Featured Awards – September/October 2017

Mousumi Bose • Nutrition and Food Studies
STAIR II Consortium
National Institutes of Health
$66,365
Dr. Bose was awarded the second year of a training grant from the Sterol and Isoprenoid Research (STAIR) Consortium of the Rare Diseases Clinical Research Network. This will allow her to contribute to the research goals of STAIR by investigating rare diseases of sterol metabolism, including nutritional aspects of the peroxisome biogenesis disorders.

Gerard Costa • Center for Autism and Early Childhood Mental Health
Socio-Emotional Formation Initiative (MSU-SEFI) 2017-2018
NJ Department of Human Services
$850,000
MSU-SEFI serves as the statewide hub, in partnership with the Department of Human Services and the array of government and community partners, to coordinate and integrate the professional formation and support initiatives promoting 0-8 mental health/social and emotional development and full inclusion.

Teresa Fiore • Modern Languages and Literatures
Italian for Spanish speakers and Made in Italy (Digital Curriculum)
Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation
$17,659
Dr. Fiore’s project will create innovative curricular offerings that, in reflecting changes to the student population in the U.S. (an increase in the number of Hispanic and thus Spanish-­speaking students), and the contemporary lure of Italy for American students (towards the Italian language and culture as a lifestyle, “Living Italian-­Style”), promise to potentially recruit majors and minors in Italian and thus increase enrollment at the advanced level via a rethinking of entry-­level courses.

Jinshan Gao • Chemistry and Biochemistry
Characterization and enrichment of glycoprotein/glycan via multi-functional
free radical reagents
National Institutes of Health
$356,609

The goal of Dr. Gao’s research is to develop solid-supported free radical probes for glycan moiety enrichment and characterization, and free radial activated glycoprotein structure elucidation (FRAGPSE) reagent for glycoprotein characterization, especially the protein sequencing and glycosylation determination, moving the frontier of glycan study forward significantly.

‌Yvonne Gindt • Chemistry and Biochemistry
DNA Repair under Extreme Conditions – Extended Studies
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
$33,139
With this continuation of a subaward from Temple University, Dr. Gindt will continue to study DNA repair by characterizing and comparing photolyases cloned from a hyperthermophile and a psychrophile to investigate the development of key biological processes relevant to the origin of life on Earth and the search for life elsewhere.

Elaine Hitchcock • Communication Sciences and Disorders
Investigating the effects of visual acoustic biofeedback intervention for speech sound errors in childhood apraxia of speech: A pilot study
Pentax Medical
$10,000
The long-term goal of Dr. Hitchcock’s project is to identify the effectiveness of visual acoustic for treatment of lingual speech sounds/sound sequence errors, specifically rhotic errors in children diagnosed with childhood apraxia of speech.

Pankaj Lal • Earth and Environmental Studies
Ecosystem service tradeoffs, landowner incentives, and optimal policy design to promote sustainable Longleaf Pine agroecosystems
US Department of Agriculture
$96,441
The goal of this project, funded by a subaward from the University of Florida, is to increase the ability to assess and communicate the economic tradeoffs associated with managing longleaf pine (LLP) in the Southeastern US. Dr. Lal along and a graduate student will work with University of Florida researchers towards acceptability and public preferences analysis of LLP ecosystems.

Christopher Matthews • Anthropology
Many Voices of Montclair
NJ Council for the Humanities
The Montclair History Center plans to research and explore the nationalities and ethnicities that contributed to the development of the multi-cultural community of Montclair by conducting a series of oral histories with long-term residents of Montclair who represent a variety of cultures. Dr. Matthews will construct the framework of the research and interview questions, as well as training and supervising Montclair State University students to assist with the project.

Bryan‌ Murdock • Center for Community Engagement
Krystal Woolston • Center for Community Engagement
Montclair State University EECO Project
Corporation for National and Community Service
$295,747

The third year of this program will continue to engage twenty AmeriCorps members who will support the development and implementation of a full service university-assisted UACS community school project in Orange, NJ.

