All posts by: Sarah Hansen, M.S. '15

UMBC’s Summer Undergraduate Research Fest 2018 spotlights talents of emerging scientists

UMBC’s University Center ballroom was standing-room only earlier this week as visitors gathered to learn about new student research on topics from HIV replication to enhancing art conservation through wireless temperature monitoring.

The Summer Undergraduate Research Fest (SURF) presenters were high school students and undergraduates from UMBC and other colleges who chose to spend their summers conducting research at UMBC. In all, 126 students participated in the event, which included two poster sessions and an awards ceremony following the presentations. More than 30 faculty members across five departments and two colleges at UMBC guided the students in their research.

“The experience helped us to think like scientists,” says Olufolake Majekodunmi ’21, biological sciences and psychology. She and her research partner, Avantika Krishna ’21, biochemistry, conducted research for a new project on e-cigarette flavorings with neurobiologist Weihong Lin. As participants in the UMBC STEM BUILD Training Program, they have also received training in writing personal statements, analyzing academic journal articles, constructing their résumés, and more.

“The internship prepared us for giving oral presentations and applying to the workforce or grad school,” says Krishna. Both Krishna and Majekodunmi plan to continue their work with Lin this fall.

For some students, the summer offered a chance to step outside their comfort zones. Sarah Carpe ‘20, environmental science, who transferred to UMBC from Baltimore City Community College, worked with biologist Steve Miller through an NSF Research Experience and Mentoring (REM) award. Her project seeks to enhance algal biofuels by manipulating algae genetics. This stretched her beyond her typical focus areas, but she sees it as very relevant to her passion for the environment because of its potential to help the planet, she says.

Ewnet Sisay ‘20, mechanical engineering, studied zebrafish embryos with developmental biologist Rachel Brewster. “I hope to go for a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering, so I wanted to try biology before committing to a Ph.D,” Sisay says. The result? “I really love it.”

On the other hand, Rakan El-Mayta ‘18, chemical engineering and biological sciences, has been conducting research with biochemical engineer Erin Lavik for two years. This summer, El-Mayta continued work on a project to generate a 3D model of the human colon that will make testing new therapies more efficient. The work has confirmed his enthusiasm for engineering. “Everything is so applicable,” El-Mayta says, “and I get to work with my hands and really think like an engineer.”

Sahle Gebremichael, a student at Baltimore City Community College, spent time in Steve Miller’s lab this summer through the NSF REM program. He intends to transfer to UMBC next year. “I think getting research experience here will help me make the transition to UMBC,” he says.

In addition to sharing the benefits of their experiences, the student also spoke to how research can sometimes be an emotional rollercoaster, peppered with challenges and failures. But by working through those issues, they came to see failures as growth opportunities, rather than setbacks.

“I’ve hit a couple roadblocks along the way,” says Carpe, “which has helped me understand the project better because I have to really think to solve the problem.”

Brett Lucht, a student at Marist College and recipient of an NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates award, also found a way to see the positive in the challenges he faced while working with physical chemist Lisa Kelly. “Failures are a part of research,” he says, “and we’ve learned from them, so they were good failures.”

Bill LaCourse, dean of the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences, which organized the event, took a moment at the research festival to tell the students that although they are still early in their scientific careers, working to answer questions no one has ever answered before is a noble and exciting challenge. He shared his hope that their time as UMBC researchers “lights a flame of passion that will drive you to greater undertakings…with joy and wonderment.”

“It has been our privilege to host you here at UMBC,” said LaCourse. “Your spirit is an inspiration to us all.”

Image: Students explain their research to attendees at SURF 2017. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

UMBC’s BUILD a Bridge to STEM internship offers students a transformative research experience

For six weeks this summer, 18 students from Baltimore-area community colleges, Gallaudet University, and Morgan State University worked as full-time scientists at UMBC. Their paid summer research experience was part of the BUILD a Bridge to STEM internship, an arm of UMBC’s STEM BUILD initiative funded by the National Institutes of Health under the Diversity Program Consortium.

The students worked in small teams to learn biomedical techniques and tackle real research questions with the guidance of faculty mentors. Like professional scientists, they shared their progress in lab meetings, discussed research papers in a journal club, and formally presented their work at a research symposium.

“I think the greatest thing about this experience was how we were treated as equals,” shares Zulekha Karachiwalla, a sophomore at Howard Community College (HCC). “We really got a feel for what it would be like to have a career in research.”

“Learning to work independently, think about the research problems, and troubleshoot on our own was the hardest thing,” adds Rahaf Alhabashi, also a sophomore at HCC. “It’s been challenging in a way that’s made us better scientists.”

Karachiwalla, Alhabashi, and Michael Mercado, a senior at Gallaudet University, formed a research team that worked with Mercedes Burns, assistant professor of biological sciences at UMBC, to conduct research examining the genetic diversity of harvestmen—commonly known as daddy long legs. The team format epitomizes the BUILD Group Research paradigm, a key component of BUILD at UMBC.

Through their lab experience, the students learned skills like how to keep a lab notebook and conduct experiments safely, which will serve them throughout their careers. “We’ve had to learn hands-on skills related to dissection and using different types of microscopes,” shares Mercado. He is confident those skills will be helpful as he pursues dental school.

Karachiwalla also found the internship to be helpful in thinking through her future career goals, and the best route to get there. After considering several different potential majors, “this internship has definitely shown me that the career path I want is not just biology or computer engineering—it’s putting them together,” she says.

Alhabashi came in with a more defined sense of her path forward, with a plan to pursue graduate school in physical therapy. But after this internship, she says, “I’ve gotten a lot more interested in doing research, too.”

