Dear colleagues,

It’s hard to believe that another academic year is drawing to a close and we are preparing to send a new class of scientists out into the world in a few weeks. In what is arguably the busiest time of year, I want to share with you some news and updates along with some successes and congratulations.

First of all, congratulations to the 20 faculty who were promoted and/or received tenure this year. This is a testament to our outstanding faculty and the extraordinary work that they are doing.

At the State of the College overview on May 29, I shared our strategic funding priorities for OSU’s next capital campaign to launch in 2020. Our goals are to advance our globally recognized research, enhance our teaching and enhance our innovation. Specifically, together, we will:

• Ignite a passion for science in all learners,
• Thrive in a data-rich world,
• Improve human and ocean health,
• Develop materials to power our planet and sustain our communities, and
• Move discoveries from the lab to people’s lives.

This year the College of Science exceeded its annual goal for fundraising–$3.25M as of March 2018—thanks to our generous donors and the hard work of our Director of Development Marlys Amundson, Senior Director of Development Tom McLennan and our former Development Director Anne Murphy, who built strong relationships on behalf of the College and OSU for more than 10 years. Two highlights are a $500K anonymous gift to support physics and chemistry graduate students and a $500K estate gift to establish an endowed professorship in mathematics.

Looking ahead to 2018-19, we will remain focused on strategies that increase student recruitment, retention and student success. We are investing in recruitment, marketing and advertising and advising. We implemented key measures to improve outcomes, including early intervention (e.g., Canvas grades), and curricular redesign (e.g., MTH 111) among others. We will expand our Integrated Professional Development platform to support students’ success after graduation and increase our online offerings to generate revenue, including launching an online B.S. in zoology and an online introductory physics course in in fall 2019) as well as growing our M.S. in Data Analytics program. We are also investing in online courses in biochemistry and biophysics, chemistry and others.

We continue to balance faculty workload by hiring a director of research initiatives to assist with funding proposals, a tenure-track faculty in data analytics and two instructors to teach biohealth science courses.

It is imperative that we constrain costs. I have said “no” a lot lately – e.g., hiring just one tenure-track faculty this academic year, cutting some non-academic budgets (while increasing academic unit budgets), reducing the number of TA’s in chemistry, etc. To solve budget challenges, we are partnering with the University. The College received an additional $650K in FY18 and will receive $2.65M/year in FY19 and FY20—one-time bridge funds in addition to funds for commitments that were made centrally. So things are improving!

In the next year, we need to return our focus to excellence by hiring faculty again, growing our research portfolio, building philanthropy and beginning facilities renovations. We will support these efforts by increasing our graduate students, undergraduate majors and Ecampus course offerings.

Roy Haggerty
Dean, College of Science

Research Highlights

Read more of the most recent research happening on our iMPACT blog site.

Chemist Mas Subramanian has discovered a new material that could play a key role in the next generation of quantum supercomputers.

Biochemist David Hendrix has developed a computer program known as bpRNA that represents a key step toward better understanding the connections between mutant genetic material and disease. His research was featured on NSF’s webpage this week—great visibility of OSU Science!

Mathematician David Koslicki has discovered that the blood of schizophrenia patients features genetic material from more types of microorganisms than that of people without the debilitating mental illness.

Mathematician Juan Restepo published a study clarifying that mathematical models of future climate change such as those used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change already take uncertainties in the data into account and, contrary to arguments sometimes thrown about in the public sphere, should therefore not be thrown into doubt by current events such as the recent ice sheet collapse that occur ahead — or behind – schedule.

Biologist Matt Orr at OSU-Cascades published a study suggesting a “restoration ecology” approach toward human health, in which humans are viewed collectively as an ecosystem where effectively fighting chronic disease means fostering the communities of symbiotic gut microbes to help people fight chronic disease.

Biologist Michael Blouin published new research showing that for steelhead trout, reproductive choices represent a collection of tradeoffs – whether spawning once or doing it multiple times.

Biochemist Elisar Barbar published a study on the protein ASCIZ suggesting that the disordered regions on gene transcription factors, which can contain multiple binding sites for the same protein, allow cellular systems to slow down or speed up production in a more graduated fashion rather than on an all-or-nothing basis. She was supported in part by the College of Science Impact Award that was also awarded to colleagues Afua Nyarko and Viviana Perez, physicist Weihong Qiu and Peter Eschbach (Electron Microscopy Facility).

Research Funding

Statisticians Yuan Jiang (PI) and Duo Jiang and microbiologist Thomas Sharpton were awarded a four-year $770K grant by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), one of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) for the project “Network-based statistical methods to decode interactions within microbiomes.”

