University News
University of Texas System - Lockheed Martin Team Submits Proposal to Manage Los Alamos National Laboratory
The University of Texas System (UT System) and The Lockheed Martin Corporation (LMC) submitted to the National Nuclear Security Administration's (NNSA) service center in Albuquerque its proposal to manage Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). The proposal finalizes the LMC-UT System bid to manage the laboratory under a new seven year contract that will commence in 2006.
Dr. C. Paul Robinson will become the laboratory director if the team is selected by DOE to become the LANL's operations and management contractor. Lockheed Martin and The University of Texas System are joined by CH2M Hill Corporation and Fluor Corporation as the four key major members of the LMC-UT System Alliance.
One major element of the proposal is the unprecedented nationwide network of universities and university systems led by The University of Texas System that brings together many of the world’s best scientists, researchers and academic resources to support the mission of Los Alamos National Laboratory. Created as part of the Lockheed-UT System bid for the LANL contract, this new limited liability company – Network for Education and Research in Science and Technology, LLC – will provide the United States’ premier national laboratory with innovative opportunities for collaborative research, peer review, educational programs and professional career development.
As the managing member of the company and a full partner in the bid, the University of Texas System undertook the challenge of assembling the best of the best as advisors and partners in the revitalization of the nation’s oldest and most storied national laboratory. The network offers the nation the combined strength of 33 outstanding universities and systems of higher education with a potential for additional new members as the need and opportunity might arise. The current network members collectively conduct more than $7 billion in research every year.
Mark G. Yudof, chancellor of the UT System, said that should the Lockheed-UT System proposal prevail, the team would invite New Mexico universities to become members of the network.
Equally important, Yudof said, the UT System and other universities in the partnership bring extensive successful experience in recruiting, retaining and enhancing the professional development of scientists. The UT System currently works under a memorandum of understanding with Sandia National Laboratories to provide peer review for Sandia’s research programs, participating with the laboratory’s scientists on collaborative research and providing specialized courses to increase educational opportunities at the laboratory.
The NNSA received the Lockheed Martin-UT System proposal at its Albuquerque, N.M., offices. The Department of Energy will announce its selection December 1 with the new management team taking over the lab June 1, 2006. The seven-year contract to manage LANL is renewable annually for an additional 13 years.
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HK$800m Pledged to Hong Kong University
The Fok Ying Tung Foundation has pledged HK$800 million (US$102 million) to the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) to support the University's development as a world academic leader and its initiatives in Mainland China. This is the largest gift made to HKUST since its foundation in 1991.
Of the HK$800 million, HK$300 million will be applied to support the University Grants Committee-funded programs as outlined in the University's Strategic Plan 2005-2020 . This portion is expected to attract additional government funding under the Second Matching Grant Scheme, which commences August 1, 2005.
The remaining HK$500 million will be applied to further research and technology transfer through the establishment of an education and research institute in Nansha, Guangzhou. The University and Foundation are long time partners and, along with the Guangzhou Government, jointly launched the Nansha Information Technology Park in 2002.
Mr Ian Fok Chun Wan, Vice Chairman of the Foundation, presented a check to the University at a donation ceremony held on campus.
This is the second gift made by the Foundation to HKUST. In 2003, the Foundation donated HK$30 million to the University in support of academic and research development.
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UT Southwestern Gets NASA Grant
A team of researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center has embarked on a four-year research mission funded by a US$1.2 million grant from NASA to explore the damage to human DNA caused by radiation that penetrates hulls of spacecrafts and space stations.
Led by principal investigator Dr. Sandeep Burma, assistant professor of radiation oncology, the UT Southwestern team will study how human cells respond to ionizing radiation, which is composed of particles that have sufficient energy to damage components of living cells, especially their DNA, hampering the cells' abilities to repair themselves and reproduce. If such DNA damage is not fixed properly by the cell, it may lead to cancer.
Dr. Burma's research project has become more relevant as NASA astronauts and crews on the International Space Station are spending more time subjected to space radiation than previous generations of astronauts and cosmonauts.