The summer at UMBC also came with benefits beyond learning how to use scientific instruments—benefits from working on a diverse team to solve real challenges in the lab. “This internship has been a great opportunity to interact with many people from different backgrounds,” shares Mercado, who is Deaf and spoke through an ASL interpreter. “At first it was awkward, but we had different conversations about our needs and how we could approach them throughout the internship. I would absolutely recommend that other Deaf students come to this program.”

“This experience gave us more than just the scientific background. It taught us how to learn with people who have a different culture or communication method,” says Karachiwalla, “so I think we were lucky to be put in such a dynamic team. I would definitely choose this group again.”

The team’s diversity contributed to its success, Alhabashi adds. “I love that we all have different ideas that we put together that give us a better way and different ways of seeing and solving problems.”

Team members also shared that their summer research internship would not have been such as success without the support of their faculty mentor. “Dr. Burns not only helped us with the research, but also guided us in our career paths,” shares Karchiwalla. “By actually meeting the people that do the research at UMBC, I learned that they’re very open to helping students.”

“It taught me to take advantage of all the resources that are available to me, wherever I am,” says Alhabashi. Mercado adds, “I would encourage people who are still in college to get involved with as many internships as they can, even if it’s not directly related to their major, because it may change your major or help you gain skills that apply to your future.”

Burns is proud of all the team has accomplished in such a short time period. “They all really hit the ground running,” she shares.

Thinking back to a day the whole group spent in the field, she says, “Seeing a diverse group of students and ASL interpreters having fun collecting arthropods was just awesome.” It may have been a short summer experience, but, she says, the way they collaborated so successfully to progress in their research gave her a feeling of “real pride” and excitement for the future.

Banner image: Michael Mercado (left), Zulekha Karachiwalla (center) and Rahaf Alhabashi (right). Photo by Tim Ford.

UMBC astronomer Kenji Hamaguchi confirms binary star system produces cosmic rays

Eta Carinae is the most massive and luminous star system within 10,000 light years of Earth. New UMBC research published in Nature Astronomy concludes for the first time that the system is emitting cosmic rays, some of which may reach Earth.

Producing cosmic rays, which also happens following a supernova, requires that particles be accelerated nearly to the speed of light. “We found that the accelerated particles are really energetic, which is much more than we expected from this star,” says Kenji Hamaguchi, the lead author on the study. Hamaguchi is a researcher at UMBC’s Center for Space Sciences and Technology, a partnership with NASA. The fourth author is Neetika Sharma, Ph.D. ’16, physics, who worked on the project as a postdoctoral fellow.

The new research takes advantage of NASA’s powerful NuSTAR satellite, which can detect and locate high-energy x-rays with remarkable accuracy. Different instruments have been tracking relatively low-energy x-rays from Eta Carinae for decades, and another instrument suggested Eta Carinae might be the source of the high-energy x-rays and even higher-energy gamma rays. However, those instruments haven’t been powerful enough to conclusively determine the source of the rays that they detect.

“That’s why we proposed the observations with NuSTAR,” says Hamaguchi. “NuSTAR can image x-rays in the high-energy range for the first time. So we can pinpoint the location of high-energy emissions.”

Eta Carinae is a binary star system, meaning two stars are orbiting each other. As they orbit, the stars come within 140 million miles of each other every five and half years. This is about the distance from Mars to the Sun, and very, very close for two stars.

Stars are constantly throwing off particles, creating what is known as the “stellar wind.” Based on their findings, the researchers explain that Eta Carinae generates high-energy x-rays and gamma rays when the two stars’ stellar winds collide. The rays’ intensity depends on the relative position of the two stars. Those cosmic rays then travel through the universe, and some of them may end up near Earth—but until now scientists haven’t been able to clearly identify their source.

Beyond confirming Eta Carinae as a source of cosmic rays, this new research also shows for the first time that a binary system like Eta Carinae is capable of accelerating particles to extreme speeds. Previously, that kind of acceleration had only been proven in the debris resulting from supernovae. This helps expand knowledge of how particles can accelerate in space, which is relevant for studies of the birth of the universe and a variety of other extreme situations in the cosmos.

Hamaguchi is already looking forward to the next new instrument beyond NuSTAR, as he works to increase understanding of how stellar winds interact, accelerate particles, and generate cosmic rays. He is drawn to analyzing complex data about the universe “because we can find something nobody knows,” he says. “Every time you get something new.”

Image: The supermassive star Eta Carinae is at the center of two huge and expanding clouds of dust and other material, the result of an eruption about 150 years ago. Nathan Smith/NASA.

UMBC and partners launch project to provide fresh fish to underserved communities

UMBC researchers at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology (IMET) in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor have developed new ways to raise commercially important fish in land-based, sustainable systems through decades of intensive research. Now the Aquaculture Research Center (ARC), where the team grows fish such as bluefin tuna and cobia, is in full operation, and the team is donating much of their harvest to Baltimore communities in need as part of a unique public-private partnership.

UMBC, the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science (UMCES), United Way of Central Maryland, McCormick’s Flavor for Life® program, and seafood distributor JJ McDonnell joined forces to launch the FISH (Feeding Individuals to Support Health) Project. The goal is to improve the health of Marylanders in underserved communities by providing fresh fish—a healthy source of protein and other nutrients. The partners gathered at Baltimore’s Franciscan Center on June 25 to announce the initiative, and center guests enjoyed bronzini grown at the ARC.

“UMBC is proud to be part of this important collaboration, applying scientific innovation in aquaculture to offer a healthy source of food for our local communities,” said UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski.

The ARC is a one-of-a-kind facility specifically constructed to avoid the pitfalls of other approaches to fish farming and catching wild fish. The environment is highly controlled and fully separate from waterways. This means there’s no risk of external pathogens sickening the fish. It also means there is no risk of fish escape — a concern with outdoor net pens — which can be an ecological nightmare if the fish are non-native species.

