It’s only a short elevator ride to the roof of Research Hall and the Astronomy Observatory, but Harold Geller fills the time with facts about the building’s construction, history of astronomy at Mason, and the excitement felt in the local community about the new thirty-two-inch diameter Ritchey-Chrétien telescope in the College of Science. The new scope is possibly the largest on-campus telescope of its kind at any university on the East Coast. Geller, observatory director and associate professor in the School of Physics, Astronomy, and Computational Sciences, explains that this new telescope continues a tradition that started in 1975. Students back then first hand-built a six-inch refractor telescope, then a twelve-inch reflector telescope.The university’s commitment to physics, astronomy, and computational sciences has grown since the 1970s. About twenty-five graduate students are currently enrolled in the astronomy program, and another 1,500 students take astronomy classes each year.  

A major goal for the diagnosis and treatment of cancer is early identification of molecular changes that signal the onset of disease.These molecular changes, or biomarkers, correlate to the progression of normal tissue toward formation of the tumor and can be distinguished from other biological changes in a person’s cells, proteins, or other molecules.The home for such clinical research within the College of Science is the School of Systems Biology (SSB). Ancha Baranova, an associate professor in SSB, came to Mason to pursue her research interests in molecular biology and genetics as they relate to cancer and obesity. When she left the Vavilov Institute of General Genetics in Moscow, she kept her ties — and her working relationships — with her colleagues and students there. As a principal investigator in the Functional Genomics Group at the Vavilov Institute, she had five doctoral students working on their theses when she left for the United States. “I continued working with my students, discussing the results of their experiments and my own research progress,” Baranova explains. “Over time, we discovered that certain experiments were less expensive to conduct in Moscow and others were conducted at Mason, all resulting in collaborative papers.” As her students earned their doctoral degrees and moved on to other academic research labs in Russia, they maintained their scientific interaction and brought more than a dozen other scientists into the group.These relationships evolved into a whole range of research projects in various areas of cellular and molecular biology, with twenty-seven papers being published in several peer-reviewed journals. The scientists recently commemorated ten years of collaboration with a workshop at the Vavilov Institute that summarized their research achievements. Baranova sees the results of her collaborative research as changing the landscape of cancer diagnosis and post-treatment monitoring. “We envision the use of high-throughput profiles to comprehensively describe tumor biopsies, for example, instead of individual biomarkers,” Baranova describes. “These tests will result in easily understood images that answer a patient’s most pressing question: ‘How bad is my tumor?’” The work that these researchers began ten years ago has built a foundation for future developments in cancer treatment and many other clinical fields. High-throughput detection of anomalies and molecular pathway analysis have implications for heart disease, diabetes, and liver disease, among others. Baranova notes, “They will pave the way for truly individualized medicine.”

