researcher profiles

Grand Challenge Initiative – Research Summaries (9/8/15)

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COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE, FOOD SYSTEMS, AND NATURAL RESOURCES

Bergholz, Peter Veterinary and Microbiological Science

Our research on microbial genomics is integral to accomplishing all three grand challenges set for NDSU, because microbes are: a) the primary arbiters of biogeochemical cycles (Challenge 3), b) the chief platforms for synthetic biology (Challenges 1,2,3), c) an enormous pool of functional biodiversity (Challenges 2,3) and d) the agents of infectious disease (Challenges 1,2). In particular, my laboratory group integrates work in evolutionary genomics, population ecology and ecological modeling using geographic information systems to produce predictive models of the microbial movements and evolution in agricultural ecosystems and landscapes. It has potential applications for the development of remote sensing algorithms (challenges 1,3) and the improvement of food safety (challenges 1,2). More information about my lab and the group can be found at: https://www.ndsu.edu/pubweb/~pberghol.

Bergholz, Teresa Veterinary and Microbiological Science

Functional genomics of foodborne pathogensMy research program has two aims: understand how bacterial foodborne pathogens are able to survive environmental stresses they encounter in the food supply, and use this information to develop and/or improve control measures to reduce pathogens in foods. Recent projects include: transcriptomic analysis of L. monocytogenes, Salmonella, and E. coli O157:H7 when they are present on pre‐ or post‐harvest food products, evaluation of vacuum steam pasteurization to inactivate Salmonella on low moisture foods such as grains and seeds, understanding the molecular mechanisms of pathogen attachment to surfaces with the goal of improving sanitation measures for fresh produce and produce processing equipment.

Bora, Ganesh Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering

Grand Challenge area:Food Systems and Security, Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure My research background is Precision Agriculture and Machinery Systems Engineering. I have extensively worked in energy savings, variable rate technology, yield monitoring systems, image processing and image acquiring through UAS to increase crop productivity in a sustainable manner and mitigation of climate change because of agricultural inputs. Quantity as well as quality of food production is increased through sustainable agricultural systems for better nutrition. The proposed initiative will cover two of three grand challenge themes. Research Expertise Precision Agriculture (UAS, Data Management, Energy conservation, Yield monitoring systems, image processing, variable rate technology, mitigation of climate change), Sustainable Agricultural systems management (Climate variability and crop production), Machinery systems engineering (Sensor and Controls, Mechanical harvesting, Agricultural energy, instrumentation)

Chatterjee, Amitava Soil Science

I am interested to participate in following groups:Food Systems and Security, Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure My expertise: Greenhouse gas emissions (I have my automated GC to analyze CO2, CH4 and N2O), Soil fertility and nutrient management, Carbon and nitrogen modeling, Geospatial and multivariate Statistics, Soil microbial community structure (PLFA, CLLP)

Dorsam, Glenn Veterinary and Microbiological Science

My laboratory group is interested in understanding novel biological roles for a small mammalian protein called vasoactive intestinal peptide (VIP). VIP was discovered in 1970 and is a master circadian regulator controlling our perception of day and night. It also regulates cellular energy usage within the mammalian gut, including hormonal effects on insulin secretion, and possesses immunoregulatory activities. Currently, my research group has uncovered additional, exciting discoveries about VIP utilizing three knockout mouse models. VIP binds two receptors designated VIP receptor 1 (VIPR1) and VIPR2. By employing mice that are deficient in VIP, VIPR1 or VIPR2, we have collected data suggesting that the VIP signaling axis impacts red and white blood cell production, called hematopoiesis. Mice lacking VIPR2 in their cells have elevated blood cell numbers, while mice without VIPR1 produce greater numbers of eosinophils in an in vitro differentiation protocol. Intriguingly, knocking out the VIP ligand does not cause a similar phenotype as the VIP receptor knockouts, suggesting that other naturally occurring ligands compensate for VIP. Collectively, these data emphasize the importance for VIPR1 and VIPR2 signaling during hematopoiesis and has the potential to impact medical disorders of the blood, as well as fields including immunology, physiology, and cell biology.


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Hall, Clifford Plant Sciences

I have been part of research teams that have addressed both Food Systems and Security and Healthy Population. My research has focused on the utilization of North Dakota Commodities in non‐traditional uses. The research has dealt with characterization of chemical and functional attributes of commodities. I have extensive experience in assessing the stability of flaxseed health‐promoting bioactives and the application of flaxseed in food systems. I have also assessed the functionality of pulse crops (dry beans, dry peas, chickpeas, lentils) as alternatives to corn in snack food products. The utilization of pea protein isolate as an egg replacer has been a significant contribution of my research team to the food industry. I can lead food‐related projects as I have a broad experience in the chemistry, functionality, and stability of compounds from commodities. I also have significant experience in the processing of the commodities into value‐added ingredients. As part of these projects, I have used sensory evaluation to assess the eating quality of the products and have extensive experience in conducting shelf‐life stability assessments of food products.

Hatterman‐Valenti, Harlene Plant Sciences

As a high‐value crop specialist for the past 15 years, I’ve conducted research in all three grand challenge areas (Food systems and security, Healthy populations and vital communities, and Sustainable energy, environment, and societal infrastructure). Production related research has been primarily conducted with small fruits, vegetables, and tree fruits, but I’ve also grown and conducted research on several commodity crops when considering food systems. Much of the production related research has dealt with environmentally sustainable issues, especially for the oil field areas of western ND. Research the past few years has also included increasing health attributes of various crops and adding value to crops as a means to enhance rural communities.

McGinnis, Esther Extension Horticulturist Plant Sciences

I do several types of research. Currently, I have a grad student evaluating native sedges (Carexspp.) for use in rain gardens. Rain gardens are a good means of keeping residential runoff from draining into the storm sewer system. My grad student is researching the ability of these native plants to take cyclical drought and saturation periods. My second grad student has just started hardiness trials of herbaceous ornamentals such as Heuchera and Echinacea. This will be important for the garden centers because these two genera are borderline hardy for the state. In addition, we are about to receive funding from two USDA Specialty Crop Block Grants. The first grant will study the impact of spotted wing drosophila on North Dakota fruits. The second grant will study the use of high tunnel greenhouses to extend the growing season for vegetables and cut flowers in North Dakota.

Norland, Jack Natural Resource Management, CAFSNR

My expertise is related to “Sustainable Energy, Environment, and Societal Infrastructure”. As a member of the Natural Resource Program I am actively engaged in research and teaching of sustainability in an interdisciplinary manner. I have been involved in many interdisciplinary research projects looking at problems such as dust and reclamation of pipelines along with how energy development is causing transformations of the environment and culture. NRM teaches about sustainability in many of its classes of which I teach two “Scenarios in NRM and NRM Planning”. Both classes investigate sustainability frameworks and promote key competencies in sustainability.

Pruess, Birgit Veterinary and Microbiological Science

The Pruess lab is developing novel anti‐microbial materials. We infuse commonly used materials, such as polyurethane and silicone with beta‐phenylethylamine and other small chemicals that our research has determined to have anti‐microbial activities. These materials have implications in food processing and clinical applications.

Reynolds, Larry Center for Nutrition and Pregnancy

For more than 35 years, Dr. Reynolds’ research program has focused on improving both fertility (the ability to conceive and to maintain pregnancy) and pregnancy outcomes (i.e., birth weights and postnatal health) in livestock. These problems have major scientific, socioeconomic, and health implications for humans as well. Dr. Reynolds and collaborators in the U.S., Australia, Europe, and South America helped establish that placental (uterine and umbilical) blood flows are key to normal placental function (i.e., transport capacity) throughout gestation. Subsequently, they were the first to show that the placenta produces angiogenic factors, which drive its dramatic vascular development. Recognizing that placental growth also is critical, they were among the first to develop methods


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to evaluate the rate of cell turnover (cell proliferation and apoptosis) in tissues in vivo. More recently, Dr. Reynolds and coworkers have shown that placental vascular development and function are key mediators by which maternal stressors such as malnutrition, environmental factors, age, etc., affect pre‐ and postnatal well‐being, and were among the first to recognize and investigate the potential impact of ‘developmental programming’ in livestock. They also have shown profound effects of assisted reproductive technologies such as in vitro fertilization on placental vascular development very early in pregnancy. They currently are investigating therapeutic and management strategies to improve fertility and pregnancy outcomes, and also the role of the fetal and maternal steroid metabolome in the processes of fetal organ maturation and birth.

Ripplinger, David Agribusiness and Applied Economics

My research and Extension activities focus on the economic and environmental sustainability of existing and new renewable products. I conduct research in the economics of new crops, the transportation and logistics associated with feedstocks from field to factory, the economics of converting renewable feedstocks to intermediate and final products, and the marketing for these goods. I conduct also environmental life cycle assessments that quantify the footprint of new crops and products.

David Saxowsky Agribusiness and Applied Economics

I have done some work in the area of food law. Contact me when you encounter a legal or regulatory issue dealing with food. If I cannot answer the question, I will work with you to find an alternative resource.

Shetty, Kalidas Plant Science

“Food Systems Innovations for Public Health"Global food security challenges now imposes double burden of undernourishment and excess calories (from hyper processed macronutrients with deficiency in micronutrients). In addition the burden of excess calories is leading to a rapid increase in non‐communicable chronic disease (NCD). In order to harness the health benefits of diverse plant foods we have developed metabolic innovations grounded in sound ecological and cellular biochemistry using systems logic of identifying the critical control points of overall metabolic control both in the food systems end and at the level of host response. We have developed metabolic innovations based on regulation of plant redox responses controlling many health relevant phytochemicals targeting early stages of type 2 diabetes. Such phytochemicals can also be further functionally enhanced for chronic disease solutions through metabolic control of food fermentations. Using both redox biology and fermentation biology we can develop health relevant phytochemicals in crop food systems for range of chronic diseases, including obesity and related environmental linked disease breakdowns. These metabolic innovations and research strategies will be recruited to add value to diverse crop food systems of North Dakota and Great plains to enhance value‐added exports. Further value added food diversity will be harnessed to address major public health challenges within communities across North Dakota and especially major NCD challenges in the Tribal communities. These initiatives and proposed solutions are at the heart of the grand challenges of improved global food systems for food security and human health and animal health while contributing to sustainable solutions to the ecological challenges such as climate change and lower carbon foot print. Major Objectives of the Proposals are: 1) To use metabolic innovations to advance food systems and diversity for addressing public health challenges. 2) To use improved bioactive enriched crops systems for enhancing quality and safety of animal food systems. 3) To enhance trade and export opportunities for State of North Dakota through high value crop food and animal food systems while enhancing safety. 4) To use enhanced food systems as solutions to public health challenges faced by diverse communities of North Dakota and Great Plains.

