Sigma Xi Distinguished Lecturers, 2011-2012

Abstracts

Potential hosts should contact lecturers directly to book events. In making arrangements, hosts should be specific about dates, lecture topic, scope of the lecturer's visit and any special accommodations that may be called for.

Each lecturer has designated his or her topic(s) for three different types of audiences. Where more than one level is shown, the lecture can be adjusted to the needs of the audience:

• P (Public)
  Aimed at presenting scientific issues of general concern to a public audience.

   

• G (General)
  Intended for a normal Sigma Xi audience of both scientists and other scholars representing a broad range of disciplines.

   

• S (Specialized)
  Aimed at scientists and students in fields that are closely related to that of the lecturer.

Mark Batzer

Boyd Professor and Mary Lou Applewhite Distinguished Professor, Louisiana State University
Dept. of Biological Sciences
Louisiana State University 
202 Life Sciences Bldg.
Baton Rouge, LA 70803 
Phone: 225-578-7102
Email: MBATZER@LSU.EDU
http://batzerlab.lsu.edu

1. The Impact of Retrotransposons on Human Genome Evolution (G,S)
2. Mobile Elements and Primate Genomic Variation (G,S)
3. Mobile Elements: a Novel Source of Primate Genomic Variation (G,S)

Dr. Mark Batzer is currently an LSU System Boyd Professor and Dr. Mary Lou Applewhite Distinguished Professor, Department of Biological Sciences at Louisiana State University. Dr. Batzer’s research interests focus on comparative genomics, mobile DNA, forensics, and computational biology. Dr. Batzer received his B.S. Degree from Michigan State University in 1983, and continued there until 1985, when he received his M.S. In 1988, he completed his doctorate in Genetics/Zoology at LSU, after which he completed a postdoc in Molecular Genetics at the LSU Health Sciences Center in 1992. Dr. Batzer completed his postdoctoral education in the Human Genome Center at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, where he continued as a Biomedical Scientist until 1995. Subsequently, Dr. Batzer joined the Dept. of Pathology at the LSU Health Sciences Center in 1995, and was promoted to Associate Professor in 1998. Dr. Batzer moved to the Dept. of Biological Sciences at LSU as a Full Professor in 2001. Dr. Batzer has previously been named the George C. Kent Professor of Life Sciences (2005), and the Andrew C. Pereboom Alumni Departmental Professor (2006) prior to being named LSU System Boyd Professor and Dr. Mary Lou Applewhite Distinguished Professor in 2008. Dr. Batzer has received an LSU Alumni Association Faculty Excellence Award (2005), LSU Distinguished Faculty Award (2007) and been named an LSU Rainmaker (top 100 faculty in research and creativity) in 2008 and 2009. Dr. Batzer has also been elected an AAAS fellow (2007) and named an HHMI Distinguished Mentor (2008). Dr. Batzer currently serves as a member of the New York State Forensic DNA advisory board, an Executive Editor for Analytical Biochemistry, Associate Editor for Genomics, Academic Editor for PLoS ONE, Editor-in-Chief for Gene and as member of the Editorial Boards for Mobile DNA, Investigative Genetics and the Repeated DNA Sequence Data Base.

Susan Birren

Professor of Neurobiology, Brandeis University
Department of Biology, M/S 008
Brandeis University 
415 South Street 
Waltham, MA 02454 
Phone: 781-736-2680
Email: birren@brandeis.edu
Web:http://www.bio.brandeis.edu/faculty/birren.html

1. How the brain loses its balance in autism and other disorders (P)
2. Balancing excitation and inhibition in the nervous system: Building a brain that works and a heart that doesn't work too hard (G)
3. Developmental regulation of excitation and inhibition in the mammalian nervous system (S)

Professor in the Department of Biology, Neuroscience Program Volen Center for Complex Systems National Center for Behavioral Genomics Brandeis University Susan Birren is a professor of Biology and Neuroscience and a member of the Volen Center for Complex Systems at Brandeis University. She received her Ph.D. in Biological Chemistry from UCLA and carried out postdoctoral work in Neuroscience at the California Institute of Technology where she became interested in the development of the mammalian nervous system. Her current research addresses how the nervous system establishes and maintains activity patterns at levels that allow normal function. This work focuses on two critical physiological systems- the brain and the heart. Disruptions in the balance of excitatory and inhibitory neural activity have dire consequences in each of these systems. In the brain the loss of such homeostasis can lead to epilepsy or to developmental disorders such as autism. In the cardiac system, imbalances in excitation and inhibition underlie a range of cardiovascular disorders including hypertension and heart failure.

