College of Science Accolades: October - November 2020

The following College of Science faculty have been recognized by students, through the Stearns Center for Teaching and Learning’s Thank-a-Teacher program, for making a significant difference in their lives: Frank Andreani, Tyrus Berry, Joseph Boone, Steven Burmeister, Susan Calderon, Molly Corder, Lorelai Crerar, Andrew Crooks, Karen Crossin, Megan Devine, Benjamin Dreyfus, Maria Emelianenko, Elisabeth Epstein, Yiğit Erdal, Gwendolyn Fondufe, Kenneth Foreman, Gregory Foster, Karl Fryxell, Henry Gallo, Harold Geller, Geoffrey Gilleaudeau, Megan Gisonda, Mario Gliozzi, Greta Herin, Denise Hunnell, Elizabeth Johnson, Rosanne Jones, Mitra Kashani, James Kinter, Malda Kocache, Sean Lawton, David Luther, John Lyver, Charles Madden, Alexandra Masterson, William Matzko, Meadhbh Molloy, Robert Oerter, Otome Okoromoba, Valerie Olmo, Alexander Owen, Giordano Paniconi, Deborah Polayes, Glenn Preston, Jonathon Reed, David Rockwell, Jessica Roman, Pritha Roy, Jennifer Salerno, Anne Scherer, John Schreifels, Stephen Scott, Grace Shin, Jagadish Shukla, Nancy Skacel, Danielle Sponseller, Ponder Thompson-Rummel, Alison Tomson, Brenda Tondi, Apoorva Veerareddy, Stacey Verardo, Anne Verhoeven, David Walnut, Dominic White, and Jacklin Yassa.

Benjamin Cash, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, Center for Ocean-Land- Atmosphere Studies, was awarded $97,656 for “CISESS: UFS Model Infrastructure - Workflow Coordination” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Liping Di, Geography and Geoinformation Science, Spatial Information Science and Systems Center, along with Co-PI Guo Liying, was awarded $397,364 for “Improved understanding and prediction of extreme precipitation in multiple urban systems” by the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR). Prime Sponsor: National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

Paul Dirmeyer, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies, was awarded $156,250 for “CISESS: Validating coupled land-atmosphere processes in UFS” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Amy Fowler, Environmental Science and Policy, was awarded $14,130 for “Rapid Assessment Survey for Introduced Marine Organisms along the Mid-Atlantic (New Jersey to Virginia)” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: Department of the Interior.

Nirmal Ghimire, Physics and Astronomy, co-authored a research article titled “Competing magnetic phases and fluctuation-driven scalar spin schirality in the kahome metal YMn6Sn6”, which was accepted and published in Science Advances. 

Daniel Hanley, Biology, was awarded $147,558 for “Journeys through a colorful world” by the National Geographic Society.

Kathleen Ellen Hunt, Biology, was awarded $99,494 for “"Finding patterns within the noise: Modelling baleen whale response to multiple stressors through replicate physiological sampling of gray whales" by Oregon State University. Prime Sponsor: Office of Naval Research.

Cing-Dao Kan, along with Co-PIs Rudolf Reichert¸ and Dhafer Marzougui, Physics and Astronomy, Center for Collision Safety and Analysis, was awarded $450,925 for “THOR-05F Finite Element Model Development” by the U.S. Department of Transportation.

Jim Kinter, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies, was awarded $39,062 for “CISESS: The Unified Forecast System Research-to- Operations Project” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Dmitri Klimov, School of Systems Biology, was awarded $195,414 for “Origami Antibodies for Threat Sensing SBIR Sequential Phase II - AA3” by the Parabon NanoLabs, Inc. Prime Sponsor: U.S. Army.

Lance Liotta, School of Systems Biology, Center for Applied Proteomics and Molecular Medicine, was awarded $75,000 for “Cellex EUA COVID-19 antigen lateral flow immunoassay” by Cellex. Liotta was also awarded $50,000 for “Memorandum of Agreement with LumiQuick Diagnostics - COVID-19 antibody analysis” by LumiQuick Diagnostics.

