All News

For organic chemists, improvements in methods of synthesizing molecules can make big differences in the time and material that go into the molecule’s synthesis. This summer, Talia Steiman ’12 and Robert Woodworth ’12 are working with Associate Professor of Chemistry Ian Rosenstein on a chemical synthesis that utilizes a unique method to simplify the process and cut down on waste.

Associate Professor of Art Ella Gant was named a 2011 Fellow in digital/electronic arts by the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA). NYFA awarded $728,000 in unrestricted cash grants of $7,000 to 105 artists throughout New York State. Fellows were selected from a pool of 3,692 applicants in the categories of crafts/sculpture; digital/electronic work; non-fiction literature; printmaking/drawing/book arts, and poetry.

“This is the first time we have the data that we can analyze statistically that shows there’s a downward trend [in monarch butterfly populations],” said Professor of Biology Ernest H. Williams in a July 11 New York Times article titled “In Midwest, Flutters May Be Far Fewer.” Williams is the co-author of “Decline of monarch butterflies overwintering in Mexico: is the migratory phenomenon at risk?” recently published in the journal Insect Conservation and Diversity.

Graphic interface tools can help students in computer science understand the programs they are dealing with. Ru Jun Han ’14 is working with Associate Professor of Computer Science Mark Bailey on a user-friendly graphic interface tool for beginner computer science students.

Why does voyeurism sell movie tickets? That's a question Danielle Mortorano ’12, a recipient of a 2011 Summer Emerson Grant, is working to answer in her project, “The Female Sex Object: The Relationship between Voyeurism and Male Dominance in Mainstream Films.”

Professor of Biology Sue Ann Miller participated in discussions about mechanisms of development at the Third Symposium on Frontiers in Biomechanics: Mechanics of Development.

Drew Christ '11 recently discussed the results of his senior thesis at the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado, Boulder.  His short talk was related to the annual data meeting of the LARISSA working group. One of the highlights of the discussion was the recognition that Christ’s work has defined for the first time the precise chronology for glacial advance during the Little Ice Age in glaciers of the Graham Land coast, Antarctic Peninsula, which took place between AD 1110 and AD 1690.

Documentaries have a way of making history come alive, and well-made and innovative documentaries are especially engrossing and vivid. Over the summer Brett Banhazl ’12 will work in Brighton, Mass., with American Experience, an award-winning television show featuring documentaries on various topics in American history.

Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology Ashleigh Smythe was invited to be a keynote speaker in a symposium titled “Meiofauna – Comparative Morphology and Evolution” at the second International Congress on Invertebrate Morphology, held in June at Harvard University. Smythe’s presentation was titled “Marine Nematodes:  Unfathomable Diversity or a Sea of Opportunity?”

Recent turmoil and political upheaval in the Middle East have dominated the global news lately, with documentations of unrest in more than a dozen already unsteady nations. Ryan Karerat ’12, an Emerson grant recipient, is spending the summer with Henry Platt Bristol Professor of International Affairs Alan Cafruny researching the current state of U.S. foreign affairs in the Middle East.