S. Douglass Gilman

Associate Professor of Chemistry, Louisiana State University
232 Choppin Hall
Department of Chemisry
Louisiana State University
Baton Rouge LA 70810
Phone: 225-578-3010
Email: sdgilman@lsu.edu
Website:http://chemistry.lsu.edu/site/People/Faculty/
Doug%20Gilman/item1091.html

1. Protein Aggregation and Disease: Is Chemical Analysis up to the Challenge (G,S) 
   
2. Microfluidics and Chemistry: Why a Bioanalytical Chemist Dabbles in Fluid Dynamics and Magnetics (G,S) 
   
3. Studying Enzyme Inhibition with Electrophoresis - Migrating Through the Chemist's Bucket (G,S) 

Doug Gilman is an Associate Professor of Chemistry at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. He earned a B.S. in Chemistry at Harvey Mudd College in 1989 where he carried out undergraduate research in synthetic chemistry under the direction of Bill Daub. Doug attended graduate school at Penn State University, working in the areas of bioanalytical chemistry and neuroscience in the laboratory of Andy Ewing. After completing his Ph.D. in 1994, Doug accepted a postdoctoral position with Bruce Hammock, in the Departments of Entomology and Environmental Toxicology at UC Davis. In 1997 Doug started as an Assistant Professor at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. In 2004 he moved to LSU where his research program focuses on the development of new bioanalytical techniques to study enzyme inhibition and protein aggregation. He also studies electroosmotic flow dynamics and the immobilization of magnetic particles in capillaries and microfluidic devices.

American Meteorological Society Lecturer

Franco Einaudi

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Retired
Phone: 410 964 0839
Email: Franco.Einaudi@GMAIL.COM

1. Weather and Climate: Its Science, its Applications and its Challenges(P,G)
2. The Role of Physics in Atmospheric, Ocean and Earth Science (G,S)
3. The Role of Satellites in Studying the Earth's Environment (G,S)

Biography:

Dr. Franco Einaudi received his bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the Politecnico of Turin, Italy and his M.S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering with specialization in plasma physics and atmospheric sciences from Cornell University.

Dr. Einaudi retired last January from the position of Director of the Earth Sciences Division at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, position that he held for 10 years. In this position, Dr. Einaudi was responsible for planning, organizing, and evaluating a broad program of scientific research, both theoretical and experimental, in the study of the Earth. The program ranged from basic research to the development of flight experiments, to mission operations and data analysis.

Dr. Einaudi's career has included two years as a postdoctoral fellow at the Physics Department of the University of Toronto, ten years with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences of the University of Colorado in Boulder, Colorado, and seven and a half years at the Georgia Institute of Technology as Professor of Geophysical Sciences.

Prior to becoming Division Director, Dr. Einaudi was the Chief of the Laboratory for Atmospheres (1990-2000), and Head of the Severe Storms Branch, now called the Mesoscale Atmospheric Processes Branch (1988-1990).

An atmospheric dynamicist, Einaudi is recognized nationally and internationally for his work on gravity waves, gravity waves/turbulence interaction, propagation of gravity waves in a moist atmosphere, and the role of gravity waves in initiating and interacting with storms.

Dr. Einaudi is a fellow of the American Meteorological Society, a fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and is a member of the American Geophysical Union.

He served as President of the American Meteorological Society in 2006.

Ted Goebel

Associate Professor of Anthropology, Professorship in First Americans Studies, and Associate Director, Center for the Study of the First Americans at Texas A&M University
Department of Anthropology
Texas A&M University 
College Station TX 77843 
Phone: 979-862-4544
Email: goebel@tamu.edu

1. The Ice-Age Dispersal of Humans to the Americas: Do Stones, Bones, and Genes Tell the Same Story? (P.G)
2. The Search for the Origins of the First Americans: A New Prehistory of the Bering Land Bridge (P,G)
3. Humans at the End of the Ice Age: Coping with Climate Change, Circa 10,000 BC (P,G)

