2001 to 2005, where his

leadership helped the missile destroyer USS

Barry receive the 2004 Arleigh Burke Fleet

Trophy for most improved ship in the Atlantic

Fleet. For two years, he ranked number one

out of 24 officers. He also earned the Shiph-

andler of the Year Award, and the Navy and

Marine Corp Commendation Medal for Out-

standing Leadership. He served as aide to

the U.S. Navy Chief of Strategy at the Pen-

tagon, where he worked with members of

the State Department to analyze and map

global terrorist and piracy threats.

At Penn State, Geary was a Naval Re-

serve Officer and was elected to Company

Commander, overseeing 200 students. He

performed research in the lab of Song Tan,

professor of biochemistry and molecular bi-

ology, and graduated with a bachelor’s de-

gree in microbiology. He also earned a mas-

ter of business administration degree from

Harvard Business School.

Geary lives in New York City with his wife,

Kristin.

Geary Receives a 2014 Alumni Achievement Award


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Alumni Photo Album

On campus and around the country,

from award dinners to receptions—

alumni, students, faculty, and staff

(and even the Nittany Lion!) come

together to celebrate their love of

science!


Be on the lookout for upcoming events. Check the calendar on the

back cover, visit our website at science.psu.edu, or email Brenda

Lucas [email protected] for the latest information. RECONNECT TODAY!


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Masatoshi Nei, Evan Pugh Professor of Bi-ology and director of the Institute for Molecular Evolutionary Genetics, and recent recipient of the Kyoto Prize, committed the $500,000 cash prize that accompanies this award to establish the Masatoshi Nei Innovation Prize in Biologi-cal Sciences. Nei shares, “I donated the Kyoto Prize award money to enhance the quality of biological sciences at Penn State.”

The Kyoto Prize, an international award pre-sented by the Inamori Foundation, recognizes individuals who have contributed significantly to the progress of science, the advancement of civilization, and the enrichment and elevation of the human spirit. The foundation honored Nei in recognition of his “research on the evolu-tion of biological populations using qualitative analyses of genetic variation and evolutionary time.”

Daniel J. Larson, Dean of the Eberly Col-

Paying It Forward – Gift of Prize Money Endows Innovation Prize in Biological Sciences

lege of Science, commented, “It was an honor to attend the ceremonies in Kyoto, Japan, where Dr. Nei received the prize in November. Profes-sor Nei’s impressive accomplishments have add-ed great strength to our college. The generous gift of the prize money will support the continu-ation of this excellence.”

Donating the $500,000 cash prize, Nei and his wife Nobuko, created the Masatoshi Nei In-novation Prize in Biological Sciences to bring public recognition to Penn State and its excel-lence in the biological sciences. The award will provide a substantial prize to a preeminent sci-entist who is on the faculty at the University; who is acknowledged as an innovator in their field; who is actively engaged in research; and who has achieved outstanding scientific re-search and leadership in the biological sciences.

Department Head of Biology Doug Cavener noted, “This gift is a testament to the lifelong commitment of Masatoshi Nei to innovation and excellence in research. The Nei Innovation Prize will provide us the means to honor our most innovative and accomplished faculty in the biological sciences.”

Nei earned a bachelor’s degree in genetics at the Miyazaki University of Japan in 1953, fol-lowed by master and doctoral degrees in quan-titative genetics at Kyoto University in Japan in 1955 and 1959, respectively. He was an as-sistant professor at Kyoto University in Japan from 1958 to 1962, a geneticist at the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan from 1962 to 1969, and head of the Population Ge-netics Laboratory at the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan from 1965 to 1969. In 1969, he moved to the United States


to become an associate professor and then pro-fessor at Brown University until 1972 when he became professor of population genetics at the University of Texas at Houston until 1990. Here, he served as the acting director of the Center for Demographic and Population Genet-ics at the University of Texas at Houston from 1979 to 1980 and from 1986 to 1987. Nei joined the Penn State faculty in 1990 as Distinguished Professor of Biology and founding director of the Institute of Molecular Evolutionary Genetics, and was named Evan Pugh Professor of Biology in 1994. He was a visiting professor of biology at Tokyo Institute of Technology in Japan for three months during 2001.

