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THE RESEARCH MAGAZINE OF BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY
The Genetics of Innocence DNA Forensics Sheds New Light On Criminal Evidence
“Greg was a huge help to Amanda’s lawyers in Italy. Without his work on this case, the truth might not have come out.” – Edda Mellas, whose daughter Amanda Knox was freed from an Italian prison after her murder conviction was overturned. Dr. Greg Hampikian and Amanda Knox
Powering The Future BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY
Game-based Learning
Amped Education
Student Ventures
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Features
THE RESEARCH MAGAZINE OF BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY
12 Game-based Learning A powerful new education platform, driven in part by Boise State research, explores how quest-based programs and virtual worlds can enhance student learning.
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Powering the Future From developing new sources for biofuels to assessing Idaho’s energy footprint and researching advanced materials for nuclear reactors, Boise State faculty are pursuing a wide range of energyrelated projects.
Amped Education Across the Boise State campus, research and teaching are integrated in classrooms, laboratories and fieldwork, strengthening the overall education of students and contributing to research endeavors in many fields of study.
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On the cover: Dr. Greg Hampikian, who has joint appointments in the departments of Biological Sciences and Criminal Justice, pursues diverse projects involving DNA. Cover photo by John Kelly Inset photo by Benjamin Hampikian
Boise State University Explore Magazine 2012 Vol. 4, No. 1
PRESIDENT Dr. Bob Kustra
EDITOR Janelle Brown
ASSOCIATE EDITOR Kathleen Tuck
VICE PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT/ EXECUTIVE EDITOR Dr. Mark Rudin
PHOTOGRAPHERS John Kelly Carrie Quinney
WRITERS Mike Journee Matt Pene Sherry Squires
DESIGNER Ann Hottinger
CONTRIBUTING WRITER Anna Webb
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Dr. Greg Hampikian reviews DNA profiles with graduate student Laura Wendell, a research assistant in his lab.
Cover Story
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The Genetics of Innocence and Guilt
Research Record Research on ways rural health care providers can tap medical resources via telecommunications; a study on how hawkmoths discourage predatory bats from hunting them; and an inquiry into the cultural influences in Japanese graphic design.
Student Ventures Boise State students are leveraging their research activities to make an impact far beyond the boundaries of campus, including setting a world speed record for a vegetable oil-powered vehicle, helping develop intellectual property, and publishing their findings in top journals.
34 In Print
Dr. Jill K. Gill’s new book explores the shifting powers of the Protestant left and the evangelical right during the Vietnam War era, plus a look at books on family politics and fragments of language as expressed through poetry.
DNA forensics is aiding criminal investigations by determining whether the evidence ties the accused to the crime. Dr. Greg Hampikian is an internationally recognized expert in this fast-evolving field who is conducting research on a number of fronts. He played a key role in the exoneration of Amanda Knox, the American college student convicted of the 2007 murder of her roommate in Perugia, Italy. Boise State University is Idaho’s metropolitan research university, located in the state’s population center and capital city. The university is the largest in Idaho, with nearly 20,000 students enrolled in its undergraduate, master’s and Ph.D. programs.
Explore, the research magazine
of Boise State University, is published by the Division of Research and Economic Development with support from the Office of Communications and Marketing. Explore is available online at http://boisestate.edu/research.
Member of: University Research Magazine Association Division of Research and Economic Development
Boise State University Albertsons Library Room 153 1910 University Drive Boise, ID 83725-1135 (208) 426-5732
Welcome
Ne ws Bri efs Japanese Graphic Art Provides Research Focus for International Program
A World Stage for DNA Forensics
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– DR. BOB KUSTRA, PRESIDENT
Francis’ efforts have brought Japanese artists and students to Boise for further cultural and artistic exchange. “I’ve always been very attracted to Japanese culture and the perfectionism in their art, how it is distilled into an elemental way of looking at things,” he said. “Most of our students have never had a foreign travel experience and there are so many benefits to that beyond seeing Japanese work. It expands their world.”
Professor John Francis
JOHN KELLY PHOTO
In the world of research, the impact of profound advances, exploration and discovery may not always be immediate. Often, the moment when the work of Boise State’s far-sighted researchers and experts becomes part of everyday life is well beyond the present horizon. But last fall, the sensational international case of Amanda Knox, the American student tried and convicted of killing her roommate while studying in Italy, put the immediate importance of one Boise State professor’s efforts on full display. Under the glare of an international media corps, Dr. Greg Hampikian disputed the evidence that led to the conviction of Knox and her co-defendant, Raffaele Sollecito. His work played a key role in an appeals process that resulted in their release. An internationally recognized expert in DNA forensics, Dr. Hampikian often makes a direct impact on our world with his work. The Knox case made headlines around the globe, but more importantly two innocent people were delivered from wrongful imprisonment, resurrecting the promise of their lives. Seldom does successful science and research provide such instant satisfaction, but its benefit is clear. That goal – making our lives and world better – is what’s behind each and every research initiative at Boise State.
A professor’s fascination with Japanese art has led to an ongoing international experience for students at Boise State. Graphic designer John Francis has visited Japan 10 times, probing the cultural and philosophical issues that shape and make Japanese graphic design unique. His research involves visiting galleries and museums, observing graphic design classrooms at Nagoya Zokei University in Nagoya, Japan, and interviewing native designers and artists. Francis discovered a country with extreme contrasts, where old culture meets modern ways, that perfectly aligned with his desire to create a short-term international study program. He developed a cooperative agreement with NZU and has taken more than 50 students and several fellow faculty members to Japan. Students spend two weeks investigating ancient and modern design by exploring temples and castles; touring museums featuring traditional Japanese crafts, modern art and animation; visiting publishing and industrial design complexes; and attending kimono shows. Boise State student and faculty work has been exhibited there, and
Julie McCreedy, a senior art major who studied in Japan with Francis in summer 2010, said the experience was profound. “It will benefit my creativity for many years to come,” she said. Added Francis: “All involved are energized about sharing one important form of communication that we have in common – the creation of art, which goes beyond any barriers of language.” – Sherry Squires
on
Research Record
Boise State R esearch
Seibert’s Telemedicine Research Improving Remote Medical Care
CARRIE QUINNEY PHOTO
Research into ways rural healthcare providers can tap big city medical resources via telecommunications is catching the attention of the medical community across the nation and internationally. Led by Dr. Pennie Seibert, a Boise State psychology professor and chief research scientist for Physician Research Services at Saint Alphonsus Health System, the research is exploring which types of patients and facilities benefit from having access to emergency specialty care consultations using a “remote presence system.” Dubbed the Emergency Specialist Program, the research includes determining how medical assessment and treatment changes with the use of the system and whether it is a feasible business model for hospitals and clinics. “Idaho’s rugged landscape and small remote communities make it a perfect proving ground for this technology,” said Seibert, whose work on the initiative is funded by the Department of Defense, which is interested in the research as a way to improve the medical care of military personnel based in remote areas of the world. “By examining the best use for this technology, we are helping bring specialized medical
Dr. Pennie Seibert, right, uses a robot to discuss a remote system with her research coordinator Jennifer Valerio, an undergraduate psychology and biology major. On the screen is Tiffany Whitmore, director of system planning and telemedicine at Saint Alphonsus Health System.
care and assessments to communities and places of the world that would otherwise go without.” As a full-time faculty member at Boise State, Seibert runs Physician Research Services at Saint Alphonsus and oversees research on telemedicine and a wide range of other medical conditions and concerns, including spinal surgery, brain tumors, stroke, movement disorders, pain, neuroradiology, trauma, sleep disorders, spasticity, cardiology, orthopedics and medical ethics.
The Emergency Specialist Program is just one of six telemedicine research initiatives being pursued by Seibert and Physician Research Services that include partnerships with 11 hospital networks across the West and the ongoing monitoring of nearly 1,500 patients. More than 175 Boise State psychology and biology students have taken research courses through Seibert’s office, most of whom have become medical professionals, clinicians and neuroscientists. – Mike Journee
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Three New Doctoral Programs Expand Research, Education Opportunities
Dr. Karthik Chinnathambi‘s research focuses on advanced materials for energy applications.
