G E O R G E H . CO O K C A M P U S M AG A Z I N E
S P R I N G 2 016
explorations
Celebrating 100 years AT RUTGERS GARDENS
1916-2016
Graduation Snapshot Class of 2016
766
Graduating Class
40
Summa Cum Laude
50
Magna Cum Laude
30
EOF Graduates
3.23
Average GPA
21
General Honors Program
60
George H. Cook Honors Scholars
(Approximate numbers at time of publication)
contents 01 EXECUTIVE DEAN‘S MESSAGE 02 VOICES OF THE ANTHROPOCENE 03 FEATURE - Rutgers Gardens—Celebrating 100 Years 07 STUDENTS - No Boundaries 09 FACULTY - Got Milk?
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11 CELEBRATING RUTGERS 250 13 RESEARCH - Mosquito Bites 15 FEATURE - Department of Food Science Turns 70 17 ALUMNI - Four Great Stories 21 DONORS - Creating Legacies 23 ALUMNI NOTES AND MUSINGS
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explorations EDITORIAL OFFICE Explorations Magazine Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey 57 US Highway 1, New Brunswick, NJ 08901-8554
EXECUTIVE DEAN OF AGRICULTURE AND NATURAL RESOURCES Robert M. Goodman
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VICE DEAN FOR ADVANCEMENT Melissa McKillip OFFICE OF ALUMNI AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT Director, Diana Orban Brown OFFICE OF COMMUNICATIONS AND MARKETING Director, Michael Green
Read All About Us Newsroom sebsnjaesnews.rutgers.edu
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OFFICE OF PHILANTHROPY AND STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS Yolanda Carden, Noah Ginter, Rachel Karl, and Melissa McKillip CONTRIBUTORS Diana Orban Brown, Melissa Kvidahl, and Paula Walcott-Quintin GRAPHIC DESIGNER Lori Casciano PHOTOGRAPHERS Jerry Casciano, Eric Gautier, Roy Groething, Jeff Heckman, Alan Brian Nilsen, John O’Boyle, Matt Rainey, and Nick Romanenko On the Cover: Jerry Casciano. Inside Cover: Jeff Heckman. Table of Contents: Nick Romaneko, Courtesy of Rutgers Gardens, and Courtesy of Rutgers Athletics.
Newsletter discovery.rutgers.edu/pubs
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orban@aesop.rutgers.edu Office of Alumni and Community Engagement Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey 57 US Highway 1 New Brunswick, NJ 08901-8554
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Executive Dean’s Message
A Message from Bob Goodman
W
e’ve completed the first full year of production of Explorations magazine, the semi-annual magazine for alumni, retired faculty, donors, and friends of the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences. I was delighted to learn of your enthusiastic response to this publication, which represents our ongoing efforts at engaging you through the activities of the school and, where it intersects, the work of the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES), which I’m also privileged to lead as executive director.
Melissa’s expertise is seen as crucial in helping us develop and achieve the advancement goals of the school and experiment station. Her appointment as vice dean is a newly elevated position and represents an integrated management approach to our philanthropy and strategic partnerships, communications and marketing, alumni and community engagement, and external affairs functions. As the chief
There are several significant updates I’d like to share with you. One of six liberal arts and professional schools on the New Brunswick Campus, our school had an impressive enrollment of 116 students in the inaugural class of 500 of the highest achieving students admitted to Rutgers’ state-of-the-art Honors College established last fall. For their first year, students live in a new, innovative living and learning facility on the College Avenue Campus, with access to on-site academic advising and administrative support to help ensure their success (see article on page 7).
Photography by Roy Groething.
Please help me give a warm Rutgers welcome to Melissa McKillip, who was appointed vice dean for advancement and associate dean of philanthropy and strategic partnerships at the school and the experiment station. Melissa came to us in March from the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where she last served as director of engagement and external relations since 2008. 01
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was established to keep our 25,000 living alumni connected to their alma mater and to nurture the varied and continuing connections of our friends and supporters to our school. I urge you all to share your ideas and your stories by writing us at discovery@aesop.rutgers.edu. We’re halfway through the Rutgers 250 anniversary celebration year, which culminates on November 10. Our school has completed a number of meaningful events centered around exploring the Anthropocene (see page 2), which refers to the age in which mankind’s activities have strongly influenced our world. So far, we’ve had 14 speakers, including a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and a MacArthur Fellow; six public lectures; book signings; an inter-campus student debate; and students and post-docs paired with invited speakers. For the first time in the university’s 250-year history, a sitting President of the United States of America has accepted the invitation to deliver the commencement address, a distinct honor to the members of the Rutgers Class of 2016.
development officer for the school and NJAES, she is primarily responsible for overseeing all development operations, including major gifts, corporate and foundation relations, gift planning, and annual giving. Her responsibilities include the day-to-day management of three key units within my office: the Office of Philanthropy and Strategic Partnerships (formerly the Office of Development), the Office of Communications and Marketing, and the Office of Alumni and Community Engagement. The latter office, as its name suggests,
We continue to honor the legacy of 250 years of revolutionary teaching, research, and service as The State University of New Jersey. If you have not yet done so, I urge you to participate in our campus activities as we commemorate this significant anniversary year. Visit sebsnjaes250.rutgers.edu/sebs.
Executive Dean, School of Environmental and Biological Sciences
Voices of the
Spring 2016
ANTHROPOCENE
To celebrate Rutgers 250, we are enjoying “Exploring the Anthropocene: The Age of Us” with a series of talks, book signings, student debates, film screenings, and more. We invite you to visit past Anthropocene events, some of which are highlighted here, at the program’s website, sebsnjaes250.rutgers.edu/anthropocene, and learn about exciting future offerings. Award-Winning Journalist
Gaia Vince
Award-Winning Author
November 12, 2015
April 8, 2016
Andrew Revkin has won the top awards in science journalism multiple times, along with a Guggenheim Fellowship. He is widely recognized for fairness and a pursuit of reality in a polarized media environment. He is among those credited with first proposing that humanity has entered a “geological age of our own making.”
Gaia Vince is a journalist and broadcaster specializing in science and the environment. She has been the online editor of New Scientist, editor of the journal Nature Climate Change, and the news editor of Nature. She is the first woman to win the prestigious 2015 Royal Society Winton Book Award, the top UK science book prize.
Dan Fagin
Pulitzer Prize-Winning Author
February 25, 2016 A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who writes frequently about environmental science, Dan Fagin is also a science journalism professor at New York University. His book, Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation, was awarded the 2014 Pulitzer for General Nonfiction, among other honors. His new book project is about monarch butterflies and the Anthropocene.
Carl Safina
Rutgers MSc, PhD,
Award-Winning Author
April 12, 2016 Carl Safina’s writing about the living world has earned him a MacArthur Fellowship as well as Pew and Guggenheim fellowships. His numerous book awards are from Lannan, Orion, and the National Academies; and he also holds John Burroughs, James Beard, and George Rabb medals.
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Photography provided by iStockphoto, Erik D. Lee, Eric Gautier, and Alan Brian Nilsen.
Andrew Revkin
gardens 100-YEAR ANNIVERSARY
Feature
Rutgers
how does your garden grow?
As Rutgers Gardens celebrates its 100th anniversary, it’s the perfect time to look back at its roots, celebrate its growth, and anticipate a new season for one of the university’s most beloved spaces.
looking back
Photography by Jerry Casciano.
Rutgers Gardens was never meant to be a public space. In fact, quite the opposite was true: according to director Bruce Crawford, the Gardens began as a purely functional learning space for local farmers. In the mid-1800s, ornamental horticulture was a new trend. “You didn’t really landscape your house back then,” quips Crawford. “Having plants and having the time to appreciate and cultivate them was completely new.” So when it became clear that New Jersey was about to experience a housing boom, it also became clear that New Jersey’s farmers—at that time, focused on dairy, poultry, and grain—weren’t prepared to offer the shrubs and trees that were suddenly in demand. The nursing industry simply did not exist. “So, that instigated Rutgers to develop the Gardens,” explains Crawford. “The focus was really for farmers, and teaching them about this new field. 03
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“There’s no recorded history of when Gardens’ leadership finished their nursery mission and started to move on, nor do we know what they intended to move on to,” says Crawford. “We may not know how the evolution existed and, to this day, when you walk through the Gardens, you stumble onto this and that. The Gardens were never denied to the public, but they were also never intended for the public.” Here’s what we do know: The early 1900s brought additional land and the first display garden. Soon after, in 1936, the Log Cabin was built and hosted its first event. “That’s when you started to see development along the road to the cabin,” explains Crawford. The late 1930s brought a portion of Helyar Woods to the Gardens’ map, and three more display gardens were planted (rhododendrons, shrubs, and lilacs) in 1939. Two years later, the Holly Orchard was established.
