IN THIS ISSUE: ENGINEERING & LAS | FAA | LAW | LAS | GSLIS | DRES & CAMPUS
engineering & liberal arts and sciences
Robert Ghrist, professor of mathematics, and Nancy Sottos and Scott White, professors of engineering, are among Scientific American magazine’s Top Fifty Innovators of the year. The awardees are chosen on the basis of their contributions to technology and human health.
Ghrist translates fundamental math research on topology to applications in constructing wireless sensor networks. His ideas are applicable to the design of security systems and are relevant to natural disaster management.
Sottos and White lead the development of self-healing polymers that stitch themselves back together when a crack forms. Inspired by the human body’s ability to continuously restore itself after repeated injuries, the researchers say these materials can currently restore themselves up to seven times and recover 82 percent of their original characteristics.
fine and applied arts
James Keene, director of bands, was honored with a performance by the UI Wind Symphony at Chicago’s Orchestra Hall on Dec. 19. The concert was organized by the School of Music to recognize the career accomplishments of Keene, who plans to retire this year after serving as the fourth director in the history of UI bands. Keene conducted the concert along with assistance from guest conductors Harry Begian, who directed the bands from 1970-1984, and Donald Schleicher, director of university orchestras and music director and conductor of the UI Symphony Orchestra.
law
UI law professor William J. Davey received an honorary doctor of laws degree from the University of Berne in recognition of his longtime efforts to promote fair international trade. Davey was cited by the Swiss university for his “fundamental work in the development and evolution of the World Trade Organization’s dispute settlement system, thanks to which numerous trade conflicts were peaceably resolved.” Davey served as director of legal affairs for the WTO from 1995 to 1999.
liberal arts and sciences
John Lynn, professor of French and of military history, was one of six U.S. professors invited to take part in a three-day analysis and celebration of Franco-American friendship in Paris. The conference was Dec. 12-14, and included colloquia on a range of cultural, economic and historical topics.
library and information science
Four earth science publications were recognized by the Geoscience Information Society at its Oct. 30 awards ceremony, held in conjunction with the Geological Society of America’s annual meeting in Denver.
Lura E. Joseph, professor of library administration and geology librarian at the UI, was awarded the GSIS Best Paper Award for her research article “Image and Figure Quality: A Study of Elsevier’s Earth and Planetary Sciences Electronic Journal Back File Package.” “The implications of poor image quality in electronic journals should be considered when libraries are deciding whether to discard print copies,” Joseph said. Her paper was published in the September-December 2006 issue of Library Collections, Acquistions and Technical Services.
disability resources and educational services & universitywide
The UI campus received two 2007 Mellon Awards for Technology Collaboration, valued at $50,000 each. The awards, presented annually by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, honor not-for-profit organizations for leadership in the collaborative development of open source software tools with application to scholarship in the arts and humanities, as well as cultural-heritage not-for-profit activities.
One of the awards to the UI recognizes the development and release of the Firefox Accessibility Extension (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1891) by Jon Gunderson, director of IT Accessibility in the Division of Disability Resources and Educational Services. Hadi Rangin, a software development specialist in DRES, accepted the award at the fall task force meeting of the Coalition for Networked Information in Washington, D.C., in December.
Douglas Vinzant, senior associate vice president for planning and administration accepted the second award on behalf of the university. The award recognizes the UI for the development and release of the OpenEAI enterprise application integration project (www.openEAI.org).
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