Personal Mention
Two students have been recognized by the Institute of International Education Boren Awards program and have been awarded grants to study abroad. Jacob Feldgoise, a rising junior with a double major in policy and management, and science, technology and public policy, and a minor in Chinese studies, was awarded one of 244 David L. Boren Scholarships. Shayak Sengupta, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Engineering and Public Policy, was awarded one of 106 David L. Boren Fellowships. On behalf of the National Security Education Program, the awards provide opportunities for students to enrich their education by studying overseas in countries critical to U.S. interests.
Feldgoise will study Chinese in Shanghai this summer through CMU's summer study abroad program at the Shanghai International Studies University. Among his long-term goals, Feldgoise aims to help government agencies apply engineering methods, analytical tools and decision sciences to public policies.
Sengupta's dissertation focuses on public policy-relevant research in energy and the environment. Working with Peter Adams and Inês Azevedo, Sengupta conducts research at the intersection of air quality, climate change and energy systems. He is aiming to develop and deploy analytical tools that measure ambient air pollution, its sources and its impacts on human health in developed and developing countries. Find out more.
Danielle Wenner, an assistant professor of philosophy in the Dietrich College, has been named a Faculty Scholar by the Greenwall Foundation for her project “The Basic Structure Model of Research Stakeholder Obligations.” The three-year, $200,000 award will enable Wenner to continue to develop a framework for thinking about research ethics. Her project aims to develop a justice-based approach to health research priority-setting and to determine appropriate regulatory or policy mechanisms for the implementation of that approach. “I’m excited to get to work on a project that I think has the potential to radically shift the way that ethicists, clinical researchers and policymakers view the role of clinical research and the development of health interventions in our society,” Wenner said.
Roy Maxion, research professor in the Computer Science and Machine Learning departments, will receive the 2019 Test of Time Award at the IEEE/International Federation for Information Processing Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks, June 24–27 in Portland, Oregon. The award from DSN — whose primary concern is the reliability of computer systems — recognizes a 2009 research paper that used machine learning to analyze peoples' typing rhythms in a process known as keystroke dynamics. Keystroke dynamics can identify users based on their typing styles, and also can be used in the medical arena to study neurological disorders that affect the human motor system. Find out more.
Anita Williams Woolley, associate professor of organizational behavior and theory, co-authored the study “The Impact of Cognitive Style Diversity on Implicit Learning in Teams,” which was recently published in the journal Frontiers In Psychology. In the paper, Woolley and her collaborators found that participants had to have just the right mix of cognitive diversity to create the highest collective intelligence. Woolley referred to the ideal mix as following “the Goldilocks principle: Not too little (diversity), and not too much. You want it just right.” The study looked at 98 teams ranging from two to five people to play a coordination game. Those groups that had the right level of diversity were able to collaborate effectively by making use of their different perspectives while also being able to overcome the difficulties that diversity can present. When not enough diversity exists within a group, it stagnates, while too much diversity can create gaps that participants are unable to bridge, Woolley explained. Find out more.
Associate Professor of Physics Di Xiao has been awarded a Simons Foundation Fellowship, which will allow him to take a sabbatical from teaching for the 2019-20 academic year to focus on research. Xiao, whose research centers around quantum condensed matter theory, plans to take advantage of the fellowship to dig into magnetic and electric multipoles in crystalline solids. The structure of a crystal sometimes can cause "exotic arrangements" of electric and magnetic charges and currents, Xiao notes, which can be described by multipoles. "My plan is to develop a theory to describe these quantum states," Xiao said. "It is going to be a challenging problem and the Simons Fellowship will allow me to focus my time on this problem."
Emeritus Professor of Chemistry Paul Karol has authored a new book, "The Legacy of Carbon Dioxide: Past and Present Impacts," which has been published by CRC Press. In the book, Karol examines the origins of carbon dioxide in the stars, its properties and how the gas has affected the Earth's atmosphere. Karol, who considers himself a "linear academic descendent" of Joseph Black, discoverer of carbon dioxide, retired in 2012 after 43 years as a member of the Mellon College of Science faculty, including five years as an associate dean. He has chaired multiple international teams of scientists that have announced the addition of new elements on the periodic table.