In Ellen O’Brien’s linear algebra class, Jody and Devin Shipp faced the first among many curious looks they would encounter in the Department of Mathematical Sciences. O’Brien was asking the students their last names as she handed back recently graded exams. Jody had already received hers, and Devin piped up, “My name is Shipp, as well.” Surprised, O’Brien asked, “Oh, is that your sister?” When Devin replied, “No, it’s actually my mom,” it didn’t compute for O’Brien. Confused, she kept asking, “You’re taking this class and sitting next to your mom?” “She was just shocked,” remembers Devin, 26. “She couldn’t get over the fact that we would sit together and work together on stuff.” That was 2010, and since then, the mother-and-son team of Jody and Devin Shipp have become exemplary students and role models for their peers. As they prepare to graduate this spring, this pair demonstrates the power of a unique parent-child partnership. While many children want to put distance between themselves and their parents, Devin often conferred with Jody before signing up for classes each semester. “I liked to take the same classes because it tends to make me work harder,” Devin says. She sums up her parenting style with a simple but powerful concept: love your children for who they are. Jody instilled in Devin a love of math since his childhood.The only question she would ask him when he returned from school was, “Did you get any math homework?” Once he finished his assignment, Jody gave Devin the task of doing extra math problems, which they would work on together. “Obviously, I was reluctant to listen half the time,” he remembers. “But that’s what got me going on math because actually, when you’re doing math that much, you become good at it.” As math tutors, both Jody and Devin strongly believe that success doesn’t come overnight. Jody, in particular, takes issue with the notion that one is either born with the so-called math gene or not. Learning math takes hours of practice and, in some cases, help from a tutor. Math educators haven’t done the best job of illuminating the real-world applications of math for students who struggle and eventually lose motivation, she notes. “I would tell students to stick with it and try to find a way to relate math to your own life,” she says. For the Shipps, learning math is like learning a language: Repetition creates fluency, and fluency fuels passion. Math’s power was first demonstrated to Jody in high school, when she learned to use trigonometry to figure out a building’s height. Devin embraces math’s consistency: “In a world of uncertainty, math is something that’s rock solid.” Of the two, Devin will say his mom is more of a math superstar, although his mom disagrees. Last year, she was chosen to participate in a National Science Foundation– supported program called Undergraduate Research in Computational Mathematics, attending the Joint Mathematics Meeting in Boston earlier this year to present her work. In 2010, she received the Amer Beslagic Award from the math department and, before that, a math award from Northern Virginia Community College. These accolades are a long time coming for Jody, who began her college career more than twenty years ago as an electrical engineering major at Utah State University. She left school after two years when she married. Now at fortynine—and after a fifteen-year career in customer service at Delta Airlines—she is picking up where she left off, exemplifying the adage, “It’s never too late.” Jody will start her master’s degree in education at Mason after earning her bachelor’s degree in mathematics this spring. Devin, a member of the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, was recently selected to become a pilot in the U.S.Air Force. He will begin training at Laughlin Air Force Base in Del Rio, Texas, after graduating with his bachelor’s degree this spring. He loves how math relates to patterns and codes and aspires to work at the National Security Agency some day, helping defend the United States against cyber attacks. A doctoral degree in math is also in his sights.

Not everyone can say that they passed on an offer to study at Oxford University. Trishna Dutta and Sandeep Sharma did just that in 2006, when the husband and wife pair received admission to pursue their graduate degrees in conservation. They chose George Mason University instead and are now close to finishing their doctorates through the environmental science and public policy program in the College of Science. Why Mason? Among the factors are the school’s proximity to Washington, D.C., home to public policy’s movers and shakers, and its special relationship with the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute (SCBI) and the National Zoo, where they both are doctoral fellows. Dutta’s and Sharma’s research deals with one of the most pressing issues in conservation policy today: how to ensure the preservation of large cat species in India, the world’s second-most populous nation. Specifically, they’re studying whether forest corridors that connect five major tiger reserves in the central Indian states of Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra are functioning for two species, the Indian leopard (Panthera pardus fusca) and the Indian tiger (Panthera tigris tigris). To determine whether genes are flowing within tiger and leopard populations, Dutta and Sharma are using noninvasive genetic sampling, a technique they learned at SCBI, to extract an animal’s genetic material without trapping and handling it.The samples are not blood or tissue, but scat, fecal matter containing sloughed-off cells from the intestinal lining, from which DNA can be extracted. 

The need to achieve energy independence and develop clean and affordable renewable energy sources has been a rallying cry here in the United States for decades. The lingering effects of the global recession and political instability in the Middle East have only underscored these concerns. Physics professor Robert Ehrlich is leading efforts in the College of Science to develop renewable energy studies and is writing a new textbook that will be suitable for energy programs across the country. Ehrlich came to Mason in 1977. He has done physics research, worked to improve physics education, and has been a champion for communicating science to the public. Ehrlich began the work of bringing renewable energy studies to the university three years ago. He says that he is coming to the end of his teaching career and that renewable energy is a good fit for him and Mason. However, for a man talking of retiring, he shows no signs of slowing down. In addition to writing the textbook, he maintains the Renewable Energy Valuation and Understanding Project (www.rev-up.org), a website that he started in 2009 “to be the most essential web-based source of information for teachers, students, and others interested in renewable energy education.” And he recently sent a letter of inquiry to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation seeking seed money to organize a group of techno-environmental educators who can work together to safeguard the environment with an understanding of balancing economics with environmental concerns. Ehrlich sees a growing need for renewable energy education and not just from a scientific approach. He explains that the discussion needs to include public policy, economics, and law. Mason’s location near the federal government and high- tech industries means that there will be a growing need for professionals with this type of education.The National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy often fund many internship opportunities at many sites around the nation, and especially in the Washington, D.C., area. Currently, a renewable energy minor is offered through the college’s School of Physics, Astronomy, and Computational Sciences that is designed for students seeking education for careers in renewable energy or as preparation for graduate work. Students can also enroll in Mason’s master’s degree program in interdisciplinary studies and seek a concentration in energy and sustainability studies.This program is ideal for students who are interested in pursuing careers in energy and environmentally related applications in the law, national and international policy, government, print and media jour- nalism, public and social service, teaching, advanced graduate studies, ethics, business, and basic and applied research. Whether to stick with the current structure or to expand to a full degree program in renewable energy at the university is an issue that will be contingent on the growth of the current offerings and staffing. Ehrlich hopes that the growth of this program will mirror the need in the job market, which appears likely to be very strong in the future. He says that currently “only five percent of schools in the nation have energy-related programs.” There’s a growing need for more, and Mason has a chance to become a leader.