Robert Reid • Family Science and Human Development
Pauline Garcia-Reid • Family Science and Human Development
Paterson Coalition Against Substance Abuse (P-CASA)
US Department of Health & Human Services/SAMHSA
$125,000
Now in its fifth year, P-CASA seeks to develop the infrastructure of an anti-drug coalition targeting at-risk racial and ethnic minority adolescents in Paterson’s 1st Ward. As a collaborative effort between Montclair State University and a diverse group of community stakeholders, P-CASA will introduce evidence-based environmental prevention strategies to meet the goals of the Drug Free Communities Grant Program, which are to increase community collaboration and reduce substance use among youth aged 12–17.

Jennifer Robinson • Center of Pedagogy
Being United in Leadership Development (BUILD)
NJ Department of Education
$113,000
Dr. Robinson has been awarded funding for the third and final year of BUILD, through which experienced teachers participate in a research-based professional development program to improve district-wide mentoring and induction policies and practices.

Teresa Rodriguez • University Art Galleries
NJSCA General Program Support FY 2018
NJ State Council on the Arts
$12,828
This award will support professional exhibitions specifically to produce exhibition catalogs and other marketing materials to promote the shows, educational programs, outreach plans, and new audience development in the seven counties we cultivate and the general public.

David Rotella • Chemistry and Biochemistry
John Siekierka • Chemistry and Biochemistry
Development of inhibitors of P. falciparum cGMP dependent protein kinase (PfPKG) for malaria chemoprevention
National Institutes of Health
$245,047
This three-year, $751,140 collaborative research grant with Rutgers University supports the design, synthesis, and characterization of potential inhibitors of P. falciparum Protein Kinase G (PfPKG) as antimalarial agents.

Lynn Schneemeyer • Chemistry and Biochemistry
Michael Weinstein • Dean’s Office, CSAM
Developing a Wetland Baseline at the Watershed Scale
NJ Department of Environmental Protection
$63,479
The second year of this US Environmental Protection Agency-funded project will continue to address New Jersey’s desire to strengthen core elements of its EPA-approved Wetland Program Plan, including long-term state wetland program planning (i.e., Wetland Program Plans, or WPPs), and carrying out shorter-term projects that are consistent with the WPP.

Amy Tuininga • PSEG Institute for Sustainability Studies
Pankaj Lal • Earth and Environmental Studies
NSF INCLUDES DDLP: Sustainability Teams Empower and Amplify Membership in STEM (S-TEAMS)
National Science Foundation
$300,000
S-TEAMS will examine how students underrepresented in STEM can be better integrated into the STEM disciplines through their participation in transdisciplinary Sustainability Teams, which will work with corporations and organizations to conceive, develop, produce, and deliver high-quality Sustainability projects.

Michael Weinstein • Dean’s Office, CSAM
At Risk – Healthy Coastal Ecosystems and Resilient Communities & Economies in an Era of Climate Change: A Balanced Approach to Protecting People, Property and Nature in Historic Greenwich Township, N.J.
NJ Sea Grant Consortium
$12,346
In the second year of this subaward from the NJ Institute of Technology, Dr. Weinstein will continue to develop an Environmental Constraints Analysis to evaluate proposed engineering designs to mitigate storm surge and flooding during severe storm events at Greenwich, NJ.

Meiyin Wu • Passaic River Institute
Stopping Trash Where it Starts
New England Interstate Water Pollution Control Commission/Hudson River Foundation
$10,200
This project, funded by the US Environmental Protection Agency, characterizes and identifies the sources of trash and floatables of the Passaic River and the Newark Bay, the local conditions contributing to trash dispersal, and community-specific actions for reducing trash at the source. This supplemental award will support the work of up to five members of the Friends of Bonsal Preserve who will work on this project.

Jedediah Wheeler • Arts and Cultural Programming
General Programming Support FY 2017
NJ State Council on the Arts
$54,464
The second year of this award will help support Peak Performances’ mission to provide unique theatrical experiences that foster both creativity and learning for on-campus and community audiences. In addition, NJSCA also recognized ACP for Artistic Excellence as well as designated it as a Major Cultural Institution in NJ.

‌Michelle Zhu • Computer Science
Pankaj Lal • Earth and Environmental Studies
Nicole Panorkou • Mathematical Sciences
Bharath Samanthula • Computer Science
Assimilating Computational and Mathematical thinking into Earth and Environmental Science (ACMES)
National Science Foundation
$1,147,085
The goal of this project is to nurture the next generation of innovators by advancing student learning in STEM + Computing through a seamless integration of earth and environmental science, mathematics and computer science in Grades 5-7.