This approach to growing fish is also highly efficient. The researchers can create the ideal conditions for fish growth by tuning the salinity, temperature, and other factors. The facility converts solid fish waste to methane, which is then used to partially power the equipment. And there’s no risk of overfishing, as some of the adults are retained as brood stock to produce the next generation. In addition, with the ability to control daylight hours, the team doesn’t have to wait for the natural spawning season and, once the system is perfected, can expect to harvest market-size fish several times per year.

UMBC and UMCES provide the scientific expertise, but the FISH project wouldn’t be possible without leveraging each partner’s strengths. JJ McDonnell will process the fish and distribute it to partner nonprofits that reach underserved communities directly, like the Franciscan Center and Maryland Food Bank. McCormick’s Flavor for Life® program will generate simple, healthy recipes that utilize low-cost ingredients, which community members will receive along with the fresh fish. The United Way of Central Maryland is the lead organizer of the project, bringing all the moving parts together.

“In many of the communities we represent, individuals and families do not have access or the financial means to purchase healthy food, like fish,” said Franklyn Baker, president and CEO of United Way of Central Maryland. He reflects, “this project is a huge step in helping us win this fight,” to help local residents access resources that can help them lead healthy lives and pursue their goals.

More information about the FISH project is available through IMET, as well as press coverage of the launch event in the Baltimore Sun, Baltimore Business Journal, Daily Record, WMAR-TV, and WBAL-TV.

Banner image: A mother and son who have just enjoyed a meal at the Franciscan Center, which included fish raised at IMET. All photos courtesy of Howard Korn Photography.

UMBC and University of Limpopo partner to grow research and exchange opportunities

On June 12, leaders from UMBC and the University of Limpopo in South Africa formalized commitments to collaborate through joint research as well as faculty and student exchanges. UMBC has steadily grown its international partnerships with universities in Germany, Japan, Portugal, Peru, and other nations around the globe. This is the first such agreement between UMBC and a university in Africa.

“It gives us a lot of joy…to be the first African university with which you sign an agreement like this,” shared Jesika Singh, deputy vice chancellor for research, innovation and partnership at University of Limpopo. “There is so much potential that we see.”

A man and woman in business attire, sitting at a table and smiling, exchange gold folders.

This relationship grew out of the African International Conference (AIC) on Statistics, an event organized annually since 2014 by UMBC statistics faculty and international partners. Past conferences have occurred in Senegal, Ethiopia, Cameroon, South Africa, and Botswana, including statisticians from all across Africa as well as a dozen U.S. institutions. The next two conferences will take place in Ethiopia and Morocco.

Yehenew Kifle, associate professor at the University of Limpopo and currently visiting faculty at UMBC, first connected with UMBC during the 2015 AIC at Jimma University in Ethiopia. Inspired to build on the success of the conference, Kifle asked UMBC to partner on a grant from the South African government to support faculty development.

The grant, managed by Professor Kingsley Ayisi, calls for University of Limpopo junior faculty, some of whom do not yet hold doctoral degrees, to travel to UMBC to pursue doctoral-level training in statistics. Through a similar agreement, other Limpopo faculty will travel to Iowa State University for agricultural training.

Three men in suits sit at a conference table. Flags of Maryland, U.S., and South Africa appear on the table.

“This is really a milestone for us,” said Bimal Sinha, professor of statistics at UMBC and a leader in organizing the AIC, at the signing. “I hope that once other African universities see this, they will want to participate as well.”

In addition to Limpopo faculty traveling to UMBC, UMBC faculty will travel to South Africa to provide short training courses in statistical methods. Those courses will specifically focus on how statistics are used in the study of climate and climate change, which is already producing severe effects throughout the African continent.

Maryland, U.S., and South African flags adorn the conference table at the partnership event.

Beyond the statistics training program, the partners also signed an agreement outlining plans to pursue joint research projects, exchange programs for UMBC and Limpopo students, and other collaborations across a wide range of departments and programs.

“The way I see it, all sides have quite a bit to gain from this collaboration,” said Rouben Rostamian, professor and chair of mathematics and statistics at UMBC.

Man in a brown suit jacket and purple tie speaks at a conference table. Another man, in glasses, appears at right.

“This agreement goes far beyond statistics,” said Antonio Moreira, UMBC’s vice provost for academic affairs. “We are using education between our two countries and our two young universities—both less than 60 years old—to truly change the world by educating, training, and cultivating the future.”

William LaCourse, dean of the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences at UMBC, is equally excited for the partnership. He shared, “We’re very proud to be here on this joint venture and to take this journey with you.”

Singh echoed his feeling. What started as a small gathering of colleagues from two continents, she said, “has very quickly developed into something that we can look forward to for many years to come.”

Photos by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

Neurobiologist Weihong Lin receives NIDA grant to investigate the safety of e-cigarette flavorings

UMBC’s Weihong Lin is helping to close a major gap in knowledge about e-cigarettes, with a focus on flavorings. The National Institute for Drug Abuse has awarded Lin, associate professor of biological sciences, a two-year, approximately $400,000 grant to supply much-needed objective data that can help inform regulation of flavorings in electronic cigarettes and protect the consumers of today and tomorrow, especially children and teens.

The dangers of nicotine are fairly well understood, but today’s e-cigarettes also include ingredients that are not well known. “A primary concern about e-cigarettes right now is that they use a huge number of flavoring components,” says Lin. A 2014 study found that 460 e-cigarette brands used 7,760 different flavorings. It also connected “e-juice” flavors—from “cotton candy” to “double chocolate”—to a rise in e-cigarette use by young people.

