Sea and Space Issue
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COLLEGE OF SCIENCE WINTER 2018: 150 YEARS OF SCIENCE SEA AND SPACE ISSUE Impact Winter 2018 new baselines.indd 1 10/18/17 5:13 PM WINTER 2018 Editor Debbie Farris Contents Writers Katharine de Baun Srila Nayak Designer Sharon Betterton College of Science Roy Haggerty, Dean Feature Publisher College of Science 128 Kidder Hall Passion & Purpose Oregon State University Corvallis, OR 97331 Faculty and student success Alumni & Friends Thinkers and doers Feature 150 years of science for sea and space News Raising the value of science Real Estate = Real Opportunity Your gift of property can open doors at OSU Learn how you can boost your retirement Discover plans through a life-income gift, eliminate Research, breakthroughs and innovation capital gains taxes, and create life-changing opportunities for students. All with real estate! Contact us today. Julie Irmer, 800-336-8217 • [email protected] osufoundation.org/giftplanning Impact Winter 2018 new baselines.indd 2 10/18/17 5:13 PM Science Success Center now open for business Our Science Success Center launched this fall to provide an inclusive space where students and faculty can make connections that improve their lives academically, socially, professionally and personally. This holistic approach will help us Fellow Beavers, of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric build a strong, diverse Sciences faculty for seven years community that appreciates I am the new Dean of the College where I served as Interim Dean. and values differences. of Science at Oregon State Most recently, I served as OSU’s University. I am excited to lead Associate Vice President of Research. The Center seeks to inspire this group of extraordinary faculty I have been an earth scientist at OSU undergraduate students and students to advance scientific for the past 22 years. to envision their future in discovery for our world and to science while providing teach science to the whole campus. To share some of my personal life, academic advising, career Science is the best invention of I grew up on a grain farm outside development resources the human mind, it is at the heart a rural town in Alberta, Canada, and learning opportunities of OSU, and it is critical to the with five brothers. I fell in love with that take them beyond university’s mission and success. learning and science before I was the classroom. Students 10 years old, and I was first in my facing academic challenges I look forward to getting to know family to go to college. can access tools to help more of you as we connect at OSU them address obstacles events, personal meetings or even A thriving College of Science is and overcome challenges through email or by phone. paramount to OSU’s success. My so they feel empowered initial priorities are to improve to thrive inside and outside I want to thank Sastry Pantula, student success and generate high- of the classroom. who stepped down after four years growth education opportunities as dean to shift his focus back to that will create a solid financial base More than 25 sophomores, statistical research and teaching for the College. From that base, we juniors and seniors serve as in the Department of Statistics. I will be able to continue to expand Peer Advisors, performing am grateful to him for being such a our scientific research and teaching outreach to students via powerful advocate for science and in other areas. phone, email and 1-on-1 a passionate champion for students meetings. Peer Advisors are and diversity. He is an excellent I look forward to getting to know well-informed on the tools, ambassador for science. you as we create a strong future for services and resources the College of Science. available to all students. I am happy to be back among my They serve as a key part colleagues in the College of Science. of the Center and are I was part of the faculty here for 15 Roy Haggerty supported by a team of four years before moving to the College Dean, College of Science professional staff. science.oregonstate.edu/SSC Impact Winter 2018 new baselines.indd 1 10/18/17 5:13 PM 2 OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY / COLLEGE OF SCIENCE Carrying on Wei Family Foundation founder’s love of travel Half a world away in Australia, where she’s studying abroad with PASSION & world-renowned marine scientists at James Cook University, Milan Sengthep is enthusiastic about Integrative Biology at OSU: “My PURPOSE advisors…and honestly every graduate student/professor/ Faculty and student success staff in that department, are the coolest, most amazing people I’ve ever met.” A junior majoring in biology with including six women and ten a minor in chemistry, Milan was Summer research in underrepresented minorities, were born and raised in Boise, Idaho, mathematics and statistics selected from over 70 applicants to where her parents immigrated Undergraduates from across pursue statistical research projects from Thailand. Throughout her the country enjoyed Research such as analyzing the environmental childhood they worked extremely Experiences for Undergraduates impact of