Three new doctoral programs at Boise State University were greenlighted during the past year by the Idaho State Board of Education and will enroll their first candidates in August 2012. The new programs include a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering, a Ph.D. in Biomolecular Sciences and an online doctorate in Educational Technology. “New doctorates like these are
essential to the advancement of Boise State’s growing research agenda as well as our efforts to prepare students with the advanced skills and qualifications required for rewarding careers in a number of key areas,” said Dr. Martin Schimpf, provost and vice president for academic affairs. “They open doors to new research opportunities and collaborations with partners in both the public and private sector here in Idaho and around the world.” EXPLORE—2012 | 3
Ne ws B r i e f s Researchers Work to Define, Measure Effective Special Education Teaching tive special education teachers help their students make big jumps in learning,” Johnson said. “But to identify those teachers, we first need to define ‘highly effective teaching.’ Then we can develop practical tools linked to student outcomes to measure it.” With practical tools in hand, the state can expand the pool of well-prepared teachers and retain effective teachers, she said. Semmelroth and Johnson plan to coordinate their research with similar projects on the national level and will work with ISDE, local schools and college programs that prepare special educators.
Dr. Evelyn Johnson
Vietnamese Ministry Awards Medal of Honor to Professor
Boise State University has a created a professional development project focused on strengthening leadership capacity in Idaho’s K-12 schools. The Idaho Leads Project will provide trustees, superintendents, principals and teachers across the state with support to become more effective leaders and create high-performing schools where all students succeed. Boise State’s Center for School Improvement & Policy Studies will head up the project. The center applied for and was awarded a $3.85 million grant from the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Foundation to fund the project over the next 18 months. Project co-directors are Dr. William Parrett, center director; Roger Quarles, assistant professor of Educational Leadership; Dr. Kathleen Budge, associate professor of Educational Leadership; and Lisa Kinnaman, director of National Improvement Support Dr. William H. Parrett for the center.
which involved delivering Boise State’s MBA to 84 participants, supporting more than 20 Vietnamese faculty Dr. Nancy Napier at the awards ceremony in Hanoi. in other master’s and doctoral Dr. Nancy Napier, a profesprograms around the world, and sor in the College of Business and helping to establish Vietnam’s first Economics, has been awarded international standard business Vietnam’s highest award for school in 1997. contributions to education in the Napier continues to return Southeast Asian country. periodically to Hanoi, where she The Vietnamese Ministry of conducts research, teaches at the Education and Training conferred NEU and works with several busithe Medal of Honor on Napier dur- ness organizations started by Boise ing a special ceremony in Hanoi, State MBAs. Her 2005 book, ManVietnam, honoring her long-time aging Relationships in Transition work there, particularly at the Economies draws from her experiNational Economics University. ences in Vietnam. Her latest book, From 1994-2003, Napier led Insight: Encouraging Aha Moments Boise State’s $8.5 million capacfor Organizational Success, has ity-building project at the NEU, been translated into Vietnamese.
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PHOTO COURTESY NANCY NAPIER
Boise State Center to Promote Stronger K-12 Leadership
CARRIE QUINNEY PHOTO
Two Boise State researchers are working to define the characteristics of highly effective special education teaching and create tools to measure it as a way to ensure special education students get the best possible teachers. Dr. Evelyn Johnson, associate professor, and Carrie Semmelroth, project coordinator in the Department of Special Education and Early Childhood Studies, are leading the three-year project called Recognizing Effective Special Education Teachers, or RESET. The research is funded by a $337,556 grant from the Idaho State Department of Education. “We know that highly effec-
Inside ‘Bat Cave,’ Biologist Studies Bats, Hawkmoths
CARRIE QUINNEY PHOTO
Research Record
With nearly 1,300 species of bats in the world to study, you could call Dr. Jesse Barber a regular “bat man” and his new research lab the “bat cave,” literally. The Boise State biologist has been studying bat behavior and evolution for nearly a decade, and now his research is about to soar to new heights. The National Science Foundation has awarded Barber more than $270,000 to study hawkmoths and certain noises they make to discourage predatory bats from hunting them. Hawkmoths, the common name of a widely distributed family of moths, include more than 1,000 species and are known for their rapid, sustained flying ability. “It’s basic science,” said Barber. “This study will attempt to answer how bats and hawkmoths evolved over time and what selective forces helped create the diversity in the species that we see today.” In a newly built research lab on campus, Barber and his team will study several different types of hawkmoths from around the world to determine the reasons behind the noises they make when they are being attacked by bats. The new lab has special features to lower the background sound level to perform as a recording studio. It also doubles as an imaging facility outfitted with multiple high-speed cameras for 3D reconstruc-
Dr. Jesse Barber utilizes a newly built lab with sound and imaging capabilities to study the noises hawkmoths make to discourage predatory bats from hunting them. A hawkmoth specimen is shown at left. tion of predator-prey battles. The Boise State researchers will pit lab-raised bats against hawkmoths to recreate these battles to see how and why hawkmoths discourage predatory bats from attacking. Researchers also will collect behavioral and genetic data to study the evolutionary relationship between bats and hawkmoths. Previous research by Barber has shown that other species of moths make noises to help jam the sonar of predatory bats and to convince the bats that they do not taste good. Barber believes that the same may hold true for hawkmoths; however, in this case, only the males make the noises. “Hawkmoths do not defend themselves chemically and the structure of the sound-producing organ varies greatly,” Barber said. “This raises the exciting prospect that these mechanisms are linked to multiple behavioral strategies, including defense and mating, and
that the hawkmoth’s ultrasonic reply to a bat attack has multiple independent evolutionary origins.” A primary goal of the collaborative project is the education of a postdoctoral research associate and a graduate student along with multiple undergraduate students. Barber also will introduce animal behavior into the university classroom by live video streaming of field expeditions, predator-prey experiments and molecular phylogenetics. “We are also pursuing plans to live video stream directly into some high school classrooms,” he said. “We also will produce and disseminate a video highlighting the scientific method exploiting the charisma of echolocating bats and one of the world’s largest and most striking groups of moths.” The study will take about four years to complete and will be the first to examine the interactions between bats and hawkmoths. – Matt Pene
State-Run Program Benefits Older Adults, Center’s Study Finds For the 40 percent of Idaho’s population living in rural areas, health care issues can present many challenges. This is particularly true for older adults, who may lack the skills to manage their chronic conditions such as arthritis and heart disease or communicate effectively with doctors. Research findings from the Center for the Study of Aging at Boise State show that those who participated in Stanford
University’s chronic disease self-management program, a state-run program known as Living Well in Idaho, had significant positive changes in their health status and improved communication with physicians. The study population included adults over age 65 who resided in rural areas, suffered from at least one chronic condition, and overall had lower incomes. “Participating in Living Well in Idaho
empowered these Idahoans. They had a better understanding of their disease condition and were able to talk more Dr. Sarah Toevs effectively with their physicians,” said Dr. Sarah Toevs, director of the Center for the Study of Aging. “The takeaway is that community-based health programs can make a positive difference.” EXPLORE—2012 | 5
Greg Hampikian and his research team, including Mike Davis (M.S. Biology, ’10), pursue a diverse range of DNA projects.
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Genetics and Judgment Story by Sherry Squires
How DNA Forensics is Helping Convict the Guilty and Free the Innocent
Dr. Greg Hampikian is tucked away at his computer in a corner of his lab, poring over DNA graphs that resemble heart-rate readouts.