Scientists have long known that space radiation passing through the outer shielding of spacecraft - mostly a specially engineered aluminum - can fragment into other forms of radiation thereby increasing the complexity and, perhaps, the injuriousness of the radiation field inside.
The findings will have implications for the shielding material NASA uses for the outer hull of spacecrafts and for the safety design of spacesuits. Dr. Burma said he also hopes the results may shed light on exactly how human cells respond to the complex DNA damage caused by space radiation that has passed through shielding material, especially on long-term missions.
In his research project, Dr. Burma will take advantage of the capabilities of the booster accelerator at the NASA Space Radiation Laboratory in the Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y. Beams of heavy ions generated at the accelerator will be shot at human cells growing in flasks and will help researchers simulate and measure the direct effects of outer-space radiation compared with that of space radiation that has passed through the shielding material of spacecraft.
Dr. Burma's grant was part of $19 million NASA awarded in June to 21 space radiation research projects and the only one awarded to an academic institution in Texas.
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Center Gets $1 Million Hartford Grant for Geriatric Nursing
The geriatric nursing program in the University of California of San Francisco (UCSF) School of Nursing has received a key grant from The John A. Hartford Foundation to continue its work in educating nurse scientists.
Through a grant from the foundation in 2001, the school launched the UCSF/John A. Hartford Center of Geriatric Nursing Excellence under the leadership of Jeanie Kayser-Jones, RN, PhD, FAAN. She has been the director of the center for the past 5 years.
The UCSF center is one of only five specializing in geriatric nursing in the US funded by the foundation.
The renewal award for US$1,050,000 over the next five years will allow the UCSF center to continue its mission of preparing an exceptional cadre of nurse scientists who will provide academic leadership in the teaching, research and practice of geriatric nursing.
To achieve this goal, the new funding will support strategic initiatives in three target areas of the UCSF center:
• Master’s and doctoral program expansion: Recruit more than 22 students each year for five years, maintain and enhance cultural diversity in the student population, and develop formal educational opportunities for students in palliative care and gero-psychiatry.
• Community and professional outreach: Collaborate with the Northern California Geriatric Education Center as well as hospitals, nursing homes, and home care agencies in the region to share faculty expertise and web-based courses in the gerontology field.
• Leadership development for graduate students in gerontological nursing: Provide structured leadership development experiences, assist students in developing the skills to present papers at professional meetings, and collaborate with the UCSF Institute for Health Policy Studies to help students incorporate policy issues into their future research, practice, and career goals.
Founded in 1929, the John A. Hartford Foundation is committed to training, research and service system innovations that promote the health and independence of America’s older adults.
Through its grant awards, the foundation seeks to strengthen the nation’s capacity to provide effective, affordable care to this rapidly increasing older population by educating "aging prepared" health professionals--physicians, nurses, social workers--and developing innovations that improve and better integrate health and supportive services.
In addition to UCSF, the Foundation funds geriatric nursing centers at the Oregon Health Sciences University, University of Arkansas, University of Iowa, and University of Pennsylvania.
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Cornell President Joins Indian Prime Minister to Open New Chapter in Science Education
India, which has cornered the world economy's virtual backroom, now will bring leading American science, engineering and computing faculty from Cornell University and other top colleges to teach students at Amrita University and other institutions, thanks to EduSat and emerging distance-learning strategies.
Cornell University President Hunter R. Rawlings III signed a three-year agreement with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on July 20 in Washington, D.C., that will bring visiting faculty and disseminate their lectures via EduSat. Carnegie Mellon University, the University at Buffalo, the University of California, UC Berkeley and UC San Diego are partners in the consortium. Qualcomm Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Cadence Design Systems are funding this program.
Cornell has a very strong Indian student presence on campus, with 333 Indian nationals, the fourth-largest international presence on campus.