Biochemist Colin Johnson won a $338K NIH grant for his project, “In vivo and in vitro studies of the deafness associated protein otoferlin.”

Biologist Jane Lubchenco received a $101K award from Oceans 5 via Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors for her project, “The Truth Squad: Accountability for true progress in ocean protection.”

Statistician Javier Rojo won a $125K grant from the National Security Agency to continue his Summer REU project, RUSIS@OSU.

Biologist David Lytle won a $100K award from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for his project “Flow-population models for tracking non-stationary changes in riparian and aquatic ecosystems.”

Chemist Wei Kong received a $332K NIH grant for his project “Serial single molecule electron diffraction imaging: atomic structures of biological macromolecules without crystals.”

Mathematician Holly Swisher received a $288K NSF award for her project “REU Site: Mathematics and Theoretical Computer Science at Oregon State University.”

Congratulations to David Koslicki and the Department of Mathematics on receiving its first NIH grant, announced in last month’s newsletter. The $437K award was supported by NIH’s National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS). The project seeks to build a Biomedical Translator, which is a software system that connects various databases of biomedical knowledge and has the capability to “reason” through these data sources to answer relevant biomedical questions.

Mathematician Tom Dick and College of Education colleagues Rebekah Elliott, SueAnn Bottoms and Wendy Aaron received a second year of funding from the Oregon Department of Education and OSU for their project, Ambitious Math and Science Teaching Fellows (see below for their upcoming annual conference event on campus).

Proposal Support

Funding opportunities can be found on ECOS. To access a suite of tools and resources available to faculty, visit the College of Science Proposal Support webpage.

Global Honors

Mathematician Juan Restrepo was recently named a 2018 Fellow for the Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) for his exemplary research contributions as well as outstanding service to the community, which includes projects, innovative programs and leadership roles taken to advance the discipline.

Regional Honors

Mathematician Malgo Peszynska was recently elected President of the Pacific Northwest Section of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM PNW).

University Honors

Mathematician Vrushali Bokil and biologist Robert Mason are two of eight Oregon State ADVANCE Faculty Fellows for 2018. They will assemble and review the Action Plans created by ADVANCE COS graduates to gather data and coalesce plans to support an equitable, sustainable and socially just academic climate. Oregon State ADVANCE was funded in 2014 as part of the National Science Foundation’s ADVANCE program aimed at increasing the participation and advancement of women in academic science and engineering careers.

Chemist David Ji won the 2018 OSU Excellence in Postdoctoral Mentoring Award, which recognizes direct and significant impact and involvement with postdocs, outstanding commitment and effectiveness as a mentor, innovative mentoring, and demonstrating unusual effort to provide consistent mentoring of postdocs during the course of their careers at OSU. Congratulations!

College Honors

Congratulations to our faculty and staff who have completed 25 or more years of service to OSU! They were recognized for their dedication and service at the 25-Year Club Dinner on May 22, 2018. Nearly half of this year’s 25 honorees are in the College of Science!

Student Honors

Biochemistry and biophysics junior Delaney Smith was awarded a Barry Goldwater Scholarship for 2018, the top undergraduate award in the country for STEM undergraduates. Congratulations Delaney!

Senior Dang Duong received an English Teaching Assistantship from The Fulbright Program in Kazakhstan! A first-generation college student, he worked as a Learning Assistant in Human Anatomy and Physiology at OSU. To expand his perspective and deepen his experiences, Dang studied and worked abroad in India, Myanmar and Malaysia supported mainly by scholarships. He was awarded the Gilman International Scholarship and many College of Science and Microbiology Department scholarships.

Nathan Jespersen, a graduate student in biochemistry and biophysics, has been named the 2018 MacVicar Animal Health Scholar for his work in Elisar Barbar’s group on mechanisms involved in rabies virus infection. The award is funded by former OSU president Robert MacVicar and his wife Clarice to support research that impacts animal health and welfare and is interdisciplinary in its approach, represented by microbiology, biochemistry and veterinary medicine.

Sigma Delta Omega, the OSU science sorority, earned no less than FIVE awards recently during Greek Week. Kudos to these outstanding women leaders in science and across campus!

