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Columns::April 7, 2003
Telling tales: Peabodys announced for 62nd year
Richard Russell Foundation funds new professorship in agriculture
State’s business schools sweep GM competition
Five undergraduates receive mid-term Foundation Fellowships
Formula for success
Choosing a career was ‘elementary’ decision for education professor
Administrative Changes
Kudos
Enhancing Quality Teaching
Training Day
Campus News
Three faculty receive university’s Creative Research Awards
By Rory Sheats
rcomm@ovpr.uga.edu
The university honored outstanding faculty and graduate students April 2 at its 24th annual research awards banquet sponsored by the non-profit UGA Research Foundation.
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Betty Jean Craige
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Three Creative Research Awards--the Albert Christ-Janer Award for the arts and humanities, the Lamar Dodd Award for the sciences and the William A. Owens Award for the social and behavioral sciences--were given for outstanding scholarly or creative activities that have gained national and international recognition.
Betty Jean Craige, University Professor of Comparative Literature and director of the Center for Humanities and Arts, received the Albert Christ-Janer Award for her scholarly work in holism. Craige studies Western society’s shift in conceptual order from a dualistic to a holistic understanding of nature and culture. Her six books include a biography of the late ecologist Eugene Odum, a book on American patriotism and a volume on literary study. In Laying the Ladder Down, which won a Georgia Author of the Year Award in non-fiction, Craige argues that Western culture’s shift toward cultural holism is evident from such social forces as feminism and the peace and environmental movements.
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David Landau
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David P. Landau, Distinguished Research Professor and director of the Center for Simulational Physics, received the Lamar Dodd Award. Landau uses supercomputer simulations to study how solids and liquids behave at atomic levels. His research on the behavior of magnets has applications for semiconductors and other thin film devices. Landau’s group discovered fatal flaws in random number generators used for supercomputer simulations and devised ways to fix the problems. Co-editor of 17 books on computer simulations, Landau recently received the Aneesur Rahman Prize, the highest honor for outstanding computational physics given by the American Physical Society.
Robert E. Rhoades, professor of anthropology, received the William A. Owens Award for his research in agricultural and ecological anthropology. Rhoades looks for innovative ways to sustain our growing population
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Robert Rhoades
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while also protecting natural resources for future generations. Rhoades has discovered ways to practice agriculture in such mountain ecosystems as the Andes, Himalayas and Appalachians while preserving both the environment and the local culture. His findings have influenced how sustainable development is studied and practiced throughout the world.
An Inventor’s Award is given each year for a unique, creative and innovative discovery that has made an impact on the community. Wayne W. Hanna, professor of crop and soil sciences, received this year’s award for solving numerous turfgrass industry problems. During his 32-year career as a plant breeder, he has developed winter-hardy, pest-resistant Bermuda grasses able to handle high traffic. These grasses now grow on golf courses and football stadiums around the world. Hanna has spearheaded the screening of Bermuda grass for hybrids that naturally deter mole crickets, the No. 1 lawn and turf pest in the Southeast. He and his research team have been awarded seven patents.
Five Creative Research Medals were given for outstanding research or creative activity on a single theme. Recipients were Thomas A. Eaton and Susette M. Talarico, James T. Hollibaugh, Ming-Jun Lai and Paul Wenston, Michael P. Terns, and Richard N. Winn.
Eaton, Hosch Professor of Law, and Talarico, Saye Professor of American Government and Constitutional Law, have conducted the most systematic study of tort litigation in any state. Contrary to popular opinion, their findings show that tort cases--civil suits that seek damages for wrongful conduct--usually involve simple disputes and that plaintiffs’ awards tend to be modest and rarely punitive.
Hollibaugh, professor of marine sciences, has won international acclaim for his innovative approach to the study of microbial diversity in aquatic ecosystems. Until recently, a majority of bacteria found in the ocean could not be studied with standard culture techniques. Hollibaugh devised an alternative approach using a molecular technique known as denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis to eliminate the need to culture bacteria. This technique has proven so effective in analyzing marine microbes that it is now used worldwide.
Lai, professor of mathematics, and Wenston, associate professor of mathematics, have developed a method that reduces approximation errors for Navier-Stokes equations. Mathematicians use these equations to describe and predict how fluids move--for example, when designing faster boats or creating animations like the huge waves in the movie The Perfect Storm.
Terns, associate professor of biochemistry and molecular biology, has contributed to understanding the process of ribonucleic acid localization and transport. Terns fluorescently labeled RNA and microinjected it into frog egg cells. Subsequent visualization of these RNAs led to the discovery of structures and proteins involved in making RNA. The Terns research group is working to translate their findings into applications for anti-cancer therapies and other gene-therapy agents through effective delivery and targeting of specific RNAs.
Winn, associate professor of biotechnology and toxicology, develops new methods that test the potential of chemicals and physical agents to cause genetic damage. He recently received a second U.S. patent on a transgenic fish. The guppy-sized fish contain specific DNA sequences that serve as targets for mutations. Researchers analyze tissues for changes in the target gene’s DNA after exposing the fish to a potential contaminant.
The designation of Distinguished Research Professor is an honor reserved for academicians whose work is recognized internationally as being of the highest levels of creativity in the field. Four faculty were appointed this year: Carmon Colangelo, art; Patricia A. Gowaty, ecology; Stephen P. Hubbell, plant biology; and Robert A. Scott, chemistry and biochemistry and molecular biology.
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