Cornell maintains eight existing agreements with Indian institutions, mostly in agriculture, according to David Wippman, Cornell vice provost for international affairs. Qualcomm and Microsoft have had long histories with Cornell. Irwin Jacobs, the recently retired founder and CEO of Qualcomm, earned his bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Cornell in 1954. Qualcomm has recently expanded its engineering and business operations in India.
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UGA Taps North Carolina Cancer Researcher as New Vice President for Research
The University of Georgia has chosen as its new vice president for research a University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill science administrator and researcher who specializes in research on growth and regulation of cancer cells.
David Lee, professor and chair of the biochemistry and biophysics department at UNC and leader of the cancer cell biology program in the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, will become UGA’s vice president for research early in fall semester pending approval by the University System of Georgia Board of Regents.
Lee’s appointment was announced today by Arnett C. Mace Jr., UGA’s senior vice president for academic affairs and provost.
Lee, who is also a professor of microbiology and immunology at UNC, was chosen in a national search to succeed Gordhan Patel, who is retiring Aug. 1 after nearly 38 years on the UGA faculty including the last four as research vice president.
Patel, who also served 13 years as dean of the Graduate School and was head of the former zoology department, will be honored at an all-campus ice cream social Sept. 21 from 3 to 5 p.m. on the D.W. Brooks Mall. The rain location will be the Tate Center Reception Hall.
Lee joined UNC in 1985 and since 1991 has been leader of the cancer cell biology program in the Lineberger Center, a part of the UNC School of Medicine. He has headed the biochemistry and biophysics department since 1998.
His research, which deals with growth factors and receptors involved in development of cancer cells, has been supported continuously by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) since 1985 and has resulted in more than 100 scientific publications written with collaborators around the world.
Lee received UNC’s Hettleman Prize for scholarly achievement in 1994 and in 2003 was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has served as both ad hoc and permanent member of several NIH peer review panels.
Lee will oversee research activities in UGA’s 15 academic schools and colleges and in a number of internationally recognized interdisciplinary centers and institutes. With research income of nearly $160 million and research expenditures of about $313 million in the last fiscal year, UGA ranked 22nd among public universities and 34th among all universities in research expenditures, according to the National Science Foundation.
In addition to administering sponsored research programs, the vice president’s office is also responsible for compliance with federal and state regulations governing research; management of research funding and accounting; research communications; development of research infrastructure, such as laboratories and specialized services; and oversight of start-up companies based on discoveries at UGA.
The office also helps protect UGA intellectual property through patents, trademarks and licensing. The university annually receives more than $4 million in licensing and royalties generated through research.
As chair of UNC’s biochemistry and biophysics department Lee introduced several new research initiatives, hired 10 new faculty members, doubled the size of the graduate program, increased the number of student fellowships and started a distinguished women in science lecture program.
Two department faculty members have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences and three to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences during his tenure, and the department has climbed from 30th to eighth in rankings by the NIH.
The cancer cell biology program is the largest basic science program in the Lineberger Cancer Center, which is UNC’s largest research entity. Lee has worked to make the program more interdisciplinary by drawing in faculty from across the UNC campus, and the faculty has grown from 31 to 45 since he’s been program leader. He also worked to enlarge the center’s facilities and he created a cancer cell biology predoctoral training program in the center.
Lee has helped start two model research support facilities, in DNA and histopathology research, in the School of Medicine, and helped provide space and funding for other core facilities in the school.
He has also been a leader in providing better working conditions for postdoctoral students at UNC, helping instate a policy for improvements in minimum salaries, vacations and grievance procedures. He also created a graduate core course in cell biology and a science ethics course for entering graduate students.
Lee holds a bachelor’s degree in biology from Stanford University and received his doctorate in biochemistry at the University of Washington. He did postdoctoral work in biological chemistry at Washington University and in pharmacology at the University of Washington. Before joining UNC he worked two years as a senior scientist for Oncogen Corp, a subsidiary of Bristol-Myers.
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MIT Engineers an Anti-cancer Smart Bomb
Imagine a cancer drug that can burrow into a tumor, seal the exits and detonate a lethal dose of anti-cancer toxins, all while leaving healthy cells unscathed.
