uwm research report 2011

RESEARCH REPORT 2011

Pathways

On the Cover: Our cover image is a montage of different stem cells, each overlaid with color-coded outlines representing patterns of shape and motion over time. Andrew Cohen, an assistant professor of electrical engineering and computer science, has developed new approaches to computationally sensing subtle differences in dynamic behaviors by analyzing live cells with time-lapse micros-copy image sequences. The tools can not only predict the type of cell each stem cell will produce, but also foresee the outcome before the stem cell even divides. (See story on page 2.)

Written, designed and produced by University Communications & Media Relations. Photography: UWM Photo Services; courtesy Andrew Cohen (cover and this page); Marcos A. Guerra (p. 11); Joe Sacco (p. 17); Lance Weinhardt (p. 25); courtesy Margaret Shaffer (p. 30); Mario R. López (back cover). This publication may be requested in accessible format.

1 Interim Chancellor’s welcome

2 Foreseeing the fate of stem cells

4 Physicist’s work yields another UWM startup

5 Bringing down the cost of nanomaterials

6 Messages from Lake Michigan’s carbon cycle

8 U.S. Census expert adds up the past

9 Microbial genes give clues for new cancer drugs

10 Factors behind forest diversity

12 Physics initiative unveils the ‘people’s pulsar’

13 Protecting Lake Michigan through design

14 Informal settings, serious learning

16 New inspiration for American Indian studies

17 doc|UWM makes it real

18 A new approach to harnessing discovery

20 A national center on children’s environmental health

22 A shield for developing immune systems

23 New insights on aging

24 Toward a brighter future for Malawi

26 A drug-free option for Tourette syndrome

27 Easing the burden for family caregivers

28 Baby-stepping toward physical therapy options

30 The ‘expat’ experience: a family affair

31 Uncovering a trend toward earlier springs

32 Public transportation leads to innovation

33 Smoothing out wind power

34 Limiting the danger of new technologies

35 The breadth of research life

36 UWM: Opening new pathways to results

37 Advancing the rate of discovery

Pathways UWM RESEARCH REPORT 2011

owerful ideas at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

are fueling our research engine forward along the pathway to proven results, to the benefit of the city, region and state. Research expenditures reached an all-time high in the most recently com-pleted academic year and showed remarkable growth over the past decade. At the heart of this

growth are the outstanding members of the UWM faculty. We have facilitated their ability to seek research dollars by creating new opportunities for collaboration and have strategically invested state resources in adding to their ranks.

Growing research expenditures has been a focal point of UWM over the past decade. They have increased more than 200 percent in that time – from just more than $21 million in 1999-2000 to $68 million in 2009-10. This latest total is an all-time high for the university.

Many researchers have found success working with regional academic institutions and industries. Such new opportunities include the National Science Foundation Industry & University Cooperative Research Center on Water Technology, Clinical and Translational Science Institute of Southeastern Wisconsin, and UW-Milwaukee/UW-Madison Intercampus Research Incentive Grants.

UWM has carefully and strategically invested the approximately $11 million in annual funding that the State of Wisconsin allotted for new UWM faculty, staff and research during the 2007-09 budget cycle. This

allowed the university to hire highly qualified faculty in several targeted areas, including 20 positions in the College of Engineering & Applied Science.

Looking to the future, several new developments will facilitate research:

Specific locations have been determined for our two new academic endeavors:•TheSchoolofPublicHealthwilllocateinthe

historic Brewery development district in downtown Milwaukee; and

•TheSchoolofFreshwaterSciences,thefirst in the country, will be the major tenant of the multi-story building to be constructed next to the current Great Lakes WATER Institute on Milwaukee’s inner harbor.

Construction plans also are under way for: •TheKenwoodIntegratedResearchComplex

on the East Side campus; and •ThefirstnewbuildingatUWM’sInnovation ResearchPark.

To guide our actions over the next decade, a StrategicPlanforResearchisbeingdevelopedthatwillhelp us establish more formal goals and a road map for research and scholarship that is not solely based on research dollars.

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee knows that nurturing powerful ideas will keep this ambitious research agenda moving forward along the pathway to proven results. This will strengthen our university while also invigorating regional economic development. PleasereadthefollowingpagesandseehowUWM is proceeding.

– Michael R. Lovell Interim Chancellor

Powerful ideas are the catalyst for proven results

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1 RESEARCH REPORT 2011 UW–MilWaUkee

completely novel approach to analyzing the behaviors of stem cells has yielded a soft-ware tool for successfully predicting what

kind of cell they ultimately will become.

In fact, the software program, developed by UWM computer engineer Andrew Cohen, not only pre-dicts the types of specialized cells a stem cell will produce, but can foresee the outcome before the stem cell even divides.

The software could lead to discovery of what con-trols stem cell specialization, the main obstacle in advancing the use of stem-cell therapy for treat-ment of disease. It also offers fresh opportuni-ties for research into the causes of cancer, which involves cells that continuously self-renew.

“This is a brand-new set of tools for developmen-tal biologists,” says Cohen, an assistant professor with a background in designing software for high-performance graphics. “And it supports an area where no other predictive solutions exist.”

The software is 87 percent accurate in deter-mining the specific “offspring” a stem cell will produce, and 99 percent accurate in predicting when self-renewal of these stem cells will end in specialization.

Creating such a tool has been hampered by the fact that there are very few markers that can foretell cell-division outcomes. Cohen’s system takes a different approach, using time-lapse images of live stem cells to identify the subtle behaviors that characterize stem cells with different fates.

“Partoftheprogrammingmechanismisdeter-mined by surrounding cells,” says Cohen. “But once these cells begin to develop in a particular way, their offspring continue down that path even if the environment changes. So at some point, they have been programmed to their fate.”

Thesoftware,whichrunsonastandardPC,out-performs the human eye in detecting differences in how the cells change over time. To manage the predictive aspects of the program, Cohen used a uniquely sensitive mathematical approach based on algorithmic information theory.

The work was published in Nature Methods.

“It is very rare for engineers to publish in Nature journals,” says UWM Interim Chancellor Michael Lovell. “This achievement signifies the quality of our faculty and the value of interdisciplinary work in biomedical technology.”

Foreseeing the fate of stem cells

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Andrew Cohen has created a new kind of predictive tool for use in stem cell research.


roteins carry out most of the body’s func-tions, but scientists’ understanding of these products of DNA is limited because most

proteins are impossible to image. With about 100,000 unique proteins in the body, it’s important to see their structures in order to unravel what they all do.

Using high-tech bio-imaging equipment that he developed, UWM physicist Valerica Raicu and his lab members have become the first scientists to determine the molecular structure of a group of pro-teins (a “complex”) interacting within a living cell.

The work forms the basis of the newest startup company to license technology from the UWM Research Foundation. Co-founded by Raicu and entrepreneur Thomas Mozer, Aurora Spectral

Technologies (AST) LLC has already raised more than $500,000 through local angel investors, such asJeffRusinow,founderofSiliconPastures.

Raicu’s method has potentially widespread appli-cations for other researchers. Because some 60 percent of drugs target proteins, better molecular imaging techniques are vital to new drug discovery and for understanding the molecular basis of illness.

Proteinsaretoosmalltobeseenwithatraditionaloptical microscope. AST’s product will be an “add-on” to a laser-scanning microscope that allows high-speed, high-resolution pictures. Researchers will be able not only to view proteins being transported within the cell in real time, but also to detect interactions among them.

For the latter, Raicu attaches fluorescent tags of different colors to the various kinds of proteins in a sample. Then he takes advantage of a specific exchange of energy that occurs when two molecules, each tagged with a different color, come within a nanometer of each other. One laser- excited molecule transfers energy to the other, and only the receiver emits its color.

