The Ruth S. Holmberg Grant for Faculty Excellence awards funds to faculty for professional development.
Of the 20 proposals received in 2015, six faculty members earned awards—selected tenured or tenure track faculty who are promoting “innovative or creative research and engagement or advancement of an academic discipline.”
Dr. Stylianos Chatzimanolis, UC Foundation associate professor of Biology, will conduct research with undergraduate students studying beetle diversity in two very popular outdoor areas in the greater Chattanooga area.
“While our knowledge of plants, birds and mammals is fairly complete in southeastern USA, relatively little is known regarding insects and specifically beetles. Beetles are a hyperdiverse group of organisms that are often used as indicators of overall habitat health. Additionally, in recent years several beetle species have become economically important (e.g., southern pine beetle, emerald ash borer) affecting many southern forest ecosystems,” Dr. Chatzimanolis wrote in his proposal.
Lula Lake in Lookout Mountain, Ga., and the Tennessee River Gorge in Tennessee will be the sites of field work to determine the number of species of beetles at each site; whether the two sites compare; the number of invasive species located at the sites; whether there are new species; and how the beetle diversity contrasts to the plant diversity in each site.
Dr. Chatzimanolis’ proposal, “Exploring Beetle Diversity in the Southeast: Integrating Undergraduate Research and Public Engagement,” was awarded $4,950.
Dr. Xuhua (Roy) Liu, assistant professor in the UTC Department of Mathematics, has been invited to contribute to a book for Chapman and Hall/CRC Press Group for its new series in mathematics, “Monographs and Research Notes in Mathematics.” Along with Professor Tin-Yau Tam at Auburn University, Dr. Liu will write a monograph entitled “Matrix Inequalities and Their Extensions in Lie Groups.” The first complete draft is expected by the end of 2015.
The grant will allow Dr. Liu release from one course during fall 2015 for the time to “conduct innovative and comprehensive research and to finish this promising and exciting project,” Dr. Liu wrote.
Dr. Liu further explained “the content of the book will be presented in international and regional conferences.” He has already been invited to present on the subject.
“Matrix Inequalities and Their Extensions in Lie Groups” earned Dr. Liu a Ruth S. Holmberg grant of $3,000.
Dr. Gary Wilkerson’s research proposal states the focus of his activity is on “refinement of previously developed injury risk screening procedures, combined with utilization of big data analytics for development of population-specific predictive algorithms, which will advance an evidence-based approach to sport-related injury prevention.”
Dr. Wilkerson, professor in Graduate Athletic Training at UTC, quoted research in his proposal that indicates U.S. high school athletes sustain approximately two million injuries annually which require more than 500,000 physician visits and 30,000 hospitalizations.
"With a sufficient amount of release time from teaching, along with funding to compensate a computer engineering graduate student, improvement of processes for electronic data acquisition and consolidation will make large-scale screening feasible for many athletic programs that have not previously used a systematic approach to pre-participation injury risk assessment,” Dr. Wilkerson wrote.
“Big Data Analytics for Sport-Related Injury Prevention” will be supported with a Ruth S. Holmberg Grant worth $3,000.
Dr. Cuilan “Lani” Gao, assistant professor in Mathematics at UTC, is developing a “statistical procedure to detect co-expressed gene sets associated to childhood Leukemia cancer,” specifically Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL). Dr. Gao explains that ALL is the most common cancer in children and the origin is largely unknown.
The American Cancer Association has published data that indicates ALL cancer relates to genetic changes before birth. Dr. Gao’s research proposal seeks “a more effective, biologically meaningful approach to analyze gene sets co-expressed via a statistical procedure.”
The proposal has earned a Ruth S. Holmberg Grant of $4,830.
Dr. Susan Eckelmann, UC Foundation assistant professor in the UTC Department of History, plans to use the Ruth S. Holmberg Grant to “fund archival research to the expansion and revision” of her manuscript Freedom’s Little Lights: The World of Children and Teenagers in the U.S. and Abroad during the Civil Rights Era.
Dr. Eckelmann’s research “examines the nexus between teenage youth, civil rights culture, and Cold War politics during the 1950s and 1960s,” she wrote in her proposal.
“The manuscript studies this exchange: the politicized interracial, multicultural, and transnational worldview of children and teenagers during the Alabama civil rights movement, and, in particular, how black youth centered activism mobilized their white peers in the U.S. and abroad,” she continued.
Dr. Eckelmann plans to examine the collections at the Lyndon B. Johnson Library, specifically the White House Central Files, the Office Files of the White House Aides, as well as the National Security File” so that she can “examine teenagers’ direct contributions and voices during the Johnson administration.”
Dr. Eckelmann has been approached by three major university presses about the book—Harvard University Press, Cambridge University Press, and University Press of Florida.
Her proposal has earned a Ruth S. Holmberg Grant of $1,827.
Andrew O’Brien, assistant professor, Photography and Media Art, wrote in his proposal that he will work to “enhance professional and pedagogical competency in the areas of Web Programming and Professional Video Editing.” Mr. O’Brien will accomplish his goal “by attending two separate two-day workshops led by industry practitioners in each of these respective areas.”
With broader technical competencies, Mr. O’Brien, a new faculty member, proposed that he will be better equipped to work in a variety of artistic disciplines, one of the goals of the UTC Department of Art.
Mr. O’Brien’s proposal for software training for professional development has earned a Ruth S. Holmberg Grant of $2,318.