MIT researchers have designed a nanoparticle to do just that.
The dual-chamber, double-acting, drug-packing "nanocell" proved effective and safe, with prolonged survival, against two distinct forms of cancers-melanoma and Lewis lung cancer-in mice.
The work will be reported in the July 28 issue of Nature, with an accompanying commentary. Ram Sasisekharan, a professor in MIT's Biological Engineering Division, is the leader of the research team.
"The fundamental challenges in cancer chemotherapy are its toxicity to healthy cells and drug resistance by cancer cells," Sasisekharan said. "So cancer researchers were excited about anti-angiogenesis," the theory that cutting off the blood supply can starve tumors to death. That strategy can backfire, however, because it also starves tumor cells of oxygen, prompting them to create new blood vessels and instigate metastasis and other self-survival activities.
The next obvious solution would be combining chemotherapy and anti-angiogenesis-dropping the bombs while cutting the supply lines. But combination therapy confronted an inherent engineering problem. "You can't deliver chemotherapy to tumors if you have destroyed the vessels that take it there," Sasisekharan said. Also, the two drugs behave differently and are delivered on different schedules: anti-angiogenics over a prolonged period and chemotherapy in cycles.
"We designed the nanocell keeping these practical problems in mind," he said. Using ready-made drugs and materials, "we created a balloon within a balloon, resembling an actual cell," explains Shiladitya Sengupta, a postdoctoral associate in Sasisekharan's laboratory.
In addition to Sasisekharan and Sengupta, the co-authors are David Eavarone, Ishan Capila and Ganlin Zhao of MIT's Biological Engineering Division; Nicki Watson of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research; and Tanyel Kiziltepe of MIT's Department of Chemistry.
The team loaded the outer membrane of the nanocell with an anti-angiogenic drug and the inner balloon with chemotherapy agents. A "stealth" surface chemistry allows the nanocells to evade the immune system, while their size (200 nanometers) makes them preferentially taken into the tumor. They are small enough to pass through tumor vessels, but too large for the pores of normal vessels.
Once the nanocell is inside the tumor, its outer membrane disintegrates, rapidly deploying the anti-angiogenic drug. The blood vessels feeding the tumor then collapse, trapping the loaded nanoparticle in the tumor, where it slowly releases the chemotherapy.
The team tested this model in mice. The double-loaded nanocell shrank the tumor, stopped angiogenesis and avoided systemic toxicity much better than other treatment and delivery variations.
But it is patient survival and quality of life that really inspire this research, Sasisekharan said. Eighty percent of the nanocell mice survived beyond 65 days, while mice treated with the best current therapy survived 30 days. Untreated animals died at 20.
"It's an elegant technique for attacking the two compartments of a tumor, its vascular system and the cancer cells," said Judah Folkman of Children's Hospital Boston. "This is a very neat approach to drug delivery," said MIT Institute Professor Robert Langer.
The nanocell worked better against melanoma than lung cancer, indicating the need to tweak the design for different cancers. "This model enables us to rationally and systematically evaluate drug combinations and loading mechanisms," says Sasisekharan. "It's not going to stop here. We want to build on this concept."
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Evelynn Hammonds Named Senior Vice Provost for Faculty Development and Diversity
Evelynn Hammonds, professor of the history of science and of African and African American Studies, has been named senior vice provost for Faculty Development and Diversity at Harvard University, Provost Steven E. Hyman announced on July 20.
Hyman said the new position - a joint recommendation of the Task Force on Women Faculty and the Task Force on Women in Science and Engineering - will address the need for more systematic analysis and review of appointments, with an eye to ensuring greater excellence and diversity in faculty ranks across the University.
In addition to overseeing the implementation of recommendations developed by both task forces in spring 2005, Hammonds, as senior vice provost, will review junior faculty and other term appointments across the University, serve as an adviser to the president and provost in the ad hoc tenure process, and oversee the administration of funds designated to facilitate appointments of outstanding scholars who contribute to increased faculty diversity. She will participate in the annual academic planning process chaired by the provost and develop annual reports on the status of diversity and development efforts across the University.
