Top Headlines

Research shows impacts from airborne nitrogen

mcoulomb — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 10:06:37 -0700

The impact of airborne nitrogen released from the burning of fossil fuels and widespread use of fertilizers in agriculture is much greater than previously recognized and even extends to remote alpine lakes, according to a study published Nov. 6 in the journal Science.

Examining nitrogen deposition in alpine and subalpine lakes in Colorado, Sweden and Norway, James Elser, a limnologist in the School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University, and his colleagues found that, on average, nitrogen levels in lakes were elevated, even those isolated from urban and agricultural centers.

The article “Shifts in lake N:P stoichiometry and nutrient limitation driven by atmospheric nitrogen deposition” presents experimental data from more than 90 lakes. The researchers’ collaboration also revealed that nitrogen-rich air pollution has already altered the lakes’ fundamental ecology.

“This is because plant plankton or phytoplankton, like all plants, need nitrogen and phosphorus for growth,” Elser says. “Inputs from pollution in the atmosphere appear to shift the supplies of nitrogen relative to other elements, like phosphorus.”

The increase in the availability of nitrogen means that growing phytoplankton in lakes receiving elevated nitrogen deposition are now limited by how much phosphorus they can acquire. Elser says that this is important because “we know that phosphorus-limited phytoplankton are poor food – basically ‘junk food’ for animal plankton, which in turn are food for fish.”

“Such a shift could potentially affect biodiversity,” he adds. “However, we don’t really know because unlike in terrestrial systems, the impacts of nitrogen deposition on aquatic systems have not been widely studied.”

Elser’s collaborators include researchers Tom Andersen and Dag Hessen from the University of Oslo; Jill Baron of the United States Geological Survey and Natural Resource Ecology Laboratory at Colorado State University; Ann-Kristin Bergström and Mats Jansson with Umeå University, Sweden; and Koren Nydick of the Mountain Studies Institute in Colorado, in addition to Marcia Kyle and Laura Steger, who are members of his own group in ASU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Hessen, a well-known limnologist, and Elser have had a long-standing collaborative relationship, looking not only at nitrogen deposition but also zooplankton nutrition and a broad range of stoichiometric studies. Elser met Bergström at a conference at Umeå University and discovered that she had performed similar experiments in Sweden.

“By combining these studies we were able to achieve a more global picture of how nitrogen was impacting a broad range of lakes and come to firmer conclusions about effects of deposition,” Elser says.

Elser and Hessen hope to expand on these findings and have a pending grant proposal with the Norwegian government. In addition, Elser says he hopes to perform similar studies in China “where atmospheric nitrogen pollution is extremely high,” but, as yet, unstudied.

Elser has built a career around asking questions about energy and material flows in ecosystems, and traveling all over the world to find answers.Understanding the balance of phosphorus, carbon and nitrogen in systems forms the backbone of Elser’s worldview, known as “stoichiometric theory.” His pioneering studies have jumpstarted new research approaches, insights into nutrient limitation, trophic dynamics, biogeochemical cycling, and linkages between evolutionary and ecosystem processes. This study was supported by the National Science Foundation.

ASU software used to help allocate H1N1 vaccine

djfreem1 — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:47:54 -0700

H1N1 is now widespread in all but two states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Arizona health officials are working hard to make sure those who most need the vaccine are able to get it. In the Phoenix area, Maricopa County public health officials are using an innovative new software program from the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University to help them quickly determine where to send vaccine doses as they come into the state.

The CDC sends vaccines to the state, and then they go down to the county level. Officials with the Maricopa County Department of Public Health often have to decide where to send new doses of the vaccine in less than one hour. Instead of having to use a variety of spreadsheets to track everything, the new program puts all of the information into one database so a decision can be filtered as quickly as possible.

"This decision-support system factors in the relevant information, such as vaccine doses, which doctors and hospitals can best utilize the vaccine based on the types of high- or low-risk patient populations they serve, where previous doses have been distributed and where the vaccine dissemination would be most effective. And with the touch of a few buttons, it maps out the suggested vaccine distribution to best manage the outbreak," said Ajay Vinze, professor of information systems at the W. P. Carey School of Business and a Fulbright Senior Specialist, who helped design the new software. "While the system's suggestions account for a number of issues, both strategic and tactical, the final decision and ability to make needed adjustments are still left to the public health professionals and their expertise."

There are several types of vaccine doses coming in, only some of which are appropriate for children, some for pregnant women, etc. The new software takes this into consideration as well.