JOHN KELLY PHOTO
Incubators hold flasks of human cancer cells suspended in brightly colored liquids, and magnetic fluids forming what look like metallic sea cucumbers float in a plastic box nearby. Hampikian, along with his students and collaborators, works on diverse DNA projects, including developing new cancer drugs, discovering new species of single-celled organisms in Idaho, studying Basque sex chromosomes and inventing micro devices. But for much of the past year, he also has volunteered his time, expertise and passion to a criminal case that grabbed headlines around the world. An internationally recognized expert in DNA forensics, Hampikian played
a high-profile role in the exoneration last October of Amanda Knox, the American student tried and convicted of killing her roommate in 2007 while living and studying in Perugia, Italy. Knox spent almost four years in an Italian prison before being freed following a highly publicized appeal in which her lawyers successfully argued that the DNA evidence tying Knox to the crime scene was suspect. “I love everything we do in the lab, it’s all incredibly creative and challenging,” said Hampikian, who has
Key evidence in the Knox trial was the victim’s DNA found on a knife, shown as spikes in the above chart. The only evidence tying Knox to the crime, the DNA levels were well below the minimum generally considered reliable. a joint appointment in the departments of Biological Sciences and Criminal Justice. “But with things like cancer research, there aren’t as many breakthroughs. To see science play out in such a human way, to help liberate someone who is wrongly accused, is just thrilling.” EXPLORE—2012 | 7
The Role of DNA
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JOHN KELLY PHOTO
JOHN KELLY PHOTO
Working with scientists in Italy, Hampikian provided scientific analysis that showed the DNA evidence implicating Knox was not reliable. Along with demonstrating how lapses in the collection of evidence from the crime scene could have resulted in DNA contamination, Hampikian also argued that the amount of the victim’s DNA found on a kitchen knife – the only evidence tying Knox to the crime scene – was so miniscule that it would be disregarded by the FBI and other forensics labs. The incriminating DNA, Hampikian said, was almost certainly the result of unintended transfer. Hampikian points to the charts of DNA profiles, Hampikian examines called electropherograms, a plastic bag contain- on his computer screen (shown on page 7): ing magnetic fluids “Here is the minimum that may hold potenamount of DNA that we tial for future research consider reliable. We applications. don’t accept anything that
drops below 150 as conclusive evidence because anything below has not been validated,” he said, pointing to the mid-range of a fluctuation. “And here,” he said, moving his hand to the bottom of the screen, “is where the victim’s DNA shows up on the knife blade – when you drop below 120.” Basically, the Italian authorities kept analyzing on a smaller and smaller scale, far below levels accepted by most labs including the FBI, until they found a miniscule amount of the victim’s DNA on the knife, Hampikian explained. “It’s like trying to use your car speedometer to measure how fast a toddler is crawling. I doubt that you could validate that approach. We asked the Italian laboratory in this case to show us their validation for such small amounts of DNA, but they never supplied it,” he said. Hampikian’s ability to clearly explain the basics of DNA forensics and his contribution to Knox’s case made him a sought-after guest on national news shows. He was flooded with media requests and appeared on CNN, Good Morning America, Nightline and other outlets, and gave well-attended presentations to Boise State faculty and to the community. Hampikian also developed a personal friendship with the Knox family, conferring with Knox’s stepdad Chris Mel-
las by telephone during the appeals process and spending Thanksgiving with Knox and her family at their home in Seattle. “Greg was a huge help to Amanda’s lawyers in Italy,” said Edda Mellas, Knox’s mother. “Without his work on this case, the truth might not have come out and two innocent people could still be locked up. (Knox’s thenboyfriend Raffaele Sollecito also was convicted and later exonerated.) “Thank goodness Greg and his project are out there working for justice, especially for people who cannot afford to hire DNA experts,” Mellas added. Enough time has passed since the Knox verdict for Hampikian to reflect on the experience and the future of DNA forensics to impact criminal cases and scientific discovery. “It’s a terrible thing to be innocent and accused of a crime, let alone convicted,” he said. “Most of the time I think that juries get it right, but not always; and with 2.3 million Americans behind bars, even a small error rate will keep me busy for the rest of my life.”
A Strong Conviction Hampikian completed his Ph.D. program in 1990, about the time DNA forensic science was developing. Three of his fellow graduate students from Linda Strausbaugh’s fruit fly laboratory Idaho Innocence Project members discuss a case. From left are Nora Staum, Matt Gordon, Gloria Wilson, Angel O’Brien, Greg Hampikian and Rick Visser.
at the University of Connecticut went into forensics; Hampikian won a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellowship and went to Australia to work on marsupial sex determination. At that time scientists had no way to tell if a single cell belonged to a male or female, and he was working to develop specific markers on the Y chromosome – unique to males – to make sex determination possible from DNA. Crime labs grew increasingly interested in appropriating this new knowledge and began asking Hampikian for help analyzing DNA collected at crimes scenes. Nine years later, while working at Clayton State College in Georgia, he met the first Georgian to be exonerated by DNA evidence. Calvin Johnson Jr. had been convicted for two rapes close to the campus and served 17 years in prison before a new look at DNA evidence freed him. Hampikian wrote Exit to Freedom with Johnson, which tells the story of Johnson’s exoneration, and helped start the Georgia Innocence Project. “The work that Greg is doing is life changing, both for the individual who is exonerated and given an opportunity to live again, and for each person close to that individual who has suffered, too, all those years,” Johnson said. “Dr. Hampikian and I came together as two human beings with a common cause, to help educate the world by my experience.” Hampikian arrived at Boise State in 2004 and began serving as volunteer director of the Idaho Innocence Project two years later. The nonprofit offers free investigative help to the wrongfully convicted, assisting those in
Idaho and beyond. Thus far Hampikian and the project team have helped free 10 innocent prisoners and used DNA to lead investigators to the real perpetrators, in some cases decades after the crime. “Greg is a brilliant scientist and a great communicator, whose work is characterized by a relentless pursuit of the truth and exemplified by his involvement in the innocence movement,” said Boise attorney David Nevin, who works with Hampikian on Idaho Innocence Project cases.
The Knox Case In 2009, while in England for his son’s wedding, Hampikian gave a talk to lawyers on controversial DNA techniques where extremely low levels of DNA were being presented as evidence. After his talk, Hampikian was asked by a barrister if he would like to take a look at a London lowlevel DNA case dating back 30 years. He visited the crime lab where he was told he also should research a similar Italian case involving low-level DNA. That case had filled
the British tabloids, which referred to one of the defendants as “Foxy Knoxy.” The key piece of evidence implicating her was the victim’s DNA on a kitchen knife. That defendant was Amanda Knox, and after studying the evidence in her case, Hampikian was convinced she had been wrongly accused. Her trial was already under way when he began working with her defense team. He traveled to Rome and Perugia, met with the lawyers to go over evidence, watched videos of the evidence collection, performed a complete analysis of the DNA, and issued an independent report. Despite defense efforts, Knox was found guilty. “When Amanda was convicted, we went back to square one, to prepare for the appeal,” Hampikian said. Key was to show the Italian jury that the victim’s DNA found on the kitchen knife blade didn’t link Knox to the crime scene. To demonstrate how DNA can be inadvertently transferred – something that Hampkian believed had happened in the
Hampikian appeared on a number of national news programs during the Knox appeal, including several interviews on CNN. Above image from CNN.com, Oct. 3, 2011. All rights reserved. Used by permission and protected by the Copyright Laws of the United States. The printing, copying, redistribution, or retransmission of this Content without express written permission is prohibited.
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Hampikian explains the role DNA evidence played in the Knox case during one of several wellattended presentations he gave following Knox’s release.
Knox case – he conducted an experiment utilizing his lab staff and students and employees in the College of Arts and Sciences dean’s office at Boise State. They became part of a mock crime scene where the evidence consisted of soda cans and knives (still in the package) from a dollar store. The employees drank from the cans, and then lab workers collected the evidence. Hampikian asked the lab to do what he had seen in the Italian crime scene
videos and change gloves after every other piece of evidence. So, his research assistants put on fresh gloves, collected one can and put it in an evidence bag, and then walked to a separate room, unwrapped a new knife and placed it in another evidence bag. They then changed gloves and repeated the process for a total of five cans and five knives. The results of Hampikian’s Boise State experiment were telling: When the five knives were analyzed using the validated instrument cutoff, no DNA contamination was found. But when the level was dropped to that used by the Italian lab to implicate Knox, one of the five knives showed a staff member ’s DNA – despite the fact that the staff member had never touched the knife. Hampikian shared the results of his Boise State experiment with Knox’s defense team. In the apJOHN KELLY PHOTO
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Samples are prepared for DNA analysis in Hampikian’s lab.
peal, the judge appointed his own two Italian experts, whose findings aligned with Hampikian’s. The DNA analysis was the lynchpin evidence that led to the guilty verdict being overturned and Knox regaining her freedom. While the dramatic reversal was certainly a victory for Knox and her family, it also opened the door for Hampikian to teach about DNA forensics – what the science can and can’t do. Rarely does a scientist get a national stage like Hampikian has. “The great thing about her case is that people were paying attention,” he said.
