Faculty & Staff Accolades: March 2016
Accolades celebrate the professional achievements of the faculty and staff in the College of Science.
Peggy Agouris, College of Science, Center for Earth Observing and Space Research, was awarded $682,082 by NASA and Trident Vintage Systems for her work on Trident/NASA/PPS Data Systems.
Changwoo Ahn, Environmental Science and Policy, published the following articles: “A creative collaboration between the science of ecosystem restoration and art in an urban college campus” in Restoration Ecology and “Carbon storage potential by four herbaceous wetland species as affected by plant functional diversity” in Journal of Environmental Management.
Dieter Bilitza, Physics and Astronomy, was awarded $58,884 by the Air Force (AFRL) and Lowell Digisonde International for their work on LDI/SwRI/AFRL/(HFGeo) Phase 2.
Benjamin Cash, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, chaired a working group on Climate Change and Infectious Disease in association with the Next Einstein Forum in Dakar, Senega.
Paul Delamater, Geography and Geoinformation Science, was awarded $30,507 by Michigan State University for his work on MSU/MDHHS/CON/Health Policy 2016.
Paul Dirmeyer, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, and collaborators, including Jixia Wu and Holly Norton from Mason published Dirmeyer et al., “Confronting weather and climate models with observational data from soil moisture networks over the United States” in the Journal of Hydrometeorology.
Harold Geller, Physics and Astronomy, was the chair of judges in the category of physics and astronomy for the 61st Fairfax County Regional Science and Engineering Fair held at Robinson Secondary School. He participated in Read Across America Day at Daniels Run Elementary School and read “A Pluto Story” by Michael Summers of Physics and Astronomy, and himself to 5th graders. He also participated in a celebration at Thomas Jefferson High School and their newly constructed laboratories and facilities. Gellar was interviewed by Citizens of Tech on their podcast regarding the discovery and nature of gravitational waves. The podcast was broadcast 12 March 2016.
Subhadeep Halder, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, presented a talk entitled “Impact of soil moisture variability on the Indian monsoon” at the Mason Water Research Symposium 2016.
Monique van Hoek, School of Systems Biology, National Center for Biodefense & Infectious Diseases,was invited to give a talk titled “Nanotrap Hydrogel Microparticle Detection of Francisella tularensis” at The Knowledge Foundation’s 24th International Biodetection Technologies conference on Biothreat and Pathogen Detection June 27-28, 2016 in the conference section titled Rapid and Future Technologies for Biodetection. She also gave a seminar in the Department of Biology on March 29th titled “Cranberry extracts have anti-biofilm activity against Pseudomonas aeruginosa”.
Younsung Kim, Environmental Science and Policy, will present her co-authored paper “Climate Change Education as a National Security Issue” at the 2016 Midwest Political Science Association conference in Chicago on April 9th.
Sean Lawton, Mathematical Sciences, was awarded $2,500 by Elsevier Science Inc. for his work on Elsevier/Virtual Reality Research.
Rainald Lohner, Physics and Astronomy, coauthored “Real-Time Micro-Modelling of a Million Pedestrians and “Numerical Simulation of an Object Washout by Floodwater; on Violent Flows” in 2016.
Thomas Lovejoy, Environmental Science and Policy, is one of the five eminent scientists who began service as U.S. Science Envoys in February 2016. The U.S. Science Envoy program demonstrates the United States’ commitment to science, technology, and innovation as tools of diplomacy and economic growth. These distinguished scientists will engage internationally at the citizen and government levels to develop partnerships, improve collaboration, and forge mutually beneficial relationships between other nations and the United States to stimulate increased scientific cooperation and foster economic prosperity. Science Envoys travel as private citizens and help inform the White House, the Department of State, and the scientific community about potential opportunities for cooperation. Lovejoy is the senior fellow at the United Nations Foundation; former president of the Heinz Center for Science, Economics, and the Environment; and founder of the public television series Nature. He is a former senior advisor to the president of the United Nations Foundation and served as the chief biodiversity advisor and lead specialist for the environment for the Latin America region for the World Bank. He is also the former executive vice president of World Wildlife Fund-U.S. As Science Envoy, Lovejoy will focus on biodiversity and wildlife conservation in Latin America and East Asia and the Pacific.
Randolph McBride, Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, is on a 6-month Faculty Study Leave at the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences (SEES) at the University of Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia and is collaborating with colleagues regarding Holocene coastal geology research in southeastern Australia. Also, McBride is a partner investigator on an Australian Research Council (ARC) funded research grant titled “Sedimentary processes on sandy coasts of southern Australia: reconstructing the past to understand future change” for a total award of $289,000.00. McBride and a doctoral candidate in Environmental Science and Policy, published a paper titled “Geomorphic history and diagnostic features of former tidal inlets along Assateague Island, Maryland-Virginia: a life-cycle model for inlets along wave-dominated barrier islands” in the journal Shore & Beach.
Chris Parsons, Environmental Science and Policy, co-authored the articles “The behavioral ecology of Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins in Hong Kong” in Advances in Marine Biology and “Have you got what it takes? Looking at skills and needs of the modern marine conservation practitioner” in the Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences. Parsons along with Erin Peters-Burton, College of Education and Human Development, and Larry Rockwood, Biology, co-authored the article “Boat operators in Bocas del Toro, Panama display low levels of compliance with national whale-watching regulations” in the Journal of Marine Policy.
Emanuel Petricoin, School of Systems Biology, Center for Applied Proteomics and Molecular Medicine, was awarded $39,500 by Medstar Research Institute for his work on Medstar/Analysis Pancreatic Cancer
Philip Rubin, Physics and Astronomy, was awarded $4,800 by the National Science Foundation for his work on NSF/Support for BEACH 2016 Conf. He was also awarded $5,000 by the US Department of Energy for his work on DOE/Support for BEACH 2016 Conf.
Daniel Sklarew, Environmental Science and Policy, was awarded $48,152 by Time Warner Cable for his work on TWC/Go Green Sustainability 2016.
Cynthia Smith, Environmental Science and Policy, served as a National judge for NSTA/Toshiba’s ExploraVision, the world’s largest K-12 science competition which engages the next generation in real world problem solving with a strong emphasis on STEM. ExploraVision challenges students to envision and communicate new technology 20 years in the future through collaborative brainstorming and research of current science and technology. In addition, the Potomac Environmental Research and Education Center’s Watershed Education Program was just notified that we were awarded the Jack Wood Award for Town Gown Relations in the Partnership Initiative category. My community partners include Fairfax County Public Schools and Fairfax County Park Authority. This university-K12-county government partnership proudly supports the federal Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement by not only building science communication skills in the current team of environmental professionals (Mason students and park naturalists) but also by sharing expertise and research tools in hands-on field programs, with over 25,000 local middle school students, who’ll be tasked with managing our environmental resources in the future.
Anthony Stefanidis, Geography and Geoinformation Science, Center for Geospatial Intelligence, gave an invited talk on “Open-Source Geospatial Intelligence” to the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency as part of their “Leaping Forward to the Future” event. He was also awarded $10,000 by Northwest Biotherapeutics for his work on NW Biotherap./Social media analysis.
Michael Summers, Physics and Astronomy, is the author of “Picture of Pluto further refined by months of New Horizons data,” published on The Conversation. The article was also featured on the cover of Science for a special issue on New Horizons. Summers wrote an article for the website now.space describing the discoveries by the New Horizons team. The New Horizons Team will receive the National Air and Space Museum Achievement Award for being the first direct investigation of Kuiper Belt objects in the outer solar system. He was also awarded
$10,000 by NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center for his work on NASA/K2 Photometry of Qatar-2b.