"Now, public health officials can focus on the key decisions, while allowing this decision-support tool to make the needed optimizations," said W. P. Carey School of Business associate professor Raghu Santanam, another of the software's creators. "We have even included details, such as vaccine orders from different doctors across the Valley and then communications back from them about how much more vaccine they need or how much they might still have stored for others to use."

Associate professor Benjamin Shao and W. P. Carey School doctoral students Trent Spaulding and Aaron Baird also helped to design the new software. They took into account the real-time pressure of making tough decisions.

"We examined the overall objectives and created a fast-working system that would help health officials maximize the vaccine's impact on the public," said Spaulding. "This is a very complicated public health problem, so we tried to look at it from an efficient business perspective."

UAE to model new innovation center on ASU’s SkySong

cderra — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:08:18 -0700

A visit to the United Arab Emirates by Arizona State University President Michael Crow and Vice President for Research and Economic Affairs R.F. “Rick” Shangraw Jr. could help the Arab state face its challenges by unleashing the talents of its entrepreneurs and innovators. During their visit, Crow and Shangraw came to an agreement with UAE officials on replicating ASU's SkySong in their country.

As it turns out, both sides had a lot in common, said Shangraw.

“Our physical environments are very much the same – we're both rapidly growing desert regions,” Shangraw said. “Because of that, we face a lot of the same challenges for managing resources and planning for growth. It turns out that innovation was a common goal, too.”

As a result, the first National Innovation Center in the UAE will be in place by the end of 2010, said Sultan bin Saeed Al Mansouri, the UAE economic minister. The UAE center will identify key projects in alternative energy, environment, education and information technology.

ASU’s SkySong Innovation Center, located in Scottsdale, Ariz., supports firms entering or expanding within the United States. SkySong is designed to help companies grow by providing business services and programs – access to new technologies, capital networks, business education and a skilled workforce – offered or facilitated by ASU.

Shangraw explained that the goal of the ASU-UAE discussions was to find common ground in areas where both entities could benefit, but not act like other universities and simply replicate infrastructure.

“We’ve been talking with UAE for the past 18 months on moving the concept of SkySong over to UAE,” he said. “We aren’t talking about a building and a sail in UAE, but to help them build a SkySong equivalent activity over there to help encourage entrepreneurship and innovation, which will be tied back to ASU by offering versions of our entrepreneurship training and the way we think about connecting global companies with other companies, and how we bring venture capitalists into that environment.”

SkySong wasn’t the only focus of the discussions.

“We are also moving forward with the concept of a national decision center (based on the Decision Theater concept) in UAE and an advanced educational platform as well,” Shangraw said.

“Each of these three concepts exist at very nontraditional intersections and collaborations,” he added. “ We aren’t talking about picking up ASU and putting it over there and start offering degrees. We are talking about bringing the concept over.”

One of the more interesting initial challenges of the UAE innovation center will be to address alternative energy.

“There are certain parts of the economy that we would like to build and enhance, especially alternative energy,” al Mansouri said.

That gave Crow the opportunity to talk about one of ASU’s newest initiatives, LightWorks, which focuses on the university's strengths in renewable energy fields including artificial photosynthesis, biofuels and next-generation photovoltaics. LightWorks will expand to include other light-based projects, such as lasers for biomedical applications, energy-efficient lighting and smart-grid technologies.

Shangraw said that the two sides are exploring ways where ASU can bring some of its expertise in solar, biofuels and smart-grid technology to the UAE. Additional challenges the UAE innovation center will address include population stress, the urban heat island and sustainable development.

Graduate College names 3 outstanding graduate mentors

mstgeorg — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 12:04:01 -0600

Leona S. Aiken, Terry L. Alford and Sandra L. Stauffer have been named ASU Outstanding Graduate Mentors for 2009. The award is for excellence in a wide variety of mentoring functions, including teaching, chairing doctoral and/or MFA committees, a demonstrated ability to attract doctoral students to ASU through recruitment and scholarly reputation, a strong commitment to the students' professional development, timely completion rates, and high-quality student placement.

"The quality of the nominations for this award from across the university is a testament to the dedication and commitment of individuals who guide our students through their graduate careers," says Maria T. Allison, the university vice provost and dean of the Graduate College. "These three individuals represent the very highest quality of mentoring and it is particularly gratifying to honor these faculty who represent fields as diverse as music, engineering and psychology."

