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Fall 2015

Fall2015

Chair’s Message Student’s Corner

Events

CreditsAlumni Highlights

Faculty Focus

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Table of Contents

Wow, the last year certainly zipped by quickly. It turned out to be another

outstanding year for the Biology Department. We continue to boast the best students on campus. More of our students are still admitted to medical and other health professional schools than any department in any university in Alabama. Our students also continue to win national and international awards as you will note in reading the rest of this newsletter.

We welcomed two new faculty members in the past year. Dr. Winston Lancaster, whom we recruited from California, has taken over the Human Anatomy course. Dr. Jeff Morris came

to us from postdoctoral research at Michigan State University. Jeff is investigating among other things whether the open ocean’s phytoplankton, which produces 15% of all the planet’s oxygen, will be able to evolutionarily adapt to rising sea temperature and acidity over the coming decades. We also lost one long-time faculty member as Dr. David Jenkins decided it was time for a well-deserved retirement.

We continue to reconnect with our alumni and two of those with very different life choices are featured in this newsletter. We’d like to feature others in the future, so give us a shout (biology@uab.edu) and let us know what you’ve been up to since you graduated.

Our celebration of Darwin Day last February was a great success. We partnered with the McWane Science Center in downtown Birmingham and our own UAB Department of Anthropology to host New York Times science columnist, Carl Zimmer, who gave a gripping lecture on Ebola and other viruses, and primatologist Frans de Waal, who filled the Highlands Hospital Media Center to overflowing with a stirring talk on War and Peace among the Primates. Keep an eye out for upcoming announcements about 2016’s Darwin Day line-up.

For those of you who still live in the Birmingham area, don’t forget about our Fall Biology Welcome Back Picnic on September 3rd (details inside). We hope to see you there.

Sincerely,

Dr. Steven N. Austad

A Letter from Our Chair

Faculty Focus

Tollefsbol Wins Ireland Award

Please join us in congratulating Dr. Trygve Tollefsbol on being awarded the 2015 Ireland Prize for Scholarly Distinction. Dr. Tollefsbol is a leader in the growing field of epigenetics. His research has found that altering one’s diet can result in fundamental, beneficial changes to a person’s genetic material in a way that protects them from aging and other biological damage. He plans to donate the $5,000 award proceeds to the ‘Trygve Tollefsbol Paper Award’ an initiative created by himself and former student, Sabita Saldanha, to encourage and reward student research. We are very fortunate to have a colleague who is not only an outstanding scholar himself but who puts such emphasis on student scholarship as well.

Above: Dr. & Mrs. Tollefsbol pictured with Mrs. Caroline P. Ireland, students from his lab, and their families

Above: Dr. & Mrs. Tollefsbol pictured with Dr. Sabita Saldanha, Mr. Saldanha, and their son Aiden

Right: Dr. & Mrs. Tollefsbol pictured with Dr. & Mrs. McClintock (left), Dr. and Mrs. Watts (middle), and Mrs. Caroline P. Ireland (front). Dr. Tollefsbol joins Dr. McClintock & Dr. Watts as winners from the UAB Department of Biology who have won the Ireland Award.

Above: Ceremony Guest, President Ray Watts, & Dean Robert Palazzo pictured with Mrs. Caroline P. Ireland

2015IrelandAwardCeremony

2015IrelandAwardCeremony

Jenkins Retires After 41 Years

Farewell Dr. David T. Jenkins

Professor David Jenkins retired in May this year after more than 41 years with the Biology Department. During his time in the Department, Dr. Jenkins focused his research on the identification and growth of various mushrooms and focused his teaching on Introductory Biology and Microbiology. Ken Marion, a long time colleague and friend of Professor Jenkins

put it very well. “Dave is the ultimate teacher. He was willing to share his vast knowledge with great enthusiasm under a wide variety of class schedules from dawn to dusk and even weekends. He touched the lives of literally thousands of students.” As a long-time UAB Faculty Athletics Representative, Jenkins retirement party was held – fittingly -- in the Green and Gold Room of Bartow Arena.

