Cycle of plant science changes

Photo: Peter Morenus

Under the leadership of new department head, Mary Musgrave, the plant science department at UConn is tailoring its research and teaching efforts to best serve the people of Connecticut as agricultural needs change. Unlike years ago, today more than half of all agricultural production in the state is from flowers and ornamental plants, approaching $600 million in sales.

Branching out from a traditional agronomy focus, UConn's plant scientists are working today in the areas of landscape and horticultural production to advance knowledge and use the expertise of faculty to create new products and processes. For example, instead of focusing exclusively on traditional field crop production, one part of the department is specializing on turfgrass. Five years ago UConn introduced a four-year turfgrass science degree program. Research and extension work in the area of turfgrass at UConn is getting considerable attention from the turf industry and homeowners.

"Our department is combining forces among landscape architecture, plant nutrient management, water quality, and soils faculty to provide expertise in land use planning and best management practices. We have collaborative work ongoing with towns and municipalities," says Musgrave.

While maintaining a world-renowned reputation in plant science and keeping pace with the strong demand for trained professionals to work in the horticulture and landscape industries, UConn's faculty remains firmly committed to research that benefits the green industries and the people of Connecticut, whether it's Mark Brand's genetically modified, root-rot resistant rhododendrons or Yi Li's innovative research into reproductive biology and its applicability to the control of invasive plants.

Promoting healthy living in the workplace

Photo: Peter Morenus

Many of Pratt & Whitney's nearly 13,000 Connecticut employees are getting healthier thanks to UConn's Center for Health Promotion in the School of Allied Health.

Working with the company's medical department, UConn faculty experts and graduate students are providing health assessments, monitoring employee progress and developing educational and behavior modification programs. UConn's Allied health faculty collaborate with colleagues in nursing, psychology and nutritional sciences.

"The unique feature we bring is our ability to conduct both program evaluation and research on the health promotion programs we bring to their employees," says Linda S. Pescatello, director of the Center for Health Promotion and principal investigator for the Pratt & Whitney program.

The variety of targeted activities includes cardiovascular health risk assessment, a walking program, brown bag learning seminars on health topics and programs for weight management, smoking cessation and more.

Pratt & Whitney's medical department identified heart disease and related conditions, such as hypertension, as the diseases most affecting its employees. The UConn collaboration has proven successful.

"This scientifically based, confidential, comprehensive, innovative and progressive health promotion program greatly enhances the health and productivity of our employees," says Judyth Crystal, P&W wellness coordinator.

Pescatello adds that the six graduate students who staff the program gain an invaluable experience while pursing their master's degrees or completing dissertations.

"It provides UConn students with education and training in health promotion service delivery as well as the opportunity to acquire research skills," she says.

Federal Reserve executive leads business school

Photo: John Collins

Dean Hunter outside the UConn School of Business.

William Curt Hunter, former senior vice president and director of research of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, is the new dean of the UConn School of Business.

"Curt Hunter brings to UConn an extraordinary breadth of academic and public sector experience, and he has the vision needed to bring our business programs to a new level of excellence," says President Philip E. Austin.

Hunter's strong business credentials include having served as vice president in charge of basic research at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. He was a consultant for many private corporations and government agencies, both in this country and overseas. Hunter was a U.S. Treasury adviser to the Bulgarian National Bank and its Bank Consolidation Company. He also has a rich background as a researcher and scholar. He has published more than 70 articles in leading finance and economics journals, is the editor of six books, and is currently co-editor of Research in Banking and Finance.

"The dynamic economy, globalization and digitization present lots of challenges for businesses. They are looking for people who can implement solutions to complex problems," Hunter says. "UConn's School of Business will become internationally recognized for developing people who can solve these problems. For me, this is a wonderful opportunity and challenge."

He has held faculty positions at Emory University, the University of Georgia and Northwestern University, among others.

Online master's degree in professional studies begins

Trying to find time for classes amid a busy career and family life is difficult enough, but when your work requires regular travel or working internationally, it may seem impossible. UConn's inaugural online master of professional studies program is designed to make it possible for those involved in humanitarian services or human resources management to pursue educational advancement needed on an individualized schedule.