Laser microscopes, however, can only view one tag color at a time. To determine whether proteins are working in combina-tion, Raicu’s invention gives laser micro-scopes the capability of showing multiple tag colors.

The research was supported by a Bradley Catalyst Grant from the UWM Research Foun-dation, the nonprofit corporation that supports

Physicist’s work yields another UwM startup

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research and innovation at UWM through a variety of programs, including patenting and licensing.Valerica Raicu (left) and Thomas Mozer, co-founders of Aurora Spectral Technologies.


rmed with a cost-effective method of pro-ducing nanomaterials that he discovered, UWM engineer Junhong Chen has launched

a Milwaukee startup company that has licensed the research from the UWM Research Foundation.

Chen, UWM associate professor of mechanical engineering, founded NanoAffix Science LLC to develop nanoscale products and devices with these materials, created by deposition of nano-particles onto carbon nanotubes (CNTs).

It is one of two startup companies established this year involving UWM research.

“We have found new ways of combining nano-components to produce valuable technologies, which are superior to existing approaches,” said Chen.Hismethodsofcombiningstructuresarenot only low-cost, but also yield high-performance materials that have potential uses in medical diag-nostics, green energy technology and sensors.

NanoAffix Director Ed Corrigan says the company objective is to bring practical nanosensor products to market and pursue other innovative manufacturing technology applications. The company currently has a federal Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant to focus on commercial development of sensors that can detect gas in very low concentrations.

Members of Chen’s lab, directed by project scien-tist Ganhua Lu, focus on combining CNTs, invis-ibly thin sheets of graphite that are rolled into a

cylindrical shape, and nanoparticles, bits of matter that are nanoscale in all three dimensions.

CNTs are the rising superstar structures of molecular engineering because of their remarkable properties, like strength, conductivity and flexibil-ity. Already they are used in making electronics, such as flat panel display screens.

By decorating CNTs with nanoparticles, the result-ing hybrid takes on additional novel properties.

This technique arranges nanoparticles on CNTs so that they stand up, like bristles on a hairbrush, allowing the hybrid nanomaterial to be further “fine tuned,” which is very difficult at nanoscale.

Bringing down the cost of nanomaterials

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Carbon nanotubes decorated with smaller nanoparticles.


uring every crossing of Lake Michigan by Milwaukee’s high-speed ferry, UWM aquatic scientistHarveyBootsmaaddstohis

growing database of vital signs from the lake.

With monitoring equipment installed aboard the ferry, one of several conditions he is logging is levels of carbon dioxide (CO2), a tracer of biological processes.

Working with Qian Liao, assistant professor of civil engineering and mechanics, Bootsma hopes to determine if invasive species, such as quagga mussels, are changing the flow of nutrients in the lake, as he suspects.

Ultimately, the team wants to find out how changes in the carbon cycle influence the lake’s ability to sustain a food web – especially under altered conditions, such as those caused by climate change or invasive species.

The U.S. government also is interested in Bootsma’s carbon cycle data, but for a different reason. In order to develop a “carbon budget” that will help monitor greenhouse gases like CO2, federal agencies need to know if the photosyn-thesis in the Great Lakes soaks up CO2 from the atmosphere as oceans and forests do.

“Right now, the Great Lakes are a black box in regard to that question,” says Bootsma, who was recently featured in the Chicago Tribune. “We don’t know if they are a net source or a sink for CO2.”

With five years of data gathered from the ferry crossings so far, the team is beginning to see some patterns, but the reasons for those patterns are still unclear.

Bootsma, an associate professor in the School of Freshwater Sciences, says the lake shows a slight net CO2 sink. But he’s also found that much of the photosynthesis that produces food has been diverted from the open waters of the lake to the nearshore area, where most of the quagga mus-sels are. The mussels filter feed on plankton so voraciously they clarify the water, allowing photo-synthesis to occur deeper. This condition, coupled with the phosphorous produced by the mussels, are contributing to excessive growth of an alga called Cladophora.

But it’s still unknown if either is important to the food web.

The research team also has documented an increase in photosynthesis over large parts of the lake after storms because of an influx of nutrients from rivers. If such events become more common in the future, as climate-change models suggest, they may promote higher algal production in the lake – and potentially more mussels and Cladophora.

Messages from Lake Michigan’s carbon cycle

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Harvey Bootsma (foreground) and research associate Jim Weselowski calibrate CO2 sensors mounted on a stationary buoy.


U.s. Census expert adds up the past efore 1970, everyone got a knock on the door, says Margo Anderson, a UWM histo-rian of the U.S. Census. Though methods of

contact change each decade, some aspects of the census remain the same.

As Anderson, a professor of history and urban studies, told a congressional committee in 2006, results of the census almost always hold surprises.

“Every time a new demographic phenomenon occurs, we don’t know how to count it,” she says. In 2010, for example, a particular challenge involved accounting for the country’s undocu-mented immigrants.

Since the last census, the undocumented immigrant population in the U.S. has grown, and the 2010 census results will be used to estimate that count.

Anderson’s historical research on the census has described how statistical methods and technology have improved accuracy; how current events have affected or changed the process; and how social prejudices have tainted the count throughout its history.

The author of several books on the U.S. Census, Anderson also is a favorite commentator in the national media. In 2010 alone, she was quoted in nearly every large mass media outlet, from USA Today to Newsweek.

The census, which is mandated by the U.S. Constitution to take place every 10 years, determines political representation in Congress, the number of a state’s electoral votes, and the distribution of government services and federal aid. But it’s also unique.

“It’s the first census in the history of the world that is used to apportion political power,” she says. “That’s an innovation in democratic governance that Americans can take credit for.”

But, Anderson points out, census outcomes also contain demographic information that has shown how Americans lived from decade to decade. From the first census in 1790, for example, the results have revealed who was eligible to be drafted into military service and who could be liable for taxes, she says.

The census is a repository of insight into the state of social issues such as civil rights, family dynam-ics, characteristics of the labor force, American spending power and racial identity in an increas-ingly multicultural country.

“Until the count is complete,” says Anderson, “the true dimensions of the changes of the previous decade are unclear.”

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Margo Anderson shows a map of the redistricted South after the 1860 census.

he classical method of drug discovery is to identify crude natural-product extracts that have therapeutic properties first,” says

UWM biochemist Yi-Qiang “Eric” Cheng, “then purify the compounds responsible.”

Working with bacterial DNA, Cheng’s lab has turned that process around – looking for new drug leads by comparing the genetic makeup of different microbes to those that have yielded existing successful compounds.

The approach, called “chemogenomics,” helped Cheng hone in on a specific microbe with potential very quickly. Last year, he uncovered two cancer-fighting chemical compounds derived from a bacterium commonly found in tropical soil.

The compounds, from Burkholderia thailandensis, were tested recently by the National Cancer Insti-tute (NCI), one of the funders, and found to be effective against about 20 different kinds of cancer.

It is the first time an anti-cancer compound from a UWM lab has been tested by the NCI with such encouraging results.

Cheng has also mined the genome of another bacterium that produces the same novel class of anti-cancer compounds. An organism’s genome is a kind of blueprint for groups of genes govern-ing the various life functions. By manipulating the compounds’ similar gene clusters, the researchers can create structural variations, called analogs.

“We have established an excellent platform for engineering this class of compounds that no one else is doing,” says Cheng, who has two patent applications out on the work.

HebeganwithacompoundcalledFK228,discoveredby Japanese pharmaceutical company Fujisawa. It inhibits histone deacetylases, a class of enzymes that are often hyperactive in cancer cells. ThenheclonedthegenesinvolvedinmakingFK228and searched for other gene clusters that contain a similar stretch of genes. The compounds he discovered, which he named thailandepsins, also inhibit the functioning of histone deacetylases, but are structurally different from the Fujisawa compounds.