Dr. Leona Aiken, a professor in ASU's Department of Psychology, has a national reputation as a leader in quantitative methods and health psychology. In addition to mentoring her own students, she has served as quantitative methodologist on the dissertation committees of well over 100 doctoral students within and beyond psychology.

Former students credit her as an exemplary role model, a guiding force in their careers, as well as someone who will remain their mentor throughout their professional life.

"Leona's ability to successfully mentor her students, both while they were enrolled and after they graduated, was one of the things that convinced me to enroll in the social psychology Ph.D. program at ASU," says Mindy J. Erchull, now working as an assistant professor at the University of Mary Washington in Virginia. "She was a deciding factor that drew me to ASU."

"Mentoring to me is both a privilege and profound responsibility-to be granted the opportunity to work with gifted, motivated, and hopeful young people," says Aiken.

Dr. Terry Alford, a professor in the School of Materials, mentors students from several disciplines, including materials science, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, physics and chemistry. He has served as an advisor for the ASU Chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) for the past ten years. His former doctoral students commend him for inspiring creativity and motivation, support and encouragement in research paper publication, help with finding research funding, mentoring skills for a diverse student population, particularly international students, and the fact that his students frequently get prestigious job offers prior to graduation.

"Understanding the competitiveness in the research field, Dr. Alford always encourages students to collaborate with other faculty members and researchers around the globe," says former student Shekhar Bhagat, now an engineer at Intel Corp. "Professor Alford is a great human being along with a great researcher. He always encourages his student in pursuing and performing innovative research."

"A good mentor has an innate desire to listen to each student's thoughts and concerns, to remove any barriers to the students' success, and to identify and nurture the student's gifts," says Alford. "I believe that a mentor's ultimate satisfaction comes by the transformation of a student into a respected colleague."

Sandra Stauffer, a professor in the Department of Music, chaired seven masters committees and seven doctoral committees last year. As an internationally recognized scholar, she co-authored the recently published book "Narrative Inquiry in Music Education: Troubling Certainty." Her students laud her for encouraging their personal successes, including publications, awards, and university teaching jobs after graduation.

"Dr. Stauffer is one of the most positive, supportive teachers and mentors I have ever known," says Randall Kempton, a choral director at Brigham Young University in Idaho. "Her teaching style is stimulating, kind, generous, powerful and far-reaching. I recognize elements of her mentoring style re-surfacing spontaneously in my own interactions with students, 10 years after I left ASU."

"Mentoring is about the best job any of us have," says Stauffer. Her first mentor was her father, who convinced her she could do anything she wanted. "And I believe the same is true of my students. Nothing is impossible. Never, never quit!"

"It is a pleasure to honor faculty who put so much effort into mentoring their students in all aspects of their graduate education and continue this mentorship as the students progress in their careers," says Andrew Webber, the associate vice provost. "Their dedication to mentorship will be further rewarded as their students continue this tradition of strong mentorship throughout their own careers."

You can read the full mentoring essay by each of the award winners, as well as statements from past winners, at the Graduate College Web site http://graduate.asu.edu/outstandingmentors.html.

The three mentors were honored recently at a reception in the ASU University Club. Current and former students and associates participated in the celebration.

The deadline for nominating the 2010 Outstanding Graduate Mentors is Dec. 31. In order to qualify for the award, nominees must be an ASU tenure/tenure track faculty and have mentored at least three students who have completed their doctoral or MFA degrees at ASU. For more information, visit graduate.asu.edu/outstandingmentoraward.html.

Researchers discover new wrinkle in ancient ocean chemistry

jgreen1 — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 23:12:44 -0600

Scientists widely accept that around 2.4 billion years ago, the Earth's atmosphere underwent a dramatic change when oxygen levels rose sharply. Called the "Great Oxidation Event" (GOE), the oxygen spike marks an important milestone in Earth's history, the transformation from an oxygen-poor atmosphere to an oxygen-rich one, paving the way for complex life to develop on the planet.

Two questions that remain unresolved in studies of the early Earth are when oxygen production via photosynthesis got started and when it began to alter the chemistry of Earth's ocean and atmosphere.

ASU scientists, working with collaborators at other institutions, have been pursuing these questions in a series of studies of ancient rocks from Western Australia. The latest of these studies appears in the Oct. 30 issue of the journal Science.