With just a two-week residency requirement at the main campus in Storrs or at an approved off-site location, students can complete the balance of the 36-credit program online. The degree in human resources management has two tracks; labor relations and personnel. The humanitarian services administration degree offers courses related to disaster relief or sustainability. Both programs include a core curriculum in organizational behavior, program evaluation and quantitative analysis.

"Most of the people working in disaster relief and sustainability are traveling overseas," says Abdou Ndoye, assistant extension professor in the College of Continuing Studies. "The only way to take classes is online."

Humanitarian services administration is an emerging field. With natural disasters such as hurricanes, tornadoes, and flooding as well as a growing number of conflicts around the world, there has not been specific training for people working to create sustainable living situations after disaster strikes, Ndoye says.

How do you bring resources together to manage and coordinate agencies to help those in need? That is the complicated question UConn's new program in humanitarian services will help to address.

A longer-lasting bite

Depending on the food type, it can take anywhere from five to 50 pounds of pressure to chew and swallow something you eat. That kind of recurring pressure, combined with saliva and other digestive elements in the mouth, will, over time, wear down the materials used to make restorative dental products such as crowns and implants.

Photo: Peter Morenus

UConn's Center for Fatigue Studies tests materials to find ways to improve the manufacture of dental implants and crowns.

"There aren't many simple laboratory tests that show what will happen under low pressure loads over a long period of time," says J. Robert Kelly, professor in the department of prosthodontics and operative dentistry at the UConn School of Dental Medicine. "There's a real need for some long-term testing."

Kelly and his colleagues, Thomas Taylor and A. Jon Goldberg, are beginning such research in the newly established Center for Fatigue Studies in the dental school with a $250,000 equipment grant from the ITI Foundation of Basel, Switzerland.

"The equipment allows us to simulate years of chewing and swallowing forces in an environmental chamber that can be kept at body temperature," says Kelly.

Testing the materials most commonly used for crowns and implants - ceramics, titanium and titanium alloys - will provide valuable information both to help dentists determine the best kinds of materials for their patients and to assist manufacturers in developing longer-lasting dental restoration products.

The research data that results from this work will also lead to the establishment of improved testing standards for dental materials, he says.

NU Foundation creates UConn
scholarships for aspiring teachers

A $330,000 gift from the Northeast Utilities Foundation to the Neag School of Education will provide scholarships for full-time master's degree students enrolling in the Teacher Certification Program for College Graduates at UConn's campus in Stamford.

The Northeast Utlities Foundation supports community efforts to improve education, social and economic conditions, and protect the quality of the environment.

Neag Dean Richard Schwab announced that 30 Northeast Utilities Foundation scholarships will be awarded during the next three years to individuals interested in becoming secondary school teachers in Fairfield County's critical need areas, which include math, science, foreign languages, and special education.

"This generous gift is another example of how this foundation steps up to fulfill a need within the communities it serves," says Schwab. "These scholarships will provide funds for those who have a passion for teaching but for economic reasons - whether loss of a job or inability to afford tuition - would not otherwise be able to become teachers."

The certification program is designed for both recent college graduates and older adults who have earned bachelor's degrees and are considering a career change.

"Students today are potential employees of tomorrow," says Theresa Hopkins-Staten, president of Northeast Utilities Foundation. "We see this partnership as a tremendous opportunity to address teacher shortages in critical subject areas and ensure the education system provides students with the necessary skill sets that will allow them to effectively compete in the workforce in years to come."

By establishing the program, says Schwab, the Neag School will be able to tap into a highly qualified but previously unrealized pool of candidates, particularly those from underserved populations, and will quickly build a fast-track supply of new teachers.

The pursuit of deep space travel

Two UConn engineering professors are researching fluid flow behavior in a weightless environment by conducting experiments in the best way possible - flying in NASA's zero gravity training plane.

Photos: NASA

Associate professor of civil engineering Fred Ogden preparing to test fluid behaivor at zero gravity aboard NASA's KC-135 research jet.

Dani Or, Northeast Utilities Foundation professor of environmental engineering, and Fred Ogden, associate professor of civil engineering, are testing fluid behavior in porous material that will be used for plant growth in developing renewable life support systems for future long-duration manned flight missions.