Ted Goebel is an archaeologist who studies the Ice Age dispersal of modern humans to the Americas. His field work has been primarily in Siberia, Alaska, and the intermountain west of the United States, and he has investigated archaeological sites spanning from more than 50,000 years ago to 10,000 years ago. He earned his B.A. degree from Washington and Lee University in 1986, and his Ph.D. degree from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks in 1993. Goebel's dissertation focused on the emergence of modern humans and the Middle-to-Upper-Paleolithic transition in Siberia. Since then, his research has investigated the peopling of Beringia. He has excavated important archaeological sites containing some of the earliest evidence of humans in Beringia, and most recently directed field research at Serpentine Hot Springs, the Ice Age archaeological site yet found on the Bering Land Bridge itself. This site is significant in that it contains the first dated fluted spearpoints in Alaska, a hallmark of Clovis and other Paleoindian cultures in temperate North America. In the Great Basin of the western U.S., Goebel's research has focused on the transition from the Pleistocene to the Holocene, a period of significant climate change and human adaptation. Since 2000, he has directed excavations at the multi-layered Bonneville Estates Rockshelter (a dry cave in eastern Nevada), which contains a series of well-preserved cultural layers spanning from about 13,000 years ago to historic times. Goebel's research has been reported in a series of journal articles in Science, Current Anthropology, and Journal of Archaeological Science. Currently Goebel is Professor of Anthropology and Texas A&M University. He holds the Endowed Professorship in First Americans Studies and is Associate Director of the Center for the Study of the First Americans.

Paula Hammond 

Bayer Professor of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Department of Chemical Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Room 66-352
77 Massachusetts Ave
Cambridge MA 02139
Phone: 617.258.7577
Email: hammond@mit.edu
Website: http://web.mit.edu/hammond/lab/

1. Self Assembly of Responsive Thin Films (G,S)
   
2. Nanoscale Assembly for Targeted Drug and Gene Delivery (G,S)

Paula Hammond currently serves as the Bayer Professor of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She received her Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1993. Her current research interests include macromolecular design and synthesis, directed assembly using surface templates, nanoscale design of biomaterials, block copolymers, asymmetric morphologies and liquid crystalline polymeric materials.

In 1994 Dr. Hammond was awarded the NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Chemistry while performing postdoctoral research in the Harvard University Chemistry Dept as a member of the Whitesides research group. In 2000, Professor Hammond was awarded the Junior Bose Faculty Award, and the GenCorp Signature University Award. She has also received the NSF Career Award, the EPA Early Career Award, the DuPont Young Faculty Award, and the 3M Innovation Fund Award. Dr. Hammond was one of a group of key faculty members involved in the planning and writing of the proposal for the Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies (ISN) at MIT.

Wesley L. Harris

Professor and Associate Provost, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
471 Memorial Drive
Suite 100
Cambridge MA 02139-4319
Phone: 617-253-0911
Email: weslhar@mit.edu

1. The Face of American Science (P,G,S)

Wesley Harris currently serves as the Draper Professor of Aeronautics and Associate Provost, MIT. He has served as Head of the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, MIT. Served as Associate Administrator for Aeronautics, NASA; Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer, University of Tennessee Space Institute; Dean, School of Engineering, University of Connecticut. Held faculty and administrative positions at MIT, 1972-1985. Research foci: unsteady aerodynamics, aeroacoustics, rarefied gas dynamics, sustainment of capital assets, and chaos in sickle cell disease. Held distinguished, endowed professorships and lectureships. In addition, Dr. Harris served on various boards and committees of the NRC, NSF, the U.S. Army Science Board, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, the American Helicopter Society, and the National Technical Association. Served as a member of the Board of Trustees, Princeton University. Earned BS degree in Aerospace Engineering, University of Virginia; MA and PhD in Aerospace and Mechanical Sciences, Princeton University. Fellow: AIAA, AHS, and NTA. Elected to NAE.

Gene Helfman 

Emeritus Professor, Odum School of Ecology, University of Georgia
Phone: 360-468-2136
Email: genehelfman@gmail.com

1. Fishing Is(n't)Murder: The Ethics of Sportfishing (P,G)
2. Fishes versus Fisheries: Can Humans be Prudent Predators? (P,G,S)

Gene Helfman taught at the University of Georgia from 1981 to 2007, specializing in ichthyology, behavioral ecology, and fish conservation. His background includes commercial salmon, tuna, and big-game fishing and three years in the Peace Corps in Palau, Western Caroline Islands, in fisheries management and tropical conservation. His earlier research involved diving observations of predator-prey interactions among fishes in lakes and on coral reefs. More recently, his research focused on effects of land use practices on stream fishes, impacts of invasive species, and marine protected areas.