Spring 2016
They say that necessity is the mother of invention, and many of the Gardens’ early programs were no exception. According to Crawford, the Gardens as we know them bloomed around 1990, when Bruce Hamilton CC’60, a landscape architecture professor, became acting director and started a strong volunteer program and community component. Take the first internships, for example. According to Crawford, Hamilton needed help cutting the grass, weeding and mulching the beds, and generally caring for the Gardens. So he secured a vacant house on site for students to live in, and in return, they worked about 10 hours per week in the Gardens. In the summer, it was a paid internship. “Today, of course, our internship program is much more educational,” explains Crawford. Students no longer live on the grounds. The summer internship, which takes them to regional public gardens for discussions as well as hands-on learning, also includes a class about public garden management. “We show students that there are great opportunities out there in public gardening, from Longwood Gardens to Central Park and others,” says Crawford. “This year we will have about 10 interns, but we sometimes have as many as 15.” A similar story accompanies the dawn of the volunteer-supported agriculture program. “In the 1990s, funding was low, and they needed help taking care of the land,” explains Crawford. “So they gave volunteers a small plot of land to grow vegetables on, free of charge, and in return, they helped weed the land.”
a place that never grows old
Like any good garden, Rutgers Gardens will continue to grow. Currently, the staff is working on a master plan that will bring cohesion to the Gardens and take visitors on a journey through time and nature. “As you walk through the garden, it would get richer and richer as you move ahead in time,” says Crawford. “You’d start with mosses, move to firs, see flowering plants like water lilies, and eventually over the flowering plants you’ll see a huge mushrooming of plants and the introduction of pollinators. You’d see how plants, insects, and animals work together.” Of course, this will change the contours of the garden as we know it today. Crawford imagines demonstrating mountain risings and adding pedestrian bridges, a topography maze, and maybe a treehouse. He imagines the Gardens becoming a place where different parts of the university—geology, geography, and others—can reveal themselves and their expertise to the public in a tangible, experiential way. “We don’t want to call it a secret garden anymore. It’s no longer a secret. We want people to be able to visit us once a month for the next 30 years because every time they come, they experience something different,” Crawford says. “I want this to be the place that never grows old.”
Today, this program is alive and well, though perhaps a bit different in practice: volunteers work together to grow vegetables on larger plots of land, rather than maintaining their own smaller gardens. “People exchange ideas, work together, harvest together, and build friendships,” he adds. “It’s what a volunteer program should be.” 1939 Chrysanthemum Field Day.
1967 Vegetable and Flower Garden Open House. 1974 Flower Garden Show.
1939 Iris Field Day.
Iris Display Gardens.
1987 Garden Display Event.
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Photography provided by University Archives.
planting the seeds
Feature
current programs
There are many opportunities to enjoy all that Rutgers Gardens has to offer. Whether you’re looking to purchase farm fresh produce for your summer barbecue or pick up a few gardening tips of your own, there’s something for everyone. Rutgers Gardens Farmers’ Market: Since 2008, the farmers’ market has provided a variety of products grown and produced locally, from cheese, meat, and veggies to baked goods, soups, wine, and prepared foods. Festivals and Fairs: Interested in adding flora to your garden? Come to the Spring Flower Fair, the Gardens’ ultimate plant sale. Looking to get the kids away from their screens and into nature? Come to the Fall Festival for a free day of seasonal games, activities, and crafts. Want to pick up a few gardening tricks (or just enjoy a beautiful day outside learning about nature)? Don’t miss the Open House, a free day of tours, classes, and leisure. Youth Programs: From daylong excursions to weeklong summer camps, Gardens staff help introduce youngsters to the joys of nature.
Photography by Jeff Heckman, Matt Rainey, Alan Brian Nilsen, and courtesy of Rutgers Gardens.
Education: Garden Series Classes, available all year round, offer beginners and experienced gardeners tips and techniques for improving the home garden, growing plants, and decorating with them. Walks and Talks, offered the first and third Saturdays most months, are volunteer-led tours of the Gardens with a seasonal focus.
Jennifer McCarthy CC ‘91 with daughter Allison McCarthy SEBS ‘19 enjoying the Rutgers Farmers’ Market.
Verizon Foundation is working with the NJ School-Age Care Coalition (NJSACC) for a special day of volunteer projects, here at Rutgers Gardens.
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1950
1959
Spring 2016
the Hamilton award
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Events at Rutgers Gardens
Bruce ‘Doc’ Hamilton at Rutgers Gardens.
In previous years, the award recognized outstanding individuals who helped the Gardens in some way. But this year, it gets a makeover. At the Gardens Party in September, the winner of the 2016 Hamilton Award will be a very special person in the horticulture world: someone who is involved with the field not for personal gain, but rather for the love of plants and plant lovers, and someone who puts personal ambition aside for the greater good. “Essentially, we changed the criteria to represent the type of person Bruce is,” says Crawford.
Rutgers Gardens is accepting nominees through June 30. For more information, visit: rutgersgardens.rutgers.edu/hamiltonaward.
1987
Rutgers Gardens wedding.
Gardens Party.
Gardens Gala and book signing.
Gardens Gala and wine tasting.
Rutgers Gardens Open House.
2011
2015
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Photography provided by Rutgers University Foundation Office of Communications, Jerry Casciano, Nick Romanenko, and University Archives.
This year, Rutgers Gardens’ Hamilton Award—previously called the DOC Award, partially an acronym for dedication and outstanding commitment, and partially named for Gardens friend and former acting director Bruce “Doc” Hamilton—goes national.
Students
IT’S AN
HONOR
It isn’t often that, at a university with a 250-year history, students get to say they are the first. But for School of Environmental and Biological Sciences (SEBS) Honors College student Daniel Peltyszyn, a pre-med biology major hailing from Clifton, New Jersey, that’s just what drew him to the banks of the Raritan. This spring, students like Peltyszyn are wrapping up their first year as the inaugural class of the esteemed Honors College at Rutgers University–New Brunswick, a new academic community marked by its integrated living and learning approach to undergraduate education.
SPOTLIGHT ON THE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURAL, FOOD, AND RESOURCE ECONOMICS
THE BUSINESS BRAIN DEREK NOAH Senior
Honors College students spend their first year of study in the brand-new, state-of-the-art residential facility located on the College Avenue Campus. The building houses all 500 honors students, as well as seminar rooms, lounges, study areas, a cafe, and administrative offices for faculty and staff. The academic dean and faculty fellows also live on-site. As Peltyszyn explains it, “It’s a three-way intersection between living, studying, and having fun here.”
WHY DAFRE Personally, I believed the study of environmental economics would provide the most career opportunities.
For SEBS students, this environment enables them to build on the knowledge they gain in their science classes, by working with similarly high-achieving students from across the university’s schools. Aditi Badrinath, an animal science major from Naperville, Illinois, found herself working with students from all majors in her Honors College Forum class, a seminar tasking students to work together to solve a real-world problem. “My group focused on fisheries,” she explains. “Some of us were addressing the problem through a biological perspective, but others were addressing the business feasibility or environmental impact of our solutions. I would have never approached this issue from those angles, but learning to do this will be significant in my career.”
HIS EDGE We learn to examine problems in a comprehensive way, taking into account all aspects: political, economical, social, environmental. No matter what career I end up with, I know I’ll have to work holistically.
Adds Peltyszyn: “Science has to be molded to fit within people’s behaviors and values and can’t be applied to everyone in the same way. At the Honors College, we’re being prepared for the real world, where fields intersect in ways we didn’t imagine before.“
CAREER TRACK I hope to be a corporation’s sustainability manager, where I can help them be environmentally friendly but also profitable. That’s what our courses teach us—there are ways to be sustainable, but you need to do a cost/benefit analysis.
GREGORY DILALO
Undergraduate Class of 1977, Graduate Class of 1979 Director of Information Technology, Office of the Executive Dean of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Rutgers University
WHY DAFRE In the 1970s, everyone was sensitized to the environment. I was drawn to this program and Cook College because of its theme of man and his environment.
Photography by Nick Romanenko.