COLLEGE OF ARTS, HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES

Brooks, Kevin English

I work in the field of community literacy and am currently engaged in a long‐term, action research project that studies adult English Language Learning, its practices, its role in fostering integration, and the role it might play in community transformation. My research addresses the theme of healthy populations and vital communities.

Cwiak, Carol Emergency Management

My research interests are relevant to all three of the Grand Challenge themes. I am interested in collaboration related to emergency management; continuity of operations; resilient communities; industry‐specific and industry‐introduced hazards; and, the impacts that


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boomtown growth has on a community’s ability to maintain functions necessary to its safety and security missions. In addition, I am interested in collaboration that focuses on veterans’ needs and challenges.

Ge, Yue Emergency Management

My research interests and projects lie in several areas. First, I am working on manuscripts from my dissertation about urban planners’ perceptions of land use planning tools for natural hazard mitigation. Second, I will be conducting an NSF‐funded research project on household level hurricane evacuation behaviors. I am also working on an evacuation study of the train derailment and oil explosion emergency. Third, I am collaborating with my student on a water contamination emergency analysis on a Native American tribal community in the Upper Great Plain. Last but not least, I collaborate with Chinese scholars on environmental health emergency studies in China. These interests are related to both “Healthy Population and Vital Communities” and “Sustainable Energy, Environment, and Societal Infrastructure” in the Grand Challenge Initiative. My expertise of quantitative research design, data analysis, spatial analysis with GIS, and hazard, risk, vulnerability assessment will help me fit into these two themes.

Goreham, Gary Sociology and Anthropology

My research interests lie in the areas of: (1) rural community and economic development; (2) sustainable agriculture; (3) sociology of the environment; and (4) rural organizations. Although I could fit into any of the three areas, I see my research interests fitting primarily in the Healthy Populations and Vital Communities area.

Isern, Tom History

Professor of History, University Distinguished Professor, and Founding Director, Center for Heritage Renewal, with expertise in regional history, agricultural history, New Zealand & Australia, historical research & writing. Author or co‐author of six books, some forty journal articles, and the weekly radio feature, Plains Folk. Other skills & competencies: historic preservation, cultural tourism, public humanities programming, and has grant relationships with National Endowment for the Humanities, the North Dakota Humanities Council, the Embassy of Canada, the Bush Foundation, Fulbright‐Hays, and other agencies

Kelley, Suzzanne Institute for Regional Studies Press

As a historian, my research has included topics relating to memory, particularly the impact of childhood experiences and how they impact life during the period of generativity (approximately ages 40‐60). My degrees are in applied learning and development and history. As a publisher, I am interested in the impact of digital delivery of published works on reading rates and retention, particularly when used in educational (public school & university) settings.

Kelly, Gina Aalgaard Sociology and Anthropology

Learning and understanding phenomenon about society is meaningful, exciting and energizing. My research interests have a collaborative multi‐disciplinary approach, centering on sociological influences. Specifically, research has been influenced by Medical Sociology, Gerontology and Public Health. My research experience and skills include the North Dakota State Data Center (currently known as the Center for Social Research), National Long‐term Resource Center (University of Minnesota), and North Dakota State University. At these research centers or institutions, I conducted academic research, program evaluation, applied research, and policy analysis research. The opportunity to work with national and state wide data provided an experience in demography or population research and quantitative methodologies as well as qualitative focus groups. These research projects provided breadth and depth needed to enhance research method skills including, preparation of survey questionnaires, creating, managing and computing statistical databases in SPSS, Access Atlas Ti, interpreting data and results, writing and editing reports and collaborating with researchers and point medical professions in the community, and preparing research presentation. Research areas have included quality of life in nursing homes, social support systems in assisted living, successful aging, and mental illness medication experiences among adults living in community settings and college students.

Kim, Young‐Jae Architecture and Landscape Architecture

Dr. Kim's interests are in assessing the relationships among built and natural environments, environmental perceptions, and human health and behaviors. During his Ph.D., as a research assistant and lab manager in the Design Research Lab for Active Living, led by Dr. Chanam Lee, within the Center for Health Systems and Design at Texas A&M University, he has been involved in a wide range of interdisciplinary research projects funded by the National Institute of Health (NIH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), mainly focusing on the roles of the


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built environments in promoting various health behaviors, outcomes, and well‐being, applying evidence‐based design and research. Dr. Kim can help you map an urban region and analyze how the built/natural environment affects human behavior, habits, decision‐making, and lifestyle by conducting geographic information system (GIS)‐ and remote sensing (RS)‐based spatial analysis, as well as advanced statistical analysis. His research contributes to understanding the spatial variations of environment and social infrastructural conditions associated with human behavior and health and to helping develop sustainable community‐specific interventions that promote active lifestyles among children and families. Of the Grand Challenges, his research intersects best with “Healthy Populations and Vital Communities” and “Sustainable Energy, Environment and Social Infrastructure.”

Kingsley Westerman, Catherine Communications

My research focuses on relationships in organizations, mainly supervisor‐subordinate relationships, but also peer relationships (i.e., coworker friendships). I look at ways people can communicate in these relationships to facilitate employee productivity, feelings of fairness, and positive impressions of supervisors. For example, some of my work focuses on how supervisors can deliver negative feedback while maintaining a positive impression with their employees. I’ve also studied whether employees share personal health information with supervisors and coworkers and why they share or withhold their information. My work relates to “healthy populations/vital communities” as it focuses on helping organizations to function effectively while also keeping employees happy and healthy. My work also relates to “sustainable energy, environment, and societal infrastructure” because functional organizations are a central part of societal infrastructure and relationships among coworkers and their supervisors are the building blocks of organizations.

Kirkwood, Meghan Visual Arts

My research focuses on the representation of landscape. I am interested in how landscape images both reflect and reinforce values and attitudes towards the natural environment in the United States. In my practice, I am working to develop a visual vocabulary that introduces ecology into the language of form and composition, and that can present areas such as grasslands and wetlands as dynamic and diverse systems. I also have a background (degrees) in the history of photography and the history of African art, collaboration with scientists in STEM fields, and arts outreach activities. I am open to thinking creatively and critically about any of the Grand Challenge themes, but I believe my research interests most closely align with the “Health Populations and Vital Communities” and “Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure” areas. I use photography (all genres) to explore and present community histories, connections, and relationships to place; these aspects are critical foundations of healthy and vital communities. My background in arts outreach and promotion of arts in rural communities also aligns with the challenge to sustain and nourish towns and cities. Finally, I also use photography to advocate for a sustainable environment and believe visual images have great power to promote psychic changes needed to support adoption of new, sustainable infrastructure technologies.

Klenow, Daniel Emergency Management

My research interests and background cover a number of areas. One primary area of teaching and research has been related to social vulnerability and functional needs populations within the context of environmental and other hazards. Social vulnerability includes a variety of demographic categories including low income, gender, literacy and language, age, etc. Functional needs refers to health and needs related to hearing, vision, mobility and many others. Methodologically my expertise ranges from qualitative methodologies such as in‐depth interviews and focus groups to quantitative studies using telephone, internet and mail survey designs. These interest areas fit into the “Healthy Population and Vital Communities” section but also relate to “Sustainable Energy, Environment, and Societal Infrastructure”. These interests apply to the former as social vulnerability and functional needs are aspects of a population’s health and tie into community capitals, capacity, resilience, and recovery. The interests tie into the latter as the environment is often the source of our hazards and the quality of our physical infrastructure is a part of the vulnerability of these groups. As recent train derailment events have shown, the infrastructure of energy management from source to consumer is also a threat to societal infrastructure (businesses, residences, etc).


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Mahalingam, Ganapathy Architecture and Landscape Architecture

Center for Applied Networks (CAN) is a multidisciplinary research center established to study the application of network theory to solve problems related to scenarios that can be modeled using networks, including 1) the modeling of risk index networks to study the impact of policy decisions related to homeland security and to study the effect of disasters. 2) the modeling of traffic networks using geographic information systems and network analysis to study evacuation patterns in cities and regions during times of disaster. 3) the modeling of power system networks to allow flexible inclusion of distributed power sources in a highly redundant and fault tolerant system capable of withstanding serious damage to the network in multiple locations. 4) modeling of habitat networks and ecosystems using concepts of energetics modeling developed by Howard Odum. Algorithmic Modeling of Energy Networks (AMEN): The algorithmic modeling of energy networks in buildings, neighborhoods and cities using concepts from graph theory and theory of applied networks. The networks are used to simulate and predict the energy flow in these energy systems and assess the energy demand of these systems. A Model for the Optimization of Environmental Performance Criteria in Spatial Enclosures Using Ultra‐Small Sensor Systems: This project will develop a model and resolve its relevant challenges for the use of ultra‐small sensor systems in optimizing environmental performance criteria in spatial enclosures. A patentable idea is the concept of “sensor paint.” Assessing Built Environments and Landscapes for their ‘Affordances’ to Physical Activity: Land use patterns have numerous characteristics that affect the extent to which the physical activity of the inhabitants is promoted or encouraged. Measures related to land use characteristics influence the physical activity of the inhabitants. These measures can also be used to determine if the environment is sufficient or deficient in terms of ‘affording’ different kinds of physical activity. Architecture + Medicine: The Next Great Partnership: The proposed exploration, which systematically documents and projects the potential collaboration between the professions of architecture and medicine, will serve to complete the engagement of a quadrivium of professions: architecture, medicine, engineering and law. Construction Simulator: The proposed project involves the creation of a hybrid digital‐physical construction simulator. The simulation will allow the construction manager to verify the construction sequence in 4‐6‐D, thereby increasing the manager’s efficiency. Small‐Footprint Robust Software for Calculations in Building Design: This proposal is for the development of small‐footprint robust software for calculations in building design. The software will be developed using Android, iOS, Windows Phone and Blackberry platforms respectively.