Thailandepsins also proved to be active against a differentportfolioofcancersthanFK228.

Even more exciting, Cheng speculates thailand-epsins may also be useful in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases, inflammatory disorders and diabetes.

Yi-Qiang “Eric” Cheng (right) and graduate research fellow Vishwakanth Potharla.

Microbial genes give clues for new cancer drugs”T


hat determines plant diversity and abundance in a forest? It’s a question even Charles Darwin pondered. With so

many variables, UWM ecologist Stefan Schnitzer’s approach is to investigate what he calls “the outlaw – the one that doesn’t fit the model.”

In tropical forests, that outsider would be woody vines, also called lianas.

Lianas are important players in tropical forest dynamics because they are so successful in dry conditions where most other plants struggle to survive. In fact, Schnitzer has found the growth rate of lianas is seven times that of trees in dry conditions, compared to only twice as much as trees in the rainy season.

Growing evidence suggests that lianas are becoming more abundant with rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere, choking out trees. While all plants remove and store the greenhouse gas CO2, lianas do not sequester as much as trees do, a cause for concern in controlling climate change.

Schnitzer, an associate professor of biological sciences, believes lianas could be increasing for reasons other than rising CO2 levels.

With considerable backing from both the National Science Foundation and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, where he also is a researcher, Schnitzer has launched one of the most compre-hensive community-level studies on liana-tree interactions ever conducted.

The study is testing his “dry season advantage hypothesis.” In it, he asserts that many plants in tropical forests, including lianas, thrive during seasonal droughts because they keep growing, while trees and other competing plant species suspend their growth and lose their leaves.

ThetropicalforestsSchnitzerstudiesinPanamahave distinct wet and dry seasons, making Panamaanideallocationtotesthistheory.Butthe “dry season advantage” might also explain the dominance of particular tree species in seasonal forests, he says.

In another study, published in Nature, Schnitzer and his lab members have determined another mechanism of forest diversity – that certain tree species are abundant because they are less susceptible to pathogens in the soil than rarer tree species.

Finding the mechanisms responsible for plant diversity and abundance is a major focus of ecological research today, says Schnitzer, because most of what’s known only describes patterns of distribution. Since not all species suffer from the same pathogens in a diverse community, his research indicates that diversity is important in limiting disease and thus increasing plant growth.

Factors behind forest diversity

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Stefan Schnitzer travels to Panama to study lianas and their role in forest dynamics.

WM’sEinstein@Homeprojectproveswhatcan be accomplished when a quarter-million science buffs in 192 countries volunteer

idle time on their computers to help look for rare events in space.

Thissummer,Einstein@Homemadeitsfirstdeep-space cosmic discovery – a previously unknown radio pulsar in our own galaxy. It is the first astro-nomical find by such a citizen-scientist project. At the helm of this data-processing supercluster at UWM is Xavier Siemens, an assistant professor at the Center for Gravitation and Cosmology, who helped to develop and now maintains Einstein@Home.TheprojectisbasedatUWMintheU.S.andtheMaxPlanckInstituteforGravitationalPhysicsinHannover,Germany.

Einstein@Homewascreatedin2005toaidaninternational effort to analyze data from detectors that are searching for gravitational waves in space. Gravitational waves are ripples in space-time that are produced when massive objects, like stars, move violently. Direct detection of these elusive waves will open up a new means of studying the universe.

Butnow,aboutone-thirdofEinstein@Home’stime is dedicated to searching for radio pulsars in observationsfromAreciboObservatoryinPuertoRico. And for good reason. Searching for pulsars can lead to detection of gravitational waves.

Pulsarsarerapidlyspinningneutronstars,theremnants of supernovae. They emit lighthouse-like beams of radio waves that can sweep past the Earth at extremely regular intervals and are received as pulses, making them highly accurate celestialclocks.Passinggravitationalwavescanbe detected because they affect the arrival times of pulses from pulsars.

BesidestheworkofEinstein@Home,Siemenshas funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to lead two other pulsar-hunting initiatives at UWM. In one, called the Arecibo Remote Control Center (ARCC), both high school and UWM students take remote control of the Arecibo radiotelescopefromthecampusPhysicsBuildingand search for signals from pulsars.

That has spun into Siemens’ participation in a $6.5 million grant from NSF that supports a global consortium of researchers and students (the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves, or NANOGrav) using observations of millisecond pulsars to detect gravitational waves.

Physics initiative unveils the ‘people’s pulsar’

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Xavier Siemens (left) and Einstein@Home system administrator David Hammer.


ilwaukee’s industrial harbor corridor, with its salvage yards, fallow smokestacks and open salt and coal storage, is more than

just unsightly. The estuary has been designated by theEnvironmentalProtectionAgencyasanAreaof Concern since 1987.

“It hasn’t been re-imagined in a long time,” says James Wasley, associate professor in the UWM SchoolofArchitectureandUrbanPlanning (SARUP).“Withsuchecologicallyharmful contaminants so close to the water, and so much underutilized land so close to downtown, we should be trying to redevelop the inner harbor to make it both ecologically healthier and economically more productive.”

In the center of this area, just south of downtown and situated on the water, is the future site of UWM’s School of Freshwater Sciences. “The school could be the catalyst that spurs the redevelopment of this area, putting Milwaukee on the map as a global green city and water industries hub,” says Wasley.

Heandotherfacultymembersinvolvedin SARUP’sInstituteforEcologicalDesign(I4ED) have seized this opportunity to orchestrate a two-year project focusing on Milwaukee’s inner harbor. The project already involves students, faculty, business owners, elected officials and the general public, all brainstorming with green design in mind, says Wasley.

With support from the Brico Fund to add Christine ScottThomson,PlunkettRaysichVisitingProfessor,as the institute’s coordinator, the I4ED brings the resourcesofSARUPtotheinnerharborproject,and acts as an umbrella for other ongoing research projects, including parallel green infrastructure research on campus.

The cornerstone of the I4ED’s inner harbor work this year is participation by internationally recog-nized water artist, landscape architect and urban plannerHerbertDreiseitl,whoseGermanfirmhasbeen given the school’s Urban Edge Award this biennium. The Urban Edge competition, sponsored by the law firm of Reinhart Boerner Van Deuren andtheWisconsinPreservationTrust,bringsvisionary designers of public spaces to Milwaukee to teach and lead a local project. Together, Dreiseitl and Wasley are teaching a studio in which students take on the environmen-tal challenges in the area.

Protecting Lake Michigan through design

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Christine Scott Thomson and James Wasley survey Milwaukee’s inner harbor.


earning can happen anywhere, outside of school and over the course of a life span.

“Over the past decade, there has been a growing interest in research about informal learning and what people take away from field trips and infor-mal experiences,” says Sandra Toro Martell, an assistant professor of educational psychology in the School of Education. Martell is the Informal Learning Strand Coordinator for the National Association for Research in Science Teaching (NARST) and also teaches in UWM’s Museum Studies certificate program.

Museums that encourage hands-on activities can help make students more receptive to subject areas that they might otherwise find boring, like classroom science, says Martell. As the principal investigator for a National Science Foundation IntersectionProject,Martellworkswithresearch-ers and educators to link what’s already known about learning with current teaching practices in science museums and other informal sites. She is helping edit a collection of articles for the journal Science Education to help share this knowledge.

Martell’s own research focuses on measuring learning at sites like planetariums and museums, but she sees benefits in working with people who study and teach in all sorts of settings and use varied methods. In her work with NARST, she is

bringing together researchers and educators who use video games and mobile phone apps to help children and their families learn science.

Among those involved are Northwestern, Vander-bilt and Central Florida universities, the University ofWashingtonandPennState.Groupmemberswill present their findings to high school science teachers and others who work with learners of all ages to help improve both theoretical understand-ing and teaching practices.