A BANNER YEAR Hampikian’s lab has published nine peer-reviewed papers during the past year that cover many of his diverse interests, such as what level of DNA is necessary to establish identity and guilt (a key issue in the Knox case), African Swine Fever, and the discovery of new single celled species in Idaho. His lab also is the first to publish papers on the spread of Basque male and female DNA overseas, studies that offer new insights about human migration patterns. Hampikian’s forensic research is the first to document subjectivity and bias in forensic DNA interpretation of actual case data. Published in the United Kingdom’s Science and Justice journal, a recent study looked at “mixed” DNA samples – those taken from a crime scene that contain both the victim’s DNA and DNA from one or more suspects. Hampikian based his research on a sexual assault case in Georgia in which he concluded that the analysis
everything we do in the lab. Forensic DNA is just a great way to teach science,” he said. Aimee Maxwell, attorney and executive director of the Atlanta Innocence Project, said Hampikian has had a hand in all 35 of the cases the Atlantabased organization has taken on, serving as their authoritative DNA expert. “Greg also is having an enormous impact on the criminal justice system by educating trial lawyers on how to handle DNA evidence and keep innocent people out of prison to begin with,” she said. “He has this knowledge that very few people have and he is so generous about sharing it.”
A Battleground Through his work with the Idaho Innocence Project, Hampikian receives about 100 letters a year from prisoners who claim to be innocent. He accepts about a dozen cases where the DNA evidence begs another look. These cases may not garner the worldwide attention afforded Amanda Knox, but Hampikian believes they are no less important. As DNA forensics technologies continue to advance, so too do opportunities to seek justice for those wrongfully convicted. “My work with the Idaho Innocence Project shows the importance of science, that science seeks truth, that the goal of science is to empirically and experimentally determine the truth. “Anytime there is a new science, there’s going to be abuses of that science, so we have to have a good testing ground and a battleground for every new use of that science,” he said. “My lab has done some work in opening up the debate, and it’s exciting to be part of it.”
DNA Forensics 101 DNA is the information code that makes us who we are. It determines everything from eye color to cancer susceptibility, and can be a powerful truth-teller in revealing who was present at a crime scene. || || | The most complete forensic DNA profiling relies on a measurement of the 13 short tandem repeats (STRs) in a person’s genetic code. The likelihood that a full DNA profile will coincidentally match a person is one in quadrillions, making it highly reliable evidence in criminal cases. The profile also can be compared with those stored in state and national databases of convicted offenders and crime scene samples to identify or link “cold case” perpetrators and evidence.
|| || | When an evidence sample contains mostly DNA from a female victim, and little from a male attacker, scientists can rely on Y Chromosome Y-chromosome analysis. Only males have the Y chromosome, and the male DNA can be copied and amplified to help identify a suspect. However, this is not as statistically powerful as STR analysis, and cannot be used to search the criminal X Chromosome database for a “cold hit.” The odds of a coincidental match are about 1 in 2,000, and brothers, fathers, sons and other direct male relatives share identical Y chromosome profiles.
|| || | Mitochondrial DNA, which is passed on from our mothers, is the longest lasting of all DNA and can remain intact long after other DNA has degraded, sometimes for thousands of years. It is found inside buried bones and broken hairs, and is great for studying long-term human history. Hampikian’s lab has used it to study the Basque migration to Idaho, and to help police investigators work on crimes committed long ago.
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of a mixed DNA sample from the crime scene should have excluded a suspect, but confusion on the part of the jury led to his conviction. His work on the case has been featured in New Scientist magazine and on Fox News, and the case in question is now scheduled for a court hearing. Another study, published in the annual review of Genomics and Human Genetics, is the first review of the DNA results used to free 194 wrongfully convicted Americans during the past several years. Working with colleagues at the Innocence Project in New York, Hampikian explored how the criminal justice system, particularly by offering deals to witnesses, can encourage false testimony and imprison innocent people. Hampikian also is developing new technologies to improve DNA sampling profiling, develop molecular barcodes, and transduce energy from vibration to electricity. He leads a team, along with Dr. Peter Müllner, a materials science and engineering professor, that is developing a micropump that can be used in a “lab on a chip” to help streamline DNA gathering and testing procedures. He and Müllner hold one issued patent and another patent application has been filed related to these collaborations. Hampikian trains hundreds of police officers, attorneys, coroners and crime lab technicians in forensic DNA analysis each year. He offers undergraduate and graduate courses in cold case evidence and forensic biology at Boise State, and helped develop a series of forensic science activities that can be used to teach basic scientific concepts to school children at all levels. “I’m still in love with the beginning biology texts and
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Quest
But what if your entire classroom experience drew upon the trick that made your favorite grade school teacher a cut above the rest? What if her ability to make learning more like a game was incorporated into the very fabric of the classroom experience? A new movement afoot in education circles called game-based or quest-based education is doing just that. Driven in part by Boise State research, the method allows teachers to link any subject or topic to the modern student’s familiarity with online games and provide alternatives to students who may not respond well to traditional classroom settings and methods. Dr. Lisa Dawley is an educational technology professor who is a leading national expert on questbased and virtual learning environments. She, along with Chris Haskell, a lecturer in the Department of Educational Technology, is exploring how gamebased learning, virtual worlds and simulations populated by student online identities called avatars can be meshed with traditional curriculum and modern education standards. “Many people are talking about gameplay as a new form of literacy – as a new way to think and process information,” Dawley said. “Ninety-seven percent of today’s teens are gamers or have played online games. For them the classroom setting is the only context where they have to sit in a room for an hour and take notes. It’s really out of context for their overall life experience. But gaming, they understand that.” Together, Dawley and Haskell developed and are refining an online gaming, quest-based learning platform called 3D GameLab where assignments become “quests,” success is rewarded with experience points, badges and achievements (called “leveling-up”) and grades become point totals. It is an environment that would be familiar to any “gamer” – an avid online game player – or anyone who has engaged in multiplayer online role-playing quest games like the popular “World of Warcraft.” 12 | BOISESTATE.EDU
SCREEN SHOT COURTESY LISA DAWLEY/JOHN KELLY PHOTO
Everyone knows that learning should be fun. Just as equally, everyone knows that school lessons are often a chore.
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Story by MIKE JOURNEE
Online Gaming Platform Shifts Thinking About Learning
Dr. Lisa Dawley is a national expert on quest-based and virtual learning environments.
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Classroom A: In a Boise State classroom, educational technology lecturer Chris Haskell, left, discusses an assignment with undergraduate English major Jesse Oliver.
ment of new classroom technology systems like 3D GameLab, which is being examined for its potential for licensing or commercialization by the university. Also, a new all-online doctoral degree in educational technology, which will host its first full cohort this fall, will add momentum and depth to Dawley’s research as a new level of graduate students takes their own research cues from her work. “This isn’t just teaching online, it’s increasing learner engagement and performance outcomes using technology,” Dawley said. “Our early research is showing that, on average, students
“This isn’t just teaching online, it’s increasing learner engagement and performance outcomes using technology.” – Dr. Lisa Dawley heart of an innovative and completely self-sustaining Educational Technology Department at Boise State. The department, which Dawley chaired until she took a recent sabbatical to focus on 3D GameLab, receives no funding from the university or state. Rather, it relies on student tuition and non-traditional revenue streams, including the develop14 | BOISESTATE.EDU
complete more work, obtain higher grades and have increased motivation in this learning platform compared to traditional classrooms. This technology could be put to use in just about any topic or subject you can think of, and can be used to address motivational issues which are the core cause of high school and college drop-outs.”