Scents and flavorings “tap into our mood and our motivation,” Lin explains. She also notes that the feelings that come along with scents and flavors can actually pose challenges to doing research on the safety of e-cigarettes.

The positive emotional associations people have with certain aromas and tastes, like eating cotton candy at an amusement park or coming home to the smell of chocolate brownies in the oven, can override the warning sensations caused by high levels of artificial flavorings or nicotine, says Lin. This means that asking people about irritation levels in their mouths and throats after using e-cigarette products with familiar or pleasant tastes may not provide an accurate picture of e-cigarettes’ actual negative effects.

E-cigarettes usually include a heating coil, solvents, nicotine, and flavoring components, all of which reach extremely high temperatures during the device’s vaporization process. Even if flavorings are considered safe for food products, they can be irritating when inhaled at higher levels. Plus, the extreme heat could change the components’ chemical make-up and convert benign substances into toxic ones. “But if you have the flavoring to mask physical irritation,” says Lin, “it becomes a more tolerable or pleasurable experience.”

To push past that mask, Lin will go to a deeper sensory level, with the help of sensory systems in mice’s nasal passages, which are responsible for the sense of smell and detecting airway irritation.

Lin’s lab will explore how specific sensory systems that detect irritation respond in the presence of e-cigarette flavorings. “It’s an objective way to measure to what degree the e-juice will activate this system,” explains Lin. “We’re asking, ‘At what level will these flavorings cause an acute, irritating sensation?’”

Lin’s group will study popular flavors used in various electronic cigarette liquid brands. The results could inform future regulations on chemicals used as e-cigarette flavorings. Lin hopes to eventually extend this work to also explore the longer-term effects of low-dose exposure to these chemicals.

As a neurobiologist, Lin says, “I’ve always been curious about how chemicals affect humans’ daily choices,” from the foods we eat to the people we choose to date. But this current research project is also personally meaningful for her, as a teacher of young people.

“You see so many young kids experimenting with e-cigarettes, and they don’t necessarily know the harm,” says Lin. “If we can give them a science-based warning and help protect them from respiratory illnesses and nicotine addition, it’s going to be good for science and for society.”

Banner image from left to right: Kayla Lemons; Avantika Krishna ’21, biological sciences, and a UMBC STEM BUILD Trainee; Abdullah Al-Matrouk; Ashley Majekodunmi; Tatsuya Ogura, research assistant professor in biological sciences; Weihong Lin; Rishit Patel; and Mark Gabriana ’19, biological sciences. All photos by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

UMBC’s Eileen Meyer explains how big data is changing astronomy research

UMBC’s Eileen Meyer, assistant professor of physics, argues that recent technological advances in the big data era are changing how astronomers learn about the universe. In an article published in outlets from Popular Science to Smithsonian Magazine, Meyer describes recent research that discovered thousands of black holes near the center of the Milky Way. The research team found them not with a new telescope, but “by digging through old, long-archived data,” she writes. “Astronomers are gathering an exponentially greater amount of data every day—so much that it will take years to uncover all the hidden signals buried in the archives.”

Over the past several decades, advances in communications have allowed astronomy research to shift away from being conducted largely by individual scientists working with the instruments available at their own institutions. Today, large, international research teams collaborate on projects, often using instruments shared by several institutions across multiple countries.

The research instruments themselves are also vastly more powerful today than in the past. Older instruments could only detect visible light (with wavelengths from about 400 to 700 billionths of a meter). New instruments examine everything from gamma rays (extremely high-energy waves with wavelengths less than a trillionth of a meter) to radio waves (with wavelengths as big as a meter).

Newer equipment can also quickly process more data—a lot more. Meyer writes that the Hubble Space Telescope has made 1.3 million observations since its launch in 1990, and it transmits 20 GB of data per week, “which is impressive for a telescope first designed in the 1970s.” Compare that to the Square Kilometer Array, scheduled for completion in 2020. “In just one year of activity,” Meyer notes, “it will generate more data than the entire internet.”

“These ambitious projects will test scientists’ ability to handle data,” Meyer writes. Archives will need to have capacity to store, and then make accessible, a million times more data than can be stored on a typical 1 terabyte external hard drive.

Although it poses challenges, “the data deluge will make astronomy become a more collaborative and open science than ever before,” Meyer says. Whereas before you had to be “an academic or eccentric rich person with access to a good telescope” to do this kind of research, Meyer says, that’s no longer the case. “Thanks to internet archives, robust learning communities and new outreach initiatives, citizens can now participate in science.”

Meyer has taken advantage of huge, stored data sets in her own work studying the jets of high-speed plasma that spew from black holes. She collected 400 raw images taken over 13 years by Hubble to reveal the structure of these jets for the first time.

“This kind of work was only possible because other observers, for other purposes, just happened to capture images of the source I was interested in, back when I was in kindergarten,” she says. “As astronomical images become larger, higher resolution and ever more sensitive, this kind of research will become the norm.”

Meyer’s article, originally published on The Conversation, has been republished in Salon, Popular Science, Smithsonian Magazine, Chicago Tribune, Space.com , Raw Story , Phys.org , and several other outlets, receiving nearly 90,000 views to date.

Image: An artist’s concept of a supermassive black hole. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Entrepreneurs Rising

Every day, UMBC researchers work tirelessly to make and build upon discoveries in their fields. For many, these successes lead to scientific publications, opportunities for further funding, or both. For some, however, a discovery is also the first step in a long and often winding pathway to entrepreneurship.

Written by Sarah Hansen M.S. ’15
Illustrated by Ruth Chan

Jumping into business can be a risk, but at UMBC, budding faculty entrepreneurs have a support system that includes the Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO) at the state level, which offers Maryland Innovation Initiative (MII) grants to support budding entrepreneurs. UMBC has a remarkable 50 percent acceptance rate for MII proposals. On campus, the Office of Technology Development and bwtech@UMBC research park provide great resources, including “Entrepreneurs in residence” who seek out research that could be a good fit for commercial development and support faculty from start to finish.