The new findings corroborate previous results that oxygen production began in Earth's oceans at least 100 million years before the GOE, but also go a step further in demonstrating that even very low concentrations of oxygen can have profound effects on ocean chemistry. This research was led by geoscientists at the University of California, Riverside, working with Ariel Anbar, an astrobiologist and biogeochemist. Anbar, a co-author on the research, is a professor in the department of chemistry and biochemistry and the School of Earth and Space Exploration in ASU's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

To arrive at their results, the researchers analyzed 2.5 billion-year-old black shales from Western Australia. Essentially representing fossilized pieces of the ancient seafloor, the fine layers within the rocks allowed the researchers to page through ocean chemistry's evolving history. These rocks were obtained under the leadership of Anbar, with support from the NASA Astrobiology Institute of which ASU is a member.

Specifically, the shales revealed that episodes of hydrogen sulfide accumulation in the oxygen-free deep ocean occurred nearly 100 million years before the GOE and up to 700 million years earlier than such conditions were predicted by past models for the early ocean. Scientists have long believed that the early ocean, for more than half of Earth's 4.6 billion-year history, was characterized instead by high amounts of dissolved iron under conditions of essentially no oxygen.

"The conventional wisdom has been that appreciable atmospheric oxygen is needed for sulfidic conditions to develop in the ocean," said Chris Reinhard, a doctoral student at UCR and lead author of the research paper. "We found, however, that sulfidic conditions in the ocean are possible even when there is very little oxygen around, below about 1/100,000th of the oxygen in the modern atmosphere."

Reinhard explained that at even very low oxygen levels in the atmosphere, the mineral pyrite can weather on the continents, resulting in the delivery of sulfate to the ocean by rivers. Sulfate is the key ingredient in hydrogen sulfide formation in the ocean.

Timothy Lyons, a professor of biogeochemistry at UCR, whose laboratory led the research, explained that the hydrogen sulfide in the ocean is a fingerprint of photosynthetic production of oxygen 2.5 billion years ago.

"A pre-GOE emergence for oxygenic photosynthesis is a matter of intense debate, and its resolution lies at the heart of understanding the evolution of diverse forms of life," he said. "We have found an important piece of that puzzle."

"These data don't make much sense unless there were at least small amounts of oxygen in the environment. The simplest explanation is oxygen-producing photosynthesis long before concentrations of oxygen in the atmosphere were even a tiny fraction of what they are today," said Anbar. "The results are beautifully consistent with our previous results. The story just gets stronger and stronger the more we look at these ancient sediments."

The researchers argue that the presence of small amounts of oxygen may have stimulated the early evolution of eukaryotes - organisms whose cells bear nuclei - millions of years prior to the GOE.

"This initial oxygen production set the stage for the development of animals almost two billion years later," Lyons said. "The evolution of eukaryotes had to take place first."

The findings also have implications for the search for life on extrasolar planets.

"Our findings add to growing evidence suggesting that biological production of oxygen is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the evolution of complex life," Reinhard said. "A planetary atmosphere with abundant oxygen would provide a very promising biosignature. But one of the lessons here is that just because spectroscopic measurements don't detect oxygen in the atmosphere of another planet doesn't necessarily mean that no biological oxygen production is taking place."

Anbar, Reinhard and Lyons were joined in the research by Clint Scott of UCR and Rob Raiswell of the University of Leeds, United Kingdom.

The two-year study was supported by the National Science Foundation and NASA.

W. P. Carey School to dedicate new Scottsdale location

djfreem1 — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:39:54 -0600

The challenging job market is prompting many people to go back to school to improve their skills and invest in education. The W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University is making it even easier to get a part-time MBA with the opening of a new Scottsdale location. The school already offers one of the best part-time MBA programs in the country, with an evening MBA program ranked "Top 25" in the nation by U.S. News & World Report.

"We now have evening MBA locations all across the Phoenix area because we want to make it as convenient as possible for working professionals to get a high-quality MBA with a flexible program schedule," says W. P. Carey School of Business Dean Robert Mittelstaedt. "We've had a presence in Scottsdale for several years, but we're making it permanent with our new facility."

The official grand opening of the new Scottsdale location will be held from 2 to 4 p.m., Nov. 4. Scottsdale Mayor Jim Lane and other city officials will be on hand for the open house at 8355 E. Hartford Drive, at the northeast corner of Bell Road and 82nd Street.

"Scottsdale has been one of our most popular locations, so we found a great space that will be convenient for those working and living in the East Valley," says Beth Walker, associate dean of the W. P. Carey MBA program. "This new facility offers four fully equipped team rooms, wireless network access throughout the entire suite, LCD displays, interactive monitors and easy access to the 101 freeway."