Mara, Andrew Flood English

Grand Challenges Research Statement:Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure I am the Director of Upper‐Division Writing, and I specialize in New Media and Writing Studies. My teaching and research focuses upon innovation, and investigates the convergence of writing and institutional design. I have worked as a professional writer, editor, newspaper reporter, an editor for two academic journals, a web designer, and a technical communicator at Sandia National Laboratories. At Sandia National Laboratories, I worked as a communications specialist for the Energy and Transportation Infrastructure center. I worked with fossil fuels, renewable energy, distributed energy, and various transportation infrastructure researchers to find systems solutions for both public and private clients. My teaching approach grows out of my role as institutional innovator and centers on long‐term institution success. My approach combines language, institutional design, and community with an activity‐centered social approach. More simply put, I endeavor help researchers and writers create the communities they are seeking to help. Technology innovation places writers and researchers into the middle of social, institutional, and pedagogical change. I study the connection between the knowledge people are supposed to attain and their own role in creating and distributing that knowledge. Instead of presenting a field of knowledge as a finished and ultimately closed set of information, I invites students to take ownership of the knowledge production in the way that invites deeper exploration. This pedagogy of socially‐active knowledge construction is almost always disconcerting to writers and researchers in the


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beginning. My challenge has been to get students past this initial feeling of being lost to engage in responsible communal knowledge production. Researchers and writers must break the multiple frames of their understanding—historical, institutional, and personal—to reorder and even remake pieces of information that might initially seem to be part of a seamless and alien whole. My scholarship on Writing Studies and New Media has published in Technical Communications Quarterly, the Journal of Business and Technical Communication, IEEE Transactions in Professional Communication, Academe, Innovative Higher Education as well as several essays for collections.

Peirce, Karen Center for Writers

Grand Challenges Research Statement:Healthy Populations and Vital Communities My research focuses on the following areas, many of which are overlapping:

rhetorical ethos, investigating the means through which a communicator conveys persona so as to attract or deter an audience’s interest

non‐argumentative discourse, investigating ways of reaching consensus, compromise, or mutual understanding through communication

intercultural communication, investigating communicative means of reaching mutual understanding across cultures

multimodal composing, investigating the broadening of text‐based communication to incorporate a wide variety of media

writing program administration, investigating best practices in the administration of writing programs

writing pedagogy, investigating best practices in the teaching of writing These research areas align with the Healthy Populations and Vital Communities emphasis because in order for communities and populations to thrive, they require the types of communication practices I research. Further, those providing services to populations and communities also require these types of communication practices. My expertise could be useful in research endeavors that aim to understand current communication practices in populations and communities, recommend improvements to those communication practices, and/or facilitate communication by service providers to the populations and communities they serve.

Rupiper Taggart, Amy English

Emphasis Healthy Populations and Vital CommunitiesI am a writing studies and teaching and learning specialist. My research has attended to the efficacy, sustainability, and best practices of community‐engaged teaching and learning (such as service learning), community literacy, teacher preparation for higher education, and teaching writing. At the core of most of this research is the over‐arching question: how does writing facilitate (or impede) learning, growth, or change (in a person or a community)? My expertise and interests intersect with the Grand Challenges primarily through community literacy efforts. I’ve taught a course related to my research‐‐Literacy, Culture, and Identity‐‐multiple times as a community‐engaged course in which students have partnered with international students and with young refugees and new Americans, have conducted oral history interviews with new Americans in the community, and have considered literacy’s role in cultural transition. My work with CHARISM, Giving + Learning, and the Fargo Public Schools reflects my commitment to and interest in thinking about collaborative ways to improve access, education, and even cross‐cultural knowledge exchange. These are key features of vital communities, and all of these community‐based projects could also yield research or have analogues outside the classroom. Additionally, on the health side of this grand challenge, writing has been widely used for therapeutic purposes. The research on this crosses disciplines, from counseling to writing studies to education to medicine. I could envision working with colleagues in the Health Sciences and Emergency Management on approaches to improving health or processing trauma through writing.

Saar, Cynthia Walters, Veronique Modern Languages

Our research interest is in difference across cultures, nationalities, ethnicities, genders, abilities, ages, etc., and cross‐cultural competence, which is the ability to shift cultural perspective and appropriately adapt behavior to cultural differences and commonalities.


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We are qualified administrators of the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI), a tool for cross‐cultural assessment of intercultural competence that is used by not‐for‐profit organizations, corporations, government agencies, primary and secondary schools, colleges and universities. The IDI has been tested and found to be a valid assessment tool, it is available in multiple languages, it can be used for individuals and/or groups, and most importantly, the IDI stresses development, providing an individualized Intercultural Development Plan. We are eager to collaborate by enhancing research involving diversity, global outreach and cultural difference by facilitating the use of the IDI, working with development of cross‐cultural competence and we are also willing to consider other kinds of work appropriate for our expertise. Our expertise fits into Healthy Populations and Vital Communities, Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure, and Food Systems and Security when projects in these areas involve diverse cultures. Our collaboration would aid research projects by developing intercultural communication mind‐sets and skills‐sets.

Smith, Angela History

I am interested in working with others who are interested in vital communities. I have worked with community organizations around the state who are interested in preserving their history through historic preservation, museums, and heritage tourism. Last summer I conducted a field school in Ellendale, North Dakota where students partnered with the local community to renovate the local museum. The impact of this effort reverberated throughout the community and increased community awareness and engagement with their history. My idea for a Grand Challenge Proposal is a collaborative effort between Ag extension (specifically the community vitality folks), business entrepreneurship, engagement practitioners, and public history to conduct collaborative research and test best practices from multiple vantage points for community vitality.

Srivastava, Malini Architecture and Landscape Architecture

I am interested in design‐based approaches to reduce energy consumption at various scales such as the building scale, neighborhood scale and city scale. As Project Lead for efargo,a partnership between NDSU, the City of Fargo and Utilities (Xcel Energy and Cass County Electric Cooperative), we are participating in a national competition organized by Georgetown University for cities to reduce energy consumption in residential and municipal buildings over 2015 and 2016. Currently we are ranked #6 out 50 semi‐finalists. As part of this competition we are working on research that is based in the three major areas where energy use reduction can be accomplished: (a) Built environment and infrastructure policies and standards; (b) performance of building systems and envelopes and (3) behavior of building occupants. We are developing various efforts within efargo such as the Urban game (purposeful play), Demonstration Passive House (reduces energy consumption by 75%‐90% as compared to the average house that is in compliance with the 2009 energy code), K‐12 energy challenge (children meet the challenge to reduce energy use in their schools), Top Ten ways to reduce energy use based on building type, and an energy‐use Dashboard to display residential and municipal consumption as the competition progresses in a map‐based format. Our goal is 5% reduction in energy consumption in these building types over the next two years. For the various projects, I have received grants from the City of Fargo, ND State Department of Commerce and funds from the Department of Energy. I would like to expand the work we are doing in efargo to include commercial and institutional building typologies such as NDSU campus buildings and target them as a whole to meet the DOE Better Building Challenge. Other local large‐scale impacts on energy use can occur by examining the functioning of municipal infrastructure such as lighting for energy use reduction and night pollution. Health and social impacts of light pollution and the balancing act of security concerns can be a growth area for this research. The urban gaming is a community‐based effort trying to create behavioral shifts in how people use energy and understand energy generation, transportation and consumption. Social Science collaboration in purposeful play and behavior influence is a potential growth area for this research. Computer science collaboration in data mining and software architecture would be a crucial part of the purposeful play idea.

Yu, Nan Communication

Research Expertise: Health Communication, Health Behaviors and Beliefs, Cultural Understandings of Health, Immigration Health, Health Information Seeking, Health Intervention


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Research Background: The central question to be answered by my research is how to increase the effectiveness of health intervention for early detection and prevention of diseases. Specifically, my research focuses on social and cultural construction of health messages and how message characteristics and individual characteristics can affect the processing of health messages in different cultures. Some of my recent work focuses on understanding how people from different cultures and communities retrieve and process health information in the United States and how that may affect the quality of health care they receive. In addition, my research also examines the use of new technologies in promoting health education and intervention. My research has been supported by national and regional funding agencies including National Science Foundation, Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, and Dakota Medical Foundation. My research areas fit well with the Healthy Populations and Vital Communities theme.

COLLEGE OF BUSINESS

Ganesh Pillai, Rajani Tangpong, Chanchai Management and Marketing

We have put together a team including Dr. Nganje (Agribusiness and Applied Economics) and Dr. Bezbaruah (Civil and Environmental Engineering). The objective is to leverage the core expertise areas of the collaborators and their departments to create new research infrastructure that will provide value for NDSU as well as external stakeholders. We propose to establish a center for decision and risk analysis. Dr. Ganesh Pillai works in the areas of consumer judgment and decision making and innovations. Dr. Tangpong’s expertise lies in the areas of supply chain management, firm capabilities, and understanding the influence of risk in organizational decision making. Dr. Nganje’s expertise lies in the areas of experimental economics and consumer choice theories as well as risk analysis. Dr. Bezbaruah has worked extensively in the area of nanotechnology with emphasis on the impacts of nanomaterials on ecosystem components specifically on plants and microorganisms as well as societal perception on nanotechnology. All four collaborators are interested in the risk and benefit analysis of technology applications across a variety of research domains. Through the center the collaborators intend to add value to business stakeholders as well as graduate students in Business, Engineering, and Agribusiness and applied economics. Areas of impact: Healthy populations & vital communities, Food systems & security

Szmerekovsky, Joseph Management and Marketing

My research is primarily in the areas of operations management, logistics & transportation, supply chain management, scheduling, and complex systems modeling. Methodologically, my research focuses on optimization modelling. My research is applicable to all three Grand Challenges. For example, it can relate to food systems and security through modeling and tracking of the food supply chain; it can relate to healthy populations and vital communities through scheduling the development, production and distribution of pharmaceuticals; and it can relate to sustainable energy, environment, and societal infrastructure through the development of green supply chains.

COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING

Cao, Dong Electrical and Computer Engineering

Research Summary: Dr. Cao’s research focus is next generation electric power processing unit/equipment for various applications in different area. He has hands‐on expertise on various hardware prototype development as well as industry experience. The power scale ranges from 5W cell phone charger, LED driver, to 200W micro‐inverter for photovoltaic panel, to 2 kW smart grid gate way device for residential energy storage and renewable energy integration, to 20~100 kW high power electric drive for hybrid electric vehicle, to 2 MW wind turbine inverter system. Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure: Next generation vehicle (aerospace, airplane, car, ship, truck, etc.) electrification: next generation electric vehicle drive, direct current (DC) or alternate current (AC) power management, battery management, charging; Distributed renewable energy source (photovoltaic panel, wind turbine, fuel cell, battery, thermoelectric generation module, ocean wave energy recycle) grid integration/standalone operation for residential and commercial application; Smart grid device for future electric grid control and management (flexible AC transmission device, united power flow controller, unified power conditioner, gateway device); Ultra high efficiency ultra bright Solid state lightning (LED drive); Wireless charging (cell phone, vehicle, unnamed vehicle)


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Food Systems and Security: High voltage high efficient waste water processing devices; Special high efficient Solid‐state lighting for next generation farm; Accurate seed planting system using multiple independent motor drive system; High efficient power supply and wireless battery charging for unmanned aerial vehicle. Health Populations and Vital Communities: Special power supply, energy harvesting (piezo, etc) for Bio‐medical devices; Next generation Power supply for Special Medical device, (X‐ray, MRI machine, etc)

Gong, Na Electrical and Computer Engineering

My research focuses on embedded system and chip design. Specifically, I work on low‐power data processing and storage system design to reduce the energy consumption of electronics for various applications, such as food security screening system, civil infrastructure monitoring system ( e.g. bridges/pipelines/railroad detection system). For example, one project I am working on is low power video streaming system in mobile devices to prolong the battery life; another one is low‐power UAV on‐board data processing and storage system to deliver real‐time usable field information (e.g. crop population, temperature) to farmers.

Huang, Ying Civil and Environmental Engineering

Interested Grand Challenge Themes: Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure Research Interests and Expertise: A system with sustainable energy, environment, or infrastructure will require an accurate assessment of the system’s performance to ensure its sustainability. The performance evaluation of the system can be achieved using advanced monitoring networks with robust sensor devices. Dr. Huang’s research interests and expertise focus on the development of advanced sensors and monitoring networks to assess the sustainability of an energy, environment, or infrastructure system. Previously, Dr. Huang has developed advanced and innovative monitoring systems for various applications, including oil and gas pipelines with corrosion, roads with extensive traffic, bridges under flooding, and buildings in harsh environments such as fire, earthquake, etc. Future researches can be extended to the development of innovative real‐time monitoring systems for other available energy, environment, or infrastructure systems through interdisciplinary collaborations.

Khan, Eakalak Civil and Environmental Engineering

My interests as a researcher are mainly on environmental issues particularly chemical and microbiological contaminants in water and soil. Environmental contaminants are related to sustainability as well as food systems and security. Food crops can be contaminated through water and soil. My recent research involves environmental issues related to unconventional oil production in western ND. Through my internal and external collaborations, I have investigated quality and treatment of flowback and produced water (from hydraulic fracturing return flow and indigenous water) associated with unconventional oil production. Risk of water contamination due to unconventional oil production is another topic of my research. As the Director of the Environmental and Conservation Sciences Graduate Program at NDSU and the North Dakota Water Resources Research Institute, I am happy to support any proposals that fit the scope of the programs and institute (http://ecs.krondek.com/ (temporary website) and https://www.ndsu.edu/wrri/index.html).

Khoda, Bashir Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Dr. Khoda leads the Design Analysis for Additive Manufacturing (DAAM) research group in the Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering Department at NDSU. His group works on the resource efficient part building techniques for additively manufactured product. The research at DAAM marked a shift in the way scientists think about complex 3D printed structure, allowing a synchronized approach between topology, material and manufacturing/delivery systems to improve the functionality and robustness. The emphasis of this research is to increase AM's penetration in areas like healthcare, aerospace, automotive as well as consumer goods. Dr. Khoda’s research expertise will fit into the following two Grand Challenge themes: Food Systems and Security: 3D printing food using additive manufacturing technique is a new kind of food production process. This process has the potential to construct novel food forms, and to embed customized textures, colors, nutrient and flavors within solid and gelled foods in new ways. The process has many benefits and has more potentials to become main stream in


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numerous applications. Dr. Khoda can contribute to the “Food Systems and Security” research theme with his expertise in 3D printing processes. Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure: As part of his research with printing complex structures Dr. Khoda focuses on developing a resource consumption model. His model includes both periodic and non‐periodic complex objects as well as functional heterogeneous structures which are attracted by many application areas and agencies (i.e. Military, NASA, Energy etc.). This research can guide the user to determine environmentally conscious part building techniques and thus help AM processes to become greener manufacturing processes. Dr.Khoda’s research can change the amount of time and energy required to fabricate a complex object and make sustainable advance manufacturing processes.

Krishnan, Sumathy Mechanical Engineering

Areas of expertise: solar thermal applications, integrated renewable energy systems (PV, Wind and Biomass). My current research thrust is focused on energy‐efficient systems specifically on solar thermal applications and other integrated renewable energy systems. Applications include: Solar absorption systems, solar adsorption systems, Unconventional water pumps, solar water heaters, Photovoltaic‐thermal systems, Building integrated photovoltaic, Greenhouse. In my research group, we develop thermodynamic models to optimize the design and fabrication of the system. The systems are analyzed for their technical and economic competitiveness with respect to other alternatives. Grand Challenge theme: Sustainable Energy

Lin, Zhulu Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering

My research skill set is mainly environmental systems analysis, which is to take interdisciplinary and systems approaches to analyzing complex environmental systems for better understanding and management. My recent research interests and projects are taking these approaches to addressing the water resource management issues in the Northern Great Plains (NGP) in the context of increasing energy and agricultural productions from the region. One of the projects is funded by NSF to develop an integrated hydro‐economic model for sustainable water resources management in the Bakken region of western North Dakota. The other two projects are funded by USDA/NIFA to assess the impacts of bioenergy policies and/or growing bioenergy crops on water quality and quantity in the energy‐rich and water‐scare NGP region. My research collaborators include (general, agricultural, resources) economists, agronomists, soil scientists, civil engineers, and remote sensing scientists, among others. So I feel my research program will fit primarily into the Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure Grand Challenge and secondarily into the Food Systems and Security Grand Challenge.

Wang, Yechun Mechanical Engineering

I strived to explore a variety of new research areas, which reveal the underlying physics for biomedical/biochemical devices involving biofluids, particles, droplets, or blood cells, e.g. digital microfluidics and cell cytometry, and to provide guidance in designing a new generation of devices. The tools, both experimental and computational, developed in the above applications also allow us to explore the fundamentals of interfacial dynamics with applications in tertiary oil recovery. Supported by the new faculty startup, “computational studies of compound droplets in Stokes flow” was the first new area that I explored. This study investigated the dynamics and stability of emulsions with complex configurations. It has resulted in articles published in a top journal of the field – Physics of Fluids. Supported by the startup funding and the Centennial Endowment Fund from the NDSU Development Foundation, I started initial algorithm development for my second direction, “droplet dynamics under the influence of steady electric fields.” This study was included as the preliminary work in my proposal to the National Science Foundation, titled “BRIGE: Computational Studies of Droplet Motion in Digital Microfluidics”, which was funded in August 2010. Besides computational studies, supported by this NSF award, I was able to set up experimental apparatus in my laboratory and initiate experimental explorations for the electric field driven interfacial phenomena. As the third direction, I developed numerical schemes for the “dynamics of fluid bridges during liquid micro/nano‐deposition.” This numerical scheme was validated with experiments and analytical solutions. This work later led Dr. Akhatov and I (together with Dr. Doug Schulz, former CNSE research scientist) to submit a proposal to NDSU Center for Computationally Assisted Science and Technology (CCAST) and eventually obtained funding from the Department of Energy through CCAST in May 2010. Benefit from NDSU Advance FORWARD’s Leap Research Grant and Lab Renovation Grant in 2009 and 2010


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respectively, I was able to explore the fourth research area of mine, “revealing the mechanism of flow accelerated organic coating degradation”. The experimental devices/setups designed, purchased, and developed in this research area allowed me to collaborate with other faculty and researchers at NDSU or other institutions. Most of my research results contribute to the development of biomedical/biochemical device; hence my research area may fall into the Grand Challenge Theme of “Healthy Populations and Vital Communities”. Since my research also advances the development of fundamental interfacial dynamics and has applications in tertiary oil recovery, my research area may also fit the Grand Challenge Theme of “Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure”. My research on predicting the service lifetime of corrosion protective organic coatings also contribute to the second theme mentioned above.

Wells, David Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

The general theme is product development of biomedical devices. Several subsets have emerged recently in [1] Artificial Bone. The objective is to replicate the geometry (both cortical shell and trabecular core) of all human bones and to do so with a newly‐devised engineered material that replicates the mechanical behavior of native bone. Current objectives are for usage outside of the body ‐‐ for such purposes as developing new therapies and techniques, testing protective devices, training new surgeons, etc. Future objectives will include applications as implants. Current status: printing of a human mandible using traditional additive manufacturing processes; preliminary development of a new engineered composite; development of a new machine tool, customized for bone printing; in‐progress assembly of a data library of bone geometries and properties for a variety of human conditions. [2] Pediatric Prosthetics: The objective is to create customized artificial limbs for children, with a focus on reducing costs by a factor of ten or more. This includes much‐simplified fitting of new and larger devices as the child grows. Current objective is to beta test a first prototype (elbow, forearm, wrist, hand, fingers; customized attachment and sensor placement) with a four‐year‐old boy, born without arms below the elbow. Beta version has four degrees of freedom. Next level objectives include additional degrees of freedom, improved sensory feedback and further developing customization strategies. Current status: beta test arm is scheduled for delivery to the first patient during Autumn 2015; additional beta test subjects are being sought; industry partnerships are being developed. [3] Early Stage Drug Screening: The objective is development of a device that will replicate in vivo conditions during cellular biology experiments in the laboratory. This includes flow of simulated body fluid through the bioreactor at rates aligned with those in the body and replicating all in vivo biochemical conditions, all with control over additions to the SBF flow stream and measurements of input, process and output parameters. Long‐range objective is to reduce costs of drug development by 2 to 5 percent, through more effective pre‐clinical lab experiments. Current status: prototype 2.3 is undergoing in vitro testing. [4] Less Well‐Developed Lines Of Inquiry: [4a] osteoinfiltration: Studies of conditions needed to induce osteoblasts to infiltrate into interior of open‐structured bone implants. [4b] anti‐infection implants: Studies of substances that can render bone implants as inherently antimicrobial, while remaining neutral‐to‐positive for osteointegration. [4c] ion exchange chromatography: Design development of apparatus that will improve efficiencies of purification stages in large scale production of pharmaceutical agents. Manufacturing Engineering and Prototype Fabrication Capabilities are available for collaboration in the realms of product, process and/or production system design for virtually any tangible product, made from any material in any dimensional scale for any industrial or commercial application. This includes fabrication of prototype articles.