“You set the tone,” says Tom Sadowski ’89, political science, and current vice chancellor for economic development for the University System of Maryland, of UMBC’s efforts to support its faculty entrepreneurs. “You set up the model that other institutions are now following.”

From start-up funding sources to access to experienced entrepreneurs and more, the available support lowers the entry barrier to entrepreneurship and creates opportunities for faculty to impact the world in positive ways. “We focus here on innovation that matters,” says Karl Steiner, UMBC vice president for research, “whether it be in the classroom, working with our communities, or creating new solutions to some of today’s most pressing societal challenges.”

Read on to see how professors and their collaborators are using research and new-found entrepreneurial know-how to bring their inventions to life.

3-D Printed Solutions

Jeffrey Gardner, associate professor of biological sciences and one of two Up-and-Coming UMBC Inventor awardees, had a problem. Gardner’s research focuses on “how bacteria eat dead plants,” which has applications from renewable fuels to removing plastics from the ocean to improved composting methods. But the technique for measuring how efficiently different bacteria could digest plant materials was lengthy and labor-intensive.

So, Gardner created a tiny solution — a plastic widget similar to a tea-strainer — that makes his research on bacteria-driven decomposition faster and lower-cost while increasing the accuracy of the results. Gardner collaborated with Tagide deCarvalho, manager of UMBC’s Keith Porter Imaging Facility, to solve the problem “with a little bit of engineering and 3D printing.”

Gardner received a Maryland Innovation Initiative (MII) grant through TEDCO to complete prototype development on the widget and do a market assessment. Now his newly-created company, Gardner Industries, LLC, exists on paper, and a patent is pending on the product. He’s waiting to find out if he’ll receive phase-three funding from MII, which would enable the company to pursue increased production of the widgets and send them to labs around the country for feedback.

Gardner suggests that academics who may be curious about entering the entrepreneurial space simply “find someone who’s done it successfully and talk to them about it. If you try to do it in a vacuum or try to guess, you could end up with a lot of misconceptions or think it’s going to be too hard or too easy.”

For Gardner, that person was Chuck Bieberich, professor of biological sciences and the Herbert Bearman Foundation Chair in Entrepreneurship. Gardner encourages adventurous faculty to take the leap because the available support lowers the barriers to entry.

Saving the Bay — With Bacteria?

Kevin Sowers, professor of marine biotechnology, has been studying anaerobic bacteria (bacteria that don’t require oxygen) for more than 20 years. In that time, he’s discovered a bacterium that can break down polycyclic biphenyls (PCBs) very efficiently. PCBs were considered a “miracle chemical” when they came out in the 1930s, but since then, researchers have identified some potentially hazardous forms as neurotoxins, carcinogens, endocrine disruptors, and more.

Although banned today, because of their ubiquity in their first several decades of existence, PCBs are now common in wetland sediments around the world. Sedimentary invertebrates ingest them, and they make their way up the food chain from there. Now people are searching for ways to get rid of them safely. Current techniques include dredging and “capping” (piling a thick layer of sand on top of the sediment), but, both techniques are devastating to wetland ecosystems.

Sowers and Upal Gosh, professor of chemical, biochemical, and environmental engineering at UMBC, joined forces to come up with an alternative. Funding from an MII phase-one grant allowed them to develop a carbon pellet as a delivery mechanism for the PCB-degrading bacteria. After bonding the bacteria to the pellets, the researchers spray the pellets out over a wetland or under a pier. The pellets are one to two centimeters in diameter, and they spray 25 kg per cubic meter. The pellets sink, and the bacteria do their work in the sediment. Carbon and this bacterium are both found naturally in sediments, but the low bacterial concentration present would take many, many years to remove the unnaturally high level of PCBs.

A new UMBC Catalyst Fund grant supports the duo’s efforts to develop a method to measure the effectiveness of the treatment by comparing the predicted amount of time it would take for the PCBs to degrade naturally versus with treatment.

Sowers and Gosh have patented the product, and in 2017 they formed a company, Rembac. While it’s still somewhat of an experimental procedure, “we’re hoping that we’ll build up a reputation and we’ll be able to show that this is working well in different environments, and it will become more of a mainstream application,” says Sowers.

Bio-Batteries for Green Medicine

Gymama Slaughter’s invention is an outgrowth of her work to develop glucose-based power sources for use in implantable devices, such as pacemakers. By using the body’s own supply of sugars to power the devices, these “bio-batteries” would remove the need for repeat surgeries to replace failing traditional batteries.

“This project is important to me because of all the issues that human beings face. I give a lot of thought to that, and how we as researchers can really touch people in the community,” says Slaughter, professor of chemical engineering and a UMBC Up-and- Coming Inventor.

“Our primary activities are transforming diagnostic tools, reinventing the manufacturing of these tools — and creating the next generation of scientists and engineers. We now get approached by students all over the world who are interested in what we’re doing.”

“This is not just about chemistry, it’s about vision and bringing the right people together to solve a problem,” Slaughter says. The goal is to “benefit the maximum number of people in the world, not just people in our community.”

Classical Music for the Masses

Linda Dusman, professor of music and the UMBC Entrepreneur of the Year, is helping more people make positive connections with classical music via a mobile app called EnCue. The app provides customized information in real time during a performance, which could include facts about the composer, quotes from the performers or conductor, or historical context for the piece. World-class orchestras like the London Symphony are already using EnCue.

Dusman has MII phase-three funding to pursue further business development and fine-tuning of the product, such as allowing orchestras to design their own presentations rather than drawing from a library generated by Dusman and her business partner, Eric Smallwood ’08, interdisciplinary studies, former assistant professor of visual arts at UMBC.