Martell is also working with Jean Creighton, direc-tor of the UWM planetarium, studying leisure-time visitors who attend the planetarium’s public shows – examining the impact of teaching approaches on what and how visitors learn. Martell and Creighton have found, for example, that repeating informa-tion and using words and pictures instead of just words can help people remember challenging scientific information.

What happens at the planetarium and other informal settings can spark leisure-time science learners’ interest in astronomy, in particular, and science, in general, according to Creighton and Martell. If visitors can learn how to learn about constellations, why not other, more challenging topics?

It’s that question that drives Martell’s work.

Informal settings, serious learning

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Sandra Toro Martell’s work with institutions like the Milwaukee Public Museum encourages informal learning.

he name and memory of a pioneering educator are offering new inspiration for American Indian studies at UWM.

The Electa Quinney Institute for American Indian Education, named for a Stockbridge-Munsee Mohican woman recognized as Wisconsin’s first public school teacher, will be a catalyst for American Indian education and policy initiatives, saysDavidBeaulieu,ElectaQuinneyProfessor and director of the institute.

The institute grew out of the endowed professorship in American Indian education, established through a gift from Milwaukee’s Indian Community School to honor Quinney. In 1828, she established a one-room log school, open to all,inKaukauna,Wis.

Beaulieu, a nationally known expert in American Indian education, came to UWM in 2009 to head the institute.Hehasservedontheboardofdirectorsandas president of the National Indian Education Asso-ciation, as editor of the Journal of American Indian Education and as director of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Indian Education.

While the institute will have oversight of Ameri-can Indian-related education initiatives, it will also have a broader mission, says Beaulieu, an enrolled member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, White Earth Reservation.

UWM educators’ vision for the Electa Quinney Institute includes developing new programs, ser-vices, research and learning opportunities in part-nership with the university’s established American Indian research and academic programs.

The institute has been working collaboratively with the Indian Community School and Wisconsin American Indian tribes and communities. “We’re having dialogues with community leaders and others about what their needs are that the university can respond to, and how we can help provide solutions that work in real communities,” Beaulieu says.

“Too often, American Indians are seen as the subjects of research and teaching, but increasingly American Indian tribes and communities have sought to be consumers defining their own needs directly,” he adds.

Research, service and learning opportunities will focus on both American Indians and non-Indians interested in working with tribal and urban Indian communities, says Beaulieu, who adds that this approach is very much in line with the educational views of Electa Quinney. “We need educated people who not only have the professional skills, but also the knowledge of the unique community contexts in which solutions must be developed.”

New inspiration for american Indian studies

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David Beaulieu heads the newly opened Electa Quinney Institute.


oc|UWM, the documentary media center inUWM’sPeckSchooloftheArtsFilm Department, bridges academics with real-

world experience.

“We give students the unique opportunity to work on professional productions before graduating,” says Ryan James Sarnowski, project director and instructor, who holds an MFA in film from UWM.

Since 2007, these documentarians have produced work for organizations as diverse as the National PoetryFoundation,MilwaukeeCountyDepartmentonAging,PeaceLearningCenterofMilwaukee,the national StoryCorps project, the Coalition for Jewish Learning, the Johnson Foundation at Wingspread,theHelenBaderFoundationandtheGreater Milwaukee Committee.

In addition, doc|UWM filmmakers create feature-length documentaries for broadcast on public television. “All of our productions have a serious missionandseriousintent,”saysJennyPlevin,program director and also a Film Department grad.

“MyWayHome,”adoc|UWMfeature-lengthfilm, chroniclesayoungHmong-Americanwoman’sjourney to reconnect with her past. It won an award at the Wisconsin Film Festival, was screened at the Milwaukee Film Festival, has been aired on WisconsinPublicTelevisiontwiceandisslatedsoonforMilwaukeePublicTelevision.

“S.A.N.E – Stop Abuse and Neglect of Elders” is a curriculum developed by the Milwaukee County Department on Aging and the title of a series of five short documentary videos doc|UWM produced to be used with it. The documentaries

give firsthand accounts of the effects of elder abuse and elder fraud, and are designed to help “first responders” identify it.

Currently in production is a feature-length docu-mentary about the Joe Sims’ Milwaukee Striders track club. This organization has provided profound support for central city youth since 1975 and is now headed by inspiring new leaders.

A series of 60 short documentaries by doc|UWM will showcase Milwaukee as a hub for water research,technologyandindustries.Partnersinthis project include the Greater Milwaukee Committee, UWM School of Continuing Education and Milwaukee Water Council (whose website will feature the finished documentaries).

“Organizations are realizing that they need to put forth a video presence – something that people can watch online,” says Sarnowski. “Our students, hopefully, will be that next generation of videomakers.”

doc|UwM makes it real

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Dao Chang filming along the Mekong River for “My Way Home.”


Great Lakes Transportation Enterprise Institute (GLTEI)

Through GLTEI, four universities have joined forces with the Wiscon-sin Department of Transportation and regional industry to jointly develop innovative products related to high-way safety and green technologies. In addition to UWM, the universities include the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Marquette University and the Medical College of Wisconsin. Business members are led by Traffic & Parking Control Co. (TAPCO) Inc., of Brown Deer, and TrafficCast Inter-national, based in Madison.

UWM School of Public Health

Building on the multidisciplinary nature of public health, this new graduate-level school was created in concert with the City of Milwaukee Health Department. Through its many partnerships, the school aims to identify the urban area’s worst health threats, address health disparities and guide public health policy. Some of the affiliated organizations are the Center for Urban Population Health and Milwaukee Public Schools.

Center for Advanced Materials Manufacturing (CAMM)

Backed by a $1.2 million federal grant, UWM has launched CAMM, which will support the transfer of UWM research in bulk nanostruc-tured materials to the manufactur-ing industry in both Wisconsin and the nation. These high-performance metallic materials hold the potential to revitalize foundries if they can be mass-produced. CAMM researchers will work with Oshkosh Corporation and other companies to develop an infrastructure for scaling up their production.

Wisconsin Energy Research Consortium (WERC)

The state’s largest academic energy research organizations have merged to form a single entity, headquar-tered in Milwaukee, with a mission of making Wisconsin a nationally recog-nized center of expertise in energy, power and control technologies. WERC brings together UWM and three other engineering schools – the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Marquette University and Milwaukee School of Engineering – with 10 indus-try partners: American Transmission Company, DRS Technologies, Eaton Corporation, Helios USA, Johnson Controls Inc., Kohler, LEM USA, Rockwell Automation, We Energies and ZBB Energy Corporation.

UWM is taking a new approach to harnessing discovery. In the collaborative centers featured here, we join with regional and

state partners to merge our diverse paths of expertise and form one road to economic and social vitality.


UWM School of Freshwater Sciences

Unique in the nation, this new graduate-level school and its research arm integrate four themes: freshwater system dynamics; human and ecosystem health; freshwater technology; and freshwater econom-ics, policy and management. The school is linked with a wide range of partners, including the Environmental Protection Agency, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Milwaukee Water Council, Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District and UW Sea Grant Institute.

Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) of Southeastern Wisconsin

Backed by $20 million from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a consortium of eight Milwaukee institutions, including UWM, shares resources to accelerate the transla-tion of research discoveries into new medical treatments. Other members are the Medical College of Wisconsin, Marquette University, the Milwaukee School of Engineering, BloodCenter of Wisconsin, Children’s Hospital and Health System, Froedtert Hospital and the Clement J. Zablocki VA Medical Center.