obesity and modeling data hard to establish a new life, (REU) in mathematics and statistics for better financial decisions. always encouraging Milan and this summer. Supported by the her brother to pursue education, National Science Foundation (NSF), especially as it “did not really REU grants fund 8-10 weeks of Fulbright year in Poland come easy for them.” hands-on research to promote Biologist Jaga Giebultowicz, an graduate study in STEM fields. Ten expert on biological (circadian) Milan’s Wei Family Foundation students participated in the long- clocks and their functions in Scholarship has filled her with running (since 1987) Mathematics organismal health, has been awarded “ecstatic emotions” and provided REU, pursuing projects from a Fulbright research and teaching enduring “financial stress relief.” classical geometry in Euclidean scholarship for the year 2017-2018. Supporting undergraduate and space to uncertainty quantification Giebultowicz’s Fulbright scholarship graduate science students with a and cryptography. will take her to the University of 3.5 GPA or higher, especially those Warsaw in Poland, where she will of Chinese ancestry and/or who In statistics, a new $380K one-year conduct research and teach in have lived in China, the Wei Family American Statistics Association the Department of Experimental Foundation Scholarships total grant supported four students’ for and Clinical Physiology and work about $100,000 per year with research in microbiome informatics, on her project, “Collaboration awards ranging from $6-8,000 analyzing data from “American on Novel Research and Teaching per student. The scholarships Gut,” a large, crowd-sourced citizen Concepts in Biomedical Science.” honor the legacy of pioneering science project. A second statistics This is the second Fulbright award alumna Chung Kwai Lui, who REU also opened its doors at OSU for Giebultowicz. In 2001-02, she emigrated from China in 1936 to this summer, moving from the traveled to the University of Warsaw become one of the first students University of Nevada under the on a Fulbright to research the in the newly formed OSU physics supervision of newly hired professor important roles of biological clocks graduate program and its first Javier Rojo. Twelve students, in reproduction. female Ph.D. graduate in 1941. Impact Winter 2018 new baselines.indd 2 10/18/17 5:13 PM iMPACT WINTER 2018 3 Grad students win top National recognition for Faculty receive NSF fellowships five stellar students top honors at The College is delighted to The College of Science is thrilled to University Day announce that three Ph.D. students announce that two students won On University Day 2017, the received prestigious National Goldwater Scholarships and three College of Science received Science Foundation Graduate students won Fulbright Awards for five of the university’s Research Fellowship Program the 2017-18 academic year. most prestigious awards for awards for 2017: Rebecca Lucia exceptional teaching, advising, Maher in microbiology and David Gregory Mirek Brandt, a promising research and Lynn Hubert and Claire Couch in junior studying physics and scholarship. Congratulations to integrative biology. This year the mathematics, and True Gibson, these winners! award, which provides three years an Honors College junior studying of financial support towards a biochemistry and biophysics, Kevin Ahern, professor of research-based graduate degree, received Goldwater Scholarships, biochemistry and biophysics, supports research on vertebrates, the top undergraduate STEM received the Elizabeth P. mammals and marine invertebrates. award in the country. The award, Ritchie Distinguished Professor honoring former Arizona Senator Award, OSU’s highest teaching Hubert and Couch will study Barry M. Goldwater, provides up to award recognizing outstanding gene expression during $7,500 per year for undergraduate contributions to undergraduate hibernation of garter snakes and tuition, fees, books, and housing education. Ahern has been on respiratory disease in African expenses. Delaney Smith, an the forefront of making the buffalo respectively, and Maher Honors College sophomore in study of life sciences more will investigate how the coral biochemistry and biophysics accessible to all students, microbiome is affected by predation and pre-education, received a by expanding the use of and nutrient availability. Goldwater Honorable Mention. technology in the classroom and creating survey courses on Biochemistry and biophysics OSU’s Ecampus. alumna Lynda Bradley (’15), biochemistry and biophysics Henri Jansen, professor and senior Arianna Kahler-Quesada lead advisor in the Department and integrative biology doctoral of Physics, received the Dar student Ian Morelan were Reese Excellence in Advising awarded Fulbright scholarships Award for outstanding on the basis of their academic undergraduate advising. A achievement, record of service dedicated teacher and advisor, and leadership potential. The Jansen has been deeply involved scholarships provide funds for a in transforming the larger, year-long study, research and/or lower division classes with teaching project abroad.