The life support systems will serve crucial functions aboard spacecraft that one day will fly to Mars and beyond. The systems will supply food, recycle wastewater, remove carbon dioxide and produce oxygen in the spacecraft's cabin atmosphere.

The two professors flew on NASA's famed KC-135 plane, known as the "vomit comet," which is flown up and down a 45-degree angle at 36,000 feet above sea level and provides between 20 and 30 seconds of zero gravity, followed by about a minute of twice Earth's gravity.

"I would describe the experience as exhilarating," says Ogden. "The sensation of zero-g is a lot like swimming, but without water - nothing to push off against except the walls of the aircraft. It is easy to function in zero-g, provided that you have something to hold on to."

The professors took two flights, one in the spring and another during the summer, to gather information for their research.

Helping students gear up for college

A cooperative effort by the School of Family Studies and the Neag School of Education is helping to put nearly 120 high school students in Hartford on the path toward higher education.

Photo: Peter Morenus

Jeff Larson, a fifth year Neag School of Education major, mentors an eleventh grade student at Bulkeley High School in Hartford as part of the GEAR UP program.

Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP), a five-year project funded by the U.S. Department of Education, seeks to increase access to college for students from under-represented ethnic or economic backgrounds. The project involves more than 200 undergraduate and graduate students in education and family studies, under the direction of faculty members John Bennett in the School of Engineering, Kay Norlander-Case and Charles Case in education, and Sara Harkness in family studies.

GEAR UP works with a group of students who were in sixth and seventh grades at the Batchelder School at the beginning of the project. With few exceptions, these students have managed to beat the odds of dropping out of school and are now in the 10th and 11th grades. Many are aiming to attend college.

The success of the GEAR UP program is due to a combination of individual tutoring and mentoring, family involvement, and fun activities that keep the students coming back. "GEAR UP is school-based but family-oriented," says Harkness. "Our diverse group of graduate and undergraduate tutors and mentors can address individual, family and academic issues."

Adds Marcia Hughes, a family studies doctoral student who is the project director, "Our job is to get to know the students and build relationships with them so they will accept our guidance."

Awarding-winning UConn Jazz Ensemble releases first CD

What's a recipe for incredible jazz? Take composer/ arranger/pianist/educator Earl MacDonald, director of UConn's jazz studies program, and mix with a generous portion of his finest students. The result is the University of Connecticut Jazz Ensemble.

The group's special blend of sounds can now be savored on its debut CD, UConn Jazz, just released on the SeaBreeze Vista Record label.

"I believe this disc will send a message to the masses that wonderful things are happening in the UConn music department," MacDonald says. "The disc, coupled with our new degree program in jazz, will most definitely help attract the first-rate students we compete for with other institutions."

Recorded in April, the 11-track CD includes performances by the big band, a dectet, and a sextet. Besides MacDonald - who plays a solo on five tracks - and renowned professional tenor saxophonist Jerry Bergonzi, the UConn student members of the band include trumpeters Bill Longo and Matt Owens, pianist Tom Thorndike, saxophonists Mark Obolewicz and Matt Janiszweski, trombonists Alisa Worth and Nicole Hansboro, flutist Justin Sider, bassist Fran Ieraci, and drummer Ray Kingston.

The UConn Jazz CD can be purchased online at www.seabreezejazz.com, and can be found at the UConn Co-op and most major outlets where compact discs are sold.

Courtrooms are in session

An important part of a quality legal education is gaining experience and confidence in arguing cases before a judge. School of Law students will now have the opportunity to hone their craft in new on-campus courtrooms.

Renovations to Starr Hall include the construction of two courtrooms for law education and instruction. The 100-seat William R. Davis Trial Courtroom honors a 1955 School of Law graduate who received the Law School Alumni Association Medal of Excellence.

The commitment to moot court training at UConn is unusual because first year students are given a two-week break from classes that allows them to concentrate on preparing and arguing their cases. Most other law schools conduct moot court during regular class schedules.

Photo: Lanny Nagler

The William R. Davis Courtroom is used by students, faculty and judges. Among recent guests in the Davis courtroom were, center, Connecticut Supreme Court Justices Joette Katz '77 J.D., Christine S. Vertifeuille '75 J.D., and Richard N. Palmer '77 J.D.