NSF Industry & University Cooperative Research Center on Water Technology

Combining their individual strengths in freshwater technology research, UWM and Marquette University have joined with six area industries and the Milwaukee Water Council to form this collaboration funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). With the goal of applying research to industry projects and producing intel-lectual property around the resulting discoveries, the center is one of only two such NSF centers in the coun-try focused on freshwater. Industry partners are A.O. Smith Corporation, Badger Meter Inc., Baker Manufactur-ing Company LLC, Gannett Fleming Inc., Pentair Inc. and the Metropolitan Milwaukee Sewerage District.

Children’s Environmental Health Sciences Core Center (CEHSCC)

See next page.


a national center on children’s environmental health

esearch into children’s environmental health is a multifaceted team sport in Milwaukee, where a new center, housed administratively

at UWM, has united some of the best scientists in the country to study the impact of environmen-tal factors on the origins and development of childhood diseases.

TheChildren’sEnvironmentalHealthSciencesCoreCenter(CEHSCC)isoneof17environmen- tal health centers in the nation funded by the NationalInstituteofEnvironmentalHealth Sciences(NIEHS),andtheonlyonedevoted solely to children’s issues.

This unique interinstitutional partnership involving UWM, the Children’s Research Institute (CRI) of Children’sHospitalandHealthSystem,andtheMedical College of Wisconsin (MCW), provides researchers with the tools to facilitate interdisciplinary research, fellowships to attract scientists into this field, and financial support for pilot projects with the potential to compete for national funding.

ThecenterisdirectedbyDavidPetering,UWMDistinguishedProfessorofChemistryandBio-chemistry.HiscounterpartsareDeputyDirectorRonaldHinesandClinicalDirectorGailMcCarver,both professors of pediatrics at MCW.

Several pilot projects illustrate center activities. Michael Carvan, a Shaw Associate Scientist in the UWM School of Freshwater Sciences, leads the planning of the zebrafish “phenome project” that will investigate how thousands of individual genes

contribute to the developmental toxicity of chemicals, from alcohol to mercury. The center is nationally recognized for using zebrafish to understand how chemicals affect development.

Understanding the relationship between childhood gastrointestinal disease and infectious agents in Lake Michigan is the topic of collabora-tive research by Marc Gorelick, director of emergencymedicineatChildren’sHospital,andSandra McLellan, UWM associate scientist.

Another pilot project studies the hypothesis that bisphenol-A causes neurobehavioral deficits during development.ItinvolvesCEHSCCscientistDanielWeber and Robert Tanguay, professor of environ-mental and molecular toxicology at Oregon State University’sNIEHSCenter.

Community engagement also is an important part ofthecenter.JeanneHewitt,associateprofessorofnursing;RebeccaKlaper,associateprofessorin the School of Freshwater Sciences; and others work with regional communities and elected officials to inform decision-making about the health of residents.

The center’s funding comes at an important time for UWM. The intersection of freshwater with health is the subject of joint research at the university’snewschoolsofPublicHealthandFreshwaterSciences.TheSchoolofPublicHealthalso emphasizes children’s environmental health. The center and its resources stand at the fulcrum of these efforts.

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Michael Carvan tests the genetic changes in zebrafish in response to exposure to aquatic toxins.

hildhood immune diseases, such as allergies, asthma and even leukemia, have risen steadily in the last 30 years. To reverse this

frightening trend, researchers like Michael Laiosa first have to figure out the causes.

“For most of these diseases, we don’t understand the underlying reasons they develop,” says Laiosa. “And some of the diseases, like asthma, stay with the child into adulthood and become chronic. That makes them important public health issues.”

Laiosa is investigating evidence that chemicals that permeate and remain in the environment for a long time are more harmful during the developmentalstageofhumanlife.PollutantssuchasdioxinsandPCBs,forexample,move efficiently through the environment, often becoming integrated into the food chain.

While the concentrations may be too low to make adults sick, developing fetuses and infants are much more vulnerable.

“We’re all exposed,” Laiosa says. “So the question is, ‘Who is the most susceptible and why?’ One of the things we like to know is where the critical windows of vulnerability are.”

Laiosa says researchers in his lab have observed changes to stem cells that are exposed to envi-ronmental stressors, which may form the basis for childhood onset of leukemia. But he suspects a more complex array of circumstances, includ-ing how environmental and genetic factors work together to disrupt a developing immune system.

Laiosa is one of the new faculty members at the newUWMSchoolofPublicHealth.HeandPeter Tonellato, who specializes in biostatistics, began in the fall. Ten others, with expertise in areas like health disparities, public health policy, epidemiol-ogy and behavioral health, will begin by year’s end.

Other susceptible communities, like the elderly and the poor or uninsured, are the focus of myriad public health studies at the school.

Working hand in hand with the City of Milwaukee HealthDepartment,theCenterforUrbanPopula-tionHealthandotherregionalhealthorganiza-tions,theSchoolofPublicHealthisinthemiddleof a multiple-year study aimed at reducing infant mortality in Southeastern Wisconsin.

Other research topics are under way, such as exer-cise promotion among African-American women, teen fatherhood and healthy eating initiatives with studentsinMilwaukeePublicSchools.

a shield for developing immune systems

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Michael Laiosa is one of the new faculty members in public health.


s director of the Center on Age & Commu-nity(CAC)inUWM’sHelenBaderSchoolofSocialWelfare,AssociateProfessorAnne

Basting has helped UWM focus the university’s talent and ingenuity on the needs of older adults.

With a joint appointment in the Theatre Depart-mentofthePeckSchooloftheArts,Bastinghasmade the arts an integral part of CAC’s work. “We are expanding the tradition of community-based arts into the community of long-term care,” she says. “We aim to create enduring and meaning-ful projects in which staff, residents, families, students and artists can learn and grow through collaboration.”

An example is “TimeSlips,” a project that empow-ers persons suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and dementia to imagine and tell their own stories. The CAC Residency in Applied Arts has attracted acclaimed artists − photographer Wing YoungHuie,artist/musicianDavidGreenbergerand playwright Laura Jacqmin.

OthereffortsincludebringingtheNationalPublicRadio StoryCorps booth to Milwaukee and advising/evaluating the StoryCorps’ Memory Loss Initiative; gathering national experts for “Think Tanks” to probe aspects of long-term care; and creating three manuals widely used in applied gerontology. Basting also has created dynamic training and student service-learning projects, and has used new technology to reach the next generation of learners.

Most recently, Basting is at work on “The PenelopeProject:ThePowerofMythinLongTermCare,” a collaboration among CAC, UWM’s Theatre Department, Sojourn Theatre, Luther Manor senior

living community and the American Association of HomesandServicesfortheAging.

ThePenelopeProjectisatwo-yearexplorationofHomer’sOdyssey.“Penelopewaited20yearsforher husband Odysseus to return from war,” says Basting. “She fended off suitors, raised her son alone and oversaw the kingdom. We’re examining thecomplexinnerlifeandtrialsofPenelope–theheroine who did not go out to conquer the world, but stayed at home.

“Peopleavoidcarefacilitiesandassumetheirresidents don’t have complex inner lives,” says Basting. “The project nurtures self-expression and creativity by all members of that community by using their input to create a script. We’ll then invite an audience to engage with participants and their creation, performed by our students and Sojourn Theatre company members.”

New insights on aging

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Anne Basting (right) and a Luther Manor day center participant.


UWM scientist is among the leaders of an international research project in one of the poorest countries in Africa.

Loren Galvao, a medical doctor and senior scien-tist in the UWM College of Nursing’s Center for CulturalDiversityandGlobalHealth,isco-principalinvestigatorontheTiphunzitsaneProjectin Malawi. The name comes from the words “learn-ing together” in the local Chichewa language. “It’s a two-way process,” says Galvao. “We are all learning from each other.”