You don’t need a certain kind of education to appreciate classical music, Dusman says. “What kills me is when I see newcomers in the audience and they’re embarrassed about not knowing when to clap, or they leave feeling stupid — that is a tragedy, a tragedy. And EnCue helps make me feel like I’m doing my best so that doesn’t happen. People leave concerts using EnCue excited about what they learned.”

Asked if she would recommend taking the plunge into the business world, she says, “If you believe in what you’re doing, then yes. In a way, I had to do it, if I really believed in this idea of real-time education.” But the process has not been without its challenges and frustrations.

“Anything worth doing, if you had known what it was going to take to get it to work before you did it, you’d probably never do it,” she says. “But if you believe in something, you do what it takes to make it happen. The value is worth the effort.”

Better Sleep With Engineering

Ever wake up feeling groggy and wonder why, because you’re sure you slept through the night? Nilanjan Banerjee, associate professor, and Ryan Robucci ’02, computer engineering, assistant professor of computer science and electrical engineering, have invented a device that may help you answer that question. In collaboration with researchers at Johns Hopkins University, Banerjee and Robucci have developed an anklet users wear at night to monitor “sleep texture” by measuring leg movements in a way that wrist monitors currently can’t.

The device is currently in the FDA approval process as a diagnostic tool for sleep-related disorders such as restless leg syndrome, attention deficit disorder, or iron deficiency. “People usually do this in a sleep lab, with EEG electrodes, and it’s very expensive,” says Banerjee. “We’ve been trying to see if we can move it to the home.”

The research team has received MII phases one through three funding, and is currently seeking larger grants from NIH — but none of this might have happened without the support of entrepreneurs in residence (also known as “site miners”) at bwtech@UMBC. Banerjee and Robucci originally sought to use their motion-sensing technology in assistive devices for people with limited mobility, but Dave Fink, one of UMBC’s site miners, knew a counterpart from Hopkins who had a researcher in need of motion-sensing for sleep monitoring. “They took the steps to help us form the company by understanding what our technology was and pairing it with exactly what the medical need was,” says Robucci.

Entrepreneur in Residence Spotlight: Dave Fink

In conversations with entrepreneurs at UMBC, one name keeps popping up: Dave Fink. He’s an entrepreneur in residence (also known as a “site miner”) at UMBC’s bwtech@UMBC Research and Technology Park. His task? Identify UMBC faculty research projects that have commercialization potential, and then steward the researchers through the entrepreneurship process, from brainstorming initial ideas to applying for start-up funding to seeking patents. Fink and other entrepreneurs in residence are critical to the success of fledgling ideas, but their work goes largely unseen.

For example, it’s not always easy for academic faculty to tell if an invention would be relevant to a wide range of potential customers or if it solves a problem unique to their research. Only in the former case is commercialization worth pursuing. “The site miners are really good at sussing out whether something will work or not,” says Jeffrey Gardner (see “3D-printing solutions”).

Like Gardner, Gymama Slaughter (“Bio-batteries”) has benefited from the support system in place for inventors at UMBC and in Maryland. “I was able to establish a wonderful relationship with David Fink at UMBC and Ken Malone at BioHealth Innovation,” she says. “They did such an amazing job with the logistics of the product and just helping out any way they could.”

Fink also guided Kevin Sowers and Upal Gosh (“Saving the Bay — with bacteria?”) in their entrepreneurship journey. “Dave was very supportive with our MII and with the Catalyst Fund grant. He advised on what to write and what the evaluators would be looking for,” Sowers says. “He’s been very supportive all along the way.”

UMBC ecologist and colleagues expose bias in forest restoration studies

When embarking on a reforestation project, is it better to let an area regenerate on its own, or take active steps like planting trees? Recent high-profile research has suggested that natural regeneration is more effective. However, UMBC’s Matthew Fagan and colleagues have just published their own research in Science Advances suggesting those studies were biased, and advocating for a more nuanced approach to forest restoration.

“This paper takes a more critical look at recent papers that have made a big splash,” says Fagan, assistant professor of geography and environmental systems. “I love this paper because it points out an important flaw in several studies, and also because those studies are really important to understanding how best we should restore the planet’s forests.”

So what was the flaw? Leighton Reid, a Missouri Botanical Garden scientist and first author on the new paper, says the studies were making “an apples to oranges comparison.” All of the sites the studies used to measure the effectiveness of natural regeneration were secondary growth forests, but the sites that used human-aided regeneration ran the gamut from abandoned coal mines to fields compacted by years of cattle-grazing. The natural regeneration sites had a leg up on the sites selected for active regeneration, so it’s no surprise the former came out the winner.

The new paper’s authors are not arguing that tree planting is superior to natural regeneration, however. “We just point out that rather than argue for natural regeneration versus artificial tree planting, it’s often worthwhile to just step back and give natural regeneration a chance for a year or two. It’s free,” Fagan says. “If it fails, then look at your objectives and figure out what sort of interventions you need to do, rather than saying one is better than the other.”

In some cases it makes sense to combine elements from both approaches. For example, planting small clusters of trees, rather than trying to replant an entire site, can sometimes be enough. “Tree planting can be the sparkplug that gets birds coming into a site, that then kickstarts regeneration,” says Fagan.

Around the world right now, countries are committing to restore millions of hectares of forest, explains Fagan, and with limited resources available for such work, it’s important to understand what the most effective techniques will be. There’s no one easy answer, but “if we want to learn more about which of these different types of restoration works better, we need to do more experiments,” says Fagan. To date, there have been very few experiments that actually look at the two methods side by side at the same site, which is what’s needed, he argues.