Nei’s gift helped the Eberly College of Science to reach its goals in For the Future: The Cam-

paign for Penn State Students. This University-wide effort was directed toward a shared vision of Penn State as the most comprehensive, stu-dent-centered research university in America. The University engaged Penn State’s alumni and friends as partners in achieving six key ob-jectives: ensuring student access and opportu-nity, enhancing honors education, enriching the student experience, building faculty strength and capacity, fostering discovery and creativ-ity, and sustaining the University’s tradition of quality. The campaign’s top priority was to keep a Penn State degree affordable for students and families. The For the Future campaign was the most ambitious effort of its kind in Penn State’s history, with the goal of securing $2 billion by 2014.

6th Annual CME/Physician’s Reunion: Today’s Health Concerns and Pioneering Research

6 CME Credits with Closing Reception and DinnerSeptember 5, 20148:30 a.m. – 8:30 p.m.

Watch your mail for an invitation and RSVP to attend.

For more information, please email [email protected] or phone 814-863-3705

science.psu.edu/alumni/2014_CME

Join Us for the 2nd Annual All-Science Tailgate September 6, 2014

Penn State Nittany Lions vs. Akron Zips8:30 a.m. - 11:00 a.m.

(or two and one-half hours prior to kickoff time)Porter Gardens, Medlar Field at Lubrano Park

Free of chargeGather your science friends and family, and join us for this informal event! Representatives from science departments and undergraduate organizations will be present. TicketsA limited number of game tickets will be available. Details to reserve tickets in advance will be provided on a postcard sent to all science alumni this summer. Tickets must be reserved and paid for in advance and will be distributed on a first-come, first-serve basis. For more informationContact the Science Alumni Relations Office at 814-863-3705 or [email protected].

Over 300 people joined us last year and we anticipate more this year—don't miss out! We Are.... Penn State Science!


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*deceased


Snapshot of Philanthropy – Funding the Future of Penn State Science

Verne M. Willaman in Science IV, V, and VIEstablished by: Verne M. Willaman* Living Trust (’51 B.S. Agriculture and Biological Science)Amount: $1M eachPurpose: Supplement departmental support for outstanding University faculty in the Eberly College of Science in order to provide a holder of the professorship with the resources necessary to continue and further the scholar’s contributions to teaching, research, and public service.

Patil-Taille AwardEstablished by: Stephen V. Stehman (’79 B.S. Bio)Amount: $20,000Purpose: Honor and recognize an undergraduate student who has demonstrated forethought and application of the use of statistics in the study of the environment.

Raymond and Christine Ayoub Award in the Department of MathematicsEstablished by: Christine Ayoub (retired professor of mathematics)Amount: $40,000Purpose: Honor and recognize a doctoral degree student for an outstanding doctoral thesis in algebra or number theory.

Aldine Lucille Cech Honors ScholarshipEstablished by: David (’75 B.S. PreMed) and Mary Schwartz CechAmount: $100,000Purpose: Provide recognition and financial assistance to outstanding undergraduate students who are also enrolled in the Schreyer Honors College and, to the extent permitted by law, who are U.S. citizens.

Dr. Mary M. Finn and Robert F. Pruner Sr. Trustee Scholarship in ScienceEstablished by: Mary M. Finn (’90 B.S. Chem; ’90 B.A. Lib Arts)Amount: $150,000Purpose: Provide financial assistance to undergraduate students who have a demonstrated need for funds to meet their

necessary college expenses.

Edmund J. Elder Trustee ScholarshipEstablished by: Edmund J. (’59 B.S. Chem) and Josephine T. ElderAmount: $50,000Purpose: Provide financial assistance to undergraduate students who have a demonstrated need for funds to meet their necessary college expenses.

Dr. Larry Travis Term Endowment for the Department of Astronomy and AstrophysicsEstablished by: Larry D. Travis (’71 Ph.D. Astro)Amount: $200,000Purpose: Support for the construction and maintenance of the Planetarium in the Arboretum Complex when the University moves forward with this construction project.

Christopher R. Dyckman and Susan Scotto Scholarship in Biology (Non-Endowed)Established by: Christopher Dyckman (’80 B.S. Bio) and Susan ScottoAmount: $12,500Purpose: Provide recognition and financial assistance to outstanding undergraduate students majoring in biology and who have achieved a GPA of at least 3.25.