Dr. Helfman has authored an ichthyology textbook, "The Diversity of Fishes", now in its 2nd edition, and a global fish conservation book, “Fish Conservation”. He has served on editorial boards for Environmental Biology of Fishes and Copeia, and edited the Marine Fisheries Newsletter for the American Fisheries Society. He has been a member of the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists' Board of Governors, chairing that society's Conservation Committee. He was a member of the National Research Council's Klamath Basin Study Committee, and the US Agency for International Development’s Sustainable Fisheries Assessment Team. He currently serves on the Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee of American Rivers, on a National Marine Fisheries Service Salmon Recovery Committee, on two fish Specialist Groups for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (Freshwater Fish Specialist Group, Salmon Specialist Group), and on the IUCN Red List Committee.

Dr. Helfman now lives on Lopez Island, WA. He participates in citizen science studies of habitat use in juvenile salmon, is on the board of a local marine conservation non-profit, reviews funding proposals for salmon research in the San Juan Islands, and fishes for salmon with limited success from a 28 foot sailboat named Chinook.

Anthony Johnson 

Director of the Center for Advanced Studies in Photonics Research and Professor of Physics and Computer Science & Electrical Engineering, University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC)
Center for Advanced Studies in Photonics Research (CASPR)
University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC)
TRC Bldg., Rm 029, 1000 Hilltop Circle
Baltimore, MD 21250 
Phone: 410-455-8440
Email: amj@umbc.edu
Web:http://www.umbc.edu/caspr/johnson%20bio.html

1. Photonics, Diversity and Mentoring -- Over 30 Years of Experiences and Strategies on an African-American Physicist(P,G,S)
2. Ultrafast Optical Characterization of Novel Nanoscale Materials(G,S)

Anthony M. Johnson has been the Director of the Center for Advanced Studies in Photonics Research (CASPR) and Professor of Physics and Computer Science & Electrical Engineering at the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) since 2003. He received a B.S. in Physics (1975) from Polytechnic Institute of New York and a PhD in Physics (1981) from City College of the City University of New York. His PhD thesis research was conducted at AT&T Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, NJ, with support from the Bell Labs Cooperative Research Fellowship Program for Minorities. He was a Distinguished Member of Technical Staff in the Photonic Circuits Research Department at Bell Labs in Holmdel, NJ, where he spent 14 years before joining New Jersey Institute of Technology (1995), where he was Chairperson and Distinguished Professor of Physics until 2003. His current research interests include the ultrafast photophysics and nonlinear optical properties of bulk, nanostructured, and quantum well semiconductor structures, ultrashort pulse propagation in fibers and high-speed lightwave systems. He served as a member of the Board of Directors of the American Physical Society (APS) [94-97], the IEEE Lasers & Electro-Optics Society, currently called the Photonics Society [93-95], the Optical Society of America (OSA) [93-96 & 00-03] and the American Institute of Physics (AIP) [02-08] He was elected the 2002 President of the OSA; Editor-in-Chief of Optics Letters (95-01); member of the DOE Basic Energy Sciences Advisory Committee [BESAC] (99-08); member of the NRC/NAS Committee on AMO2010: Atomic, Molecular and Optical Science (05-06); and member (05-08) and Chair (09-10) of the IEEE Photonics Society Fellows Evaluation Committee. He is an elected Fellow of the APS [1995], the OSA [1991], the IEEE [2000], the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) [1996] and the National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP) [1992].