“The main takeaway from our paper is that natural regeneration isn’t a guaranteed success, even in the tropics. Sites can be so damaged by human management that they take a long time to recover,” says Fagan. “So while natural regeneration can be a useful restoration possibility, we shouldn’t necessarily assume that it’s always better for all objectives.” Those objectives could include pulling carbon out of the atmosphere, preventing erosion, filtering air and water, or building up sustainable agriculture, such as shade-grown coffee. “Contrary to previous scientific arguments, planting trees can be a perfectly viable choice.”

Image: A new artificial reforestation project in Costa Rica. Photo by Matthew Fagan.

UMBC’s Songon An discovers new molecular mechanism likely involved in cancer cell metastasis

Cancer is most devastating when it metastasizes—when tumor cells break away, travel through the bloodstream, and then attach elsewhere, only to grow another tumor. A significant amount of scientific research has focused on finding ways to prevent metastasis. For some time, scientists have understood that a particular biochemical pathway, known as the PDK1 pathway, is active in metastasizing cancer cells. But no one knew why.

In a new paper published in PLOS ONE, Songon An and colleagues have shown for the first time that the PDK1 pathway regulates the formation of a three-protein complex that facilitates two chemical pathways: One builds purines (two of the four building blocks of DNA) and the other produces thiamine, a B vitamin. While it’s still unknown how purine and thiamine levels contribute to metastasis, the authors hypothesize ways they could be related, and they are planning further research to reveal any links.

For example, the three-protein core complex that PDK1 regulates is sometimes joined by three more proteins. Together, the six proteins form a larger complex called the purinosome, which carries out all 10 reactions necessary to build purines. Without the three peripheral proteins, however, purine production only goes halfway, and the molecule the core complex makes is more likely to end up as the vitamin thiamine.

Making purines is an energy-intensive process, so one hypothesis is that decreasing purine production during metastasis helps the cell survive while it is detached from a nutrient source like an organ. “Looking at this metabolic switch—which pathways are in use during metastasis versus when the cell is attached—may be where our research goes in the future,” says An.

The team’s immediate next step is to validate the function of the three-protein core complex. After that, they’ll investigate whether the core complex and the six-protein purinosome are actively coming together and breaking apart in metastatic cells. “Blocking those dynamics could be an alternative way to block metastasis,” An says.

A broader goal for An and collaborator Greg Szeto, UMBC assistant professor of chemical, biochemical, and environmental engineering, is to map the various protein complexes and the signaling pathways they regulate in cancer cells. “We want to put every signaling pathway into the same context,” An explains. “Whenever the proteins have different spatial assemblies, we would like to know which pathways are on and which ones are turned down.”

So far, the researchers have only looked at one pathway at a time (such as PDK1), but by using a cutting-edge technique that can detect many proteins at once within a cell, “now we are going to target multiple signaling pathways at the same time, so that we can understand the complete picture of the regulatory map for purine metabolism.” That knowledge could provide more new insights into the causes of metastasis and how to prevent it.

Image: Songon An and Danielle Schmidt in the lab. Photos by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program honors 18 UMBC students and alumni

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded prestigious Graduate Research Fellowships (GRF) to 10 UMBC-affiliated STEM students, including eight alumni and two seniors who will soon begin their graduate studies. Their awards include a $34,000 stipend and $12,000 toward tuition and fees for each of three years.

NSF also recognized three UMBC students and five alumni with honorable mentions. Of the 17 UMBC students and alumni honored, 13 are Meyerhoff or MARC U*STAR Scholars. These programs aim to increase the number of first-generation college students, students from low-income families, and underrepresented minorities in STEM.

This large number of honorees “shows the quality of student we have here at UMBC and what they’re doing,” says Keith Harmon, director of the Meyerhoff Scholars Program. “It also shows the quality of their research experiences at UMBC, and the commitment of the faculty to mentoring these students as undergraduates.”

Randi Williams ’16, M24, computer engineering, received a fellowship for her work as a master’s student in the personal robots group at the MIT Media Lab. She studies children’s interactions with artificial intelligence and is developing a curriculum to help young children learn about AI by building, programming, and training their own autonomous robots. “I was drawn to this research because of my interest in developing a platform that helps decrease the technology gap for low-income and underrepresented communities in tech,” she says.

Williams finds the work rewarding because it combines her aptitude for engineering with her passion for education and social justice. “The greatest thing about receiving the fellowship is support and validation for my diverse research interests,” she shares. “I’m looking forward to chasing my dreams and being a bridge between disciplines.”

Jonathan Werner ’18, M26, bioinformatics and computational biology, has been conducting research with Rachel Brewster, professor of biological sciences, since his freshman year. By studying zebrafish development, “we aim to provide the basic research necessary for the future clinical treatment of neural tube birth defects, the most common birth defects in humans,” he says.

Werner’s interests span computer science and traditional experimental biology. “In graduate school, I’m hoping to join both a computational lab and an experimental lab to further train as an interdisciplinary scientist,” he says, “and winning the NSF GRF gives me the freedom to do so. It’s going to allow me to be as creative as I want when designing my graduate research projects, which I’m really looking forward to.”

Jamshaid Shahir ’18, M26, mathematics and statistics, works with Hye-Won Kang, assistant professor of mathematics and statistics, on mathematically modeling the dynamics of cell polarization—how cells develop distinct front and back ends. That process allows cells to move and transmit information. It is particularly important for wound healing, the immune system, and embryonic development.

“Winning the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship is a powerful affirmation that I can both pursue and excel in a research career,” Shahir says. “I look forward to the freedom of pursuing questions that interest me, and growing as a researcher.”