COURTESY LISA DAWLEY
Dawley’s work to make 3D GameLab a vehicle for converting traditional curriculum to a web-based quest format is driving innovation in that field across the country, according to national experts. But what really sets her work apart is her research on how both students and teachers interact with this technology. “Whether it is a deeper understanding of professional development for K-12 virtual schooling, or a study on the importance of virtual educational environments, Dr. Dawley’s work pushes our national research agenda forward,” said Dr. Rick Ferdig, a research professor at Kent State University’s Research Center for Educational Technology. “Boise State’s work on the 3D GameLab is allowing educators and researchers the opportunity to explore the use of quest-based learning, moving us beyond just the typical theoretical exercises.” Dawley and Haskell’s work has been featured in publications like eSchool News, Converge Magazine and the Seattle Times. Their research also is at the
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Research with National Impact
Chris Haskell and Lisa Dawley meet online to discuss their work.
A Personal Path to Learning
The single most important element that 3D GameLab infuses into the curriculum is student choice. In traditional classroom situations, the path forward is mapped out in detail far in advance and progress is measured incrementally while everyone works on the same assignment at the same time. There are few, if any, options for students to pursue individual interests within the curriculum and those who fall behind become locked in an endless game of “catch-up” or fail. In a quest-based learning environment, students choose their own personal path and pace to the class’s completion, with guidance and facilitation from the instructor. Along the way, students can earn awards, badges and achievements for things like helping classmates,
E N V I R O N M E N T S Classroom B: In a virtual environment in Second Life, Dr. Lisa Dawley teaches an interactive course to online students gathered around a “campfire.”
completing especially challenging quests or completing a series of quests quickly. Quest by quest and at a pace of their choosing, students select their own paths through the class curriculum until they have enough experience points to earn the grade they want. (More about quests is on page 17.) For the uninitiated, the whole experience may sound completely out of context – or even intimidating. That’s the biggest hurdle for convincing teachers to explore this strange, new world. But through summer workshops for inservice teachers, Dawley and Haskell have found that 3D GameLab’s ins and outs are intuitive enough for anyone familiar with a computer to easily master.
Tackling a New Approach “We’ve had all types of people take part and you might imagine that their comfort level with something like this would be generational, but it is not age related at all. It’s more related to personality traits,” said Dawley. “We’ve found that early adopters are learners who enjoy seeking out new things, are willing to be challenged and have a level of comfort with being frustrated as they pursue a new challenge.”
COURTESY LISA DAWLEY
COURTESY LISA DAWLEY
“I am a very goal-oriented person,” said Weathers. “If I see a goal in front of me, I try to reach it as fast and as well as I can.” While Weathers’ speed in completing the course is unusual, Haskell says it points to the platform’s ability to accommodate students of varying abilities. “Failure and mistakes are acceptable because they are part of a larger learning process and dialogue between the teacher and student,” Haskell said. “If something is not correct, it gets addressed. When corrected, the student gets full value without penalty.”
A ‘Low-Stakes’ Advantage Lisa Dawley uses her avatar to facilitate and participate in quests. Bob Kahn, an eighth-grade science teacher at Brentwood School, a private school in the Los Angeles area, had no online gaming experience when he signed up for Dawley and Haskell’s summer workshop. “It’s been paradigm shifting for me,” said Kahn, who hopes to gradually move most of his curriculum over to a 3D GameLab format. “My kids love the game aspect. And those who move more quickly are eager to help the others and show off what level they are on or what awards they earned. It’s really blown up my thinking as a teacher.” Jessica Weathers, a sophomore theatre arts major in one of Haskell’s educational technology classes last fall, said the ability to move quickly through the material allowed her to put that class aside for the semester and focus on the classes in her major. She finished the entire semester’s worth of course curriculum in just three weeks.
This “low-stakes failure” aspect of quest-based learning is especially attractive to Dr. Suzanne Waldenberger, an associate professor of visual, performing and liberal arts at Yavapai College in Prescott, Ariz. “When you fail at a game, it’s OK,” Waldenberger said. “That’s what makes learning games so fun. And rather than hand out a bad grade, as a teacher I can say, ‘No, what I want to see is this, this and this. Go try it again. Initially I was shocked at how much I was sending back to my students. But since there’s no bad grade attached and no artificial deadline to get it right, they usually figure it out and move on.” Waldenberger also had no experience with quest-based online gaming before she took the Boise State summer workshop. She now is rapidly converting her curriculum into the 3D GameLab format. “It’s funny, but my students seem to be giving me a lot more positive feedback, even on assignments that didn’t seem all that popular before,” Waldenberger said. EXPLORE—2012 | 15
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COURTESY LISA DAWLEY
COURTESY LISA DAWLEY
Quest-based learning may also include chat rooms, websites and other interactive tools.
For example, one assignment (now a quest) in her popular culture class asks students to list five fads and five trends, and then explain their choices in a sentence or two. She’s used a variation of that assignment for years, she said, but this year she received a lot of positive feedback about it from the students. She attributes the change not only to the assignment’s designation as a quest or game, but also to student opinions about the quest that are actively sought through the software and students who may not enjoy such a quest being able to skip it and choose another. That ability to make your own choice as a student is key, she said. “It pulls you forward through the curriculum, rather than pushing you forward,” Waldenberger said, adding that she’s looking at it as both a teacher and as a student in the summer workshop. “It makes you really curious about what’s around the next corner. Yet, it’s just a different way of organizing and presenting the same material.”
A Focus on Exploration Student feedback and the teacher ’s ability to listen to it and react appropriately are extraordinarily important to success in using the tool and can make the student experience especially rewarding. 16 | BOISESTATE.EDU
A Skype connection allows students who live hundreds of miles apart to easily “meet” face to face. “The point of this is to give students academic freedom to seek out their interests,” Haskell said. “The danger comes when teachers put themselves on an island and expect they’ll be the font of all knowledge for their students. It’s just not compatible with this model and creates frustration for everyone.” Accepting feedback also is central to Dawley’s and Haskell’s ongoing development of 3D GameLab. The
mathematical learning models and design a system to help inform teachers and students when they are on the right path, and make suggestions along the way to improve their learning experiences.” While the concept of making learning fun is an old one, Dawley and Haskell are pursing it with new ideas, new technology and a new approach that is making the educational technology world sit up and take notice. “Those who do not know (Dawley) personally have read her work; those who do know her personally have sought her out and chosen to work with her because of her educational expertise, her core research agenda and her vision,” said Kent State’s Ferdig. Creating technology that makes it possible to bring quest-based learning into practically any classroom is just the beginning. Making that technol-
“The point of this is to give students academic freedom to seek out their interests.” – Chris Haskell summer workshops and undergraduate classes are a gold mine of data on how students and teachers interact with the software, which Dawley and Haskell use to make refinements to the software. “We are using the data and text mining to create an intelligent learning technology that tracks, monitors and logs every behavior,” said Dawley. “When we sort through the data sets we find what leads to success and what leads to failure. Using that knowledge, we can create predictive
ogy accessible not only to students, but also to the teacher is the real key to the success of 3D GameLab. “As our society increasingly uses interactive digital media, both at work and in play, understanding the strengths and limits of these media is vital,” said Dr. Chris Dede, the Wirth Professor of Learning Technologies at Harvard University, in a recent endorsement of Dawley and the research. “Thus, her work is very important for the evolution and transformation of education.”
What is a Quest? In the simplest terms, a quest in a quest-based class is an assignment. Just as in any class, the assignment forms the centerpiece activity for learning the subject matter. But unlike a traditional class, a game- or quest-based class in 3D GameLab allows students to choose the assignments that seem most interesting to them at the time, and engages each student by asking them to “do” something.
FOR EXAMPLE:
A student in a quest-based American history class that is studying the Civil War may find a selection of three quests waiting for her when she logs into the class from her computer:
QUESTS – LEVEL ONE [ 1 ] Listen to a 20-minute podcast lecture from your instructor on the role Abraham Lincoln’s election played in starting the Civil War. 3D Game Lab is the interface students use to access their accounts and find quests.