Yang, Huojun Construction Management and Engineering

My research fits two of the three themes: 1) Healthy Populations and Vital Communities, 2) Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure. My detailed research interests cover a variety of areas in the Built Environment Systems, including Heating, Ventilation, Air‐conditioning and Refrigeration (HVAC&R), Indoor Air Quality, CFD, Smart Buildings, Building Automation and Control, Building Energy Systems, and Thermophysical Properties Measurement of Porous Materials; Renewable and Sustainable


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Energy; Human Behavior in Buildings; Healthy and Sustainable Buildings and Communities; Community Environment. Healthy and Sustainable Buildings with high Energy Efficiency in Cold and Very Cold Climates North Dakota has the highest energy expenditure per capita ($10,540 in 2013) and its energy consumption per capita also ranks 4th in the nation. In terms of building sector, it is in part because of the high heating demand during North Dakota's very cold winters, which in turn make people stay more time in the buildings. During people’s longer time in buildings, human behavior will play a more important role in building energy consumption and human health will also be more susceptible to the indoor environment. In addition, the population of North Dakota has been undergoing a fast rise, and it was estimated 10% increase from 2010 to July 1, 2014 (about 740,000) by the U.S. Census Bureau. A lot of new buildings that have been and will be constructed are expected to meet the heavy housing demand of recent people boom in North Dakota. However, there is an evident lack of study about energy efficiency and health for the buildings in the areas of North Dakota. This research is based on the performance data of existing commercial, residential and demonstration buildings, to analyze these data from the perspectives of 1) climate, 2) architecture and building design, 3) building construction, 4) life cycle analysis, 5) building equipment (e.g., mechanical and electricity systems), 6) operation and maintenance, 7) occupant behavior, and 8) indoor environmental conditions, and then to develop building technology innovations to make existing/new buildings in North Dakota areas more healthy, energy efficient, and sustainable.

Yang, Mijia Gao, Jerry Civil and Environmental Engineering

Sustainable energy, environment and societal infrastructure system Sustainability and environmental issues caused by growing economic development has gained intensive statewide and worldwide attention. As a state with fast growing economy, North Dakota is also facing this challenge. Since the design and construction of infrastructure are heavily involved in the economic development and consumes great amount of resources and energy, its impact on environment is significant. Therefore, it is necessary and urgent to regulate the infrastructure construction and its related performance to sustainable manners. The existing research and practice efforts showed with smart design and planning, infrastructure projects can be made sustainable and therefore save energy, reduce resource usage, and avoid damages to environment. We are targeting sustainable energy resources through energy harvesting from roadways, solar energy, and wind energy. Tied with ND windy climate, and abundant coal, oil resources, we are suggesting a new infrastructure such as highway system, which will be the first in the nation that will collect the green energy and self‐manage its usage in maintaining the societal infrastructure.The effort is to propose a study or development of a roadmap to environmentally sustainable infrastructure system in North Dakota to prevent the state from the negative impact on environment caused by construction and its related activities. The study will be focusing on the following issues and needs a significant collaboration from different colleges, the government, and design and construction firms: 1) Sustainable design and infrastructure permits – establish a specific system to ensure environmentally sustainable construction requirements are addressed.2) Sustainable selection of infrastructure materials – establish a system to identify the environmentally friendly and sustainable of construction materials and to avoid the use of harmful materials. 3) Sustainable infrastructure site ‐ develop a systemic method to reduce the environmental impact on construction site and its surrounding areas. 4) Sustainable design and construction technology and methods – identify the construction technologies and methods to reduce the waste, pollution and energy usage, and to increase the construction efficiency as well. 5) Sustainable recycling – improve the recycling of the construction waste at all phases and increase the reuse of these materials.

Wang, Jinhui Electrical and Computer Engineering

Passive Wireless Sensor Network. Wireless sensor networks (WSN) are providing tremendous benefit for a number of industries. The ability to add remote sensing points, without the cost of running wires, results in numerous benefits including energy and material savings, process improvements, labor savings, and productivity increases. But the conventional sensor network communication model assumes the deployment of low‐cost, multifunctional sensor nodes operating on limited power capacity of their batteries, which cannot be recharged due to dense


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and random WSN deployment. Therefore, the primary challenge in WSN deployment is the limited network lifetime due to finite‐capacity batteries. Passive Wireless Sensor Network (PWSN) provides an alternative source of power, particularly a source without limited capacity for WSNs. External radio frequency (RF) power, in this regard, stands as a promising source for WSNs. It practical remotely feeds the sensor nodes with this RF power source, and takes the capabilities of wireless sensors a step further by allowing them to be powered without wires and without the need to change batteries.

Applications: Building Automation, Access Control, Security; Energy Management; Smart Grid, Sub‐station Monitoring; Industrial Monitoring; Smart Health Monitoring

Zhang, Yan Mechanical Engineering

My name is Yan Zhang. I am a new Assist. Professor of Mechanical Engineering Department starting this Fall semester. I am very interested in this opportunity to start my research program in a collaborative way. Expertise: My expertise is in Experimental Fluid Mechanics & Aerodynamics, Wind Energy, and Bio‐fluid Mechanics. Research interests: One of my research interests may fall into the category: Healthy Populations and Vital Communities: Cardiovascular fluid dynamics & blood flow characteristics in left atrial (LA) and LA appendage, particularly during Atrial Fibrillation (AF). AF is the most common heart disease in the US and it is a major cause of blood clots and stroke. However, its underlying physics is still largely unclear. Since it is very difficult to quantify the blood flow field and its fluid‐structure interaction with cardiac muscle wall during clinical practices, an experimental study may be very helpful to reveal these critical information in detail. Some related preliminary studies have been performed using 1‐D mathematical modeling during my postdoc research. The long‐term plan is to form a collaborative study among multiple colleges. The experimental measurements and testing using artificial heart models may involve advance fluid diagnostic techniques (my expertise, College of Engineering), polymeric material model designs (College of Science and Mathematics), and related clinical data (College of Health Professions).

COLLEGE OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT AND EDUCATION

Fuller, Heather Human Development and Family Science

Grand Challenge: Healthy Populations and Vital CommunitiesMy research program focuses on how social relationships affect health and well‐being across the lifespan. I study how interpersonal relationships, whether with family, friends, neighbors, or communities impact the quality of our lives. For instance, I focus on how the structure and quality of social support networks impacts both physical and psychological health. I specialize in aging populations, and am particularly interested in topics such as social integration in late‐life and the impact of intergenerational relationships on well‐being. I also have a strong interest in examining and understanding cross‐cultural variations in interpersonal relationships. My methodological expertise is in survey research, but an important next step for my research is examining biomarkers (such as cortisol, blood pressure, etc.). Moreover, I primarily engage in basic research, but would look forward to pursuing applied research avenues such as community interventions.

Hilliard, Elizabeth Health, Nutrition, and Exercise Science

The Dietetics workgroup is interested in Foods Systems and Security and/or the Healthy Populations and Vital Communities. In Dietetics we address increasing the consumption of nutrient dense foods, and this focus will complement both of these RFP concentrations. The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, our national level professional organization is currently focusing on increasing access to healthy foods. We realize that we cannot improve the diets of our population, if many of our people cannot directly access healthy foods. As part of the educational training required to become a dietitian, students must complete an internship of 1200 hours. One of the concentration areas for internships are food security and sustainability. We discuss food security in HNES 442: Community Health and Nutrition Education, and sustainability in our food production classes, HNES 361: Foodservice Systems Management I and HNES 460: Foodservice Systems Management II. A balanced diet is also a major component of health, therefore, Dietetics is also an integral part of Healthy Populations and Vital Communities. With the increasing numbers of obese


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individuals, a healthy diet is the first line treatment for this. Any intervention for obesity would be insufficient without the addition of the dietary component. Our faculty are well –versed in methods for decreasing caloric content while increasing nutrient quality, which is essential in weight loss.

Lee, Jaeha Apparel, Design and Hospitality Management

My interest is in “Healthy populations and vital communities. ” One of my research expertise is rural retailing and retail strategies of small businesses. The downtown area is one of the major destinations for tourists in small and mid‐sized cities and the major tourism activities in the downtown area are shopping and dining. Thus, a strong retail presence is essential for the economic vitality of the downtown and the city. I am interested in researching technologies that enhance retail experiences in the downtown area of small and mid‐sized cities.

Park, Jeongdoo Apparel, Design and Hospitality Management

My research focuses on environmental management in the hospitality industry. I have conducted research examining how hospitality firms become proactive in their responses to environmental issues. In particular, I am interested in the roles of top management leadership, organizational structure and resources, and the firm’s relations with other stakeholder groups (e.g., shareholders, employees, and communities) in adopting and developing environmental management strategy.

Park, Kwangsoo Apparel, Design and Hospitality Management

I would like to examine the feasibility of continuous development in Agritourism in the state of North Dakota and make suggestions for future development. Agritourism refers to many different activities including farm or ranch stays, buying products directly from a farm, picking fruit, feeding animals, or staying at a B&B on a farm or ranch. Over 30 registered Agritourism operators in ND continue to claim a larger piece of pie in the tourists’ spending as farmers and ranchers in the state started to think outside the box. Since the growth of Agritourism business has been expected, research efforts are wanted to make suggestions for future development and ultimately develop a guideline/model. I believe that my research interest can be related to a topic of Healthy Populations and Vital Communities.

Ray‐Degges, Susan Apparel, Design and Hospitality Management

Clearly aligned with the Grand Challlenge Themen of “Healthy Populations and Vital Communities” ‐‐establishing an interdisciplinary Center for Aging at NDSU has the potential to reach across colleges and programs at NDSU and create collaborations across many disciplines. This unit would serve as the interdisciplinary center for research, teaching, and outreach to state constituents on gerontology and aging related programs. My research interest focuses on Aging in Place and examines how older adults can be accommodated in their current environments rather than being forced to adapt. My background is environment and behavior in the area of gerontology.