The project’s goal is to find out which approaches work best to address the complex, intertwined public health and economic problems of rural Malawians.TheNationalInstitutesofHealth(NIH)funds the project, which involves U.S academics, CARE workers and local Malawian field research-ers who travel to remote areas of the countryside by motorbike. Almost 2,000 Malawian households are involved in the baseline studies.

Between the transportation and translation challenges, “the logistical difficulties are incredible,” says Galvao, “but they are overcome with a strong research team on the ground.”

The team, co-led by Galvao and Lance S. Weinhardt of the Center for AIDS Intervention Research at the Medical College of Wisconsin, is near the halfway point of the five-year project.

Women and children in rural areas are particularly hardhitbypoverty,HIV/AIDSandmalnutrition,says Galvao. The country’s annual Gross National Income per capita is $290 (UNICEF, 2008) and theadultHIVprevalencewas11.9percentin2007. As fathers and husbands die, women become the sole family support, sometimes taking in orphaned relatives.

CARE is working to assure food security, set up microfinance programs and develop sustainable agriculture. Galvao and her academic colleagues are evaluating the long-term impact of these multi-level interventions on public health.

Few such controlled, “quasi-experimental” studies have been done. “This project will help us develop scientific knowledge and information on success-ful interventions so they can be applied in other regions in Malawi and other countries.”

Since its inception, the project has attracted additionalNIHfunding,andinterestamongotherUWM researchers, graduate students and the UniversityofWisconsinPopulationHealth FellowshipProgram.CAREUSAandCARE Malawi, the University of Malawi, the London School of Economics and the University of Pennsylvaniaarealsoinvolved.

“This is an exciting time, when we are creating a global health research team in Milwaukee,” Galvao says.

toward a brighter future for Malawi

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A group of Malawian women welcomes a team of Milwaukee researchers with a song.

arents of kids with Tourette syndrome have a difficult decision to make. Do they simply wait and hope the physical tics that plague

their child go away? Or do they resort to medica-tions that control the tics, but carry undesirable side effects?

The work of UWM clinical psychologist Douglas Woods now offers a third option – a treatment shown to be effective in managing tics without medication.

Tourette syndrome is a chronic neurological disorder characterized by motor and vocal tics, such as eye blinking, body twisting or word rep-etition, which affects about six in 1,000 children and adolescents. When severe, tics can lead to academic problems and social isolation.

In a study led by Woods and conducted for the NationalInstituteofMentalHealth,researchers

compared a comprehensive behavioral intervention for tics, called CBIT, to a form of supportive psychotherapy and education about tic disorders. One-third of the study patients were also on medication.

“In both treatments, we educated the parents and offered support on living with the condition,” says Woods, professor of psychology and director of the UWM Tic Disorders and Trichotillomania Clinic. “But, in CBIT, we gave children specific instruc-tions on how to deal with their tics.”

In CBIT, children learn to recognize the uncomfort-able feelings that lead to and are relieved by tics. They then substitute a voluntary action for the tic until the unwanted sensation passes.

“The study’s results do not mean that tics can simply be suppressed,” says Woods, “but they can be managed.”

The study showed that almost 53 percent of children receiving CBIT were rated as signifi-cantly improved, compared to 19 percent of those receiving the comparison treatment. Ben-efits were observed in children regardless of whether they were on medication.

In fact, the degree of improvement with CBIT was similar to that experienced by patients taking anti-tic medication, but without the side effects. Treatment gains for CBIT also were maintained, with 87 percent of re-spondents showing continued benefits six months after treatment had ended.

Results of the study, which included researchers

a drug-free option for tourette syndrome

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Douglas Woods (right) and graduate student Michael Walther working with a young patient.

aregiving for a relative with dementia is often stressful and can lead to depression,” says ProfessorRhondaMontgomery,HelenBader

Endowed Chair in Applied Gerontology at UWM’s HelenBaderSchoolofSocialWelfare.“Some-times those of us who do it simply cannot continue without physical and emotional support.”

Seeing this need, Montgomery has designed a program with partner agencies nationwide that helps professional care managers design individu-alized care plans for family caregivers. The TCARE (Tailored Caregiver Assessment and Referral) protocol guides caregivers to the specific support services that can help ease their workload and reduce stress.

An exciting development is the use of TCARE to help family caregivers who are in other situations – caring for wounded soldiers, for example. The HelenBaderSchoolofSocialWelfareisworkingwith U.S. Army Soldier and Family Assistance Centers, located on 27 bases in the United States andEurope.Throughacurrentpilotstudy,HBSSWfaculty are training care managers to use TCARE at six centers in Georgia, North Carolina, Texas and Washington.

In addition, Montgomery and her team are partnering with the Georgia Department of Aging to bring TCARE to care managers who provide services to those providing care for developmen-tally disabled relatives.

Despite the particulars of the caregiver/ care-receiver situation, the strains of caregiving are the same – often related more to the emo-tional aspects than the actual care tasks. “Each person who becomes a caregiver undergoes a systematic process of identity change as they take on more caregiving responsibilities,” says

Montgomery. “As their caregiving role grows, their relationship with their relative changes in ways that are uncomfortable.”

Further evidence of the national impact of TCARE came this fall, when Montgomery received the Rosalynn Carter Leadership in Caregiving Award, presented personally by the former First Lady. The award recognized a UWM partnership with the Washington Association of Area Agencies on Aging to implement TCARE in Washington State.

The development of TCARE has been funded bygrantsfromtheHelenBaderFoundation,theNational Alzheimer’s Association, the Jacob & Valeria Langeloth Foundation and contracts with the states of Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota and Washington.

Easing the burden for family caregivers “C


A son and his mother embody a caregiver/ care-receiver relationship.

orUWMAssistantProfessorVictoria Moerchen, “there are real children behind the data we collect.”

She brings a different sensibility to her research than her basic-science collaborators. Moerchen was a pediatric physical therapist for 15 years and so has “one foot in the research world and one foot in the treatment world.”

AsdirectorofthePediatricNeuromotorLaboratoryinUWM’sCollegeofHealthSciences,shestud-ies both “typically developing infants” as well as infants with disabilities such as Down syndrome and spina bifida, a birth defect that involves the spinal cord.

Moerchen and her collaborators are completing a five-year study of infants with spina bifida that asked, “Can we tap the residual motor activity that we observe in the legs of these infants, by using an infant treadmill to get their legs active earlier?”

“Remarkably, we found out that yes we can,” says Moerchen. “We were taking these babies, who really should have a considerable degree of paraly-sis, and they were stepping at 2 months of age.”

For this physical therapist turned researcher, the implications are profound. Waiting for traditional therapy may mean missing the most potent period of neuroplasticity (the residual potential in the nervous system). Moerchen describes it as tapping into circuitry that wouldn’t ordinarily be used, but can be used.

Howtheseresultsinthelabtranslateinto interventions in the clinic motivates Moerchen’s research. She’s conducted studies to enhance the utility of the treadmill, has developed a clinical decision-making algorithm to integrate the treadmill into traditional therapy, and is currently leading a team of UWM researchers in studies to examine the parent-child interaction during treadmill intervention.

This is critical to translation of the treadmill inter-vention from lab to clinical practice and, ultimately, to homes. “Just because you do a controlled trial with a group of children and show that something works doesn’t mean that it’s going to work as a treatment intervention. It’s vital that we ask how this work best translates to the clinic and into families’ lives.”

Baby-stepping toward physical therapy options

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Victoria Moerchen runs an infant treadmill study with the assistance of graduate student Jeffrey Konrad.

t’s a scenario that affects more and more workers and their families. With globalization and removal of barriers between countries, an

increasing number of employees are taking jobs outside of their home countries.

ProfessorMargaretShaffer,RichardC.NotebaertDistinguished Chair of International Business and Global Studies at UWM’s Lubar School of Business, has an international reputation for her pioneering work on expatriate issues.