Improving achievement in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) is a high priority for the United States at the national, state, and local levels.A new College of Science initiative, the Science and Math Accelerator, supports Virginia’s STEM education goals while boosting Mason student achievement in these subjects. The Accelerator’s goals are to increase the number of students in COS majors, streamline their path to graduation, and improve job placement rates. Cody Edwards, director of the Science and Math Accelerator, describes the program as early intervention for at-risk students to provide extra instructional support.Traditionally, tutoring and exam preparation take place after students have shown poor performance. Edwards is working to change that approach. “We want to identify students and offer them help before they fail an exam,” he explains. Five newly hired faculty members in the Accelerator have begun working with their individual units to identify academically at-risk students.The five initial units are mathematics; physics, astronomy, and computational sciences; chemistry; biology; and forensics. Accelerator professorsare administering assessment exams to students before they enroll in certain difficult prerequisite courses (for example, organic chemistry).Once the students are identified,Accelerator professors and student assistants offer them programs that target theirspecific needs.Two pilot programs, peer-to-peer tutoring and oral reviews, are showing success. The oral reviews were brought to Mason by Accelerator faculty member Mary Nelson, assistant professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences.The reviews take place just a few days before each exam and provide a specialized, small-group experience.About five students meet with a faculty facilitator who helps them understand the underlying concepts for the material to be covered in the exam. “We don’t ask them to practice procedures, but rather to explain how the procedures work and why they are helpful in real life,” Nelson explains. The oral reviews are already showing dramatic results. “During my first round of orals here at Mason, just over thirty percent of the students participated.The average grade for participants was twenty percent higher than that of the nonparticipants,” Nelson noted. “This result is more dramatic than anything I previously saw; average gains were usually between four and eight percent.” Other learning tools and activities are in the works for the Accelerator, including a course that Edwards has dubbed “STEM 101.” He envisions it as a critical thinking course to prepare students to be able to transfer the ability to analyze and solve problems to any subject. “We have very capable students, but many lack critical thinking skills,” explains Edwards.Taking details from word problems and translating them to formulas seems to be challenging for some students. “We want students to be successful in all the STEM fields,” points out Edwards. “We’re trying early on to develop activities that can have the biggest impact for the most students.”

Within the next five years, there will be at least one commercial space flight “a day,” says Mike Summers, director of the School of Physics, Astronomy, and Computational Sciences. Summers just returned from the 2012 Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference held in Palo Alto, California, where he sits on the program committee and works to advise the group on how to use space vehicles to support education. “There were over 450 registered attendees this year,” says Summers. “This was the most exciting conference we’ve ever had.”  Summer’s excitement about the future of commercial space flight is infectious. “Commercial space exploration leads the way,” he says.Through companies such as Virgin Galactic, XCOR Aerospace, and Space Adventures — just down the road from Mason in Vienna,Virginia — “average people will be able to travel to space,and there will be new venues to study planetary science, climate, and space medicine, and develop new technology.” Former astronaut Neil Armstrong delivered this year’s conference keynote address. He spoke about space exploration in the 1950s and 1960s and the importance of going back into space.Armstrong has not spoken publicly in many years. “He brought back all the excitement about space that I felt as a kid,” says Summers. “The public needs to feel motivated again, and that enthusiasm was felt here.” The next generation of space flight will take tourists not to the moon but rather to suborbital space, which is defined as 100 kilometers above sea level. From there, passengers will experience weightlessness and see the infinite darkness of space and the curvature of the Earth. The cost for the adventure starts at about $100,000.And while that is no small sum, it is attainable for many people and equivalent to mounting an expedition to Mt. Everest. Summers says that many companies are giving flights away to promote their services. But what’s more exciting is that the cost of sending experiments into space will be affordable, somewhere between $5,000 and $10,000. Companies are working with both NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration on safety rules and regulations.