CAREER TRACK I’ve been at Rutgers 42 years. My role evolved from supporting graduate students to developing and running the college’s first email system to, now, managing IT for SEBS and NJAES. IN HIS TOOLBOX As the land-grant institution of Rutgers, SEBS has unique reporting responsibilities to the USDA. A direct extension of my DAFRE experience was developing systems that managed the data necessary for that accountability. 07
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Spring 2016
In 2014, the Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics (DAFRE) celebrated its 100th anniversary. And it’s come a long way since its early days as Cook College’s farm management division. Today, DAFRE is a unique place that bridges the environment with economics, situating the study of business within a real-world context. But don’t take our word for it. Here are six students and alumni, each with a very different career path but one common thread: DAFRE.
The Lifelong Farmer BOB BRUCH
Undergraduate Class of 1969, Graduate Class of 1977 Owner, Chesterfield Christmas Trees
THE ASPIRING CONSULTANT ERICA LIGUORI Fourth-year master’s track
WHY DAFRE I grew up in a rural area, and the belief was that you’d get a better job with a college degree. Ultimately, 4-H led me to the ag school.
WHY DAFRE I take classes in all different subjects, and I think that makes me more well-rounded and more qualified for a job than a traditional economics track would.
CAREER TRACK For 38 years, I worked in the New Jersey Department of Agriculture, focusing on farmland preservation and assisting the farm community. Because I stayed in New Jersey all the while, I was able to farm. I retired six years ago.
CAREER TRACK Right now, I’m interning at an environmental consulting firm. I gather research for various projects, from installing solar panels and attaining LEED Certification to converting diesel vehicles to biodiesel.
IN HIS TOOLBOX The Department of Agriculture didn’t need economic theory; they needed problem solving. DAFRE taught me how to do analysis and take into account many different aspects of a problem.
HER EDGE We are required to take a lot of standard business classes, but we also study sustainability, statistical analysis, and business feasibility. My major is so comprehensive I can honestly get a job in whatever part of the business world I choose.
The Agriculture Advocate
The Music Man
DAVID OBERSTEIN Graduate student
WHY DAFRE A lot of millennials want a successful career that doesn’t compromise their values. DAFRE gives you the opportunity to work in economics while being environmentally conscious. CAREER TRACK A lot of farmers have a very strong understanding of agriculture, but not as much of an understanding of the business side. I want to be an extension specialist so I can help guide farmers toward profitability. HIS EDGE In a lot of programs, you either study business or agriculture—this program offers a unique link.
IMRAN MAJID
Class of 2005 Senior Vice President of Artist & Repertoire, Columbia Records
WHY DAFRE I was drawn to economics and business, but I liked the idea of being able to see it practically applied in the agriculture of New Jersey, where I lived. CAREER TRACK I happened to know a local hip hop group, so I was in the studio with them and realized that it’s someone’s job to pick songs. I thought I’d be good at that. For my co-op, I got an internship at Universal Records. Today, my job is to sign artists and make hit records. IN HIS TOOLBOX I bring efficiencies I learned at DAFRE—looking at the trends and analysis to make the right decisions—to my job every day.
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Faculty
NOTHING to Nee e AT
Photography by iStockphoto and Dena Seidel.
S
Z
For many people, spring’s arrival signifies blissfully longer days, welcome sunshine, and flowers in bloom. But for millions of Americans, it’s also the first sign that dreaded allergy symptoms are on their way, from sneezing and stuffy nose to watery eyes and an overall malaise that can last months or even all year, depending on the trigger. And according to Leonard Bielory, M.D., a specialist in allergy and immunology with the Rutgers Center of Environmental Prediction, allergy sufferers should hunker down for more of the same in the years to come. Bielory’s research focus is the impact of climate change on allergies, and what he found was a discouraging link: the milder winters and warmer seasonal air that accompany climate change bring with them shifts in flowering phenology and pollen initiation—in other words, when it comes to ragweed, for example, climate change is causing the allergy season to start earlier and, in some areas of the northern U.S. and Canada, last up to a month longer than it did in 1995. Why? First, upwardly inching temperatures often mean a delayed first frost and a longer frost-free period overall. Plus, since plants reproduce every single year, their genetic code is evolving very efficiently to adapt to increasing CO2, warming temps, and other stressors that come with climate change. According to Bielory, by the year 2020, there will be about 10 to 20 percent more pollen production overall, and counts could more than double by 2040. The silver lining? Though counts may rise, they can shift dramatically depending on location. That’s why Bielory, a certified pollen counter with a 30-year history recording counts in New Jersey, is looking to expand the counting force by working with local 4-H clubs and young scientists. He is also currently seeking funding to launch an education program that teaches students to assess air quality and pollen counts, so they can alert their neighbors. Eventually, Bielory hopes that this information will be widely available via mobile technology so that individuals can monitor their symptoms and compare them against reported allergens to determine personal triggers. In the meantime, gesundheit!
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issues
Alan Robock, distinguished professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences, has never been one to shy away from controversy. But if you ask him, there really is no controversy when it comes to the science behind his two primary areas of study: nuclear winter and climate change. In the case of nuclear winter, Robock’s most recent research interest, he sounds the alarm in Huffington Post blogs, New York Times op-eds, Newsweek profiles, and innumerable speeches in such locations as London, Mexico City, the Vatican, and beyond that the fires ignited by a nuclear war would be so dense they could block out the sun. The result, he says, would be temperatures below freezing in the summertime, the death of plants and the prevention of agriculture, and almost certain death by famine for much of humanity. Even a “small” nuclear war using just 100 Hiroshima-sized atomic bombs—less than half the combined arsenals of India and Pakistan—could be disastrous in terms of climate change, he says. That’s why, for this scientist, dabbling in politics is practically inevitable (in fact, he’s spoken to President Obama’s scientific and nuclear advisors about this concern), even if his recommendation that the nine nuclear countries give up their weapons seems no easy task. Robock’s other well-known research, centered on the impact of humans on climate change, currently focuses on climate engineering and, specifically, how scientists may be able to reverse global warming by creating clouds the way a volcanic eruption might. Still, without political will, climate change remains a formidable foe. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t light at the end of the tunnel. Robock believes that these two issues—both nuclear winter and climate change—are each created by humans and solvable by humans, and he remains optimistic that with a little bit of education, we can change our behavior to make the world a safer place.
Spring 2016
Got Milk? According to professor of animal sciences Carol Bagnell, milk serves as a conduit for delivery of developmental signals from mother to offspring in a lactocrine manner. Lactocrine—a term she coined with colleague Frank Bartol of Auburn University—refers to the transmission of milk-borne bioactive factors from mother to child through nursing. Maternal contributions to offspring development begin at conception, continue through pregnancy but don’t end at birth. Among those contributions is colostrum, the first milk produced by mammals during the late stages of pregnancy through the first few days after birth. In humans, colostrum contains high concentrations of nutrients and antibodies in a high-protein, low-fat formula that’s easy for newborns to digest. But as Bagnell discovered, these aren’t the only benefits bequeathed through colostrum. It began when she was studying the hormone relaxin, produced by mothers during pregnancy in preparation for birth. “In investigating a source for relaxin in the newborn, we discovered it was present in colostrum,” she says. “Also, this hormone was detectable only in the blood of neonatal pigs that nursed, and not found in those fed a commercial
milk replacer (formula).” Bagnell found that when baby pigs were fed formula for two days after birth, they presented with reduced uterine gland development by two weeks of life, as compared to those that were nursed. This paired with findings that minimal colostrum intake at birth is associated with lower lifetime reproduction rates in adult sows, suggests that nursing in those critical days and weeks post-birth may have lifelong consequences when it comes to fertility. “These studies indicate that a window of opportunity for transmission of milk-borne signals is open during early postnatal life,” she says. “Our research shows that milk-borne bioactive factors, delivered as a specific consequence of nursing, affect both gene expression and morphology in neonatal female reproductive tissues, including the uterus and the cervix.” At the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences, Bagnell involves students intimately with her research. A typical day
for her students might involve time on the farm observing pregnant sows, working with neonatal pigs, or running tests in the lab. By joining her Sow Watch Club, undergraduate students have the opportunity to monitor late pregnant sows for signs of birth, either by watching them in person or by monitoring them remotely from their dorms via a livestream broadcast from the farrowing house. “At the time of birth, students then go to the farm to assist in delivery of newborn pigs and help with the treatments for our studies,” Bagnell adds. In addition to valuable hands-on experience, the students also earn credits towards graduation. Going forward, Bagnell says her next challenge is to focus on mechanisms responsible for the long-term effects of nursing on the female reproductive tract. In collaboration with scientists at Auburn University and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Meat Animal Research Center in Nebraska, Bagnell is following up on observations that minimal colostrum intake at birth is linked to reduced litter sizes in adult sows, supporting the idea that nursing can have long-reaching effects on reproduction. “Since all mammals evolved to nurse,” she concludes, “this research has broad implications for understanding maternal contributions to postnatal reproductive tract programming in both humans and domestic animals.”