Laurie E. Locascio

Chief of the Biochemical Science Division, Chemical Science and Technology Laboratory, National Institute of Standards and Technology
Analytical Chem Division
National Institute of Standards and Technology
100 Bureau Dr
Gaithersburg, MD 20899
Phone: 301-975-3130
Email: laurie.locascio@nist.gov

1. Biological Applications of Microfluidics (P,G,S)
   

Dr. Laurie E. Locascio is a Project Leader and Biomedical Engineer in the Analytical Chemistry Division within the Chemical Science and Technology Laboraotry at NIST. She has published more than 60 papers, and has filed for 6 patents in the fields of microfluidics, biosensors and sensor/flow systems. Her current research efforts involve the design and application of microfluidic chemical systems, also known as "lab-on-a-chip" devices. This work focuses on the development of new methods for microfabrication and microsystems integration; development of fundamental methods for accurately measuring flow and temperature in microsystems; development of new methods for improved microchemical separations and detection; and the development of microscale methods to facilitate single molecule measurement and manipulation. Much of her earlier work involved the development of new methods for low-level detection of clinical and environmental analytes utilizing biological receptors for analyte recognition and employing both otpical and electrochemical elements. Some of her honors and awards include the following; US Department of Commerce Certificate of Recognition 1987, 1989, 1990; US Department of Commerce Bronze Medal Award,1991; and National Institute of Standards & Technology Applied Research Award, 1993; and National Tour Speaker for the Society of Applied Spectroscopy, 1994. Dr. Locascio is a member of the journal of Analytical Chemistry Editorial Advisory Board, the American Chemical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and Sigma Xi, and is a participant in review panels for the ATP, DAPRA, NSF and NIH. Dr. Locascio is a co-chair of the 2003 Gordon Research Conference on the Physics and Chemistry of Microfluidics.

Christine Ortiz 

Dean for Graduate Education
Professor of Materials Science and Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology 
RM 13-4022 (Research)
RM 3-132 (ODGE)
77 Massachusetts Avenue 
Cambridge, MA 02139 USA 
Email : cortiz@mit.edu
Phone: 617-253-1957 
Web (Research) :http://web.mit.edu/cortiz/www/
Web (ODGE): http://web.mit.edu/odge

1. Nanomechanics of Musculoskeletal Tissues
2. Natural Armor: An Untapped Encyclopedia of Engineering Designs
3. Biological Structural Materials: Interdisciplinary Convergence of Engineering, Architecture and Evolutionary Biology

Gregory M. Paoli

President, Decisionalysis Risk Consultants, Inc.
Decisionalysis Risk Consultants
1831 Yale Ave
Ottawa, ON K1H 6S3
Canada
Phone: 613-260-1424
Email: gpaoli@RiskSciencesInt.com
Web: http://analyzerisk.com/bio_gpaoli.html

1. Key Themes from the NRC Report, Science and Decisions: Advancing Risk Assessment (P, G, S)
2. Accounting for Public Risks in Enterprise Risk Management Systems (P, G, S)

Greg Paoli serves as Principal Risk Scientist at Risk Sciences International, a consulting firm specializing in risk assessment, management and communication in the field of public health, safety and risk-based decision-support. Greg has experience in diverse risk domains including toxicological, microbiological, and nutritional hazards, air and water quality, climate change impacts, medical and engineering devices, as well as emergency planning and response for natural and man-made disasters. He specializes in probabilistic risk assessment methods, the development of risk-based decision-support tools and comparative risk assessment. Mr. Paoli has served on a number of expert committees devoted to the risk sciences. He was a member of the U.S. National Research Council committee that issued the 2009 report, Science and Decisions: Advancing Risk Assessment. He serves on the Canadian Standards Association Technical Committee on Risk Management, advisory committees of the National Roundtable on the Environment and the Economy, an NRC Standing Committee on the Use of Public Health Data at the Food Safety and Inspection Service, and has served on several expert committees convened by the World Health Organization. He has provided training in risk assessment methods and consulting services in many countries around the world. Greg is a member of the Editorial Board of Risk Analysis: An International Journal. Greg holds a Bachelor's Degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering and a Master's Degree in Systems Design Engineering from the University of Waterloo.

Jose-Antonio de la Peña 

Full professor Instituto de Matemáticas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)
Instituto de Matemáticas UNAM 
Ciudad Universitaria
Mèxico City 
Mexico 
Phone: +5255-53228131
Email: jap@matem.unam.mx

1. Mathematics in the movies (P)
2. Mathematics as a human endeavor (G)
3. Scientific and social networks: a mathematical view (P,G,S)

Dr. de la Peña received his doctoral degree in Mathematics from the National University of Mexico at 1983 and made a postdoctoral stay at Zurich from 1984 to 1986. Since then he has a research position at Instituto de Matemáticas of UNAM, institution he directed from 1998 to 2006. His areas of expertise are the representation theory of algebras, the spectral theory of graphs and network theory where he has published more than 100 papers in indexed journals with more than 800 citations. He has supervised 7 doctoral thesis, two of which won the best doctoral dissertation prize of the Mexican Academy of Sciences. He has published several text books in mathematics at pre-graduate, graduate and postgraduate levels, dozens of articles for popularization of science and directed the design and construction of the Hall of Mathematics at the Museum of Science Universum (1989-1992). He has been invited as lecturer to countries in North and South America, Europe and Asia.