Rhee, Yeong Health, Nutrition, and Exercise Science

Research Interests: Prevention of obesity and its related chronic diseases such as diabetes or cardiovascular diseases through behavior changes such as nutrition education and nutrition interventions using health‐promoting compounds of foods, and using molecular, cellular, and whole‐body approaches. My research methods include body (anthropometric) measurements, food intake measurement and analysis, and lab procedures/assays. I do both clinical (with humans) and mouse‐model research for testing the health‐promoting compounds of foods and the mechanisms by which they work. Of the Grand Challenge initiatives, my research interests, methods, and skills align well with Food Systems and Security, Healthy Populations and Vital Communities, and the Societal Infrastructure aspects of the third track. While I am particularly interested in nutrition for diabetes and cardiovascular disease prevention, I am also interested in collaborating on projects related to public health, nutrition throughout all human life stages, health and culture, and large initiatives for nutrition and disease prevention.

Sanders, Greg Human Development and Education

We are interested in creating an interdisciplinary center on aging to build research collaborations in gerontology. Our recent work has related to health and wellness of older adults from both an individual and community perspective. Research to date has included mental health and aging, community structure as it affects older adults, exercise and aging, and a number of other topics. We would like to expand our focus by including additional disciplines and topics under the umbrella of Healthy Populations and Vital Communities.

Stastny, Sherri Throughout my career my ultimate goal has been to help people improve their health. To accomplish this goal, I have combined my background in foodservice management with my


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Health, Nutrition and Exercise Science

nutrition education skills to design research studies that can help solve problems for the constituents of our state, particularly older adults. I am trained as a dietitian. I am also a Board Certfied Specialist in Sports Dietetics (CSSD) which encompasses wellness and cardiovascular health. I have headed several research studies that were designed to compare nutrition claims in food to actual analyzed values. I have also headed the nutrition component of a human subject study involving use of increased protein diets (and a creatine supplement) and weight lifting among 60 women. Our research teams have collaborated with research teams in NDSU Cereal Sciences, and/or used the USDA Nutrient Database and the Food Processor (ESHA) to measure actual nutrient content of foods, estimate nutrient content of foods, and to estimate self‐reported dietary intake among individuals. I have worked very closely with the NDSU Extension “Nourish Your Body” series, as a 1st author, collaborating author, instructor, mentor and researcher. Nourish Your Body is a series of nutrition education materials designed for the general public. I spearheaded the NEI grant for Eating for Your Eyes II which includes outreach to individuals living on North Dakota reservations. Two papers from the project “Eating for Your Eyes II” have been published and our next step is to report our findings from a “Living with Low Vision” project.

COLLEGE OF HEALTH PROFESSIONS

Buettner‐Schmidt, Kelly School of Nursing

Grand Challenge Theme: Healthy Populations and Vital Communities My background is in public health with 17 years in the field before entering academia. My PhD is in nursing and health policy. My expertise include: public health; population health; policy development, implementation, and evaluation; health promotion; tobacco prevention, cessation, and control. My research interest is in all things public health, population health, and policy. My extensive experience in public health provided me with broad experiences in public health and I have many contacts at the state and national levels. I will be honored to be a collaborative member for initiatives related to the Healthy Populations and Vital Communities theme of the Grand Challenge Initiative.

Gross, Dean School of Nursing

Faculty in the Doctor of Nursing Practice/Family nurse Practitioner program are proposing a NDSU worksite wellness program providing health promotion and disease prevention guidance for faculty and staff. The program will provide an interprofessional practice site for DNP faculty and students as well as other disciplines. We anticipate collaborating with key individuals within the Sanford Health organization to secure a practice site. Our intention is to collaborate with faculty and students in pharmacy practice, nutrition/dietetics, counseling, and exercise science in order to provide wellness and disease prevention programs. Potential wellness programs or services offered to individuals or groups of faculty and staff will include, but are not limited to, screening and evaluation, patient education, including referrals for healthy eating, exercise, stress management, smoking cessation, disease prevention, and immunizations. NDSU faculty and staff wellness program could lead to improved health, retention, productivity, and life satisfaction as well as a reduction in lost work days due to illness. The research component will include collecting and analyzing data related to improved health outcomes e.g., blood pressure, glucose, lipids, and weight/body mass index (BMI). An additional research focus will evaluate students’ competencies related to interprofessional health care practice.

Petry, Natasha School of Pharmacy

My research interests mainly apply to the Grand Challenge Related to: Healthy populations and vital communities. I am a residency trained pharmacist and spend half of my time in clinical practice in an ambulatory care setting in an Internal Medicine clinic. We practice using the Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) model. In the PCMH we focus on collaborative care and I especially have an interest in how the pharmacist fits into the collaborative healthcare team. I focus on many chronic diseases, but specifically focus on Diabetes management and treatment. I also have a focus on medication adherence. I have participated in research related to diabetes and depression as co‐morbidities. I also have participated in research regarding the overuse of Proton Pump Inhibitors. I am also interested in Vitamin D deficiency and what role that plays in a person’s health. My most recent research interest involves Pharmacogenetics and Personalized Medicine. I also am


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pursuing my Masters of Public Health degree and have an interest in public health related research. I also have an interest in the Grand Challenge Related to: Sustainable Energy, Environment, and Societal Infrastructure. I am interested in pharmaceuticals in our water and the resulting consequences which also ties in to the topic of proper disposal of unused pharmaceuticals.

Strand, Mark Pharmacy/Public Health

My research addresses the epidemiology of chronic diseases, with particular attention to diabetes. I have current research projects in the management of co‐morbid diabetes and depression, the progression of metabolic syndrome among middle aged persons in China (2008‐2016), and translational research into diabetes prevention among pre‐diabetic women in China (Pathway to Health: A Lifestyle Intervention to Prevent, International Diabetes Federation funded). A second line of research is in the area of public health service delivery by pharmacists. I have funded research in assessing public health knowledge among pharmacy students and assessing current public health service delivery by practicing pharmacists. The primary goal of this research is to increase the ability of pharmacists to contribution to improved population health beyond the contributions they make to individual patients. A third area of research is “Health Impacts of Road Dust in Western North Dakota” (grant‐funded 2014‐16) in collaboration with faculty from the NDSU Soil Sciences department. We are seeking to improve the health and quality of life of residents in the oil patch by identifying dust‐associated health risks. All of my research fits closely with the “Healthy Populations and Vital Communities” Grand Challenge. The current epidemiologic transition in the U.S. and the world has resulted in chronic diseases being responsible for the greatest burden of disease. Furthermore, these diseases create long‐term burden, and consume the majority of healthcare resources. The ability to identify correlates of chronic disease, and design effective strategies for upstream disease prevention is critical to improving the health of populations. The evidence base for effective methods of disease prevention and management is quite strong, but the ability to utilize evidence‐based best practices is limited by many factors. Translational research, which seeks to demonstrate the effectiveness of best practices in real practice settings, is critical. The randomized controlled trial described above, using the diabetes prevention program, is an example of translating an established diabetes prevention protocol to the community level to demonstrate the efficacy of the protocol. Personal global experience opens the door to global comparative analyses of health care needs and services, and to translate the global health experience for the American medical community. This is something that has enriched my research experience tremendously.

Swanson, Kathleen Nursing

I am interested in mental health needs of rural women in particular. This population is isolated by virtue of their location and also the rural culture surrounding them. Recognition of women as equal with men is often lacking and can result in unhealthy or abusive relationships which are perpetuated by the lack of mental health support and knowledge. I envision a collaboration with nursing, psychology, sociology and women's studies to determine how to best address these needs and develop services to meet those needs. Mental health status is correlated with physical health. Addressing the mental health needs of rural women is a public health issue that would benefit our state.

Warne, Donald Public Health

Research Interests / Brief Overview of Proposed Initiative: To adequately address Population Health, an interdisciplinary approach to research and discovery is required. The factors that impact Population Health are multi‐faceted and cannot be adequately addressed through a single lens or by addressing a single health condition. The field of public health is by its nature multidisciplinary, and the NDSU Department of Public Health has already established a track record of interdisciplinary efforts to expand population health research, education, and service. The Department of Public Health [formerly the Master of Public Health (MPH) Program] is housed in the College of Health Professions. Memoranda of Understanding already exist with three other colleges:


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College of Human Development and Education / Department of Health, Nutrition, and Exercise Science in which the Health Promotion track is housed;

College of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Natural Resources / Department of Veterinary and Microbiological Sciences in which the Management of Infectious Diseases track is housed; and

College of Business, Master of Business Administration in which curriculum for the Health Industry MBA track includes several MPH courses.

The Department of Public Health Grand Challenge Initiative proposal leverages current and emerging strengths of NDSU and develops a new doctorate program (DrPH) while strengthening existing PhD programs. In addition to strengthening the existing multidisciplinary relationships across four colleges described above, new partnerships are proposed with the College of Science and Math / Department of Psychology and with the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences / Department of Sociology and Anthropology. The proposed faculty lines include Public Health Psychology, Public Health Nutrition, Indigenous Food Systems, and are designed to promote high‐level, interdisciplinary population health research with significant potential for large‐scale impact, external funding, sustainability, and growth of the NDSU research enterprise. The proposal will also include matching investment and leveraging of existing resources from the participating colleges.

COLLEGE OF SCIENCE AND MATHEMATICS

Bowsher, Julia Biological Sciences

Grand Challenge: Food Systems and SecurityOne third of all agricultural crops species require insects for pollination, and a majority of those species are the fruits and vegetables critical for a healthy diet. Honeybees pollinate most fruit and vegetable crops, and are critical to our nation’s food security. However, our country faces a pollination crisis because managed honeybee populations are in a steep decline due to a complex combination of management practice, insecticides and poor nutrition. Solving the pollination crisis will require not only a better understanding of honeybee biology, but also the use of alternative bees species for pollination. My research focuses on how anthropogenic stress affects pollinator health and performance, in both honeybees and alternative bee species. My specific research areas include (1) the role of nutrition in the juvenile growth and adult health of honeybees, (2) thermal stress during management of the alfalfa leafcutting bee, the most widely managed alternative pollinator, and (3) the regulation of body size and developmental timing in the blue orchard bee, a pollinator of almonds.