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Photography by John O’Boyle and iStockphoto.
Of all the gifts a mother gives her child, one of the most important just might take place during the days and weeks following birth.
Black on the Banks Conference African-American students of Rutgers in the 1960s examining the struggle for equality and access in higher education.
Rutgers 2
Launching our year-long 250th birthday
11
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Byrne Seminar
A culinary history of food, with students experiencing food from the 1760s to present.
250 Kick Off
Photography by Nick Romanenko.
celebrations on the lawn of Old Queens.
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Research
Taking a
S
Bite out
OF THE MOSQUITO PROBLEM
ummertime in Rutgers’ native Garden State is marked by lazy days at the beach, ice cream on the boardwalk, and leisurely vacations (and maybe a little summer coursework!). The living’s easy. The sun is shining. And, let’s be honest, the mosquitoes are biting. Everyone nationwide knows mosquitoes are a bit of a nuisance. But according to Dina M. Fonseca, professor in the Department of Entomology, they’re also incredibly dangerous. “They are responsible for more death and suffering than any other animal because they transmit diseases,” she says. “And the reason they do that is because they’ve become adapted to people, and that’s an important distinction.” Fonseca’s research focuses on how mosquitoes have become “domesticated” to live and thrive right in our backyards. “We tend to think of them as flying insects, but they have complex life cycles with a larval stage that’s aquatic,” she explains. Thanks to us—with our birdfeeders, gutters, backyard clutter, and even underwater sewerage lines—mosquitoes now live happily among us. “When the adults emerge in urban areas,” she says, “they have adapted to recognize us as a source of blood.”
Photography by iStockphoto.
And herein lies the problem. “Depending on the species, mosquitoes can feed on mammals, birds, reptiles, or amphibians,” explains George Hamilton, professor and chair of the Department of Entomology. “If they bite an organism with a disease—West Nile virus, zika, malaria—they are likely to contract it, and then they can transmit it to the next host.” And if the mosquito has evolved to feast on humans, disease can spread. 13
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That’s why mosquitoes are the focus of research and outreach coming out of the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences as well as the Center for Vector Biology, housed in the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station. (In fact, the center is proud to be the birthplace of mosquito research and control, with traditions dating back to the early 1900s.) At the center, director and distinguished professor Randy Gaugler is attacking the mosquito problem from all fronts. First, he’s examining how species of worms that feed on mosquito larvae may be a more effective and safer pesticide than chemical applications, since they live longer than a chemical ever could, and reproduce in the environment, providing future control. Secondly, he’s working to create applications for drones that can more precisely spray areas (rather than blanketing a whole area, which is inefficient and not as eco-friendly). Through a research grant from the National Institutes of Health, Gaugler is also exploring autosemination. “We create a station that looks like a bucket, and the mosquito wants to lay her eggs in it, but when she approaches, she can’t because it’s been screened off,” he explains. “She has to exit through a narrow passage contaminated with a chemical insecticide that is very toxic to mosquitos but has a very, very low risk for humans.” So, instead of spraying a wide area with insecticides, which can’t even reach attractive habitats like bottles and hoses, the mosquitoes transmit it to where they live and lay eggs. “We tested this in Trenton last year and we found a 77.4 percent reduction in adult mosquito populations,” Gaugler says.
But prevention is only as effective as the community’s dedication. That’s why researchers conducted an outreach and research program from 2008 to 2012, in New Jersey’s Mercer and Monmouth counties. It included pesticide applications alongside targeted education efforts, from grade-school curriculum to direct mailers to door-to-door education. “We found that education could impact the numbers,” says Hamilton. “People became aware and cleaned up their yard. We also showed that when we educated, in tandem with insecticide monitoring and applications, it worked better than just applications alone.” So what can residents do to combat their mosquito problem? According to Hamilton, the best plan includes: •
Monitoring water sources on the property, like bird feeders and planters. Make sure to empty or clean them once a week (that’s how long it takes for eggs to develop and hatch) and replace the water, if necessary.
•
Cleaning out gutters so they’re not holding water.
•
Wearing insect repellent if you can, but skip on the zappers. Hamilton says they may actually attract more bugs than they repel. Look for natural sprays if chemicals are a concern.
Still fighting an uphill battle? “Every county has access to a mosquito control department with a hotline number you can call. They will come out and try to help the situation,” Hamilton advises. “If you have a problem, your neighbors do, too.”
Spring 2016
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Rutgers ES I T Breeding E I R VA Revolutionizes Agriculture BRATE LE
RU T GER
As part of the Rutgers 250th Anniversary celebration, the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES) is showcasing one of its breeding program’s all-star varieties each month. But make no mistake: though this promotion lasts for just this one year, it represents decades of research by Rutgers agriculture and aquaculture specialists across the state of New Jersey. “This Rutgers 250 promotion of the breeding programs is designed to highlight varieties that have been developed through NJAES in conjunction with the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences,” says Anna Molinski, NJAES program coordinator. “We were able to identify 12 different breeding programs and are focusing on the best and most recent varieties, and attempting to pair them with the month in which they are seasonal.” Molinski hopes this promotion will help get the word out to shoppers about the notable research coming out of NJAES. For example, its partnership with the Rutgers Climate Institute aims to determine how the university’s prized varieties may adapt to the effects of climate change, whether it’s drought, disease, or even flooding. “We’re informing the public that our research is preparing local agriculture for climate change,” Molinski explains. “Since Rutgers 250 is looking backward and forward 250 years, we want to do the same thing with our varieties and take a look at where they began but also determine how they’ll continue.” Another hot topic among Rutgers specialists—and the general public—is genetic engineering. But at NJAES, varieties are developed using creative breeding techniques, says Molinski. “Our varieties are non-GMO, developed using breeding techniques based on hybridization and selection, following in the footsteps of Gregor Mendel, the father of modern genetics. Breeders at Rutgers are crossing plants with desirable traits to produce superior offspring,” she explains. “By using those techniques, we can address the questions and concerns raised by the farming and fishing communities regarding GMOs.” Add to this the work being done in the areas of increasing yields, lowering pesticide use through disease resistance, supporting local agriculture, and preparing for extreme weather, and it becomes clear the Rutgers breeding programs still have many groundbreaking years ahead of them. Wondering if your local farmers’ market stocks Rutgers produce? While Molinski says that some farmers do publicize their seed origins, others do not. The best way is to call local farms and find out where they source their seeds and plants. You just might find that your pantry is stocked with Rutgers Scarlet™ strawberries, Rutgers 250™ tomatoes, or other varieties, all courtesy of NJAES researchers. To learn more, visit breeding.rutgers.edu, or follow NJAES on Facebook at facebook.com/rutgerscooperativeextension or Twitter @rutgersnjaes.
Celebrating featured varieties by month.
JANUARY
LETTUCE by Ilya Raskin
FEBRUARY
SWEET BASIL by Jim Simon
MARCH
ASPARAGUS by Chee-Kok Chin
APRIL
TOMATO by Tom Orton
MAY
STRAWBERRY by Bill Hlubik and Pete Nitzsche
JUNE
DOGWOOD TREE by Tom Molnar
JULY
TREE FRUIT by Joseph Goffreda
AUGUST
SHELLFISH by Ximing Guo
SEPTEMBER
TURFGRASS by Stacy Bonos and Bill Meyer
OCTOBER
HAZELNUT by Tom Molnar
NOVEMBER
CRANBERRY by Nick Vorsa
DECEMBER
HOLLY TREE by Elwin Orton (emeritus) discovery.rutgers.edu
14
Feature
The Food Chain With one professor, one room, and two support staffers, the Department of Food Science opened its doors in 1946 to bring food-related science, education, and research to Rutgers. This year, the department celebrates its 70th anniversary...and its incredible evolution.
Photography by John O’Boyle and courtesy of the Department of Nutritional Sciences.