The W. P. Carey School of Business also offers its evening MBA program at ASU's downtown Phoenix and Tempe campuses, as well as at a location in the south Tempe/Chandler area. After the Scottsdale location has its grand opening, a fifth location is planned for Arizona State University's West campus.

The 21-month W. P. Carey evening MBA program offers a high-caliber core business curriculum, with the ability to specialize in several areas of emphasis, including finance, health care management, international business, marketing and supply chain management. A popular 18-month evening accelerated version is also offered at the Tempe campus, with the next class starting in February. In both cases, students meet just two nights per week, allowing them to fit their MBA programs into their busy work and home lives. Both platforms feature world-class faculty and seek high-quality applicants with an average of six years of work experience.

For more information, visit wpcarey.asu.edu/mba.

New math school aims to meet challenges

chughes3 — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 00:05:09 -0600

The new School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences at Arizona State University will teach between 27,000 and 28,000 students this year, which includes nearly 500 undergraduate majors – twice as many as five years ago, according to founding director Wayne Raskind.

"The very large amount of instruction we do is a source of strength," Raskind said during a school launch ceremony Oct. 27. It's a big task, yet only half the mission of the new school in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, which was established last year by transforming the department of mathematics and statistics.

The other half of its mission is research, with the school serving as a hub and spokes going out to almost every other academic unit at the university. "In relationship to the initiatives that the university has – energy, climate, sustainability – these are things that mathematics can play a big part, and we must if we are to be successful," Raskind said.

"I can't imagine a time in history when what mathematicians do could be more important than now," ASU President Michael Crow said. "We're facing higher levels of complexity; we're taking on challenges as a society; we're asking bigger and deeper questions about our own universe, about origins."

He called on the faculty members of the new school to first and foremost "do great math." The school has more than 100 faculty members and lecturers.

Additionally, Crow said "we have a profound and deep problem: We need in our society going forward for every university student to have a base level of mathematical capability and mathematical understanding for them to have any ability to comprehend the rest of their education."

Yet, according to Crow, there is resistance in society and in the university community.

"So, what we need in this [new] school is not only fantastic mathematical expressions from faculty and students, but new pedagogical tools, new ways to teach math, new ways to advance math ... and learn how to teach across the spectra of intellect," Crow said.

"How do we find ways to figure out how to teach people in three-dimension, or multidimensional?"

Crow also talked about a society in which the general interest in mathematics and the ability to teach mathematics across the cultures has grown weaker. "Now, we have fewer and fewer people who are adequately educated," he said, and called on faculty members in the new school "to help us more broadly as a society to think of and devise ways to change [this].

"In the forming of this School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences, we don't want you to act like other math departments," Crow said. "We want you to find in this school whoever it is that you need – mathematicians, statisticians, pedagogists, philosophers, thinkers – whatever is necessary to advance this agenda. We're excited about the fact that you've taken the first step to move in this direction. It's important to the university and its evolution."

Also speaking at the ceremony were Quentin Wheeler, ASU vice president and dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Sid Bacon, dean of natural sciences.

"[This school] represents a change of mind set, a way of viewing quantitative reasons and its role in the university," said Wheeler. "I see this school emerging as an important hub ... forming partnerships to solve the large and complex problems facing science and society."

"It seems almost like yesterday when I was standing in front of you at a department meeting, talking about becoming a school," said Bacon. "Since then, you have worked hard together to make it happen. And, I must say I can really think there is no other academic unit better suited to be transformed into a school; no other academic unit that can interface with so many other disciplines, from life sciences to physical sciences, to social and behavioral sciences, to computer science, to education, to engineering, to economics and art, and so on.

"We need to build a great school here, not only to help bring quantitative rigor to our other disciplines, but also to educate the next generations," Bacon said.

He congratulated faculty members on being an integral part of the university, and thanked staff "for making such a big difference to this university and to our students."

Raskind added some levity in the closing minutes of the ceremony. He challenged the audience with a number of math-related trivia questions: Which NBA most valuable player was a math major in college? The answer was David Robinson. Which former head of state was a math major? The answer was Ehud Barak, the former prime minister of Israel. In which famous rock song is the word "mathematician" mentioned? The answer was "Tangled up in Blue" by Bob Dylan.

Additional information about the new school is online at http://math.asu.edu/school or at (480) 965-3951.

