Sharon Hammes-Schiffer, a professor of chemistry and the Eberly Professor of Biotechnology at Penn State, has been named a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Hammes-Schiffer is an acknowledged world leader in theoretical chemistry whose research spans the fields of chemistry, physics, biology and computer science. Her research has important implications for the development of alternative energy sources such as solar cells, as well as for protein engineering and drug design. (more)
Kenneth H. Nealson, a Wrigley Professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of Southern California, will present the 2011-12 Stone Memorial Lecture at 4 p.m. on Monday, April 23, in 101 Althouse Laboratory on the Penn State University Park campus. This free public lecture, titled "Extracellular Electron Transfer (EET): Some New Things to Think About," is sponsored by the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. (more)
Penn State's Eberly College of Science has announced science seminars taking place during the week of April 16 on Penn State's University Park campus. (more)
For the first time, researchers at Penn State University and Rice University have created solid, spongy blocks of carbon nanotubes that have an astounding ability to clean up oil spills in water. Separating oil from seawater is just one of a range of potential applications for the new material formed using carbon and a dash of boron. The international team, which includes Mauricio Terrones, a professor of physics and of materials science and engineering at Penn State, has published the results of its research in Nature's online journal Scientific Reports. (more)
J. Franklin Egan, doctoral candidate in ecology, is the recipient of the 2012 Intercollege Graduate Student Outreach Achievement Award. This award recognizes outstanding achievements of degree candidates in any of the Intercollege Graduate Degree Programs that relate to bringing their scholarship to the community in order to benefit society in some manner. The award also endeavors to encourage future scholars and researchers to embrace outreach and promote a commitment to advancing the welfare and quality of life for the public through scholarly pursuits. (more)
The Penn State Forensic Science program recently signed a corporate sponsorship agreement with Life Technologies to work on forensic DNA research projects for the company. Life Technologies Corporation is a global biotechnology company dedicated to improving the human condition. In exchange for the research, Life Technologies provided the program with instrumentation, software and reagents valued at $350,000 that will be used in the research and as educational tools for students. (more)
Six Penn State faculty members have received the 2012 George W. Atherton Award for Excellence in Teaching. They are Karen Barr, senior instructor of business at Penn State Beaver; Aquila Kikora Franklin, assistant professor of theatre/dance in the College of Arts and Architecture; Christine Masters, associate professor of engineering science and mechanics in the College of Engineering; Katherine Masters, lecturer and lab director in chemistry in the Eberly College of Science; Heather McCoy, senior lecturer in French in the College of the Liberal Arts, and Laura Palmer, associate professor of biology at Penn State Altoona. The award, named after Penn State's seventh president, honors excellence in teaching at the undergraduate level. (more)
Richard Cyr, professor of biology in the Eberly College of Science, is the recipient of the 2012 Undergraduate Program Leadership Award. The award recognizes a faculty member who has demonstrated exemplary leadership benefiting a Penn State undergraduate degree program. Specifically, it recognizes those individuals who have major responsibilities for the delivery of undergraduate education within a unit and who are providing leadership that has transformed or revitalized the undergraduate program in some way. (more)
J. Martin Bollinger Jr., professor of chemistry and of biochemistry and molecular biology in the Eberly College of Science, is the recipient of the 2012 Howard B. Palmer Faculty Mentoring Award. The award honors and recognizes outstanding achievement by a faculty member with at least five years of service who effectively guides junior faculty. Howard Palmer was the senior associate dean of The Graduate School from 1984 to 1991. (more)