Burghaus, Uwe Chemistry and Biochemistry

Work on surface science, nanoscience, and materials is the focus of our projects. In particular, we are interested in heterogeneous catalysis on new nanocatalysts such as model catalysts, graphene, functionalized graphene, silicatene, 2D zeolites, clusters, nanoparticles, 2D systems, metals, metal oxides, heterostructures and nanotubes. Besides some synthesis/nanofabrication projects we use molecular beam scattering techniques to characterize gas‐surface interactions combined with spectroscopy. Details: www.uweburghaus.us

Choi, Yongki Physics

Most enzymes have high specificities for a particular substrate, and therefore are highly specialized for detecting a particular microbe, a type of bacteria, cancerous cells, or rare molecules that can constitute disease markers. This specialization makes enzymes a key reagent in virtually all analytical tests. However, the practical exploitation of an enzyme’s specificity usually requires additional equipment, electrical power, and reagents. In principle, nanotechnology provides opportunities to reverse this situation. By working at the molecular scale, nano‐sensors could theoretically be no larger or energy intensive than the enzyme itself. This premise has guided past research in the PI’s research group. Recently, the PI has made scientific and technological breakthroughs in biotechnology using a next‐generation and non‐fluorescence hybrid biomolecular nano‐circuit technique. This new technique has opened up an entirely new way of watching, recording, and analyzing single biochemical events happening in real time. The advance provides the necessary proof‐of‐concept to begin imagining practical and low‐power electronic sensors that have the selectivity and specificity of any desired biomarkers for human disease. In addition, rapid success investigating three different enzymatic systems, Lysozyme, DNA polymerase I, and protein kinase A, demonstrates the nano‐circuit architecture


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as a promising and general platform for single molecule, single cell, and biopolymers research and applications including early detection of diseases, DNA sequencing, and new drug discovery. Such sensors could be tremendously useful in “Healthy Populations and Vital Communities”. Health monitoring is a critical need, but conventional diagnostics continue to be developed around equipment‐centric and power‐hungry technologies that require multiple reagents. Our prototype single molecule enzyme sensors operate on ultra‐low power and require minimal additional reagents or equipment. Additionally, our sensors based on DNA polymerase can directly read DNA base pairs with single base sensitivity, in order to assay for environmentally or genetically‐damage DNA. And our sensors using Protein Kinase A are extremely sensitive to the presence of noncovalent inhibitors produced by certain diseases. Using an array of nano‐circuits, one can imagine versatile diagnostics to catch particular diseases in their early stages.

Cook, Gregory Chemistry and Biochemistry

Keywords: Organic Synthesis: Drug Discovery, Medicinal Chemistry, Cancer, Renewable Resources, Catalysis, Green Chemistry, Natural Products, Environmentally Benign Chemical Processes Grand Challenge Themes: Given that chemical synthesis is a core enabling technology that impacts in many areas, Dr. Cook can contribute in a number of ways to all three grand challenge themes. Healthy Population: Dr. Cook has 15 years of medicinal chemistry experience at NDSU. Key areas of focus in the group are in the area of small molecule inhibitors and activators for Histone Deacetylases (HDAC). These have implications in cancer (neuroblastoma), chronic autoimmune diseases as well as rare orphan diseases such as Cornelia de Lange syndrome. Dr. Cook has a provisional patent application on a new HDAC8 activator directed toward these areas. With their experience, the Cook Group can contribute to drug design and synthesis in new disease directions. Food System and Security: Where chemistry is required to develop materials, packaging and sensing, the Cook group can contribute. Spoilage is a big challenge in the food industry and chemical sensors for spoilage markers embedded in packaging could provide consumers and retailers with quick and easy visual cues to determine when food goes bad. Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure: Dr. Cook has had a focused research program for 19 years at NDSU to develop green chemical processes. This involves developing new efficient catalysts, reducing energy consumption, eliminating toxic reagents and waste products, reducing waste, and developing reactions that can be carried out in “green” safe solvents ‐particularly biorenewable solvents and water. Applications of these processes can be targeted in many different areas of chemical synthesis. The group has interests to expand into the area of processing biomass into useful high value chemicals. Catalysis in water would be amenable to developing new protocols to obtain commodity chemicals from raw cellulose and lignans.

Croll, Andrew Physics

Healthy Populations and Vital Communities: One of the areas we currently focus on has a ‘big picture’ application in the field of drug delivery. We are exploring the physics of block copolymer stabilised emulsion drops as a model of a ‘smart’ drug delivery system. The copolymer gives many handles for specific chemistries to be added but also acts as a surfactant and coats the oil ‘hiding’ it from degradation by the outside environment. We are developing simple methods to measure material properties in these systems and, more importantly, are examining how different features can be manipulated to make the capsules ‘responsive’. The ultimate goal is to find a way to quickly open and deliver a cargo at will, and at the same time maintain structure until this point is reached. Sustainable Energy, Environment, and Societal Infrastructure: Another current focus that my group is exploring is thin polymer films in advanced geometries (origami for example). This research couples real material properties with complex geometry in order to completely understand the resulting performance of a thin film system. One of the many features that will emerge from the work is a new class of lightweight structure that is potential responsive (for example self‐deploying solar cells). Such work would contribute to an overall energy budget by reducing weight and potentially using passive energy storage to accomplish goals (e.g. stored elastic energy in a folded structure).


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Denton, Alan Physics

My research develops theoretical and computational modeling methods, including Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics simulation, to investigate physico‐chemical properties of a variety of soft, bio‐ and nano‐materials. Applications to charge‐stabilized colloidal suspensions, colloid‐polymer mixtures, and polyelectrolyte microcapsules have potential industrial relevance for foods and food systems, pharmaceuticals and drug delivery, and environmental remediation.

Hinsz, Verlin Psychology

Food Systems and Security: I have been pursuing research in food safety for over a dozen years. This has lead me to develop a theoretical framework for motivating food safety and security behaviors on the part of the humans interacting with food systems. Healthy Populations and Vital Communities: I have extensive experience in topics that underlies these topics. In particular, attitude measurement and change as well as the relationships of attitudes with subsequent behavior. I also have a strong emphasis on judgment and decision making. Moreover, my background provides me a strong foundation of understanding of social interaction, particularly group interaction, as a vehicle for developing healthy populations and vital communities. Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure: My backgrounds in attitudes, judgment & decision making, social and group interaction also serve as a basis for understanding human behavior with regard to energy, the environment, and particularly society. In the past, I spearheaded an effort to create a center for overcoming resistance and fostering use of new energy technologies which reflected one of the directions my research experience and expertise could be directed. My background allows me to take a variety of perspectives to the problems posed by the grand challenges.

Hobbie, Erik Physics Coatings and Polymeric Materials

Materials and Nanotechnology plans to be active in at least two proposals, one related to materials aspects of sustainability (led by Eakalak Khan in CEE) and another related to materials/nano aspects of detecting and destroying bacteria and viruses. We are looking for potential partners in the latter topic right now and have a summary available.

Hyun, Seung Won Statistics

My primary research area is optimal designs in clinical trials. An optimal design specifies the design points (dose levels) to use and how to distribute subjects over these design points in the most efficient manner. In practical terms, optimal design can provide accurate statistical inference with minimum cost. My research has provided various optimal designs that can be easily used and applied to real studies. Instead of using a design constructed on the hope that it will adequate for studying research questions, researchers can use the optimal designs that guarantee to work well for studying their research questions. In my recent research, I tackle challenging design issues motivated by real‐world problems and focus on constructing efficient designs that realistically meet the needs of practitioners and researchers. I find realistic objectives from real‐setting problems in clinical trials and study optimal designs that do not require strong assumptions. The outcomes of my research provide an efficient and far more realistic designs to study researchers’ interesting objectives from a single study. In addition, I develop user‐friendly computer programs for searching the optimal designs, so that practitioners and researchers can find appropriate and efficient designs easily for their studies.

Kilin, Dmitri Chemistry and Biochemistry

One of three Grand Challenges: Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructurea paragraph summarizing research: Dynamics of excited states in nanomaterials, theory and computation of hot carrier relaxation. The goal of the research is a better understanding of photo‐excited processes in broader range of materials with higher precision. This goal is pursued by atomistic computational modeling of dynamics of excited electronic states at interfaces of semiconductor and metallic nano‐structures, related to renewable energy applications: photovoltaics and photocatalysis. The benefit of calculations based on electronic structure and density matrix methods is a computationally assisted design of efficient photo‐active energy materials. A side product of this basic research is a development of two suites of codes that can be used by a broad range of reseachers of photoactive materials. Practical research includes modeling of (i) photophysical and (ii) photochemical processes. Modeling of photophysical processes of excitation, charge transfer, multiple exciton generation, and photoluminescence in thin films and between layers of nanomaterials serves to photovoltaic theme. Modeling of photochemical processes such as photodisoociation and photoreactions is related to practical


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area of deposition of thin films of electronically relevant materials and to photocatalytic theme of solar energy utilization optimizing photoelectrochemical generation of hydrogen from sun and water. how it may and can fit into any one [or more] of the Grand Challenges: This research fits into Grand Challenge of Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure, specifically into pool of research dealing with sustainable energy. This research will be based in College of Science and Mathematics and would benefit from active synergy with College of Engineering, for practical transition from solar cell materials to solar cell devices. The proposed research will be a vivid component of graduate program, preparing intellectual leaders in the area of energy materials, through active research, thus benefitting from interactions with Graduate school and Interdisciplinary Studies as well as College of Human Development and Education. The planned computationally intense research program will contain substantial IT component and will utilize CCAST facilities.

Kong, Jun Computer Science

Dr. Kong’s research focuses on Human Computer Interaction. He and his team developed a framework that supported users to collaborate with each other efficiently in a multi‐device environment. Users share information through a large public display and edit information through his/her personal smartphone. This inter‐device interaction improves user experience in social networking applications by facilitating information sharing without sacrificing privacy for co‐located groupware. Therefore, this research has a potential application for building a vital community through efficient collaboration and information sharing among community users.

May, Sylvio Physics

My research expertise is in theoretical modeling at the interface of biophysics and physical chemistry. I'm specifically interested in the following topics: 1) Electrochemistry: modeling the structure of the diffuse double layer and ion‐specific effects 2) Self Assembly of Surfactants: formation of micelles and other aggregate structures, predicting thermodynamic and structural properties 3) Membrane Biophysics: Interactions of peptides, proteins and DNA with lipid membranes. I find the potential of using amphipathic peptides as broad spectrum antibiotics especially interesting. 4) Drug Delivery: design of delivery systems for poorly water‐soluble drugs I see potential relevance of 2 and 3 for Food Systems and Security, 4 for Healthy Populations and Vital Communities, and 1 for Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure.