[ 2 ] Watch an audiovisual slideshow featuring photographs of Civil War scenes and an actor reading the Gettysburg Address, research the speech and write a 150-word analysis.
ing.” This student really does not enjoy working with others, so the third quest is not an option, despite the 75 experican earn and comments and ratings pro- ence points it offers and the glowing reviews of other students. vided by other students, including how The student clicks on the second long it took them to complete the quest. quest, which is worth 40 points. It takes Each quest also is listed in the “Civil War her to a new screen that includes a and Reconstruction” category. window where the slideshow, which the Let’s say this student’s main priorteacher found on YouTube, is embedity today is to make as much progress as ded. Below that there’s another window possible toward the for a four-minute video 300 experience points podcast of the teacher she must earn in the providing context and “Civil War and Reconother background on the struction” category to speech, as well as other “level-up” or move on possible sources of into the “Gilded Age” formation. There also is a category of the class. text window beneath the In previous weeks, she slideshow for writing the completed the “Coloshort essay. nial,” “Revolutionary The student clicks on Badges and awards Era” and “Exploring the the slideshow and watches show achievements West” categories to it. Surprised at its brevreach her current level. and milestones. ity, she watches it again, Also on her mind is the then moves on to the teacher’s video 1,250 experience points (out of 1,500 podcast and looks over the other webpoints possible for the entire class) she based sources he recommends. Feeling needs to make an A in the class. confident of her grasp of the topic, she The student rejects the first quest types her essay in the window provided because it is worth only 20 experience and clicks the “Complete Quest” button. points and some of the comments from other students said the lecture was “bor- A new screen comes up asking her to rate
Each quest includes an associated number of experience points the student
[ 3 ] With a classmate, study and discuss Lincoln’s plan for reincorporating the South back into the Union (called Reconstruction) after the war.
the quest and make comments about it, which her fellow students can use to help their own quest selections or the teacher can use to tweak the quest, if necessary. Once her comments are entered, the student is returned to the quest selection screen where she sees that it took her 35 minutes to complete the quest; also she has the option of selecting one of the two remaining quests she already passed over or choosing one of two new quests, shown below, that build on the work she just did.
QUESTS – LEVEL TWO
[ 1 ] Explore why the Battle of Gettysburg happened at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
[ 2 ] Take a video tour of Gettysburg National Military Park
She also may choose to log out and continue another day. When a student completes a quest, the GameLab platform notifies the teacher, who can then look over the student’s work and award the quest’s fixed experience point value. Or, if necessary, the teacher tells the student that she missed the mark and may want to do the quest again, or select a different one altogether. EXPLORE—2012 | 17
It may be smelly and gooey, but cow manure has its upside. Dr. Kevin Feris regards this inevitable byproduct of large-scale dairy farms as a research opportunity in the making, one with the potential for far-reaching environmental and economic benefits.
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Feris, an associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, is the Boise State lead investigator on a collaborative project to develop novel strategies for processing and treating dairy waste. His research addresses two pressing issues: reducing greenhouse gas emissions linked to climate change, and developing domestic sources for jet and diesel fuel that are carbon neutral, meaning their production doesn’t increase the net carbon released into the atmosphere. “Animal waste from dairy farms accounts for two and a half percent of all greenhouse gases emitted in
the U.S. That doesn’t sound like a lot, but it makes dairies one of the largest industry sources of these gases,” said Feris. “And methane, the gas released by decomposing cow manure, is 23 times more effective Dr. Kevin Feris is growing algae in manure at trapping heat in slurry, left photo, as a possible source the atmosphere than material for biofuels. carbon dioxide. So waste management is a big deal for agriculture.” graduate student Feris is conducting studying at Boise State, and unstudies that could give dergraduate Benjamin Cragin, are dairies an environmengrowing algae in liquid manure tally friendly tool for inside large beakers. The algae, a processing animal waste scrim of brilliant green atop the while also providing thick brownish liquid, feed on the them with an additional phosphorus and nitrogen in the revenue stream. manure, absorbing it to grow. If Inside his Boise State lab, Feris successful, the small-scale experiand his students, including Maxments could help lead to the develine Prior, a University of Idaho opment of large-scale algae farms
POWERING THE F U T U R E
Story by JANELLE BROWN
Boise State Researchers Address Energy Challenges
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that use manure slurry as a growth medium, storing carbon in the plants and reducing the greenhouse gas footprint of dairies and other animal waste management systems. At the same time, the algae are being evaluated by Feris and his team for their potential as a source material for the development of aviation and diesel biofuels, an advance that could generate new income for dairy farmers, reduce overall green-
house gas emissions and provide military and civilian customers with a reliable U.S.-based biofuel source for diesel trucks and airplanes. “The research itself is intriguing, but it’s the potential applications that really capture the imagination,” said Feris, who first got interested in bioremediation and biofuels after witnessing the destruction caused by the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska’s Prince William Sound.
Meeting the Energy Challenge Feris’s research is supported by the Center for Advanced Energy Studies, a consortium that includes the state’s three research universities and the Idaho National Laboratory. It is one of a number of initiatives at Boise State with connections to CAES, and part of an even larger number of Boise State programs across many disciplines EXPLORE—2012 | 19
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The CAES Energy Efficiency Research Institute is focused on “energy effectiveness” and is directed by Dr. John Gardner.
that are focused on various aspects of energy development, energy use and energy policy. “The energy future of Idaho, our region and the nation is of great concern and interest, and Boise State faculty are contributing knowledge and innovations through energy-related research,” said Dr. Mark Rudin, vice president for research and economic development. “Our researchers have developed expertise in key areas that is of increasing value as we confront complex questions around energy development and use.” At Boise State, faculty in disciplines ranging from materials science, mechanical engineering, geosciences and biological sciences to community and regional planning and public policy and administration are pursuing collaborative projects. Some programs, such as Feris’s CAES-funded algae research, bring 20 | BOISESTATE.EDU
together experts from institutions here in Idaho, while others involve collaborations with top research universities from across the country and around the world. “A multidisciplinary approach is crucial, first of all because the issues are complex, but also because there are so many stakeholders,” said Dr. John Gardner, director of the CAES Energy Efficiency Research Institute and a professor of mechanical and biomedical engineering. “Energy issues affect us all.”
Evaluating Energy ‘Effectiveness’ As director of CEERI, one of three CAES programs led by Boise State faculty, Gardner is in the business of what he terms “energy effectiveness” – looking beyond mere efficiency to consider the core efficacies of energy
use. He’s coined the slogan “Valuing Energy More than it Costs” to describe CEERI’s mission. “The price tag for energy often doesn’t accurately reflect its impact on the economy or the environment,” Gardner explained. “By using energy more effectively, we can move toward a more sustainable energy model that benefits everyone.” With a new $1.5 million grant from the Department of Energy to establish an Industrial Assessment Center in Idaho – one of only 24 in the nation – CEERI is poised to make a major impact in addressing energy issues in the state while also training Idaho students for promising careers. “This industrial efficiency training program opens the door to good jobs in a growing, global sector for thousands of energy-savvy students while promoting real, boots-on-theground progress toward our transition to a clean energy economy,” said U.S. Energy Secretary Dr. Steven Chu in announcing the DOE grant. The new CEERI center is tasked with assessing the energy efficiency of Idaho industries and developing strategies to help them improve. Students at Boise State and other Idaho universities are hired and trained to conduct the assessments, which involve such tasks as evaluating boiler systems, industrial lighting, blower fans and air filtration systems and identifying where unnecessary energy is being expended and how that can be remedied. “For industries, the energy cost is oftentimes small compared to other costs so energy efficiency isn’t a priority,” Gardner said. “If they get a little help, however, they are responsive to making changes, and that’s exactly what this program provides.” The Industrial Assessment Center is just one of a number of CEERI programs Gardner is leading. Another DOE-funded program looks at residential electrical energy use. Home monitoring devices were installed recently in a group of Boise homes by Boise State students, and are being monitored to determine how construction methods affect energy efficiency over time.
Mechanical engineering senior David Manthey is among students involved in the project. “It really pays to do a comprehensive study of home energy usage and look where people may not be looking, such as duct work in crawl spaces,” he said.