Christopher R. Dyckman and Susan Scotto Scholarship in Mathematics (Non-Endowed)Established by: Christopher Dyckman (’80 B.S. Bio) and Susan ScottoAmount: $12,500Purpose: Provide recognition and financial assistance to outstanding undergraduate students majoring in mathematics and who have achieved a GPA of at least 3.25.

Drs. Milton and Rose Prystowsky Trustee Scholarship in the Eberly College of ScienceEstablished by: Eric N. (’69 B.S. Micrb) and Bonnie S. Prystowsky (’67 B.A. Lib Arts)

Amount: $50,000Purpose: Provide financial assistance to undergraduate students who have a demonstrated need for funds to meet their necessary college expenses.

Masatoshi Nei Innovation Prize in Biological SciencesEstablished by: Masatoshi Nei (Evan Pugh Professor & Dir., Inst. Of Mol. Evol. Genetics) and Nobuko Nei Amount: $500,000Purpose: To bring public recognition to Penn State and its excellence in the biological sciences by providing a substantial prize to a preeminent scientist who is on the faculty at the University; who is acknowledged as an innovator in their field; who is actively engaged in research, and who has achieved outstanding scientific research and leadership in the biological sciences.

Harold Kohn Endowed Alumni Lectureship FundEstablished by: Howard L. Kohn (’71 Ph.D. Chem)Amount: $100,000Purpose: Provide funding to bring in distinguished and nationally and internationally renowned scientists for the purpose of developing broad interests in the chemical sciences through lectures.

Donald and Nancy Abraham Trustee Scholarship in the Eberly College of ScienceEstablished by: Donald J. (’58 B.S. Chem) and Nancy AbrahamAmount: $50,000Purpose: Provide financial assistance to undergraduate students who have a demonstrated need for funds to meet their necessary college expenses.

Anonymous Trustee ScholarshipEstablished by: Anonymous Amount: $130,000Purpose: Provide financial assistance to undergraduate students who have a demonstrated need for funds to meet their necessary college expenses.

Thank you to the alumni and friends who have committed funds for

scholarships to benefit students in the Eberly College of Science.

Below are gifts received between July 1, 2013 – February 28, 2014

We’d like to hear your comments and feedback.

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exclusive online content!

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Share Your News!Penn State Science will feature the accomplish-

ments of our alumni on the science alumni

website. Sharing your success stories is a great

way to network with fellow alums and show

how science grads have made an impact on

the community and world! Share your career

experiences since graduation and let us know

how Penn State Science prepared you for your

career pathway.

Share with us at science.psu.edu/alumni/alumni-news

or by email Barbie Collins, assistant director of alumni

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Upcoming Events

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This publication is available in alternative media on request. The Pennsylvania State University is committed to the policy that all persons shall have equal

access to programs, facilities, admission, and employment without regard to personal characteristics not related to ability, performance, or qualifications as

determined by University policy or by state or federal authorities. It is the policy of the University to maintain an academic and work environment free of discrim-

ination, including harassment. The Pennsylvania State University prohibits discrimination and harassment against any person because of age, ancestry, color,

disability or handicap, national origin, race, religious creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or veteran status. Discrimination or harassment against

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Action Director, The Pennsylvania State University, 328 Boucke Building, University Park, PA 16802-5901; Tel 814-865-4700/V, 814-863-1150/TTY. U.Ed. SCI 14-137.

June 5-8• Traditional Reunion Weekend,

Science Brunch• Distinguished Alumni Induction

July 11-12• Forensics Mini Camp during Festival

of the Arts

September 5-6• Physician’s Reunion/CME Seminars• All-Science Tailgate, Penn State vs.

Akron Porter Gardens at Medlar Field

September 26-27• Penn State Homecoming (vs.

Northwestern)

October 8-9• Alumni Fellow Dinner and Induction

Ceremony

October 10-12• Parents & Families Weekend • Alumni Board Meeting• Outstanding Alumni Awards Dinner• Careers in Science

For more information on any of the events listed above, visit science.psu.edu/alumni/events.

Documents

Science Journal June 2014