In close collaboration with the faculty and School deans, Hammonds will also focus on improving the climate for women and underrepresented racial and ethnic groups on campus through the systematic collection and analysis of faculty demographic and appointments data, the implementation of University-wide diversity education programs, the development of junior faculty mentoring programs, and a variety of other initiatives.
Reporting directly to the president and provost, the Office of the Senior Vice Provost for Faculty Development and Diversity will be supported by two advisory committees: the University Committee on Faculty Development and Diversity, comprised of School representatives designated by the deans, and an advisory committee of senior faculty members selected by Hammonds to assist with the administration of the Faculty Development and Diversity Fund. As senior vice provost, she will also be a member of the Academic Advisory Group, which includes the deans of the faculties, the president, and the provost.
One of Hammonds' first projects in the position will be to undertake a survey of junior faculty, developed by researchers at Harvard's Graduate School of Education and administered at an array of peer universities, aimed at measuring the climate for junior faculty. "If we are indeed going to change the focus of the University toward really promoting from within, then that means we need to have a much clearer understanding of the needs and concerns of current junior faculty," she said.
Hammonds, who chaired the Task Force on Women Faculty, joined the Harvard faculty in 2002. She graduated from Spelman College with a B.S. in physics, earned a B.E.E. in electrical engineering from Georgia Tech, received her master's degree in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and her Ph.D. in the history of science from Harvard. Previously she was professor of the history of science at MIT where she was the founding director of the Center for Diversity in Science, Technology, and Medicine. Her areas of expertise include the history of scientific, medical, and socio-political concepts of race; the history of disease and public health; gender in science and medicine; and African-American history. She is the author of "Childhood's Deadly Scourge: The Campaign to Control Diphtheria in New York City," 1880-1930 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999) and she is completing a book on the history of race in science and medicine titled, "The Logic of Difference: A History of Race in Science and Medicine in the United States." Hammonds has participated in several national projects addressing the issue of women and minorities in science and engineering. Locally, she chairs the Race/Science Workshop that brings together scholars from throughout the greater Boston area whose work focuses on this topic. Hammonds is also a trustee of Bennett College for Women in Greensboro, N.C.
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Cliatt Appointed Media Relations Manager
Casundra (Cass) Cliatt, a Princeton alumna who has worked in journalism and public relations, has been named Princeton University's media relations manager.
She joined the Office of Communications staff on July 18, and will serve as the primary spokesperson and coordinate external coverage of the University.
She will report to Lauren Robinson-Brown, director of communications.
For the past two years, Cliatt has been deputy director of communications/policy for the Cook County clerk's office in Chicago. She helped implement a communications plan to inform constituent groups about new procedures mandated by a federal election reform bill and served as a liaison with the media.
She was a reporter between 1999 and 2003 for Illinois' third largest newspaper, the Daily Herald based in Arlington Heights. Cliatt covered major crimes, social service and municipal government.
She worked at the Battle Creek ( Mich.) Enquirer from 1997 to 1999. In addition to reporting, she led a community diversity program that brought together reporters and members of civic, nonprofit and municipal groups to develop priorities for news coverage.
She has received awards from the Michigan Press Association, Gannett, the Chicago Headline Club and the Northern Illinois Newspaper Association for her reporting.
Cliatt earned her A.B. in English with a certificate in Spanish from Princeton in 1996. While an undergraduate, she served as editor-in-chief of the Student Guide to Princeton, a 165-page publication written by students and alumni for new students. She completed an M.S. in journalism as a Brown Fellowship recipient at Northwestern University in 1997.
Cliatt succeeds Patty Allen, who has relocated to Ohio. Eric Quiñones, who has been serving as interim media relations manager, has been named a senior writer on the communications staff, working primarily on the Princeton Weekly Bulletin and other internal communications vehicles.