ASU exceeds $300 million in research expenditures

cderra — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 16:41:34 -0600

Arizona State University has topped $300 million in research expenditures for the first time in its school history. With a total of $307 million in research expenditures for FY2009 (which ended June 30), a growth of nearly 9 percent compared to FY08, ASU has made a dramatic climb in the ranks of top research universities.

ASU’s $307 million total research dollars for FY09 comes from a variety of sources. It includes funds received from the federal government, industry, private sources, state funds (including Technology & Research Initiative Funds from state sales tax revenue) and local government, funds from the ASU Foundation specifically for research projects and funds from foreign sources.

This year’s total includes funds for non-science and engineering research. Next year, the National Science Foundation will begin counting non-science and engineering research funds for its official reports on university research expenditures.

R.F. “Rick” Shangraw Jr., ASU’s vice president for research and economic affairs, said that including non-science and engineering research in its total provides a fuller, more accurate picture of the research enterprise at ASU.

“We support the National Science Foundation’s decision to include all research related expenditures regardless of discipline,” Shangraw said. “ASU has strong programs in the humanities, social sciences and education research that should be represented in our research reporting and that of other institutions.”

“We are growing because we have differentiated our research and we have excelled at transdisciplinary projects that tackle some of the toughest challenges facing our nation,” Shangraw explained. “These and many other research projects are driven by the critical needs of society and aim to use the transformative power of research to make substantive changes to fill those needs.”

Sethuraman “Panch” Panchanathan, ASU’s deputy vice president for research said ASU’s rapid climb in research ranks is the result of tremendous efforts put forth by faculty in a highly competitive environment, the hiring of top researchers in key areas, and strategic investments in several new initiatives using resources such as the Technology & Research Initiative Funds (TRIF).

Examples include the Biodesign Institute, which is focused on advancing biosciences, life sciences and health related research to provide a better quality of life; the Flexible Display Center, a U.S. government, industry, university collaboration to conceptualize, design and develop flexible displays that integrate seamlessly into everyday applications resulting in a significant economic impact; the Global Institute of Sustainability, which is focused on solving some of the greatest challenges faced by society in the areas of energy and climate change; and a number of research projects and programs in social sciences and humanities that benefit society.

“ASU built the world class Biodesign Institute by drawing upon the multifaceted expertise at the university and augmented that with new programs and projects that attracted top researchers and leaders from around the world,” said Panchanathan. “The investments in infrastructure and people are already paying rich dividends from the perspectives of intellectual, societal and economic impact.”

Now, Biodesign is a $70 million a year institute that works on improving health care outcomes for all people through a focus on personalized medicine, outpacing the global threat of infectious diseases and improving our environment through renewable energy and bioremediation, Panchanathan said.

Another example is the Flexible Display Center (FDC) at ASU. It was established by the U.S. Army in February 2004 in order to revolutionize information displays. FDC researchers work side by side with industry and government scientists to usher in a new era of powerful real-time information sharing through a new generation of innovative displays that are flexible, lightweight, low power and rugged. It is expected that the advances at FDC will attract whole new industries in this rapidly growing field.

The U. S. Army renewed the FDC’s contract in February 2009 for an additional five years at $50 million.

Sustainable world

ASU’s expertise in environmental science grew over 30 years, but a significant contribution by Julie Ann Wrigley in 2004 led to the creation of the Global Institute of Sustainability (GIOS) and eventually the formation of the School of Sustainability in 2007. GIOS today conducts research, education and problem solving related to sustainability, with a special focus on urban environments. Most of all, it involves students, tomorrow’s leaders, in its work and scientific advances.

Patricia Gober, director of ASU’s Decision Center for a Desert City, which studies water management and climate adaptation in Phoenix, also teaches an interdisciplinary class in water sustainability.

“Students come to my class with backgrounds in engineering, science, social science, law, journalism, business and education,” Gober said. “The blending of their perspectives breaks down the old boundaries that separated teaching, research and service in the university and creates settings in which students work on real-world problems in search of solutions to sustainability challenges.”

Today, GIOS is a cross-disciplinary research institute that includes the participation of more than 400 faculty working to solve important issues in climate adaptation, renewable energy and urban sustainability, tackling some of today’s primary problems. GIOS initiates and nurtures work on issues of sustainability across many departments on the four campuses of ASU, and collaborates with other academic institutions, governments, businesses and industries, and community groups locally, nationally and globally.

ASU has several significant research efforts in the humanities and social sciences.