L
Student Dylan Jagiello ‘16.
ooking back at the history of the Department of Food Science is much like hopping in a time machine and taking a journey through our culture’s relationship with food. In its earliest days—the late 1940s and early 1950s—researchers in the department focused primarily on food processing and canning technology, says professor and former chair Mukund Karwe. Slowly but surely, around the late 1990s and early 2000s, emphasis began to shift onto natural products and the natural functionality of foods (think of the health-boosting lycopene in a tomato for one example). Today, the emphasis has shifted yet again, and this time it’s onto food safety, food microbiology, and nutrition.
Outreach and Research Take it from Donald Schaffner, extension specialist and distinguished professor in the department: bacteria touches everyone. “Bacteria don’t care whether they’re in your kitchen or in a food processing plant,” he says. “The work we do stretches from making sure that the food is safe in your kitchen, to making sure that restaurants, supermarkets, and food processors of all sizes are safe.” How? One way is through outreach, and as extension specialist, Schaffner knows a bit about that. By working with the Food Innovation Center, Rutgers’ business incubation and economic development accelerator 15
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program, Schaffner is able to work with food entrepreneurs. He helps them tackle issues ranging from the finer aspects of microbiology to risk assessment and safety. (The two most common topics? Shelf life and market regulations.) Schaffner also works with the Department of Family and Community Health Sciences (FCHS), which is housed at the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station. From county offices, FCHS works to promote healthy families, schools, and communities through collaboration and science-based education, and the Department of Food Science acts as its technical resource. Common questions surround whether food is still safe if it’s left on the counter, how to can safely, or what to do with frozen food when the electricity goes out. On campus, food science graduate students lend their expertise to the dining halls by conducting microbiological tests and doing health-department-style inspections. “It’s a win-win,” says Schaffner. “The students benefit from it, and the dining halls benefit from it.” But outreach isn’t the only impact of the Department of Food Science. The department also boasts a rich history of
Spring 2016
groundbreaking research, in the areas of food biology (molecular genetics, biochemistry, microbiology, and more), food chemistry (applying chemical techniques to the understanding of food, its physical properties, and its chemical transformation during manufacture and storage), and food engineering (manufacturing, processing, packaging, and preservation).
An Alumnus’ Take
Some of the research focuses on nutritional aspects of food, like the 1992 findings that green tea boasts antioxidant benefits. (Look no further than supermarket shelves stocked with everything from green tea ice cream to green tea powders for proof that this benefit is invaluable in today’s food industry.)
The issue is, of course, that humans can’t safely ingest E. coli. “We are working with a strain of probiotics to generate something that can be accepted safely by humans,” Quadro says. That discovery will be groundbreaking, since it would overcome the need to constantly ingest foods or supplements with vitamin A, and address a deficiency that has worldwide impact.
Looking Ahead Going forward, the department has a clear and distinct charge: to be an internationally recognized and studentcentered program for innovative education and research, focused on global concerns of hunger and obesity. Its primary focus, indeed, will surely shift yet again. This time, we may see research tackling issues like naturally functional foods that can improve health; the interaction of foods’ microorganisms with soil, water, processing equipment, and human contact; and other collaborative efforts such as those coming out of Rutgers’ newly established Institute for Food, Nutrition, and Health. And by leveraging New Jersey’s robust food manufacturing and agricultural economy, there’s no doubt the Department of Food Science will continue to facilitate change on the farm and in the lab. “Food science is alive and well at Rutgers,” says Schaffner. “It really takes this huge team of people with all their specific expertise, working together. I see the department as that connecting piece.”
Hank Izzo, Jr. CC’84, GSNB‘91, ‘93, is the vice president of research and development at Mars, Inc. He’s also a second-generation Food Science grad, along with his brother and sister. Here’s what he remembers, what he looks forward to, and what he has to say as his beloved department celebrates the big 7-0. On joining the department: My father completed his Ph.D. in the Department of Food Science when it was a tiny, little green building off to the side on Cook Campus. I remember going to Ag Field Day as a little kid. So I’ve always had a tie with this department. My father was the vice president of research and development for Unilever, and then for Lipton, and I remember him bringing home prototypes of new products for us to try, from soups and drinks from Lipton to a very exciting time when he was working at Good Humor! All the products always had a story behind them. I was always interested in science, but working on a product and seeing it come to life in the market really appealed to me. On his fondest memory: Every year, we had a Food Science holiday party and, since we had such a diverse group, everyone would bring food from their country of origin. We’d bring our families, and professors would join in, too. We’d perform skits, or do a song or dance. It was a lot of fun. That’s what I remember most—those times when it was a true community. On what’s changed: Over the years, the food industry’s challenges have changed. It started off with the need for availability and certain processing and preservation technologies, and moved onto creating new flavor experiences. Today, food safety is hot, as well as figuring out how to develop ingredients that are sustainable and considered by the public to be less processed. If you were to map out the differences between the generations that have gone through the department, you’d see the different challenges in the industry and the kind of research it spurred. On what’s stayed the same: What’s remained the same is the camaraderie and culture, that connection that was created by students and professors. Even today, when we hire students coming out of the department, we all tend to talk about the same things: Food Science Club, making ice cream, and the labs. The science, research, challenges, and university have evolved, but the experience and the camaraderie in the department is the same.
discovery.rutgers.edu
16
Photography courtesy of Hank Izzo.
Other research, like a project led in part by food science professors Loredana Quadro and Michael Chikindas, seeks to solve a worldwide nutrient deficiency. Vitamin A deficiency, experienced by hundreds of millions of people worldwide, and mostly in the developing world, is linked to blindness, impaired immune systems, and birth defects. “We came up with the idea of using bacteria instead of food to provide this nutrient which, currently, can only be obtained by ingesting food,” explains Quadro. What they found, in mouse models, was that E. coli bacteria could in fact be engineered to produce beta-carotene, which naturally produces vitamin A.
Alumni
food WITH thought f
Harvest at IFNH is a labor of love for Peggy Policastro (center) and Harvest chefs Ian Keith and Rachel Reuben.
ortunate is the person who can parlay a childhood fascination into an academic and professional career. Peggy Policastro is a fortunate person.
Policastro, a registered dietitian, is the nutritionist for Rutgers Dining Services, and the director of behavioral nutrition with the Institute for Food, Nutrition, and Health (IFNH). She also holds a master’s degree in nutritional science from Rutgers and what she describes as a first-of-its-kind Ph.D. in interdisciplinary studies—nutritional science and psychology. The interdisciplinary doctorate is a relatively new concept for the Graduate School–New Brunswick that requires the aspiring doctoral candidate to devise a course of study and to get approval from the authorities of each academic program or department involved in the curriculum.
Photography by Eric Gautier.
Why go through all the effort? In Policastro’s case it was because of her intense curiosity about not only what people eat, but also why they eat what they eat. As part of her work, she directs the Rutgers Healthy Dining Team and the IFNH Student Ambassadors, teams of undergraduates studying nutritional sciences who are selected for their ability to reach out to students, stakeholders, the community, and others to encourage healthful eating. According to Policastro, the goal of the team goes far beyond helping students avoid the dreaded “freshman 15”—the purported 17
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weight gain students are said to experience in their first year away from home. Rather, the team “strives to make foods a natural part of a healthy lifestyle that will provide good habits and benefits now and for a lifetime,” she says. Policastro’s dedication to food and nutrition began at home in Edison, New Jersey, when, as a little girl, she developed an interest in cooking. “Other girls were asking for Barbie dolls. I was asking for an Easy-Bake Oven or a crepe pan”, she says. When it was time to go away to college, she selected the University of Delaware for its psychology major. “I was always a foodie, but I was not interested in being a chef. However, at Delaware I discovered dietetics and was drawn by the medical aspect of it,” she says.
she got a call from the chair of the Department of Nutritional Sciences, who had a project in mind for connecting nutrition with student dining. The result is a dining program that marries student food service with nutritional consultation and an academic component. Rutgers Dining Services, led by Joe Charette CC’73 and bolstered by Policastro, is a leader among universities across the country in promoting healthy eating and providing menus that support the effort. Possibly because of the influence of this new approach to student dining, Policastro decided to go after her interdisciplinary Ph.D., which she proudly completed in 2015.