Assessing the ‘Built Environment’
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people to park their cars and ride bicycles. “I see energy use in terms of communities being sustainable,” said Mason, Dr. David Solan, director of the CAES Energy Just as the energy efficiency of who has joint apPolicy Institute, and graduate student Rebecca residential and commercial buildings pointments in Jacobsen review the first-ever energy “state of the impacts a city’s energy footprint, so political science and state” report, which will be released later this year. does the overall “built environment” in public policy and – the buildings, streets, pathways and administration and share facilities to meet the needs of other structures that influence the de- is interim director of the regional their constituencies. The study is cisions people make about transporand community planning master ’s part of Central District Health efforts tation, leisure activities and where program. “There is no way you can to obtain funding to construct the they live. plan a community without considbike share facilities in the Boise area, Dr. Susan Mason studies the built ering energy.” including bicycles equipped with environment to address a number Mason, along with Dr. Thomas of energy-related issues, including Wuerzer, a public policy and admin- GPS tracking devices that could be utilized by Mason and other Boise how to best encourage green building istration professor, and graduate practices, how citizen participation student Riley Youngerman, is work- State faculty to study how changes in affects transportation planning and ing with the Central District Health the built environment encourage or discourage people from cycling. That choices and how to encourage more Department on a location analysis in turn could provide data to help study to determine where cities make planning decisions that to site bicycle share faencourage alternative transportation. cilities in the downtown Mason understands how critical Boise area. The goal is to effective planning is, regardless of determine where bicycles the issue, because it lays the foundathat people can “borrow” tion essential to effect change. “The for short trips should be placed throughout the city planning gets at where the rubin order to maximize their ber meets the road, where policy is implemented and what that looks use – a transportation like,” she said. “We can do lots of option that would reduce planning but it’s the implementation gasoline consumption, piece that’s really critical.” ease traffic congestion, reduce air pollution and promote health. Mason and her colleagues are analyzing fac As director of the CAES Energy tors such as the location of Policy Institute, Dr. David Solan also pathways, restaurants and other popular destinations, can speak to the challenges of connecting science to policy. “When how far people might be people throw up their hands and say willing to walk to reach a bike share facility, popula‘that’s just politics, we’ll never solve tion and building density that,’ we see that as an opportunity,” and other data. They will Solan said. “By providing the data, we use the information to can get the emotion out of the way so Dr. Susan Mason studies urban environments build a model that could the core issues can be addressed.” to address a number of energy-related issues, be weighted in various The statewide institute Solan including how to encourage people to park ways by cities to determine directs from Boise State focuses on their cars and ride bicycles. where to best site bike research questions around energy
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Connecting Science to Policy
EXPLORE—2012 | 21
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Energy and Advanced Materials Sound energy policy, as well as the creation of energy technologies, is built on the foundation of scientific research. “Every single energy system relies on materials to perform,” said Dr. Darryl Butt, an associate director of CAES and professor and chair in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering. For example, the materials used in solar panels are silicon-based, the blades on giant wind turbines utilize superlight materials developed in part for the aerospace and boat industry, and nuclear and coal-fired power plants require materials that can withstand radiation or high temperatures. Much of Butt’s research involves novel materials for extreme conditions – an area of great interest to energy technologies including nuclear, coal and geothermal. With more than a dozen active grants funded by the Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation and other federal and state agencies, Butt is researching how radiation, temperature and other environmental factors affect the atomic structure and properties of advanced materials. In addition, Butt is the Boise State principal investigator on a
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conflicts with recreation. It also includes a measure of social risk to assess where the public prefers projects be sited and what should be avoided. The project is part of the DOE’s Sunshot Initiative that seeks to make solar energy systems more cost-competitive and to ensure widespread solar adoption across the country. Once developed, the tool will be publicly available on an open source platform so that users can improve it. Novel materials for extreme environments are a The institute research focus for Dr. Darryl Butt, professor and chair also was awarded in the Department of Materials Science and Engineera National Science ing and CAES associate director. Foundation grant for a study and usage and demand and on the siting workshop on electricity transmission of energy infrastructure such as solar planning in the Northwest and in farms, power plants or transmiswestern Canada. And later this year, sion lines. Through its research, EPI EPI plans to release the first-ever also assists policymakers confrontcomprehensive report on the energy ing what can be hotly debated issues “state of the state” in Idaho. regarding these topics. Rebecca Jacobsen, a master of “We don’t tell policymakers what public administration student, is they should do. We provide them compiling data for the report, which with the tools so that they can confeatures graphs, statistics and text sider the technical issues, the scito document in great detail Idaho’s ence, the public sentiment and other energy picture including energy factors and come to an informed sources, consumption, generation decision,” said Solan, a former senior and trends. policy adviser for the Environmental “Personally, I find it very satisProtection Agency who joined Boise fying,” Jacobsen said of the project, State’s faculty in 2009. which will be sent to state decision Among EPI’s current projects is a makers and posted online. “I believe $2.8 million grant from the U.S. Dewe can do much better as a society in partment of Energy to develop a Geoour energy generation and consumpgraphic Information Systems decision tion. It requires making policies that support tool to identify utility-scale take the science into account, and unsolar facility sites based on natural derstanding where we are and where resource and physical restraints such we’ve been so we can take control of as impact on wildlife and nearby com- where we are going.” munities, availability of water and
Dr. Kerr y Allahar, a Boise State research professor, at work in the CAES Microscopy and Characterization Suite.
A SHARED Research FOCUS While energy-related research at Boise State covers a broad spectrum, it also shares core commonalities – most notably, a focus on developing technologies, tools, strategies and an information base that will enable further advances in energy generation, conservation and consumption in the years ahead. “Energy issues can get complicated because they also involve emotion and perception,” Butt noted. “Our job as scientists and engineers is to do the objective research so policymakers have the information they need to make sound decisions.” Added Solan: “The next 20 or 30 years are really important to the energy direction we take. Are we
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CAES: When it came time for Boise State graduate student Ellen Ellen Rabenberg conducts Rabenberg to tests at CAES headquarters. conduct lab experiments for her the sis research, she jumped in her car and drove four hours across southern Idaho to reach a world-class research destination: The Center for Advanced Energy Studies headquar ters in Idaho Falls. Rabenberg, who is pursuing a master’s degree in materials science and engineering, utilized a CAES laboratory with radiological capabilities to test the strength characteristics of steel alloys that are exposed to high levels of radiation. Her studies will provide new knowledge about structural materials used in nuclear reactors, including how radiologic conditions might affect how long reactors safely can remain online. “It was a new experience for me, but I found it really fascinating,” said Rabenberg about wearing a radiation suit (she went through extensive training first) and working safely with radioactive materials. “Without the CAES facilities, I wouldn’t have been able to conduct these experiments.”
going to become more electrified? Are we going to rely on oil? New technologies, as well as policy inputs, will be factors.” Feris, working in his lab to grow the algae that could someday be the source for jet biofuel, is optimistic about the possibilities. “We don’t have all the answers yet, but by conducting research like this we continue to advance,” he said.
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multi-university DOE grant totaling $4.5 million to develop technologies for remotely monitoring the interior of spent nuclear fuel over time. The project, headquartered at Texas A&M, also includes the University of Florida, the University of Illinois, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and several other top research universities. Butt is tasked with developing sensors that can withstand radiation and corrosion. Engineering professor Sin Ming Loo is a Boise State co-principal investigator and will develop the sensor electronics package. “The opportunity to work on this project with colleagues from around the country is rewarding on many levels,” Butt said. “These are complex challenges that require a multi-faceted approach.”