• Community Values Award (for 5th consecutive year)
• Blood Drop Award for most hours volunteered at the blood drive (for 2nd consecutive year)
• Outstanding Service Character of the Year: Allison Tep
• Collective Greek Council Member of the Year: Sydney Phu, a BHS major
• Recognition for the highest Greek chapter GPA and the highest first-year student GPA

Congratulations to these two Ph.D. students for receiving prestigious National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (NSF GRFP) awards for 2018. Rebecca Mostow in integrative biology and Julia (Grace) Klinges in microbiology are among 10 OSU students to receive NSF GRFP awards this year. In addition, two recent science alumni have also won the award this year:  Trevor Shear (Chemistry, ‘16), now at the University of Oregon, and Jeanne Marie Klein-Gordon (Microbiology, ‘16), currently at the University of Florida.

Kudos to these three graduating seniors who were selected as 2018 ARCS (Achievement Rewards for College Scientists) Foundation Oregon Scholars!

• Jesse Howe, Biochemistry/Biophysics (also a Provost Scholar)
• Jesse Laney, Integrative Biology
• Ashley Pica, Chemistry

Seeking Nominations

The College of Science is seeking nominations for five relatively new honors and awards for faculty and staff. These awards bring valuable limelight and lucre to the winners, so apply soon to edge out the competition. What are you waiting for?

1. Outstanding Faculty Research Assistant Award ($500)
2. Milton Harris Award in Basic Research ($1,000)
3. F.A. Gilfillan Memorial Award for Distinguished Scholarship in Science ($1,500)
4. Dean’s Early Career Achievement Award ($1,000)
5. College of Science Impact Award ($10,000)

Nominations are due by July 15, 2018. Review the guidelines online and peruse the 2017 award winners.  Submit your recommendations soon!

Mathematician Malgo Peszynska was chosen as one of the plenary speakers at the 2017 SIAM (Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics) Conference on Mathematical and Computational Issues in the Geosciences in Erlangen, Germany, September 11-14.

Chemistry Ph.D. student Jenn Amador represented the College of Science at an outreach event at Straub Middle School in Salem on May 30. Says Jenn, “I’m happy to help out. An outreach event like this when I was in middle school is what sparked my interest in the field, and I’d love a chance to give back.”

Alumna Rebecca Pankow (Honors Biochemistry and Biophysics, ’11), currently a doctoral student in computer science at Brown University, was featured in the October 2017 issue of the New Yorker for her ongoing research to build a new generation of robots that can work cooperatively with humans.

Marine biologist Jane Lubchenco is featured in the upcoming Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) documentary, “Oregon State University: an Oregon Experience” in honor of OSU150. The one-hour episode airs on OPB June 11. See below for advance screenings on June 5 in Bend and on June 6 in Corvallis!

YInMn Blue continues to make waves!

A well-written in-depth Bloomberg News piece on Mas Subramanian and YInMn Blue, “The Quest for the Next Billion-Dollar Color,” is a great read (even if you think you already know the story).

The Hindu, the most respected English newspaper in India, recently featured a radio interview with chemist Mas Subramanian about the discovery of YInMn blue.

Mas was also interviewed on NPR’s Here & Now about the discovery of YInMn blue on May 14. Check out the interview—it’s a wonderful in-depth look at the discovery and offers a fresh perspective!

Promotion & Tenure

The College of Science congratulates these 20 faculty on receiving promotions and/or tenure for the 2017-18 academic year:

Mary Beisiegel, Mathematics
Vrushali Bokil, Mathematics
Elaine Cozzi, Mathematics
Andrew Bouwma, Integrative Biology
Adrian “Fritz” Gombart, Biochemistry and Biophysics
Sarah Henkel, Integrative Biology
Katie Jager, Statistics
Torrey Johnson, Mathematics
Elise Lockwood, Mathematics
Kimberly Halsey, Microbiology
Ryan Mehl, Biochemistry and Biophysics
Juliann Moore, Statistics
Ryan Mueller, Microbiology
Mark Novak, Integrative Biology
Oksana Ostroverkhova, Physics
Martin Schuster, Microbiology
Holly Swisher, Mathematics
Rebecca Terry, Integrative Biology
David Wing, Mathematics
Lan Xue, Statistics

New funds support students and faculty

We are excited to announce eight new scholarships available for science students next year thanks to the incredible generosity of our alumni and friends!

Judith Ann Smith Hill Memorial STEM Scholarship Fund ​
Rise Fund ​for students in science with disabilities (physical or learning)
Student Success in the College of Science Fund
Robert & Susan Poole Excellence in Health Scholarship
College of Science First-Year Opportunity Scholarships
College of Science Transfer Scholarships
Cohen-Wolf BioHealth Scholarship Fund in the Department of Microbiology​
Berge Chandler Scholarship Fund in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics

The College of Science is investing in the longstanding NSF-supported Interdisciplinary Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program in mathematics and theoretical science with a $13,500 grant from the Robert Lundeen Science Faculty Development Fund to help cover two years of housing and fees for participants. This enables the program, managed by mathematicians Holly Swisher and Mike Rosulek, to recruit the most diverse pool of students possible. The College’s REU programs, including Javier Rojo’s award-winning REU in statistics, are increasing the numbers of underrepresented minorities and women in mathematics and statistics.