Otte, Marinus & Jacob, Donna, Wet Ecosystem Research Group, Biological Sciences

Our research interests fit with all three themes, because availability of clean water is central to life and society. Our research spans 25 years of work on wetlands, both coastal and inland, lakes and streams, with a particular focus on plant‐soils interactions, and ranges in scale from the microscopic (rhizosphere) to landscape level. Current projects include (1) biogeochemistry of prairie potholes and shallow lakes, also in relation to water quality and disturbance, and (2) uptake and effects of nanoparticles in crops (wheat, rice, spinach) and wild plants (dock, duckweed).

Rafert, Bruce Physics

My work includes most major subfields of remote sensing spanning instrumentation, signal processing, optical engineering, and multiple applications‐‐with a focus on hyperspectral imaging. My hyperspectral research is relevant to all three grand scale areas at scales from um to global coverage. My current interests are growing in applications of hyperspectral imaging, structure from motion, and plenoptic sensing using swarms of UAS for observation and assessment of transportation and agriculture. I am currently the NDSU PI for the remote sensing projects within the Upper Great Plains Transportation Institute under the aegis of a UTC grant funded via a the Mountain Plains Consortium, and am interested in providing support as deemed logical in any/all of the GSC areas.

Reindl, Katie Biological Sciences

My research program is centered on whole foods and natural products and their potential to prevent and treat cancers. This work includes investigating the use of whole foods (such as flaxseed) as cancer preventive agents and bioactive food components (such as alkaloids and lignans) as chemo and radiation‐sensitizing agents. My research incorporates clinical, organismal, cellular, biochemical, and molecular approaches to investigate biological responses elicited by natural products. The long‐term goal of my research program is to contribute toward the development of natural products for prevention and clinical treatment of human disease,


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particularly cancer. I am interested in the Grand Challenges themes of Food Systems and Security as well as Healthy Populations and Vital Communities.

Sibi, Mukund Chemistry and Biochemistry

Grand Challenge Themes: Prof. Sibi has a broad range of research and leadership expertise and can participate in all the three grand challenge themes. Healthy Population: Prof. Sibi has served as the Director for the Center of Protease Research since 2001. The Center for Protease Research is a biomedical resource hub for the NDSU campus. Prof. Sibi has wide ranging expertise in drug discovery, medicinal chemistry, and synthetic organic chemistry. He has 6 patents on new method development for the synthesis of small organic molecules with chirality that are useful for the synthesis of therapeutics. Prof. Sibi has an active program in the development of new therapeutics for ‘Triple Negative Breast Cancer’ (TNBC) and recently completed a pilot study funded by the Susan Komen Foundation. Food System and Security: Preservation of food for future use in times of need is important. There is an urgent need for replacement of bisphenol A (BPA) based container coatings used extensively in the food industry. Human exposure to BPA is widespread and there is concern for its effect on the brain, behavior, and prostate gland in fetuses, infants, and children. The Sibi group is investigating novel biomass‐based monomers as BPA replacements. These studies address two important grand challenges (1) replacement of fossil fuel derived chemical feedstocks with those from biomass and (2) a need for safer non‐toxic container coatings for food preservation. Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure: The word ‘Sustainability” has taken on a new meaning in the 21st century. Over the past two decades the Sibi group has made significant contributions to the development of energy saving, efficient, and eco‐friendly catalytic methods for the synthesis of organic compounds important to the pharmaceutical and chemical industry. Fossil fuels play a major role in our day‐to‐day life. However it is a non‐renewable resource. Biomass has been identified as a potential and sustainable alternative. The Sibi group has several major programs in the utilization of the all the major sources of biomass for the production of chemical feedstocks. Current research thrusts include (1) identification of a 100% biobased alternative to polyethyleneterephthalate (PET) polymers used for beverage bottles (2) identification of a non‐toxic alternative to BPA monomer and (3) preparation of novel biobased polymers.

Craig Stockwell, Biological Sciences

My lab works at the interface of evolutionary ecology and conservation biology of aquatic systems. We have conducted molecular surveys to look at how anthropogenic landuse patterns affect genetic connectedness as well as the genetic health of protected species and invasive species. These questions are of interest due to the dynamic interactions between wetlands which occur in an agricultural matrix, which have rapidly changed in response to commodity market forces associated; i.e, reduced participation in the conservation reserve program. We are interested in applying molecular tools to examine the biotic connectedness of wetlands, some of which are physically isolated. These tools may be useful assessing for interpreting the functional interaction among wetlands – a topic that is generating considerable interest due to new EPA rules on wetland classification. Along with our collaborators at Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center, we also have examined climate change impacts on the biotic communities of northern prairie wetlands. Finally, we have conducted work to evaluate the impacts on invasive species on native species of concern.

Sweetman, Jon Biological Sciences

Research in my lab is focused on understanding the potential impacts on freshwater ecosystems from the cumulative effects of climate change, population growth and land use change. I look at information archived in lake sediments to provide historical perspectives on environmental change. This data can be used to help define natural environmental variability, examine the impacts to aquatic communities from human development, and evaluate models used for assessing environmental changes. With regards to the three grand challenge themes, all three themes (Healthy Populations and Vital Communities; Food Systems and Security; and Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure) require sustainable water supplies that are of high quality. Possible areas of research related to the grand challenge areas:


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Healthy Populations and Vital Communities: 1) Examining long‐term changes in surface water availability and quality; 2) Assessing the impacts of wastewater and pathogens on freshwater ecosystems; and 3) Examining the impacts of increasing recreational use on lakes. Food Systems and Security: 1) Understanding past climate variability; 2) Evaluating long‐term changes in surface water availability and quality; 3) Assessing the impacts of nutrient and pesticide loading to freshwater environments; and 4) Tracking the impacts of changing landuse patterns. Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure: 1) Assessing the impacts of unconventional oil development (e.g. produced water spills) on aquatic ecosystems; 2) Understanding impacts of economic development on aquatic environments; 3) Providing a long‐term perspective on potential or perceived environmental risks.

Tackett, Lydia Geosciences

My research in the geosciences addresses ecosystem response to rapid or protracted catastrophic perturbations, primarily in marine environments from deep in Earth’s past (the Mesozoic Era, 250‐65 million years ago). Specifically, I’ve worked to characterize the biotic effects of rapid events like asteroid impacts and devastating ocean acidification events. I have two primary areas of expertise: paleontology of shelly invertebrates (taxonomic identification and paleoecological analyses of fossil assemblages) and sedimentology (both field and microscopic interpretation of depositional environments). I have used these skills to examine major upheavals in Earth’s history and identify analogous biotic and environmental features between these events and with modern ecosystems. These research areas have important applications to at least two of NDSU’s Grand Challenges. First, the main overarching goal of my research is to use the past to better predict the future, thereby informing us about ecosystem function in the face of a changing environment (Grand Challenge: Sustainable Energy, Environment, and Societal Infrastructure). Second, I am able to use examples from the past to understand temporal scale during these events, and understanding the ecological changes that take place both at the onset of a major ecological shift and the duration and stages of the recovery will be vital for food resources (Grand Challenge: Food Systems and Security). I believe that we can use the deep time record more extensively to understand how our world is changing.

Voronov, Andriy Coatings and Polymeric Materials

Andriy Voronov is an Associate Professor in the Coatings and Polymeric Materials. Before joining NDSU in November 2007, he held a research position at the Institute of Particle Technology, University of Erlangen‐Nuremberg in Erlangen, Germany. He completed his academic education in the Ukraine, gaining an MS in Chemical Engineering and a PhD in Polymer Chemistry from Lviv Polytechnic National University. Andriy Voronov’s research concentrates on nanostructured materials, responsive materials, biomaterials, polymer sustainable and renewable materials, colloids, nanoparticles, thin films, gels, polymer interfaces and polymer composites, as well as on polymer design and synthesis, surfactants, responsive polymer micelles, colloids, polymer latexes.

CAMPUS DEPARTMENTS

Bahr, James Research and Creative Activity

Expertise: Senior Research Engineer with BS in Mechanical Engineering. Over 23 years of experience serving as both PI and support staff on a wide variety of research projects (50+). My expertise includes process chemistry development, scale up of chemical synthesis, automation of chemical reactions and processes, prototype design and fabrication, ceramics, polymers, biotechnology, bio composites, catalysis, workflow development and automation. Past funding agencies/companies include: NASA, NSF, DoE, USAF, ONR, Natick, US Army, UDRI, ND Soy Council, USDA, DARPA, NREL, PNNL, Sandia NL; W.L. Gore, Rohm and Haas, Elf AtoChem, PPG, P&G, Bobcat, Aldevron, Ashland Chemical and others. Interests: Research on the utilization of renewable materials, scale up of chemical synthesis, polymer chemistry, high throughput experimentation, prototype development and the automation of experiments. The research projects that I have been awarded typically involve the design and fabrication of automated research equipment for the chemical and biotechnology fields. However, what I enjoy most about my job is to be part of multidisciplinary research teams where I can bring my years of experience and diverse research background to


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collectively solve difficult problems. Most of the research projects that I have worked on involved areas of science that were new to me. This diversity and ongoing learning are what I enjoy most about my job.

Chisholm, Bret Research and Creative Activity

My research expertise is in polymer science with emphasis on polymer chemistry. Over the years, I have developed strong expertise in the areas of polymeric materials based on renewable resources, antimicrobial and fouling‐release polymers and coatings, hybrid organic‐inorganic materials, and the development and use of high‐throughput methods for polymeric material development. With regard to the Grand Challenges, my expertise and interests fall within all three topics. My expertise and interest in polymeric materials based on renewable resources fits nicely within the topic of Sustainable Energy, Environment and Societal Infrastructure, while my expertise and interest in antimicrobial materials fits into the topic of Healthy Populations and Vital Communities as well as Food Systems and Security.

Penn, Jeremy Student Affairs

As Director of Student Affairs Assessment, my interest is in research that directly impacts the health, wellness, and success of our students. The Division has a large number of health and wellness programs for students, including health promotion, a full pharmacy and student health clinic, counseling services and access to psychiatrist, as well as opportunities to support healthy eating choices through dining. We are always seeking collaborators for projects and would be happy to visit with you about your project.

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