Curtis Marean, a professor in ASU’s School of Human Evolution and Social Change and associate director of the Institute of Human Origins, has done groundbreaking anthropological work pushing back by several thousands of years the dates of evidence of the earliest ‘human’ experiences, such as the expansion of diet to include shellfish and other marine resources, the use of pigment in symbolic behavior and the use of fire to help craft tools from stone. Marean and his students work on a coastal area of the Cape of South Africa called Pinnacle Point. The research is funded by a $2.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation.

This year, ASU received four grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, three of which were directly related to ASU’s Institute for Humanities Research. Daniel Shilling, a researcher, and Joan McGregor, a professor in the School of History, Philosophy and Religious Studies, examined the role of literature, philosophy and history in developing the core principles and values that will directly influence today’s sustainability efforts. Another grant aided in the development of a research, teaching and outreach program on the cultural and environmental history of the Sky Islands borderlands region of Arizona, New Mexico, Sonora and Chihuahua, Mexico. The fourth project, Becoming Arizona, is the development of an online e-cyclopedia of Arizona history, culture, politics, economics and other topics as a tribute to Arizona’s centennial in 2012.

An interdisciplinary team, led by Steven Corman, a professor in the Hugh Downs School of Communication and director of ASU’s Consortium for Strategic Communication, has developed a text-analysis tool used to decode messages containing potential security threats to the U.S. Funded by the Office of Naval Research, the technology provides tools, methods and training programs to assess threats posed by terrorist narratives among contested populations.

Devens Gust, an ASU professor of chemistry and biochemistry and a leading researcher in its efforts in solar energy conversion, said the growth of ASU’s research relates to its ability to set up projects that cut across traditional disciplines.

“When I came to ASU, we had only a few research efforts that had high international visibility,” Gust said. “Today, our major research strengths span an impressive diversity of subjects. Much of this growth has been in interdisciplinary research areas, which is important because the solution of many of the intellectually fascinating and socially important research problems facing humanity today require expertise from a whole range of disciplines.”

“All of these projects are examples of how ASU is pushing knowledge in several new and exciting directions,” Shangraw said. “Our emphasis on interdisciplinary research, our ability to organize and engage larger projects and our ability to win larger, multi-year awards will allow ASU to play an increasingly formidable role in meeting the grand challenges of science and society.”

Research grants are restricted to use for specific research projects and cannot be used to fund general university expenses. However, they do add a significant amount of money to the state economy.

2007 research expenditureS PDF

Arizona State University has been building momentum in research expenditures in recent years. For example, in 2007 ASU ranked 19th in expenditures for universities that do not have a medical school. In 2009, ASU’s expenditures exceeded $307 million. View PDF.

Researchers tackle clouds, rivers with NSF Career awards

jgreen1 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 03:29:47 -0600

Two ASU faculty members have earned Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) awards from the National Science Foundation (NSF).

The CAREER program is NSF’s most prestigious, and supports the early career development activities of teacher-scholars who most effectively integrate research and education within the mission of their organization. It provides five-year research grants to each recipient.

The CAREER award winners are Pierre Herckes, assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry; and Hilairy Hartnett an assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the School of Earth and Space Exploration in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. ASU junior faculty were awarded six CAREER awards earlier this year.

Cloud chemistry; often the unexpected

Pierre Herckes will investigate the impact of clouds on atmospheric composition.

More specifically, he will study how cloud droplets act as miniscule chemical reactors that can transform atmospheric gases and particles into new and sometimes threatening chemical forms. This has a direct impact on atmospheric composition with implications for human health and global climate.

The health related aspect of his research stems from chemical reactions in clouds or fogs that might transform some relatively innocent chemicals into, for example, the potent carcinogen and mutagen, N-nitroso dimethylamine (NDMA). Herckes will tackle the problem through laboratory and observational field studies.

In the laboratory Herckes can simulate reactions occurring in cloud droplets under controlled conditions. This allows for identification of reaction products, the determination of reaction mechanisms and rates, which can later be used in complex atmospheric models.

“In the field, we will study clouds and fogs in a variety of environments,” Herckes says. “These will include highly polluted fogs in the Central Valley of California, more pristine mountain clouds in Arizona as well as marine clouds on the East Coast. This will yield novel insights into cloud chemistry, as observations of this type are quite rare.”

Herckes’s will use part of the grant (more than $560,000) to reach out to K–12 students through educational class modules that teach about the formation of clouds and their role in the water cycle, their impact on air pollution and their role in climate processes. A Web-interface will allow students and the general public to check on the latest status of field experiments, including real-time images from Web cameras, movies of cloud events and chemical composition data.