Shaffer has published comprehensive studies examining how organizations can facilitate expatri-ates’ adjustment to their host countries and the factors that contribute to job success. She also is well known for her research on the challenges of international assignments for the “trailing spouse” and how dual-career issues impact employee decisions to accept international assignments.

Funded through a $192,000 grant from the United States-Israel Binational Science Foundation, Shaffer and her research partners are gearing up to test their model of how the work/home “spillover” influences behaviors of expatriates as employees and as partners.

“It’s not just the employee who is affected by all of this global travel, or global interaction, or global mobility – it’s the family that’s affected as well,” says Shaffer. (Traditionally, families move with the employee.)

“Too often as organizational researchers we tend to just look at what happens in the workplace, and we don’t realize that people do have lives beyond the organization,” she explains. “Their families, their spouses, their partners, their children and even extended family members are affected.”

Overseas postings can be good news for employ-ees and their families, says Shaffer. International assignments are often portrayed as disruptive and demanding on the expatriate family, and the expatriatepartnerinparticular.Partnersmayforego their own careers and become household caretakers and stay-at-home parents, and even those not employed before the move find them-selves faced with new tasks and expectations.

However,Shaffersays,researchalsoshowsthatexpatriates with accompanying partners tend to adjust better. “And, living in a new country offers the promise of new opportunities and successes – professional and personal.” She does emphasize that access to personal, work and family resources is vitally important in helping expatriates and their partners respond effectively to the demands of a move abroad.

the ‘expat’ experience: a family affair

I


Margaret Shaffer visits the Taj Mahal.

or climatologists like Mark D. Schwartz, there can never be too much data.

An expert in the field of phenology, the study of how plants and animals respond to changes in seasons and climate, Schwartz has developed models based on the first-leafing and blooming of lilacs and honeysuckles.

Using 40 years of weather observations and stud-iesoflilacs,theUWMDistinguishedProfessorofGeography not only showed a correlation between temperature and the onset of spring, but also created models that predict when first-leafing will happen under differing environmental conditions.

Specifically, he determined that spring is now arriving five to six days earlier in the U.S. than before 1960 – with the most dramatic change beginning in the mid-1980s.

Hisphenologymodelswereincludedina report issued last year by the U.S. Environmental ProtectionAgencyasoneof24climate-changeindicators in the country.

To pump up the volume of data, Schwartz and his collaborators decided to ask interested citizens to record simple observations from their own backyards.

So in spring 2007 he co-founded and now leads theNationalPhenologyNetwork(USA-NPN)in partnership with the U.S. Geological Survey. Funded in part by the National Science Founda-tion, the project gives ordinary people the chance to participate in climate-change research. There are now more than 3,000 members.

“To find trends, we need large numbers of simple measurements, and that is really the goal of the network,” he says. “We want to track change in the biological community using this dynamic information.”

Schwartz had an existing pool of data to begin his bud-burst models. Now he is establishing a similar database for native trees, charting both spring bud-burst and when autumn leaves turn color and drop.

Hislabhasbeenmonitoringspringandautumnphenology of trees in UWM’s Downer Woods since 2008 and just began a similar autumn study innorthernWisconsinnearParkFalls.

One goal is to separate the genetic and environ-mental factors that cause phenological variability among the tree species.

Uncovering a trend toward earlier springs

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Mark Schwartz has created models that predict when spring will arrive.


f you want to put more Americans to work, put them to work on trains.

DuringarecentvisittotheWhiteHouse,UWMlaborandtransportationeconomistJamesPeoplesencouragedthePresident’sCouncilofEconomicAdvisers to get construction workers out of the unemployment line and into jobs updating and renovating America’s crumbling public transportation infrastructure.

“The first 12 months of stimulus spending have re-vealed that money invested in public transportation infrastructure projects creates twice as many jobs per dollar as investment in highway infrastructure,” saysPeoples.“Yet,over90percentofthestimuluspackage has targeted highway infrastructure.”

As current president of the American Economic Association’sTransportationandPublicUtilitiesGroup,Peoplesnotesthattransportationinfra-structure of every kind is in desperate need of maintenance and repair.

But with a large portion of the 2008 stimulus funds already spent on roads, bridges and the Interstate,Peoplesthinksit’stimetogivepublictransportation its due.

“Saying that better public transportation options are too expensive, or that no one would use them in mid-market cities, addresses only half the equation,”saysPeoples,whoalsohaspublishedinternationally on the deregulation of the commercial trucking and shipping industries, and wage disparities in professions like nursing and long-haul trucking.

“A full discussion of public transportation in the U.S. has to consider what public transportation infrastructure can contribute to cleaner air; to reducedtrafficcongestion.Plusthedollarsthat

could be saved diverting more consumers to better public transportation options, which we know require less infrastructure and employ more people over the longer term.”

The employment figures are compelling on their own,saysPeoples,explainingthatSmartGrowthAmericaandtheU.S.PublicInterestResearchGroup found that 19,000 job-months were created per $1 billion spent on public transporta-tion, compared with 10,000 job-months created per $1 billion spent on highway infrastructure.

Combine those numbers with supporting figures: 17 percent unemployment in the construction industry, low federal interest rates and competitive pricing on construction materials due partly to declining construction activity.

Here’sanother:“Publictransituseexceedspopu-lation growth by threefold since 1995, so there is a demand for more and more efficient public transportationoptions,”saysPeoples.

Public transportation leads to innovation

I


James Peoples stands next to the Amtrak Hiawatha in Milwaukee’s Intermodal Station.

ind energy provides less than 2 percent of our nation’s demand for electricity. In order for the U.S. to increase that sliver

to a substantial slice, scientists must first find methods of overcoming the main obstacle – the intermittent nature of wind.

UWM engineer Adel Nasiri and his lab have created a system that captures and stores electricity generated by turbines during high winds and wind gusts. When the wind falls below average, the stored energy is released to the grid, the interconnected network that manages energy flow to the public.

Nasiri’s system uses different forms of energy storage, rotor inertia and power conversion to ex-tend the mechanical operating life of the turbines andimprovepowerefficiency.Hisresearchgrouphas teamed with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Eaton Corporation, JSR Micro Inc. and We Energies.

Nasiri has a pending patent for the work, which is among seven projects being funded through a new Midwest energy research center formed by a historic partnership of the engineering schools at UWM, Marquette University, UW-Madison and the Milwaukee School of Engineering.

The Wisconsin Energy Research Consortium (WERC) is the framework for stimulating basic energy research discovery from funded projects, while its sister organization, the Madison-based

Center for Renewable Energy Systems (CRES), will be the structure that applies the research to sponsored product development.

WERC industry members include American Transmission Company, DRS Technologies, Eaton Corporation,HeliosUSA,JohnsonControlsInc.,Kohler,LEMUSA,RockwellAutomation,We Energies and ZBB Energy Corporation.

Other UWM engineering faculty members working in wind energy research include David Yu in electri-cal engineering, and Ryo Amano and Yaoyu Li in mechanical engineering.

smoothing out wind power

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Adel Nasiri’s work improves the efficiency of wind turbines.

he Internet, the Web, search engines, social media and other communication/information technologies offer both new potential and

new danger.

“We get information through search engines and we interact socially online,” says Michael Zimmer, assistant professor of information studies at UWM. “These tools are powerful, sexy and alluring, but we don’t always know what’s going on behind the scenes. We can’t get under the hood.” Zimmer has received national attention for his work in critically exploring and carefully explaining the ethical issues and privacy challenges posed by new communication tools.

