Dec. 17

Alison Jones, ND, RN, has become the primary investigator for the Cancer Center's Lance Armstrong Foundation LIVESTRONG Survivorship Center of Excellent grant. Al Marcus, PhD, has been the PI since we got the grant in 2005. This year, the LAF has asked UCCC to begin developing cancer survivorship clinics, and we needed someone with a clinical background to lead the program in this new direction. Marcus will continue as program leader for our AMC Cancer Prevention and Control Program and director of our Survey Research Core.

Dec. 11

Abbie Beacham, assistant professor of psychology in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, is first author on a Society of Behavioral Medicine policy brief that was recently released. The brief is important from a policy formation standpoint and furthering the clinical health psychologists discipline. The brief encourages integration of health psychologists into primary care settings to foster health behavior change. It has been forwarded to Department of Health and Human Services and Obama Administration health care folks. Check out the link to the policy brief.

Dec. 10

Rebecca Schweppe, left, PhD, Joshua Klopper, right, MD, Christopher Korch, PhD, Bryan Haugen, MD, et al had a paper in the Aug. 19, 2008, issue of the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism about what has become a pervasive problem in cancer research: misidentification and cross-contamination of cancer cell lines.

The paper, “Deoxyribonucleic Acid Profiling Analysis of 40 Human Thyroid Cancer Cell Lines Reveals Cross-Contamination Resulting in Cell Line Redundancy and Misidentification,” is the result of two years of work by Drs. Schweppe, Klopper, Haugen and Korch and two other groups to untangle a mess of cell lines that have been identified for years as thyroid tumor cells of unique origins.

Dec. 7

David Hildebrand, assistant professor of philosophy in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, was nominated President-elect of the Southwestern Philosophical Society for 2010. The society has been operating for 70 years, providing a scholarly venue for the presentation and publication of new philosophical work. Hildebrand presented a commentary at the recent November meeting in Kansas City.

This month, a new book by Lynn Johnson, GIS in Water Resource Engineering, will be published by CRC Taylor & Francis LPD. The book presents a review of the concepts and applications of GIS in the various sub-fields of water resource engineering and provides a fundamental understanding of GIS, including how to develop and analyze geographic data, and how to apply GIS to the operational requirements of urban and regional water infrastructure systems.

Electrical Engineering Assistant Professor Tim Lei gave a presentation on the current development of the UC Denver biophotonics research and education and discussed the newly formed UCD Biophotonics Consortium at the Colorado Photonics Industry Association (CPIA) annual Meeting and 9th annual Photonics Research Review held at CU Boulder. The Biophotonics consortium facilitates collaborative research to solve biomedical problems by applying photonic techniques. For more information on CPIA, see http://www.coloradophotonics.org/.

Civil Engineering Assistant Professors David Mays, left,  and Jason Ren, right, have received an award from the Advanced Technology Grant Program administered by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE). This grant provides $96,600 over two years to support a laboratory study on using crumb rubber from recycled tires for storm water pollution control.

Dec. 3

Donna Berrier, Cancer Center associate director for administration, and Tim Byers, MD, MPH, deputy director, attended the first Great West 6 Summit of the American Cancer Society in Santa Fe. It was the first time that the six western state National Cancer Institute cancer centers met with a focus on cancer prevention and control. The goal of the meeting was to establish a new model for interdisciplinary collaboration aimed at reducing cancer-related mortality through prevention and early detection, treatment and survivorship, with special emphasis being placed on the underserved.

The Colorado Center for Community Development, led by director Jon Schler, has received a grant from the Colorado Department of Local Affairs in the amount of $289,870. The project consists of providing preliminary design and community development assistance to selected Colorado communities which are affected by energy and mineral development.

Mary Weber, PhD, APRN, PMHNP-BC, associate professor at the University of Colorado Denver College of Nursing, has been appointed to an endowed professorship as part of a $3 million gift to fund an endowment for the Psychiatric-Mental Health Nursing specialty in the graduate program. Weber begins in her new role on Dec. 1. Weber’s primary focus is to redevelop and reopen the Psychiatric Mental Health option in the graduate master’s degree program.

Dec. 1

In the December/January issue of Parenting magazine, the research done by Professor Phil Strain, School of Education and Human Development, and the PELE Center on teaching "feeling" words to toddlers is presented along with a couple of quotes on the importance of a good "feeling" vocabulary and its relationship to preventing problem behavior.

Nov. 28

Virginia Borges, MD, MMSc, is the recipient of  a new grant from the AACR/Breast Cancer Research Fund for her project, “Targeting the Inflammatory Milieu of Pregnancy Associated Breast Cancer.” Borges, who is an assistant professor of medical oncology at UC Denver and member of the Immunology Program, will receive $246,667 over two years starting in January.