Organic carbon in the Colorado River system

Hilairy Hartnett’s research will develop a regional carbon budget for the Colorado River system using a combination of field measurements and laboratory manipulation experiments. Rivers are the dynamic link between terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems.

“Our basic understanding of river carbon cycling is based largely on data from pristine rivers,” Hartnett says. “Yet today virtually all rivers are managed to optimize water supply, flood control and hydropower. On the Colorado River, the system of dams and reservoirs has dramatically altered hydrodynamics and geomorphology, light conditions and sediment-water interactions.”

Hartnett wants to develop a broader understanding of the effects of these reservoirs on carbon biogeochemistry of the rivers. Organic carbon is the currency of ecosystems. Plants produce it and animals consume it. Understanding where the carbon in the Colorado River comes from and what happens to it along the way will tell Hartnett something about the role of the river with respect to regional carbon budgets and also, more generally, about how large managed rivers contribute to the transport of carbon to the sea..

The goal is to construct a carbon budget for each of the major reservoirs, to determine how much carbon comes in from upstream, how much is stored in sediments, how much is released as carbon dioxide and how much is transported downstream to the next reservoir. Hartnett also will investigate the composition of the organic carbon in each reservoir and assess how the composition changes downstream. The project requires both field sampling – to measure the amounts of carbon and nitrogen in sediments – and laboratory experiments. The latter are designed to show how reactive the carbon is to different processes like microbial degradation, photo-oxidation and sorption to mineral surfaces.

Hartnett’s project (award is more than $570,000) also will enhance learning outcomes for geoscience students through field-based teaching. The education component of the project will provide field science experiences for undergraduates and improve learning by giving them a real research project to participate in rather than a controlled laboratory experience.

CAREER awards provide an example of the economic benefit that a research university can bring to its state. Each year, Arizona universities pour nearly $1 billion into the Arizona economy from their research, most of which is funded by the U.S. government and entities from outside the state. Research money brought in by universities is restricted money that can be used only for the research activity it supports. It cannot be used to compensate for cuts in other parts of the university’s budget.

Entrepreneurship rank lends force to innovation efforts

sjkeele1 — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:53:26 -0600

The Global Student Entrepreneur Awards (GSEA) this week released its second annual ranking of universities that are home to the most student entrepreneurs. Arizona State University was ranked second with 31 student entrepreneurs. Babson College ranked first with 54.

GSEA, a program of the Entrepreneurs' Organization, is the world's premier competition for students who own and run businesses while attending a college or university.

"Today, university-based entrepreneurship is critical not just to students, but also to cities and nations that seek to foster innovation, job growth and economic development," said Kevin Langley, Entrepreneurs’ Organizations chairman-elect.

Other schools in the top 10 include the University of Pennsylvania, University of Southern California, Yale University, Harvard University, National University of Singapore, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University and New York University.

“Entrepreneurship at ASU has really taken off in the last few years. ASU students have fantastic energy and ideas and really, there are so many ASU students starting and running businesses on their own,” said Kimberly Loui, associate vice president and executive director in the Office of Student Initiatives. “We’re trying to encourage and support this movement by offering entrepreneurship courses and opportunities in disciplines as varied as journalism, nursing, design, theatre and film. With GSEA’s rankings, ASU students are just beginning to make their mark.”

Entrepreneurship at ASU is unique in that is crosses all academic. Students are experiencing ways to map entrepreneurial skills and ideas onto their regular course of study, combining classroom environments with real-world applications.

More than 23 undergraduate and graduate entrepreneurship programs exist across the university, 112 courses are taught and seven certificate and degree programs in entrepreneurship are offered.

Outside the classroom, entrepreneurship at ASU provides opportunities to work with entrepreneurial companies, or to take ideas further, with funding to start a project or launch a business venture.

The Edson Student Entrepreneur Initiative, for example, is one of the broadest student entrepreneur programs in the country. Edson helps students explore innovative ideas for business products and services in partnership with faculty, researchers and successful entrepreneurs from both the academic and private sectors. To date, Edson ventures have received $100 million in external funding and in-kind services.

In 2006, ASU was designated a leading entrepreneurial university. The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation awarded a $5 million grant to ASU to extend access to entrepreneurship education university-wide.

For more information on entrepreneurship at ASU, visit http://entrepreneurship.asu.edu.