Teams of first year law students are assigned a side of the case for moot court, where the students make their arguments before a judge who is either a practicing lawyer or a sitting judge. Often the judges are UConn law alumni.

While the courtrooms also are used for law classes, having an atmosphere that looks and feels like a hall of justice provides another major benefit to legal education - the ability to observe cases being argued before a judge.

"We like to get judges to hear cases on campus," says Nell Jessup Newton, dean of the School of Law. "This will help tremendously in bringing a court session to our students, allowing them to fully experience the reality of the courtroom."

Journalism is first in New England to be accredited
Colonial scholar named to Draper Chair in American History

Journalism is first in New England to be accredited

UConn's journalism department has joined an elite list of programs, becoming one of approximately 100 programs in the world - and the only journalism program in New England - to be accredited by the Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communication.

"This gives us added national exposure," says Maureen Croteau, professor and head of the department.

"High school counselors recommend accredited schools and departments, and now we're among them."

The accrediting team's evaluation report says that other UConn departments indicate that the journalism department is well-known for its faculty expertise in teaching writing that sharpens critical thinking and the wide impact it has across the campus. It accommodates non-journalism students in its introductory writing course, which helps hundreds of students to fulfill the University's writing requirement.

Graduates of the program show an unusually strong and enduring interest in journalism careers, the report says, noting that of all accredited programs, only eight had 50 percent or more of majors working as journalists three years after graduation, compared with 78 percent of UConn journalism majors.

Since UConn began offering a major in journalism in 1979, nearly 650 students have graduated from the program. Alumni work at newspapers, in TV and radio newsrooms, and at magazines and specialty publications across the nation and in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.

Colonial scholar named to Draper Chair in American History

Robert A. Gross, a distinguished scholar who has long been interested in micro-history, the practice of studying an era through the lives of ordinary people, has joined UConn's history department as the James L. and Shirley A. Draper Chair in American History.

Photo: Peter Morenus

Historian Robert A. Gross, a distinguished scholar of colonial America, holds the James L. and Shirley A. Draper Chair in American History.

"The Draper Chair is an extraordinary opportunity to continue my work and to foster activities that have long interested me," says Gross, who grew up in Bridgeport, Conn., and has spent much of his career researching American history centered around Concord, Lexington and the Minutemen.

The Drapers, both 1941 UConn graduates, established the history chair with a $1.5 million gift.

Gross specializes in the period from the American Revolution to the Civil War and recently wrote an afterward for the 25th anniversary edition of his book The Minutemen and Their World, which won the Bancroft Prize for outstanding scholarship in history. He expects to publish his latest book, The Transcendentalists and Their World, which focuses on the relation between Concord writers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau and the Concord community in which they lived and wrote, by the end of the academic year.

"Professor Gross is extremely well known in the field for his pioneering work in social history, especially regarding Concord and Lexington. So UConn is the perfect place for students who are interested in early American history and the revolution," says Altina Waller, chair of the history department.

Distinguished alumna leads Cancer Center

Carolyn D. Runowicz '73 (CLAS), a nationally prominent expert in gynecologic cancers and women's health, is the new director of the UConn Health Center's Cancer Center.

Photo: Peter Morenus

Carolyn D. Runowicz '73 (CLAS), an expert in gynecologic cancer, leads the UConn Cancer Center.

The 2002 recipient of the UConn Distinguished Alumni Award, she previously was a professor of clinical obstetrics and gynecology at Columbia and vice chair of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital in New York City.

Runowicz says her vision for the UConn Cancer Center is clear. "Ultimately, I'd like to develop a strong center with enough outstanding oncologists, translational, and basic science researchers, as well as a cancer control program, to become a National Cancer Institutes designated cancer center," she says.

National Cancer Institutes designated centers are the nation's most elite cancer centers and participate in broad-based, interdisciplinary programs in cancer research.

Runowicz was the first woman to become president of the Society of Gynecologic Oncologists and is currently on the national board of the American Cancer Society.

She has candidly shared insights from her own battle with breast cancer in her book To Be Alive: A Woman's Guide to a Full Life After Cancer. Her fourth book, The Cancer Prevention Breakthrough, is in progress.