These days, you are likely to see Policastro in the corridors of the IFNH building on the George H. Cook Campus. One of her major projects is the startup of Harvest, After graduation, she came the new café at IFNH. She, along back to New Jersey and became a with chefs Ian Keith and Rachel registered clinical dietitian at St. Ruben, set out to demonstrate that Peter’s Hospital in New Brunswick. nutritious food can be delicious, “My job was to educate patients desirable, and an attractive alternative on their diets. The fact that I had a to the usual fast food, grab-and-go strong food background—including choices that we often make. Harvest an interest in cooking—made clients serves up these healthful dishes especially receptive to my advice” daily in a location that has become a and helped them connect good lively and popular gathering spot for nutrition with practical application faculty, staff, and students. in their cooking. Her homecoming “Essentially, where, how, when, also permitted her to work on her and why we eat are just as important master’s degree at Rutgers. as what we eat,” she believes. And Soon she came to work for that is the connection between Rutgers as the nutritionist for the nutritional science and psycholoDepartment of Athletics and Rutgers gy—a combination that is perfect for Student Health Services. In 1999, Peggy Policastro.
Spring 2016
AT THE TOP OF
Gary Brackett CC’03 was inducted last year into the Rutgers Athletics Hall of Fame and in 2014 honored with the George H. Cook Distinguished Alumni Award. During his Rutgers days, he was a standout with the Scarlet Knights, earning the post of defensive captain for two years and an MVP. With a Super Bowl ring to his credit during his career with the Indianapolis Colts, you’d think that the Glassboro, New Jersey, native would be abuzz every Super Bowl week. Not so, as we catch up with Brackett thanks to the Colts Roundup blog on February 4, 2016, by Heather Lloyd.
“It would be a lie to tell you that I’ll be up for the entire game. Because now, with my schedule and everything else, I’m in bed by 8:30 or 9:00,” he says. These days, Brackett is a busy guy. “It’s about making sacrifices. I’ve got a big Monday. I’ve got a big week next week. So, I take care of my responsibilities. No one cares that I watched the Super Bowl. But they care if I missed a meeting that could potentially impact my business.” Brackett’s business has gone from stopping the run to running restaurants. After retiring from football in 2011, he went back to school and got his MBA from George Washington University. “Then after that, I invested in this company, Stacked Pickle, which now I’m the owner of and have eight locations. I also opened up two southern table and bar restaurants called Georgia Reese’s and that currently keeps me busy.” And so do his three kids, Gabrielle, 6, Lawrence, 4, and Georgia, 2.
Georgia Reese’s is named after his youngest daughter. The businessman says it was an easy decision. “My daughter was five and the other one was about one at the time. The five-year-old was too tough to negotiate with, so the one-year-old won out. She wasn’t talking at the time. So, she just put her little thumb in her mouth and put a little slobber on the piece of paper and we had ourselves a deal.” Brackett says he was drawn to the hospitality business early on. His first job was as a dish boy in a restaurant. He liked the game plan— the idea of learning a playbook and applying it in different locations.
“Football correlates in so many other businesses, the world, relationships. I definitely learned a ton playing football. And realizing once I got my MBA that I had transferable skills that would make me successful in the game of life, just as successful as I was in the game of football.” And that’s coming from a guy who was pretty successful at football [just looking at the stats]. “It says I had the most solo tackles of any player in Super Bowl history, 12, when we played the Saints. So I always look at the stat like, ‘Man, I played a game that the top one percent get a chance to play, …and then I have a stat like the most tackles in a game.’ I’m just like, ‘Man, that’s a pretty awesome achievement.’” But that’s not what he’s most proud of. Brackett is still a leader in the community, now in a more hands-on role. “I’ve always believed in giving back and connecting with the community. All my restaurants have personal interests inside the neighborhood, at school systems, with parents. So, I’m extremely proud that now I still have an impact in our community.” He’s on a different field now, but Gary Brackett is still at the top of his game.
discovery.rutgers.edu
Photography courtesy of Rutgers Athletics .
I
t’s Super Bowl week. But for Gary Brackett, the defensive captain of the Colts’ Super Bowl-winning team, it’s business as usual.
Reprinted with permission.
18
Alumni
Roger Locandro:
A Teacher For Life
Ask alumni from the 1970s through the 1990s about Roger Locandro, and they invariably will recall his unique—and very effective—teaching style. As alumnus Joe Charette CC’73 put it in an article in the Rutgers 250 Anniversary Portrait: “When I think of being a Rutgers University student, Roger ‘Doc’ Locandro is always part of it. I can’t help but smile as I remember him saying, ‘Eat together, learn together.’ Doc was a real teacher. He did not teach by standing in front of a room of students seated at desks. If we were seated, he usually was as well, but we were not lined up in rows, but more than likely in a circle all around him.
Growing up in New Brunswick, he started raising and processing chickens in high school for extra money. On an April day in 1954, full of confidence as “a big-time chicken farmer,” he walked over to College Farm looking for a job. He happened to meet John Pino, a young poultry science instructor, who told him that instead of looking for a job, he should be going to college. By the end of the day, he
“Either way, you’d often find yourself eating or drinking while he was sneaking some new knowledge into your head. It was communal…a true sharing experience. I believe that is why I have never forgotten his lessons.”
Photography by Carol Rutgers.
Locandro’s take on teaching is that “experiential learning is the philosophic core of teaching. See it, feel it, taste it, and then understand it.” Needless to say, Locandro was the recipient of numerous teaching awards during his years at Rutgers, including several from his Cook College faculty colleagues, the Alpha Zeta Teacher of the Year (more than once), and his proudest achievements, the University Teaching Excellence Award and the Lifetime Leadership Award. A question arises: how did Locandro’s background influence his passion for teaching? When he joined the Rutgers College of Agriculture’s Class of 1958, he was what you might call an accidental student. 19
explorations
was set to enroll in the College of Agriculture in September. He interrupted his education in his sophomore year when Palmyra High School needed an agriculture teacher. After two and a half years there, Freehold High School pulled him in to be a fill-in for its agriculture instructor. He came back to Rutgers and earned his bachelor’s degree in 1960. Locandro accepted an offer in 1962 to become an extension agricultural agent for Hunterdon
County, a faculty position. He came to the Cook Campus in 1967, and began working on his master’s degree in soils and crops. He received his doctorate in plant ecology in 1973. Eventually, he became the college’s dean of students and was given the opportunity to develop the experiential courses that he—and the students— loved so well. He taught Interesting and Edible Plants, and built courses around fishery science and research, meat science (Interesting and Edible Meats), ecology (Landscape Ecology of New Jersey), tropical ecosystems (Tropical Ecosystems and Agriculture), and natural resources in Newfoundland and the rainforests of Alaska and Puerto Rico. That last course was aimed at seniors and graduate students, who often met at Locandro’s home to learn and, of course, to eat. Half of the class each year would travel to Alaska, and the other half to Newfoundland. Many of the students who participated still stay in touch with Locandro, who retired in 1999 as professor emeritus in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources after 38 years on the faculty. His positive influence on the students in his care is wide-ranging and deep. As Charette writes: “During my 25-plus years here, I have always remembered the lessons Roger taught me and have done my best to give students my time and attention, in an effort to sneak some lessons into their heads the same way Doc did to me.”
Carl Safina
Spring 2016
communicating beyond words
Carl Safina GSNB‘82,’87 is founder of the Safina Center (formerly the Blue Ocean Institute) at Stony Brook University. He is an ocean conservation pioneer, a MacArthur Fellow, a Pew Scholar, author of several books on ecology and the environment, and host of a PBS series. He also was recipient of the 2013 GSNB Alumni Award in the Biological Sciences. Safina was profiled in the Winter 2016 issue of Rutgers Magazine. Excerpts from the article by Angela Delli Santi, contributing writer, appear here.