McClintock receives Odessa Woolfolk Award

Professor Jim McClintock is this year’s recipient of the UAB Odessa Woolfolk Community Service Award. This prestigious award recognizes a UAB faculty member for their outstanding service to the Birmingham Community. Professor McClintock previously received the 2008 Live the Dream Award, the highest honor awarded by the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce. With nearly 30 years of dedicated service to educational outreach, he continues to work assiduously to make Birmingham the best it can be and helping make UAB an integral part of the Birmingham community.

Austad Wins International Longevity Research Prize

Professor and Biology Department chair, Steven Austad, has been awarded the 20th Fondation IPSEN Longevity Prize. Fondation IPSEN, based in Boulogne-Billancourt, France, awards its Longevity Prize to a French or foreign researcher – biologist, geneticist, gerontologist, psychologist, demographer, statistician, etc.- in recognition of an outstanding contribution to understanding the basis of longevity. Dr. Austad will officially receive the award at a ceremony in November 2015.

Watts’ Sea Urchin are Making WavesWhile at first glance, sea urchin may appear to be immobile, on the contrary they DO move, especially ours! Check out where Dr. Watts’ sea urchin have recently been featured.

+ Iron Chef, Chris Hastings, Hot and Hot Fish Club+ Chef & Host Andrew Zimmern, “Bizarre Foods America”, Travel Channel+ Chef David Bancroft, “Great American Seafood-Cook-Off”+ Chef James Lewis, Vittoria Macelleria+ Alabama Gulf Seafood

Alumni Highlights

Dr. Heidi R. Umphrey, Chief of the Breast Imaging Section in the Department of Radiology at UAB Medical School, got her start in research as an undergraduate in Professor Doug Watson’s laboratory. Continuing on for a Master’s degree in Watson’s lab, her research on anti-molting hormones in crabs awakened an interest in human biology, so she fixed her sights on Medical School. Originally planning to become a surgeon, her medical studies were interrupted somewhat when her great aunt and uncle, Evelyn and Harold Martin, became ill and she became their caregiver. The Martin fund, established by them, now supports a Departmental Outstanding Graduate Student Development Award. We are grateful for their generosity. Dr. Umphrey eventually turned to radiology and says that the best part of her job today is working with her patients -- helping strong women through difficult times, as she puts it. She wasn’t done with the Biology Department though, even after medical school. When her father, who had a farm and a pond, needed something to do after retirement, she consulted with Professor Steve Watts, who suggested farming tilapia. Both Dr. Umphrey and her father ended up raising tilapia for a while. Today she also enjoys keeping honeybees. So from medicine to bee keeping, biology continues to infuse her life. Asked about her favorite course, she says “Of course, Dr. Watson’s endocrinology course. It changed my life.”

Dr. Heidi R. Umphrey

You truly can be anything with a major in biology. Filmmaker Ingrid Pfau proves that. Ms. Pfau began her UAB career as a biology major with the vague thought of eventually attending medical school. That all changed when she took a course in ethnographic filmmaking. She determined that she would combine her newly found love for making films with her interest in biology. Taking advantage of the Biology Department’s Individually Designed major program, she created a major that she called “Environmental Science Filmmaking,” which combined courses in biology and filmmaking. As part of her major she made films about Jim McClintock’s work on ocean acidification as a consequence of atmospheric carbon dioxide pollution and Dr. Wibbels’ diamondback terrapin restoration project. This work earned her a prestigious Jack Kent Cooke scholarship to graduate school at Montana State University where she received her Master’s degree in Science and Natural History Filmmaking. A Birmingham native, Ms. Pfau has recently moved back to Birmingham where she is currently working as an independent filmmaker on an impressive diversity of documentary projects. Her 29 minute film, Seizing the Unrecorded, a personal account of epilepsy, will be showing at the Birmingham Sidewalk Film Festival, August 28-30.

Ms. Ingrid Pfau

Bliss Chang had a busy summer. But then he’s been busy his whole UAB career. After winning a list of scholarships as long as his arm, being awarded research prizes, publishing papers, advocating for science to the U.S. Congress and Whitehouse Office of Science and Technology Policy, and giving keynote speeches at conferences from Harvard to Irvine, you might think he was ready to take a break. But that just wouldn’t be Bliss. After graduating with a dual major in Biology and Chemistry in May, he still needed to finish up some research, write up the results for publication, and learn German before summer was over. Learning German was in preparation for the next phase of his life – doing graduate research as a Fulbright Scholar at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, Germany. One wonders whether he’ll have time to continue his favorite hobbies – weight lifting and table tennis – while in Germany. Knowing Bliss, he will make time.