Alessandra Luchini, along with Co-PI Lance Liotta, School of Systems Biology, Center for Applied Proteomics and Molecular Medicine, was awarded $431,750 for “Sensitive transrenal Mycobacterium tuberculosis nucleic acid detection” by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

David Luther, Biology, published a paper titled “Global assessment of critical forest and landscape restoration needs for threatened terrestrial vertebrate species” in Global Ecology and Conservation. Luther also published a paper titled “Temporal patterns of visitation of birds and mammals at mineral licks in the Peruvian amazon” in Ecology and Evolution. 

Igor Mazin, Physics and Astronomy, along with co-authors Karen Sauer, Physics and Astronomy, and Jaafar Ansari, a Computational Sciences and Informatics’ graduate student advisee to Mazin and Sauer, published a paper titled “Density functional theory-based electric field gradient database” in Scientific Data. Mazin also published three papers titled “Superconductivity in La2Ni2In,” “Ising Superconductivity and Magnetism in NbSe2,” and “Reduction of the Spin Susceptibility in the Superconducting State of Sr2RuO4 Observed by Polarized Neutron Scattering” in Physical Review.

Mikell Paige, Chemistry and Biochemistry, along with Co-PI Dmitri Klimov, School of Systems Biology, was award $2,850,046 for “Developing capsid-importin alpha inhibitors for the treatment of VEEV infection” by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Aarthi Narayanan, School of Systems Biology, National Center for Biodefense and Infectious Diseases, was awarded $399,117 for “Novel circulating RNA-based markers as diagnostic biomarkers of infectious diseases” by the CFD Research Corporation. Prime Sponsor: U.S. Department of Defense/Army.

Emanuel “Chip” Petricoin, School of Systems Biology, Center for Applied Proteomics and Molecular Medicine, was awarded $561,393 for “Discovery of Protein Biomarkers for Response Prediction to Novel Phase II Targeted Therapy Agents for Stage II/III Breast Cancer Patients in the ISPY2 TRIAL” by the Gateway for Cancer Research.

John Jianhe Qu, Geography and Geoinformation Science, Center for Environmental Science and Technology, was awarded $108,481 for “CISESS: JPSS Life-Cycle Data Reprocessing” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Shobita Satyapal, Physics and Astronomy, was awarded $41,924 for “Academic Fellowship Program for the U.S. Naval Observatory - TO 693” by the U.S. Department of the Navy. Satyapal was also awarded $60,148 for “THE MOST LUMINOUS AGN IN A TRULY BULGELESS DISK GALAXY? THE \NUSTAR\ VIEW OF NGC 4178” by the NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center. Satyapal was also awarded $93,923 for “Academic Fellowship Program for the U.S. Naval Observatory - TO 137” by the U.S. Department of the Navy.

Cristiana Stan, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, was awarded $195,313 for “CISESS: GMU Contributions to the Coupled Model Development Sub-project” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Mingzhen Tian, Physics and Astronomy, along with co-PI Michael Jarret Baume, was awarded $199,650 for “EAGER: QIA: Optimal Synthesis Algorithms for Few-Qubit Fault-Tolerant” by the National Science Foundation.

Daniel Tong, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, Center for Spatial Information Science and Systems, was awarded $121,711 for “CISESS: GMU Improving Dust Weather Hazard Forecasting with JPSS Aerosols and Land Products - 8/1/2020 - 7/31/2021” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Tong was also awarded $741,867 for “CISESS: GMU Air Surface Exchange and Atmospheric Composition Research” by the State of Maryland. Prime Sponsor: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. In addition, Tong was also selected to be a member of NASA’s Health and Air Quality Applied Sciences team.

Zack Chester, a Climate Dynamics’ graduate student, worked alongside Tong and together their research contributions, which seeks to better understand and predict the onset of a dust-born pathogen threatening the U.S. Southwest, were highlighted by NASA Headquarters for “their broader efforts in using Earth science data to support public health.”

Mark Uhen, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, along with George Mason University Alumni Advait Jukar and collaborators, provided the first independent test of the coevolution hypothesis in their article titled “Late Quaternary extinctions in the Indian Subcontinent” in Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.

Andrea Weeks, Biology, was awarded $5,508 for “Recovering native plant diversity in the Piedmont: Gilbert's Corner habitat restoration and native plant demonstration site” by the Virginia Native Plant Society Inc.

Jie Zhang, Physics and Astronomy, was awarded $252,370 for “Physics-based Understanding and Data-constrained Simulations of CME Initiation and Propagation” by the Smithsonian Institute. Prime Sponsor: National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).