Last fall, the College of Science initiated an annual awards program to recognize those scientists who embody the creativity, dedication, and discoveries that shape today’s world. Congratulations to the 2010–2011 award recipients for their contributions and accomplishments. The Publication Award recognizes high-impact, creative, and well-written scholarly contributions by COS faculty members who are at the forefront of scientific research. Ancha Baranova, School of Systems Biology Iosif Vaisman, School of Systems Biology Yuntao Wu, School of Systems Biology Barney Bishop, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry Chaowei Yang, Department of Geography and Geoinformation Science Lingli Wang, Department of Geography and Geoinformation Science Juan Cebral, School of Physics, Astronomy, and Computational Sciences Predrag Nikolic, School of Physics, Astronomy, and Computational Sciences Mario Gliozzi, School of Physics, Astronomy, and Computational Sciences Timothy DelSole, Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences Patrick Gillevet, Department of Environmental Science and Policy Evelyn Sander, Department of Mathematical Sciences  The Teaching Award recognizes COS faculty members who are outstanding teachers or mentors or who have made major con- tributions to COS educational activities during the previous year. Daniel Cox, School of Systems Biology Monique van Hoek, School of SystemsBiology Charles Madden, Program in Biology Paul Cooper, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry Kevin Curtin, Department of Geography and Geoinformation Science Joseph Weingartner, School of Physics, Astronomy and Computational Sciences Robert Weigel, School of Physics, Astronomy and Computational Sciences Giussepina Kysar Mattetti, Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences Dann Sklarew, Department of Environmental Science and Policy Padmanabhan Seshaiyer, Department of Mathematical Sciences  The Impact Award recognizes individuals who have made major contributions to their field of scientific research or education over the course of their career at Mason. This can be demonstrated in research by high publication and citation rates, or in the case of teaching, by major contributions to COS educational programs and demonstrated excellence in teaching. Fatah Kashanchi, School of Systems Biology

Researchers at the National Center for Biodefense and Infectious Diseases (NCBID) stepped away from their experiments briefly last November to attend the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) 2011 Chemical and Biological Defense Science and Technology Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. DTRA is the U.S. Department of Defense’s official Combat Support Agency for countering weapons of mass destruction. NCBID scientists work with DTRA in the study of highly infectious pathogens that could pose national security threats.At NCBID, they focus on understanding host-pathogen interactions, which is an effective strategy to identify therapeutic targets for both viral and bacterial infections. Conference attendees included Charles Bailey, Myung-Chul Chung, Ramin Hakami, Kylene Kehn-Hall, Serguei Popov, Monique van Hoek, and students Saira Ahmad Chaudhry, Scott Dean, Cathaleen King Madsen, and Rachel Van Duyne. The group presented a total of thirteen posters and an oral presentation. Both Chaudhry and Madsen were awarded DTRA student scholarships that covered their costs to attend the event and present their research findings. “It is a great honor for their doctoral work to have been selected by the review committee as being worthy of scholarship support,” says van Hoek. “I am very proud of Saira and Cathy for their accomplishments.” Chaudhry works in van Hoek’s lab and credits her and the entire team for their support and research expertise. Chaudhry presented a poster on “Inhibition of Francisella Biofilm: Identification of LL-37 Targets.” Madsen, who works for Kehn-Hall, gave an oral presentation about “Changes in Cellular Micro-RNA Following Rift Valley Fever Virus Infection.” Madsen’s research is focused on identification of altered microRNAs following Rift Valley Fever Virus (RVFV) infection, explains Kehn-Hall. RVFV is a Category A select agent and potential bioterror weapon that could have a significant impact on both humans and livestock.  

Come relax with us before finals begin... The College of Science's Office of Academic Affairs will host another pre-finals drop in for its students. We will have light refreshments and friendly conversation on the menu! When: All day on May 3, 2012 Where: Science and Tech 1, Room 103 We hope to see you there!