All three students spoke to the impact of their UMBC experiences on their success. Williams includes UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski among her mentors and shares, “Honestly, I wouldn’t be at MIT pursuing a Ph.D. without UMBC.” Werner adds, “I reached out to a lot of professors here asking for advice, and every single one was more than happy to help.” He also shared his gratitude for UMBC alumni mentors Keisha John ’03, M12, biochemistry and molecular biology, and Kafui Dzirasa ’01, M8, chemical engineering. Shahir is particularly thankful for UMBC’s supportive culture, including guidance he received from Kang and John. “I believe UMBC promotes a healthy balance between cooperation and competition that has motivated me to push myself harder,” he shares, “allowing me to grow as both an aspiring scientist and as a young adult.”

The honorees are pursuing graduate study at top institutions across the nation, from UMBC and MIT to Duke and Georgia Tech. Whether students receive NSF fellowships or honorable mentions, Harmon describes this level of national recognition as very meaningful validation. “I think students are always questioning, even the most accomplished,” he says. “It’s nice for them to see yes, I can do this. Another affirmation that yes, I am on the right path. I have ability. I have something to offer. There is a place for me in STEM.”

2018 UMBC-affiliated NSF Graduate Research Fellows:

William Dean ’16, chemistry
Sarah Hemler ’15, mechanical engineering
Teisha King ’16, biological sciences
Rachael Knoblauch ’15, theatre, and current Ph.D. student in chemistry
Samantha McDonald ’16, information systems
Sean Najmi ’17, chemical engineering
Jamshaid Shahir ’18, mathematics
Gwenaëlle Thomas ’16, biochemistry and molecular biology
Jonathan Werner ’18, bioinformatics and computational biology
Randi Williams ’16, computer engineering
Jasmin Zarb ’16, biochemistry and molecular biology

2018 UMBC-affiliated NSF Graduate Research Fellow Program honorable mentions:

Roy Anderson ’16, mechanical engineering
Anya Byrd ’18, biological sciences
Adrian Davey ’18, chemical engineering
Skylar Fisher, ’16, biological sciences
Alvaro Fletcher ’16, mathematics
Kori McDonald ’16, chemistry
Theresa Sheets ’18, mathematics

Image from UMBC’s Keith Porter Imaging Facility, by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

UMBC “rising star” Linda Wiratan receives Goldwater Scholarship for leadership in scientific research

UMBC is again celebrating major national recognition for talented student researchers with the announcement that Linda Wiratan ’19, biochemistry and molecular biology, has been named a 2018 – 2019 Goldwater Scholar, and Yasmin Graham ’19, mechanical engineering, received an honorable mention. The Barry Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Program seeks to identify and support undergraduates in the natural sciences, engineering, and mathematics “who show exceptional promise of becoming this nation’s next generation of research leaders.”

Wiratan began her UMBC research career as a high school senior, working with mentors Marcin Ptaszek, associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry, and Nopondo Esemoto ’12, biochemistry and molecular biology, and a current Ph.D. student in chemistry. “She learned both theoretical concepts and experimental techniques quickly,” Ptaszek recalls.

After only a few months, she was working independently in the Ptaszek lab. During her two years in the lab, she contributed significantly to two academic papers, one of which was featured on the cover of Inorganic Chemistry. Based on her rapid progress, Ptaszek says, “I am sure in just a few years she will be a world-leading researcher.”

With gratitude for his mentorship throughout that initial lab experience, Wiratan shares, “Dr. Ptaszek’s patience and real-world advice have shaped my early successes in college and maturation as a researcher.”

Once enrolled at UMBC, Wiratan began work with Hua Lu, associate professor of biological sciences, and Chong Zhang, a postdoc in the lab. “Dr. Lu constantly encourages me to be a creative and driven scientist and cares deeply about my well-being in and out of the lab,” Wiratan shares.

Wiratan’s research today focuses on the relationship between the circadian clock and innate immunity in Arabidopsis thaliana, a model plant species. Specifically, she is examining how the plant’s defense system, when activated by pathogens, can alter the plant’s circadian clock. Her results demonstrate that the relationship clearly exists, but is complex. The research has important disease-control applications for agriculture and even human medicine.

“Linda has been a key member in my laboratory to study this topic,” says Lu. Wiratan independently developed an undergraduate research award proposal and is a co-author on a research paper under revision in Nature Communications, a premier international journal.

Beyond her impressive scientific journal articles, Wiratan has also written for broader audiences. She co-authored a piece in The Conversation, an online news outlet that connects researchers with the general public. Her article introduced readers to the idea that studying plants can inform precision medicine, and it was republished in Smithsonian Magazine online. Wiratan has even founded her own social entrepreneurship organization, City of Cells, LLC, which focuses on improving the public perception of science through creative work, such as an online journal, science-inspired home furnishings, and educational animations. She does all this while maintaining a 4.0 GPA.

“Disseminating science concepts to the general public is one of Linda’s ways to show her passion for research,” says Lu. “She is clearly a rising star who will make a difference in science education.”

For Wiratan, being named a Goldwater Scholar is particularly gratifying because her success has not come easily. “This scholarship symbolizes the culmination of years of hard work and endurance,” she says. “I have always loved science and research, but growing up I have been faced with so many challenges.” She thanks her mentors—Ptaszek, Lu, and Simon Stacey, director of the UMBC Honors College—for their support in helping her confront those challenges and grow a sense of inner strength, resilience, and confidence that has propelled her forward.

“Now I see the proof that I am strong enough to create my own future and inspire others,” she says. “The Goldwater Scholarship is that final push that will help me fly.”

In 2016, Daniel Ocasio ‘17, Naomi Mburu ‘18, and Andreas Seas ‘17, all chemical engineering majors, received Goldwater Scholarships.

Banner image: Linda Wiratan stands in front of flats of her research plants. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.