NationalPublicRadiohassoughtZimmer’sexper-tise on Facebook privacy issues for its “Morning

Edition”and“ScienceFriday”programs.Hewasinvited to provide expert commentary on the DVD version of “Eagle Eye,” a thriller touching on poten-tialdangersofcell-phonetrackingtechnology.HeconsultedfortheNewYorkPublicLibraryrecentlyon the potential privacy issues involved in a new homework app for teens.

Heseeshisworknotjustascritiquingcom-munication ethics, but also as an opportunity to work pragmatically with companies to help them develop new information products in an “ethically sensitiveway.”He’sbeeninvitedtotheGoogle-plex to review products before they are launched, and serves on a number of advisory councils on ethical and privacy issues.

A troubling consequence of new technology has been the rise in cyberbullying and violations of per-sonal privacy, says Zimmer. “It’s one thing to peek through a window and another to have a webcam transmitting what’s happening over the Internet.”Young people who have grown up with new media don’t always understand the power of the tools they’re using. “Students have expectations that only certain people will see something – only their 50 or so friends,” says Zimmer. They don’t consider that future employers, lawyers or a much wider audience around the globe might see that information, too.

Education is one way to offset the problems and harness the value of the technology. “It’s good to be out there,” he says, “but you need to have tools and skills to navigate this new world. You need to have the digital literacy to know how to use the Web safely and responsibly.”

Limiting the danger of new technologies

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Michael Zimmer’s research investigates the promise and potential dangers of new technologies.

the breadth of research lifeIt takes scholars from across the university to give a true picture of the breadth of an institution’s research life. Included here are more examples of UWM’s wide-ranging expertise.

A Home to Milwaukee Poet LaureatesBrenda Cardenas, assistant professor of English, wasnamedthelatestMilwaukeePoetLaureatein2010. Four of the city’s six named laureates have come from the ranks of UWM’s faculty, while one – the poet Antler – is a UWM alumnus. Cardenas’s most recent book, Boomerang, was published by BilingualReviewPressin2009,andherworkisfeaturedonthePBSwebsitePoetryEverywhere.

More UWM AuthorsIn the last 18 months, more than 100 new books or monographs by faculty and staff members were added to Special Collections at the UWM Libraries, including the following sampling:•The Marvelous Hairy Girls (2009, Yale), byMerryWiesner-Hanks,UWMDistinguishedProfessorofHistory.

•The Flight Cage(2010,TupeloPress),byRebeccaDunham, assistant professor of English.

•Nixon’s Super-Secretaries: The Last Grand Presidential Reorganization Effort (2010, Texas A&MUniversityPress),byMordecaiLee, professor of governmental affairs.

Grusin heads 21st Century StudiesRichard Grusin has been named director of the Center for 21st Century Studies (C21) and a professor in the English Department. Grusin has extensive experience building programs that emphasize global, urban and technological issues inthecontextofthehumanities.Hislatestbookis Premediation: Affect and Mediality After 9/11 (Palgrave,2010).

Graduate School Research Awards 2010• JolienD.Creighton,AssociateProfessor,Physics• JenniferA.Jordan,AssociateProfessor,

Sociology

•LindsayJ.McHenry,AssistantProfessor, Geosciences

•AdelNasiri,AssociateProfessor,Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

•JohnBuntin,Professor,BiologicalSciences•MichaelF.Fendrich,Director,Centerfor AddictionandBehavioralHealthResearch; Professor,SocialWork

•MarleenC.Pugach,Professor,Education•VladislavV.Yakovlev,Professor,Physics

UWM Distinguished ProfessorsThree faculty members were named by the University of Wisconsin System this year as UWMDistinguishedProfessors,bringingthe total number in this prestigious group to 20. • MohsenBahmani-Oskooee,Economics• ErikChristensen,CivilEngineeringand

Mechanics• MarkD.Schwartz,Geography

Merry Wiesner-Hanks is among the many faculty and staff members who have published books or monographs in the last 18 months.


esearch and its applications don’t materialize in a vacuum. Nowhere is that more evident than at UWM, where linking the university’s expertise with other

institutions, research centers and businesses is beginning to turn the wheel of economic development in Milwaukee.

By linking with partners in Southeastern Wisconsin and adding scientists in target areas, UWM is advancing the rate of discovery, while also attracting much more external support to fuel it.

A case in point is the expanding pool of intellectual property managed by the UWM Research Foundation (UWMRF). With 10 completed licensing or option agree-ments to date – including two startup companies spun from UWM research in 2010 – it was a milestone year for our nearly four-year-old foundation.

In the area of water technology, the U.S. Environmental ProtectionAgencycametoMilwaukeetobrokeranagree-ment with UWM on joint research intended to grow green infrastructure technology. The National Science Foundation and regional companies also acknowledged the potential of research to stimulate and support water-related busi-nesses in the area by funding a center that brings together the expertise of UWM and Marquette University.

Last year also saw a jump in the amount of health care

research that occurred as a result of multiple projects done in conjunction with the Medical College of Wisconsin.

Perhapsthemostprolificareaofresearchactivityin 2010 was in engineering – from energy to materials to imaging technology.

Considering a surge in new faculty, particularly in the College of Engineering & Applied Science, where 22 professors were added, it isn’t surprising that UWM’s research expenditures for this period have also increased – reaching a record $67,997,194. Though much of that funding came from federal sources, local support also rose. More than $2 million in seed funding has been awarded to date through the UWMRF Catalyst Grant pro-gram, which is backed by local industry and foundations.

With so many new ideas and faces at our institution, onequestionremains:HowcanUWMpartnerwith you in 2011?

– Colin G. ScanesVice Chancellor for Research and Economic

Development, and Dean of the Graduate School

– Brian ThompsonPresident of the UWM Research Foundation

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

Expe

ndit

ures

(in

Mill

ions

)

Fiscal Year

TOTAL RESEARCH EXPENDITURESFiscal Year 2004 though 2010

67.997

2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

UwM: Opening new pathways to results

RColin G. Scanes (front) and Brian Thompson


NSF 32.4% $9,601,874

NIH 31.4% $9,301,661

Education 8.1% $2,401,666Defense 6.2% $1,832,138

FED – Other 5.5% $1,624,042DHHS – Other 5.1% $1,503,959

Energy 4.7% $1,402,767

Agriculture 1.7% $504,204

NOAA 2.6% $766,823

EPA 1.4% $422,470

Transportation 1.0% $302,199

UWM RESEARCH EXPENDITURESFiscal Year 2010FEDERAL SOURCES – By Agency ($29.66 million)

0506

0708

0910

Other Internal

Indirect Cost Reimbursement

Non-Federal ExtramuralState (Fund 101)

Federal Extramural

1.744

2.618

7.443

27.115

29.664

04

30

25

20

15

10

5

0

Expe

ndit

ures

(in

Mill

ions

)

Year

RESEARCH EXPENDITURESAll CategoriesFY 2004 through 2010

Letters & ScienceEngr & Appld Science

Graduate SchoolFreshwater Sciences

NursingEducation

Health Sciences

Social Welfare

Administrative Units

Public Health

Other Academic0809

10

20

18

16

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

0

Expe

ndit

ures

(in

Mill

ions

)

Fiscal Year

ALL RESEARCH EXPENDITURESFiscal Year 2008 through 2010By Division

1.720

0.839

2.447

2.992

3.978

6.0294.720

5.384

10.516

17.610

18.523

advancing the rate of discovery



The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee makes its home along the

shoreline of Lake Michigan, just a few miles north of the economic

and industrial center of Wisconsin. Almost 31,000 students,

180 majors and degree programs, and a world-class faculty drive

UWM’s progress as a top research university and engine of economic

development for Southeastern Wisconsin and beyond.

research.uwm.edu

uwm research report 2011

Documents

new opportunities

new inspiration

new insights

new approaches

new pathways

research dollars

research engine

new cancer drugs