He was President of the Mexican Mathematical Society (1988-1990), President of the Mexican Academy of Sciences (2002-2004), President of the Mathematical Union of Latin America and the Caribbean (2001-2008). He is member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences, the Sigma-Xi Society and several mathematical societies. Among other distinctions he won the TWAS Award in Mathematics (2002), the National Prize of Mexico in Science and Arts (2005) and the Humboldt Prize (2006). Since 2007 he is Deputy Director General for Science of the National Council for Science and Technology of Mexico.

William Tad Pfeffer 

Professor, Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research and Department of Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering, University of Colorado
Phone: 303-258-7035
Email: pfeffer@tintin.colorado.edu

1. Future Sea Level: Where do we go from here? (P)
2. Land Ice and Sea Level: icebergs, rivers, and new coastlines (G)
3. Land Ice Instabilities: How glaciers tip the scales toward faster sea level rise (G,S)

Howard Pinderhughes

Associate Professor and Chair, University of California, San Francisco
Social and Behavioral Sciences Department
3333 California Street Suite 455
University of California, San Francisco
San Francisco CA 94118
Phone: 415 502-5074
Email: howard.pinderhughes@ucsf.edu
Website:http://nurseweb.ucsf.edu/www/ffpindh.htm

1. Love Is Blind: Relationship Violence Among Inner City Youth (P,G)

Howard Pinderhughes is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco. His research examines race relations among youth, the causes and consequences of youth violence, the dynamics of adolescent relationship violence and the role of race and ethnicity in the production of health disparities. He is the author of Race in the Hood: Conflict and Violence Among Urban Youth, a study of racial attitudes among youth and racial violence in New York City. Dr. Pinderhughes is currently writing a book, Dealing With Danger: How Inner City Youth Cope with the Violence that Surrounds them that examines how urban youth think about, experience and make decisions about the use of violence. He has developed comprehensive violence prevention plans for San Francisco and Alameda Counties and is the Director of Education for the Center on Culture, Immigration and Youth Violence Prevention

William N. Ryerson

President, Population Media Center - Shelburne, Vermont
Population Media Center
Suite 2011, 145 Pine Haven Shores Road
P.O. Box 547
Shelburne, VT 05482
Phone: 802-985-8156
Email: ryerson@populationmedia.org
Website: www.populationmedia.org

1. Application of Albert Bandura's Social Cognitive Theory to Practical Issues of Reproductive Health and Population Trends in Developing Countries (S)

William Ryerson is the Population Media Center's founder and President and President of The Population Institute. He has a 40-year history of working in the field of reproductive health worldwide. He is a global leader in using prime-time serialized melodramas in various developing countries to create characters who evolve into positive role models for the audience to bring about use of family planning and elevation of women's status. He received a B.A. from Amherst College and an M.Phil. from Yale University. He served as Director of the Population Institute's Youth and Student Division, Development Director of Planned Parenthood Southeastern Pennsylvania, Associate Director of Planned Parenthood of Northern New England and Executive Vice President of Population Communications International before founding Population Media Center in 1998. In 2006, he was awarded the Nafis Sadik Prize for Courage from the Rotarian Action Group on Population and Development. He became President of the Population Institute in 2008.

Michael Summers

Professor and Investigator, University of Maryland Baltimore County, and Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Phone: 410-227-4200
Email: summers@hhmi.umbc.edu
Web: www.hhmi.umbc.edu

1. Mentoring and Retention of Minority Scientists (P,G,S)
2. Structural basis for HIV-1 assembly and genome packaging in infected cells (G,S)