All science faculty are encouraged to check out InnovationX, the OSU Center of Excellence for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. While the Center is housed in the College of Business, the services and resources are available to all interested students. For example, Launch Pad is a first-year course series for aspiring entrepreneurs and Launch Academy is a new student incubator. Science faculty are encouraged to apply to be InnovationX Faculty Fellows!

Upcoming events

June 4
4:00 – 6:00 p.m., CH2M Hill Alumni Center
Please join us for the College of Science’s 2018 Scholarship Dessert to honor our extraordinary science students and celebrate with alumni, donors, faculty and friends. A passion for science education and excellence connects us all.

June 6
7:00 – 8:30 p.m., LaSells Stewart Center
Enjoy a special screening of “Oregon State University: An Oregon Experience” followed by a discussion with the producer Kami Horton. The event is part of the ongoing OSU150 celebration and will be aired on OPB TV on June 11. Register today – the event is free but tickets are required.

June 8
11 a.m. – 2 p.m., Valley Library Quad outside Kidder Hall
Science Fair and Study Break with Voodoo Doughnuts – The pink Voodoo Doughnut truck and free doughnuts always draw a crowd! Join us for this annual tradition featuring quirky science games, prizes, student clubs and, of course, doughnuts! Faculty, staff and advisors are encouraged to attend!

June 15
3:30 – 5:30 p.m., Valley Library Quad outside Kidder Hall
Commencement is an important milestone to mark before graduates’ transition to the next chapter of their lives. Faculty and staff are encouraged to join us at the 2018 Science Graduation Reception for our graduates and their families at an outdoor reception in their honor. RSVP by June 8.

June 19-20
The Ambitious Math and Science Summer Institute, co-sponsored by the Oregon Department of Education and OSU, comes to campus for a second year. Middle and high school math and science teachers, teacher leaders, and administrators from across the state will enjoy an invigorating opportunity to work with and learn from regional and national STEM education leaders.

Recent Events

May 29
State of the College, a new annual event featured an update on budget, research, enrollment, capital campaign planning and vision for the College by Dean Roy Haggerty. The presentation was followed by Q&A and a light reception.

May 29
Mathematics Ph.D. candidate Sarah Hagen represented the College of Science at the 2018 DaVinci Days 2018 Steam Lecture Series where she gave a free public lecture, “Ancient Greek Astronomy.”

May 18-19
Mi Familia Weekend hosted current and future Latino students and their families to learn about the different academic programs, institutes, and student resources on campus, including the College of Science, which was a gold sponsor of the event.

May 11
At OSU’s Recognizing Excellence event honoring her Distinguished Professor award, physicist Janet Tate gave a public talk entitled “With a little help from my friends: Collaborative materials research and incorporating research into the undergraduate curriculum.”

May 5
Spring Family Weekend: Science students and their families as well as faculty and staff enjoyed our annual brunch, art exhibit and talent show co-hosted with the Honors College. 

May 1
Discovery Days, a twice-annual outreach event for local elementary schools, attracted approximately 2,000 kids to campus and enthusiastic teams of volunteers from our College. The event was featured in the Gazette Times.

April 30
What do the Nobels Mean? The College of Science presented a trio of mini public lectures elucidating the science behind the Nobel Prizes in Physics, Chemistry, and Physiology or Medicine, by science faculty Davide Lazzati, Elisar Barbar and David Hendrix, respectively. The event aimed at educating the public about science’s most important awards and the impact they can have on their lives. 

April 25
Microbiology graduate student Ryan McMinds (Vega-Thurber Lab) presented the 2018 Middlekauf Scholar Award Lecture “Preliminary findings of the Global Coral Microbiome Project, and other stories.” McMinds, an eloquent blogger (The Cnidae Gritty) and the youngest scientist on board the Tara Pacific, gave a preview of results from a two-year expedition with scientists around the world to complete the most comprehensive assessment ever of coral reef health and biodiversity.

April 24
The College of Science held its annual Health Professions Fair for students to connect with more than 50 professional schools and programs with specializations in the healthcare industry. Students explored health profession career options, networked with professionals and gained tips from admission representatives, including writing personal statements, navigating the application process and securing strong letters of reference.