For the project, Safina, who earned a Ph.D. in ecology from Rutgers, visited elephant herds at Amboseli National Park in Kenya, wolf packs at Yellowstone National Park, and orca pods in the Pacific Northwest. A clear pattern emerged. These animals know who they are, he says. “We have the same imperatives: take care of our babies, find food, try to stay alive.” Beyond Words contains insightful examples of animal behavior. There’s the
study in which elephants in the wild distinguish between the voices of tourists (who seldom cause them any harm) and herders (who hunt them); the description of a wolf pack descending into chaos after the alpha female strays out of Yellowstone and is shot dead by a hunter; and multiple instances in which dolphins and whales that become tangled in fishnets go limp until they are cut free, then thank their rescuers before swimming off. Many behaviors we consider uniquely human are in fact shared with some other species. For example, elephants grieve and stand vigil when a family member dies. Killer whales spend years teaching their young how to hunt seals by surging through the surf onto a beach that could strand and kill them. In other instances, an animal exhibits more advanced behavior than humans. Elephants, for example, are virtually never violent to one another, especially within the family. “We cause so much pain to them. The mystery is, why don’t they hurt us more than they do?” says Safina. “If we want to carve elephants’ teeth, can’t we wait for them to die?” For this book, Safina, the first to hold the endowed chair for nature and humanity at Stony Brook University on Long Island, set out to do what he loves best: see what animals are doing in the wild and
ask why they are doing it. He hadn’t been in Kenya long, however, when renowned researcher Cynthia Moss, who has spent more than 40 years observing African elephants, suggested that he think about animal behavior differently. As a result of their conversation, he quit asking, “How are they like us?” and began asking, “Who are they?” Science doesn’t encourage this type of inquiry. Like virtually all graduate students, Safina was taught not to anthropomorphize animals. It’s a premise with which he wholeheartedly disagrees. Ascribing human feelings to animal behaviors “is the best first guess about understanding what an animal is doing,” he says. “If an animal is acting fearful, your best guess is that it feels afraid. If it’s playing with its babies, it’s having fun. That’s a really good first guess. For the most part, it gets you the right answer right away. Then if you keep watching, you have a better chance of confirming that answer or realizing you might have been mistaken.” Invariably, similarities to humans emerge in the researcher’s stories of animal joy, grief, jealousy, anger, and love, and that can lead people to an uncomfortable place. “If you acknowledge that they feel and want to stay alive, that makes it harder to do anything you want to them”—like trophy hunting, animal research, and factory farming, says Safina. “You have to consider their feelings and their experience. That is not very convenient for most of us.”
discovery.rutgers.edu 20
Photography by Jeff Heckman and Alan Oliver.
Years of studying animals at sea and on land convinced scientist Carl Safina that many creatures in nature think, express emotion, and communicate. In his new book, Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel (Henry Holt and Company, 2015), Safina couples personal observations of wildlife with the best field research available to create a thought-provoking portrait of the distinct and complex lives of animals.
Donors
opening DOORS
KENNETH POSSENRIEDE Donors who support scholarships for higher education consistently designate their gifts for second-year students and above, subscribing to the theory that these students have demonstrated an academic track record that makes them deserving of scholarship support.
Possenriede admits that he had always been more interested in sports—football and cross-country—than studying, but his parents were adamant that he and his sister attend college. Proudly, Ken was the first in his immediate family to go to college.
In the case of Ken Possenriede CC’82 and his wife Jennifer DC’83, however, their longtime and generous scholarship assistance is deliberately focused on incoming, first-year students as an incentive to excellence.
When he arrived on the Cook Campus, he signed up for intramural sports, but he quickly realized there was much more to experience. He joined the Alpha Zeta honor and service fraternity, which “forced me to get involved with the Cook community and put me in touch with a diverse group of individuals who helped me to progress. And I came to realize that diversity is very important to education.”
The Kenneth and Jennifer Possenriede Recruitment Scholarship for students in the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences is designed “to open doors for the best and brightest students” to the kind of rigorous academic program offered by the school, says Ken Possenriede. An intensely loyal alumnus, Possenriede envisions Rutgers University being recognized as a “public ivy”—in the same category as the University of Michigan. He knows both institutions well, having received his bachelor’s degree in business economics from Rutgers and his MBA from Michigan. Possenriede would like to see Rutgers become the top school of choice for even more academically excellent high school students and believes that this scholarship for incoming first-year students is an attractive incentive.
Photography courtesy of Ken Possenriede.
Possenriede’s motivation in part stems from his own experience as an undergrad. When he was at Carteret High School, he applied to and was accepted at Cook College and Rutgers College. He gravitated to Cook because of the ag econ department (now the Department of Agricultural, Food and Resource Economics) and its major in business economics, as well as “the small-school atmosphere in a large university.” 21
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Possenriede recalls that the late Professor Al Meredith, who taught agricultural economics and marketing, was a major influence in his progress. Part of the connection was sports; Meredith had been a varsity lacrosse player. But the other part was Meredith’s insistence that Possenriede challenge himself. So he
applied for the G. H. Cook Honors Program and was accepted. His research focused on the frozen concentrated orange juice futures market “because of my interest in exchange markets, commodities, and regression analysis. It was a great experience and excellent preparation for graduate school and a career,” he says. He also appreciated the legendary teaching of the late Professor Roy DeBoer of the Department of Landscape Architecture, who taught Environmental Design and Analysis to virtually all of the school’s newly-minted freshmen. It so happens that a Douglass College student, Jennifer Cooper, also took DeBoer’s class. Eventually, they met through mutual friends at the Cook-Douglass Pub (“yes, there actually was a pub on campus in those days”) and became Mr. and Mrs. Possenriede. Soon daughter Emily and son Alex came along, and Ken went to work for Lockheed Martin, where he currently serves as vice president–finance and business operations for Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company in Fort Worth, Texas. Emily graduated from Smith College, and Alex from Boston University. Both are pursuing successful careers in Manhattan. What is Possenriede’s takeaway on his time at Rutgers, and why are he and his wife so loyal? “For me, the lightbulb went on in college. My Rutgers education was the bedrock for all that followed. The school challenged me and made me want to be a good student. I discovered that if you follow the steps— if you do this, this, and this—it will make you successful,” he says. And by the way, while the couple currently lives in Fort Worth, you are sure to see them on campus at a football game or down the shore at their home on Long Beach Island. New Jersey and Rutgers are never far away in their lives and loyalties.
DAV I D E A R L
Spring 2016
TRUE TO HIS SCHOOL
David is a section chief in the Office of Landscape Architecture of the New Jersey Department of Transportation, where he has worked for more than 36 years. “I was one of the lucky ones,” he says, “I got my job because of my education at Rutgers, and I have been there ever since.” Three years after David graduated, he dedicated his first small gift to the Department of Horticulture, home in those days of the landscape architecture program. His reason was simple: “I was grateful to have been prepared so well for a career I love,” he says. In the mid-1980s he began directing his donations to a memorial scholarship set up by the family of classmate Kevin Dorko. David says that although he didn’t know Kevin well, he admired his zest for life. “Kevin loved active sports, like motocross. He liked to fly airplanes. When I heard that he died in a plane crash in ’83 and found out that his family created the Kevin Dorko Memorial Scholarship, I decided to donate to that,” David recalls. Later, he opted also to support the Roy DeBoer Travel Prize, set up by the late Professor Roy H. DeBoer. DeBoer founded the landscape architecture program, taught the subject for nearly 50 years, and was chair of the department for 25 years. DeBoer “welcomed me into the landscape
architecture program,” David says. “He had the greatest influence in both my academic and professional careers. He cared for and guided many students. In my case, as my advisor, he would not let me fail and pushed me to succeed.”
“because money is always tight and departmental needs occur from time to time.” In addition, as an active member of the Cook Community Alumni Association, David contributes to the group’s own endowed scholarship.
The travel prize, set up while DeBoer was still teaching, to this day provides educational travel for students. David became a booster of the travel award because of his admiration for DeBoer and his belief that students should have the opportunity to attend conferences and professional gatherings —“the professional meetings keep the
Although not a Rutgers graduate, David’s wife of 39 years MaryLou, fully endorses his philanthropy and is a Rutgers donor in her own right. She is employed in Rutgers’ Department of University Communications and Marketing, which she joined in 1996 after working for several years in the public school system.
connection going and keep alumni involved with students.” DeBoer and his colleague Bruce “Doc” Hamilton also were instrumental in the development of Rutgers Gardens and its many horticultural areas and programs. So, true to his usual practice, David also directs gifts to Rutgers Gardens and to the Bruce “Doc” Hamilton Endowed Scholarship. Other gifts benefit the Department of Landscape Architecture’s general fund. “I support it,” he says,
To Make a Gift: www.tinyurl.com/ne5l4hm
The couple has two children, David E. Earl Jr., who works with McMaster-Carr Supply Company in Robbinsville, New Jersey, and Amy Earl CC’01, who earned her degree in biological sciences from the Department of Animal Sciences and works for the Carrier Clinic in Belle Mead, New Jersey. MaryLou and David jointly support the Department of Animal Sciences, partly because of their daughter’s degree, but mostly because MaryLou was quite involved in 4-H when the children were young and spent a lot of time on the Cook Campus interacting with the animal sciences faculty. Both of them would agree that the departments and scholarships they support financially “are very personal to us and helped shape our lives and careers. Hopefully, they will have the same effect on the student beneficiaries,” who, in turn, will be “true to their school.”