Dr. Michael F. Summers received his B.S. degree in Chemistry from the University of West Florida in 1980, his Ph.D. degree in 1984 from Emory University, and was a postdoctoral fellow at the NIH from 1984-1987. He joined the faculty at the University of Maryland Baltimore County as an Assistant Professor in 1987, and was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 1991 and to Full Professor in 1996. In 1994 he was appointed as an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He currently serves on the Advisory Council for the NIH Office of AIDS Research. He is an Associate Editor for the Journal of Molecular Biology and a member of the editorial advisory board of the Journal of Biomolecular NMR. Dr. Summers' research focuses on NMR studies of proteins and macromolecular interactions, with a major emphasis on the structural proteins that comprise the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV-1). His laboratory typically includes large numbers of students from diverse backgrounds, and he has led efforts to develop programs for retaining minority students in the sciences. Dr. Summers is a recipient of the Emily M. Gray Mentoring Award of the Biophysical Society, the ASBMB Award for Exemplary Contributions to Education, the Mentor Award of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Society for Microbiology Hinton Award for Mentoring, the White House Presidential Award for Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring, the ACS Maryland Chemist of the Year award, and the Protein Society (DuPont-Merck) Young Investigator Award.

Sheryl A. Tucker

Associate Dean of the Graduate School and Professor of Chemistry, University of Missouri
210 Jesse Hall
University of Missouri
Columbia, MO 65211
Phone: 573-884-1402
Email: TuckerS@missouri.edu
Website: http://sheryltucker.com

1. From Having a Pet to Working with a Vet (P,G,S)
   
2. Understanding and Harnessing Molecular Containers (G,S)

Sheryl A. Tucker is Associate Dean of the Graduate School and Professor of Chemistry at the University of Missouri (MU) in Columbia. As a higher education leader, Dr. Tucker has an outstanding record of scholarly achievement, established administrative skills and a demonstrated commitment to diversity. Prior to joining the MU faculty, she earned her Ph.D. from the University of North Texas and was a postdoc at Duke University. As a molecular spectroscopic with an interest in chemical separations, her research is a distinctive combination of both fundamental and applied studies, involving the molecular-level understanding and application dendrimers to self-assembling supramolecular nanocapsules. Dr. Tucker also founded the nationally recognized Magic of Chemistry program, designed to ignite girls' interest in science. In 2005, she received a Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring from the White House for her commitment to broadening the participation of underrepresented groups in science

Lisa H. Weasel

Associate Professor of Biology, Portland State University
Portland State University
PO Box 751
Portland, OR 97207-0751
Phone: 503-725-3862
Email: lisaw@pdx.edu
Website: http://www.lisaweasel.com

1. DNA at the Dinnertable: The Global Politics of Genetically Modified Food (P,G)
   
2. When Ethics and Politics Intersect with Science: Lessons from the Global GMO Debates (P,G)
   
3. Feminism in the Field(s): Gender, Globalization and the Politics of Knowledge in the GMO Debates (S)

Lisa Weasel received an A.B. magna cum laude in Biology from Harvard, and a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from the University of Cambridge. Her postdoctoral work included training in social science research and methodologies. Her current research interests are centered on the social dimensions of science and technology, particularly ethics and equity issues relating to the life sciences. Her scholarly work encompasses a broad range of interdisciplinary topics, from feminist science studies and gender equity, to public engagement with science, to the relationship between biotechnology and sustainable agriculture and food security in the developing world. She is the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships, including a National Science Foundation CAREER Award for her interdisciplinary research investigating debates surrounding agricultural biotechnology in a global context. Her recent book, Food Fray: Inside the Controversy over Genetically Modified Food, received the 2009 Green Book Festival Prize for Best Scientific Book.

National Academy of Engineering Lecturer

Donald Winter

Professor of Engineering Practice in the Department of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering and the Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan. Former Secretary of the Navy.
Phone: 703-917-6195 or 734-764-8269 
Email: dcwinter@umich.edu

1. Deepwater Horizon–a case study in managing risk (P,G,S)

Donald C. Winter is Professor of Engineering Practice in the Department of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering and the Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan. He served as the 74th Secretary of the Navy from January 2006 to March 2009. Previously, Dr. Winter served as a corporate vice president and president of Northrop Grumman's Mission Systems sector. In that position he oversaw operation of the business and its 18,000 employees worldwide, providing systems engineering and related services. Previously, he served as president and CEO of TRW Systems. Dr. Winter received a BS in physics from the University of Rochester in 1969 and a doctorate in physics from the University of Michigan in 1972. In 2002, he was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering and he is currently the chair of the National Academy's committee investigating the Deepwater Horizon incident.