"Under Dr. Runowicz's leadership, UConn's cancer program will become a hub of new initiatives in cancer research and clinical care," says Peter J. Deckers, UConn's executive vice president for health affairs and dean of the School of Medicine.

Critical service to elderly

UConn nursing students are gaining valuable experience while providing direct care to patients in a partnership program with the Visiting Nurse Association (VNA) of Central Connecticut.

Photo: Peter Morenus

Erin Tragash '04 (NUR), a senior nursing student, visits an elderly patient in New Britain.

The Carelink program provides a critical service to homebound elderly patients with chronic illnesses such as diabetes, arthritis and heart disease. Senior nursing students fulfill their community health clinical practice by caring for patients in the familiar environment of their own homes. Since the program began in 1997, hundreds of patients have received care from UConn students.

"Our students develop a commitment to the Carelink program through the relationships they develop with their clients," says Juliette Shellman '99 M.A., '03 Ph.D., coordinator of the program. "They conduct holistic nursing, looking at the entire situation, taking everything into consideration.

As a result, clients comment that their students provide high quality nursing care."

The UConn students conduct a range of health assessments that are important to maintaining good health in elderly patients, including fall risk, nutritional habits, medication evaluation, monitoring of cognitive functions and a wellness inventory.

All care is conducted under the supervision of licensed VNA nurses and UConn faculty.

The success of Carelink is evident in the results of a fall prevention program, which reduced patient falls by 18 percent. Falls are a common health problem in older patients.

The program was established through the cooperative efforts of Henrietta Bernal '68 (NUR), '74 M.S., '84 Ph.D., professor emerita of nursing, and Karen Reid '69 (NUR), director of public health services for VNA of Central Connecticut.

Pharmacy building construction commences

Construction is underway for the new 200,000-square-foot Pharmacy-Biolo gy building, which will include flexible laboratories designed to meet a range of research needs, high technology classrooms and a state-of-the-art, multi-use pharmacist care center.

"It's exciting to see the facility coming to fruition after all the planning," says Robert McCarthy, dean of pharmacy. "Everything seems to be right on target for a Fall 2005 opening."

The building will house the School of Pharmacy, two biology departments (ecology and evolutionary biology & physiology and neurobiology) and a centralized animal facility. The building will be located in the newly formed science quadrangle on Auditorium Road, and the sharing of laboratory space will allow increased collaboration between pharmacy faculty and other UConn scientists, helping to stimulate the development of multidiscipli nary research projects.

Ronald Langner, professor of pharmaceutical sciences and chair of the pharmacy building committee, says the pharmacist care center will provide students with enhanced learning and pharmacy practice opportunities, such as dispensing drugs, recognizing drug errors and demonstrating proper use of drug therapy devices. It will feature networked computer workstations, small conference rooms and a classroom area to instruct students in contemporary patient counseling practices.

A new dosage form laboratory will instruct students in the latest techniques for creating pharmacist-made drug products that are customized for individual patients, such as liquid medicines and reduced dosages of medication for children.

Understanding alcoholism in ethnic minority populations

UConn's Barris Malcolm remembers growing up in Jamaica and being told to avoid certain roads at night because of drivers who practice a long-standing island tradition of "taking one for the road."

Illustration: John E. Bailey

"DUI is a law in most Caribbean islands, but you don't find police stopping or monitoring it unless there is an accident," says Malcolm, an assistant professor of social work, who is researching the causes of alcoholism in ethnic minority populations under a $261,000 grant from the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

Using data gathered from 10,000 cases nationally, including from the Alcohol Research Center at the UConn Health Center, Malcolm is seeking to define the various risk factors for alcohol abuse in ethnic minority populations, which will include studying excessive drinking behavior in Hartford's sizeable West Indian population.

"What we're trying to find out is how alcoholism affects family relationships within ethnic minority populations and what interventions we can develop as social workers in helping to address the problem," says Malcolm.

A significant challenge to the research, Malcolm says, is that adults who emigrate from Caribbean islands as teenagers may arrive with views about alcohol consumption that predisposes them to legal and societal difficulties later in the United States.