Maybe it’s just us, but we think we have the most interesting students on campus. Yoonhee Ryder, for instance, a dual major in Biology and Anthropology, not only received scholarships to study abroad in Korea and Dubai, worked in archeological research in Fiji and in a rural medical clinic in Guatemala, not to mention excelling in traditional academic work. She also won the 2015 UAB President’s Award in Diversity, the UAB Outstanding Woman Undergraduate Award, and was a finalist in competition for a Rhodes Scholarship. Now, having graduated, she’s off to Togo as a Peace Corp volunteer to continue her work in community health. If she’s not the most interesting student on campus, we’d like to know who is.

Yoonhee Ryder Wins (Practically) Every Award

Bliss Chang Wins (Practically) Every Other Award

Student’s CornerU

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Bioe

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ics Team Wins National Title at 2015 Bioethics Bowl! Congratulatio

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Julie Schram Barker AwardDepartment of Biology Ph.D. candidate, Julie Schram has been selected to receive the 2015 UAB Samuel B. Barker Award for Excellence in Graduate Studies at the Doctoral Level. “The Barker Award”, named for UAB’s first graduate dean, Dr. Samuel Booth Barker, was introduced in 1995.

Julie’s research has comprised the effects of ocean acidification on starfish as well as the effects of climate change on species within the far south regions of Antarctica. She modestly attributes her recognition to her collaborative experiences throughout her study here at UAB. “I am just grateful to have my research recognized. Every year UAB has so many Ph.D. candidates graduating who have done amazing research. It really is an honor and a tribute to the community we have here in the Biology Department. There is no way I could have done my research without the support and guidance I have received at each step from the faculty, staff, and fellow graduate students here.”

Mary Latimer Awarded Chateaubriand

Mary Latimer was recently awarded the 2015-2016 STEM Chateaubriand Fellowship. Please join us in congratulating her achievement. The Fellowship grant is offered by the Embassy of France in the United States and allows doctoral students enrolled in American Universities to conduct research in France for four to nine months. Mary will be traveling to Rennes, France for study and will complete some of her dissertation while aboard.

Congratulations to our Graduate Students who were selected for this year’s National Science Foundation & UAB College of Arts and Sciences Fellowships!

Corey Cates NSF Awardee Corey Cates UAB CAS Fellow Yali Sun UAB CAS FellowMegan Roegner NSF Awardee

Mark Your Calendars!

As the fall semester approaches we are gearing for our annual Department of Biology Fall Welcome Back Picnic. Our beloved picnic will be in its 21st year this year and will take place on Thursday, September 3rd, 2015, from 11:30 am – 1:30 pm in UAB’s Mini Park. Come join us for Jim N’ Nicks BBQ and camaraderie with UAB faculty, students, alum, campus and community groups. RSVP to biology@uab.edu. We look forward to seeing you there!

Biology Fall Welcome Back Picnic

Darwin Day CelebrationWinter may be in hindsight but February will be here before you know it. Keep on the look out for our Annual Darwin Day Celebration festivities that will take place during the week of Charles Darwin’s birthday in the second week of February. Last year’s events were a great success and we look forward to continuing to share the ways that Darwinism and evolutionary theory are prevalent in today’s science world. Until February, please take a look at some of the pictures that were taken at last year’s event.

Coming Soon!

Nathan Shock Center

Bio-PhiliaFall 2015 is brought to you by the

University of Alabama at Birmingham Department of Biology

Dr. Steven AustadEditor-In-ChiefDistinguished Professor & Department Chair

Deja DowdellEditor, Content Development & Design Program Coordinator II

YouWe want to hear from you!Let us know about your achievements and accomplishments since you’ve graduated. To be featured in our future issues contact us at biology@uab.edu?

DONATE TO THE DEPARTMENT OF BIOLOGY BY VISITING

http://www.uab.edu/cas/biology/alumni/give

Coming Soon!