Professor of Architecture Peter Schneider, Professor of Planning Willem Van Vliet, left, and former architecture faculty Michael Hughes and Bruce Wrightsman are the recipients of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) 2008-09 ACSA Collaborative Practice Award for their project Design Outreach: The Trailer Wrap Project. Each year, the ACSA honors the best practices in school-based community outreach programs. This year, the competition was rigorous for the four award winners. As Collaborative Practice Award Winners they will have the opportunity to present the winning project in a special focus session during the ACSA annual meeting in March, where they also will be presented with an award certificate at a special plenary awards ceremony.

Nov. 24

Professor of Landscape Architecture Lois Brink, at left, and Associate Director of Learning Landscapes Rachel Cleaves have received a $224,997 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation for their project Organized Leaders Across a Healthy Westwood. Their goal is to increase healthy eating and active living by increasing neighborhood walkability, improving neighborhood safety, increasing organized physical activity programs, and increasing access to healthy foods for children and youth who live throughout Denver’s Westwood neighborhood.

Nov. 19

Michael Bristow, professor of medicine and co-director of the Colorado Cardiovascular Institute at the University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine, has been chosen the 2008 Scientist of the Year by the Colorado Chapter of the Achievement Rewards for College Scientists (ARCS) Foundation. ARCS is a national women's organization dating back more than 50 years which gives scholarships to exceptional U.S. students in the fields of science, engineering and medicine who demonstrate financial need.

Nov. 14

Sharon Araji, chair of the Department of Sociology, appeared in two interviews with Czech Television, a public television station of the Czech Republic. The first spot was about the election and the important role of Colorado and other battle ground states, and the second spot  was a story about Sarah Palin.

Jeff Franklin, PhD, associate professor of English, has a new book, published by Cornell University Press, called The Lotus and the Lion on Buddhism and the British Empire.

Donna Langston, PhD, chair of ethnic studies, is the keynote speaker at the Denver Federal Center, Minerals Management Service for the American Indian Program on Thursday, Nov. 20.

Brad Stith, PhD, professor of biology, had a paper published in Journal of Lipid Research where possible new lipid biochemical pathways important to fertilization were identified. This paper involved numerous student researchers, including William Holland, PhD, who earned his bachelor's and master's from UC Denver.

Nov. 13

Chip Ridgway, MD, senior associate dean for academic affairs at UC Denver and member of the Hormone Related Malignancies Program, received the 2008 John B. Stansbury Thyroid Pathophysiology Medal from the American Thyroid Association (ATA). He received the award, which recognizes outstanding research contributions to the understanding of thyroid physiology or pathophysiology of thyroid disease, at the ATA's annual meeting last month. Women's Health magazine also named him a "Top Doctor" for endocrinology in the Western United States.

Bill Schiemann, PhD, associate professor of Pharmacology at the University of Colorado Denver and member of the Hormone Related Malignancies Program, has won a Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research Award for his project, “Chemotherapeutic targeting of Fibulin 5 to suppress breast cancer invasion and metastasis stimulated by TGF-b.” The award, which starts in February, is for $569,699 over three years.

Nov. 12

The School of Education's Carole Basile’s supplemental funding proposal to the National Science Foundation for her Rocky Mountain Middle School Math and Science Partnership project was awarded $16,000. The proposal is "Evaluation Research Experience for Undergraduates Social Network Analysis."

A Teach Colorado Scholarship grant proposal by Wanda Blanchett, associate dean in SEHD, has been awarded $98,000 by the Colorado Department of Higher Education. The proposal is titled "Repairing the Broken Pipeline to Teaching Careers for High-Need Content Areas and Diverse Candidates."

Willie Brown’s efforts during the past year brought $5,500 in additional funding and an extension for her 2007-08 AmeriCorps Contract, which will help support additional IPTE Partner School Legacy Projects. Brown is admissions counselor in SEHD.

New and supplemental grants were awarded to various SEHD projects during October. SEHD's Cindy Gutierrez and Diane Hageman received a $45,000 grant for Teachers Learning in Networked Communities (TLINC) from the National Commission for Teaching & America's Future.

Nov. 10

Assistant Professor Stephan Durham, College of Engineering (COE), along with graduate students Robert Cavaliero and Rui Liu attended the fall American Concrete Institute (ACI) Convention in St. Louis, Mo., on Nov. 1-4. Durham presented a talk titled “ACI Student Fellowship Program—Helping Students with Concrete Futures.”

UC Denver Vice Chancellor for External Affairs Jay Gershen, DDS, is being honored by the Colorado BioScience Association (CBSA) with a Lifetime Achievement Award. The award recognizes his work as an original board and executive committee member of the forerunner to CBSA -- the Colorado Biotechnology Association -- and his contributions to the planning process leading to the health sciences center programs move to the former Fitzsimons Medical Army Base, now the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora. Official presentation of the awards occurs Thursday, Nov. 13, at the Denver Grand-Hyatt, in conjunction with the 2008 BioWest Conference & Expo.

Assistant Professor Danielle Varda, School of Public Affairs, was awarded a $5,000 first-place prize in the Syracuse University's Maxwell School Collaborative Governance Initiative competition. Varda's winning teaching simulation is titled “Strategic Network Management in a Community Collaborative.” She specializes in collaborative management and policy networks.

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