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Photography by Jeff Heckman.
Many alumni support their alma mater with time, talent, and treasure. But few are as true to their school as David Earl CC’76, who started giving back to Rutgers shortly after his graduation and has continued to this day.
Alumni Notes and Musings The Rutgers University Alumni Association welcomes news about your professional accomplishments and personal milestones. Submit your information at ralumni.com/mynews on the web, send it to your class correspondent listed in the Class Notes section of Rutgers Magazine, or drop a note via postal mail (Rutgers Alumni Communications, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, 7 College Avenue, New Brunswick, NJ 08901-1280). Ag, CAES, Cook, and SEBS news will be posted and indexed at discovery.rutgers.edu. David Scarr AG’42 reports that he is widowed and lives in West Virginia near one of his sons. Following graduation and a stint in the Army, he obtained his doctor of veterinary medicine degree, practiced for some time, and then joined the FDA, retiring as its chief of the food animal branch in the division of surveillance. This information comes from Class of 1942 correspondent Berne Rolston RC’42 of Los Angeles. Bill Suter AG’43 was looking forward to attending the 2016 Alumni Reunion Weekend when he wrote last winter to Class of 1943 correspondent J. Domer Zerbe Jr. RC’43. The two were roommates in their freshman year. John Brockett AG’52, GSNB’54 offers farm management consultation to fewer farmers these days at his farm in Lewistown, PA. He began the practice after retiring from the Penn State faculty in 1986. “I lost my wonderful wife to Alzheimer’s dementia three years ago,” he writes. “Due to aides and our eight children, I was able to keep her with me until the last three months. My children and grandchildren do their best to help me cope.” His wife, the former Mary Allen, was
After a career with Johnson & Johnson, Ted Graboski AG’67, GSNB’70 returned to school in 1985 for a degree in theology and ordination as a minister in the Assemblies of God Church. He has served churches in New Jersey and Delaware and does a prayer and education ministry with the Victory Fred Quick AG’53, GSNB’63 attended Christian Fellowship in New Castle, the annual Theta Chi reunion this past DE. Rev. Graboski’s eldest daughter September in Hellerstown, PA. He has has retired from the Air Force; his given up flying and has sold his airplane, middle daughter is an early childhood but he is still working, according to Class teacher; and his youngest is in the of 1953 correspondent Jim Van Vliet IT field, installing network printing ENG’53 of Center Valley, PA. systems. His wife died in 2009. This report comes from Class of 1967 Jay Kowalski AG’62 spent time with classmates at a meeting of the Varsity correspondent Mike Moran RC’67. R Letterwinners Association prior to Seth Goldsmith CC’74 is retired from the 2015 football homecoming game Dole Fresh and lives in Monterey, CA. against Kansas, according to Class of He reports that he has refurbished his 1962 correspondent Geoffrey Gould, home and recently attended a Grateful RC’62, GSE’66 ’74 of Vestal, NY. Dead concert in Santa Clara, CA. Rick
a Douglass student when they met at a campus dance. She dropped out but went on to graduate from Penn State “25 years and seven kids later.” This report comes from Class of 1952 correspondent Bob Comstock RC’52, of Redding, CT.
Sam Schlesinger AG’67 meets regularly in Bordentown, NJ, with fellow members of the Lamda Chi Alpha fraternity to reminisce about their time living in the Heights and share news of their latest activities, according to Class of 1966 correspondent Larry Benjamin RC’66 of Freehold, NJ.
Stier AG’74, class correspondent, reported that he and his family were honored this past September by the Rutgers University Alumni Association with a Legacy Award, which recognizes families with multiple generations of Rutgers graduates. His family history goes back to his grandfather, Wilhelm Rudolph Fuerchtgott Stier RC 1913, and continues with his niece, Charlotte
SCHO OL A BBR E V I AT IONS AG College of Agriculture . CC Cook College . CCAS Camden College of Arts and Sciences . CLAW School of Law–Camden DC Douglass College . ED School of Education . EJB Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy . ENG School of Engineering GSAPP Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology . GSC Graduate School–Camden . GSE Graduate School of Education GSM Graduate School of Management . GSN Graduate School–Newark . GSNB Graduate School–New Brunswick . LC Livingston College . MGSA Mason Gross School of the Arts . NCAS Newark College of Arts and Sciences . NLAW School of Law–Newark NUR College of Nursing . PHARM Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy . QC Queen’s College . RBS Rutgers Business School–Newark and New Brunswick . RC Rutgers College . RWJMS Robert Wood Johnson Medical School . SAS School of Arts and Sciences . SB School of Business . SBC School of Business–Camden . SC&I School of Communication and Information . SCILS School of Communication, Information and Library Studies . SCJ School of Criminal Justice . SEBS School of Environmental and Biological Sciences SMLR School of Management and Labor Relations . SNC School of Nursing–Camden . SPAA School of Public Affairs and Administration SPA School of Public Health . SSW School of Social Work . UCC University College–Camden . UCJC University College at Jersey City UCN University College–Newark . UCNB University College–New Brunswick . UCP University College at Paterson
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explorations
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Whitehead, who is in the Class of 2017. She followed her brother Edward Whitehead CC’11 to the university.
conservation and New England Cottontail habitat management.
John “Rusty” Gilbert Jr. CC’77 is general manager of technology deployment and adoption for Chevron’s technology venture company. J. Daniel Van Abs CC’77 joined the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences’ Department of Human Ecology, having retired in 2012 from New Jersey state government.
Vivian Baker CC’83 reports that she underwent a kidney transplant in February 2015 at New York Presbyterian University Hospital in New York City. She writes: “I was lucky to receive a living kidney donated by a coworker! Both he and I are doing very well. I urge all alums to consider becoming organ, eye, and/or tissue donors. It is very easy to do; simply sign up the next time you need to renew your driver’s license. The greatest gift you will ever give is the gift of life!”
Don Knezick CC’79, GSNB’84, president of Pinelands Nursery in Columbus, NJ, was honored with the Farmer-Rancher Pollinator Award by the North American Pollinator Protection Campaign of the National Association of Conservation Districts (NACD). Don was presented the award by NACD President Lee McDaniel and Victoria Wojcik, Ph.D., at an evening reception during the pollinator protection campaign’s annual conference at the Department of the Interior in Washington, DC. This annual award recognizes individuals who have contributed significantly to pollinator protection, conservation, and issue outreach resulting in increased awareness of the importance of pollinators and pollination within the agricultural community.
G. Joseph Pennucci CC’84 has been appointed chief probation officer of the Lynn, MA, District Court by Massachusetts Commissioner of Probation Edward J. Dolan. In his new role, he will manage the operations of the Lynn District Court Probation Department and a staff of 24, including two assistant chief probation officers, 14 probation officers, and support staff. His Rutgers degree is in business Start with a visit to 250.rutgers.edu economics. ✦ Discover Rutgers history ✦ Peruse the Rutgers timeline
Fernando De Aragon CC’80, GSNB’84 is the author of Dos Santos, a historical novel set in the first year of the Spanish colonization of Puerto Rico. The author lives in Ithaca, NY. To learn more about the novel, visit dossantosnovel.weebly.com. Laura Bishop CC’81 was appointed to the Rowan University College of Communication and Creative Arts advisory board. The board supports the college and its missions by offering counsel and assistance and advocating on the college’s behalf. She also was appointed to the American Red Cross Board of Directors, Southwestern Chapter, in Pennsauken, NJ.
Matthew Adams CC’04 is a partner in Fox Rothschild’s litigation practice group in the firm’s Roseland, NJ office. Greg Dahle GSNB’09 is a co-recipient of the International Society of Arboriculture’s Early-Career Scientist Award given to professionals showing exceptional promise in arboriculture research. He received his doctorate in ecology.
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Scott Ruhren CC’87, GSNB’98 has been director of conservation at the Audubon Society of Rhode Island for 11 years. In 2014 he received the Professional Conservationist of the Year award from the Southern Rhode Island Conservation District for work on projects in coastal marsh
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Download the Rutgers 250 mobile app and take a virtual historical tour of Rutgers’ three main locations, browse “Today in Rutgers’ History,” or keep track of Rutgers 250 events that interest you. To learn more about the 250th anniversary year, visit
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