A NATIO NAL MO DEL F O R COLLABO RATIVE RES E A R CH
Rabenberg works with Dr. Daryl Butt, pictured opposite page. She is among students, faculty and government and industry researchers from throughout Idaho who benefit from CAES. Started in 2005, CAES is a partnership between Boise State University, the Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho State University and the University of Idaho that focuses on research to address the country’s and Idaho’s energy challenges, and on preparing the next-generation workforce for in-demand jobs in energy-related fields. Three CAES initiatives – Advanced Materials, the Energy Policy Institute and the Energy Efficiency Research Institute – are led by Boise State faculty. “The whole idea of CAES is that every project is collaborative. As a result, it elevates all the universities,” Butt said. During fiscal year 2011, CAES researchers brought $18.2 million in competitive research grants, infrastructure and other funding to Idaho – an 11 to 1 return on the $1.6 million invested by Idaho taxpayers in the program. The INL provided $1.4 million to fund exploratory research projects at CAES during the past fiscal year, and since 2009 CAES has distributed $45,000 in college scholarships. “We’ve had phenomenal collaboration and collegiality between the four CAES partners,” said CAES director Bill Rogers. “It didn’t start instantly and we had to earn everyone’s trust, but now the program continues to increase its momentum and impact.” EXPLORE—2012 | 23
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Boise State Students, Faculty Benefit from the Fusion of Research and Teaching
When tectonic plates converge, the results can be intense. When research and teaching do the same, it’s no less earth shattering. Dr. Kasper van Wijk, associate professor in the Department of Geosciences, understands the importance of marrying research and teaching. Each semester, his students create homemade seismometers using diverse tools such as a metal Slinky, an orange car spring and a blue bowling ball to measure movement in the Earth’s crust. The build-it-yourself seismometers might not have the sleek appearance of commercial instrumentation, but they definitely work. Students have used them to record earthquakes around the world, as well as the seismic activity generated by a touchdown on the blue turf at Bronco Stadium. “In the past, the largest recordings came from interceptions since they are not as predictable [as 24 | BOISESTATE.EDU
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Story by KATHLEEN TUCK
Dr. Kasper van Wijk, right, and members of the Geophysics Club demonstrate use of a homemade bowling ball seismometer they dubbed “The Big Lebowski.” The screen shows the seismic activity generated by the cheers of thousands of exuberant fans during the third Bronco touchdown of the Nevada-Boise State football game held at Bronco Stadium in October. From left: Kellie Rey, Brian Yelen, Kara Ferguson, Katie Carlisle, Thomas Otheim and van Wijk.
touchdowns],” said Katie Carlisle, a master ’s student in geophysics. “However, for the game against Nevada, we got a distinct response during the third touchdown, most likely as a result of the crowd jumping and cheering.” For the past five years, members of the university’s Geophysics Club and the Football Seismology Team have used the Bronco Stadium experiments to collect subsurface information related to mapping earthquake hazards and have presented their findings at national and international academic conferences.
These “seismic football” experiments not only generate true scientific data, they also help create excitement for geosciences. “Because it is not explicitly taught in high school, a first introduction to the math and physicsheavy field of geophysics can be intimidating,” van Wijk said. “It helps students if I can show them that what we are doing is current and that it ties in with other exciting discoveries in Earth sciences.” “We’ve been taught all about the scientific process and how it works,” said Carlisle, “but you don’t really
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get it until you actually do it.” In addition to giving students hands-on assignments, van Wijk incorporates results of his – and other scientists’ – current research into his courses through photos and journal articles. And using research as a jumping-off point for class discussion has proven very successful. “My students gain a lot of confidence in class when I show them that what they are learning is an only recently discovered level of understanding of the Earth’s interior,” he said. “Research makes us more comfortable in the classroom.”
AN INTEGRATED EDUCATION
Van Wijk’s melding of research and teaching is mirrored across the Boise State campus. Students benefit when faculty
incorporate their research into class discussions, coursework and labs. Faculty also benefit from student contributions that advance their research programs and improve their teaching effectiveness. Together, these activities increase the ways new knowledge can be gener-
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ated, evaluated and shared. “Research activity at Boise State University is tightly woven into our teaching mission,” said Dr. Martin Schimpf, provost and vice president for academic affairs. “More so than at other research universities, faculty work directly with students in their creative activity, and the distinction of Boise State University lies in the fact that those students include a large proportion of undergraduates. Our faculty appreciate this distinction because they recognize and experience first-hand the enhanced development of students through active EXPLORE—2012 | 25
Freshman Kit Vilord, right, works with Dr. Jim Smith on genetic studies involving pepper (Peperomia) plants found in Madagascar.
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problem solving outside the classroom.” Dr. Amy Moll, interim dean in the College of Engineering and a materials science and engineering professor, sees research as a continuation of teaching. “By working with our students on research projects we are teaching them how to be engineers and scientists. Rarely does a faculty member do research alone. It almost always involves students,” she said. The integration of research and teaching is powerful because it injects context, added Dr. Tim Dunnagan, dean of the College of Health Sciences. “Learning is most effective in real-life situations,” he said.
“We tend to compartmentalize research, teaching and service, but it’s really all one sphere.”
– Dr. Tim Dunnagan, dean of the College of Health Sciences
Dunnagan points to clinical programs and capstone experiences in his college that provide future nurses, respiratory therapists and other health care professionals research opportunities directly tied to their chosen careers. Collaborative research, such as a current project to develop a retrofit device for an ultrasound probe used by sonographers, engages faculty and students in tackling challenges that could lead to an improved work environment and better health care. “We tend to compartmentalize research, teaching and service, but it’s really all one sphere,” Dunnagan said. “We are searching for truth, and that search requires that we engage in many ways.” 26 | BOISESTATE.EDU
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AMPED LEARNING
Dr. Jim Smith, a professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, is among many faculty who understand the power of research to help students learn.
With funding from the National Science Foundation, he hosted a nationwide workshop at Boise State in 2010 that focused on developing a research-based model to strengthen systematics and biodiversity teaching and research utilizing undergraduates. He’s been working with students in his lab for two decades. Freshman chemistry major Kat Vilord works with Smith on his NSF-funded genetic studies to determine the number and sources of pepper (Peperomia) plants found in Madagascar. Along with honing her chemistry skills, the project is teaching her time management and how to be more precise in scientific analysis. “Undergraduates are really valuable people to get data gathered and analyzed,” Smith said. They generally are curious and eager to investigate, and when recruited early in their academic careers they can follow a project for several years, providing valuable input. On the flip side, Smith said, “students gain hands-on experience with data collection, analysis and interpretation that cannot be accomplished in a traditional lecture/laboratory framework.”
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MEASURING IMPACTS
under the direction of Dr. Bill Knowlton and Dr. Peter Müllner in the College of Engineering. Students also play a large role in Dr. Ken Cornell’s research. In addition to developing an oral vaccine for West Nile virus, the chemistry professor is working on the creation of a diagnostic chip to assess a variety of clinical parameters. The research is funded by the Department of Defense and through a cooperative grant between pSiFlow Technology Inc. and Boise State.
Four years ago, Dr. Susan Shadle, Dr. Don Warner and Dr. Eric Brown, all chemistry faculty, made a proposal to the National Science Foundation to fund new infrared spectrometers and other equipment to assist with research and to update the curriculum. “The more students are involved, the better they perform Their request was approved, if they could in classes and the more likely they are to graduate.”
provide a plan to measure the impact of the new equipment. So they created a strategy to assess whether students could identify which instruments were best to use to solve certain types of chemical problems. They also created a survey asking students at various stages of their education to identify specifics about the instruments and how they were used. Finally, they developed new labs to fill in gaps in student understanding and to take advantage of the available instruments. It wasn’t long before they were swimming in data. The results told them a lot about students’ understanding of chemical concepts and laboratory practices and informed their development of new curriculum. The group’s first paper has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Chemical Education and more analyses will follow. “There are a lot of places where the goals of our institution as a research university and our goals as a place that fosters learning are in fact aligned,” said Shadle, who also is director of Boise State’s Center for Teaching and Learning. “If we put forth the effort, we can find places where we get both at the same time.”
– Dr. Ken Cornell, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry “It’s essentially a lab on a chip,” Cornell said. “Instead of having to give a blood sample, you could run diagnostic tests off of a single drop of blood or saliva, tears, urine, or other body fluids.” A significant amount of this research is accomplished with the assistance of students in the lab. “The more students are involved, the better they perform in classes and the more likely they are to graduate and go on to the next phase of their lives successfully,” he said. Working on real-life problems means the variables aren’t all worked out ahead of time and students may not always have clear evidence that the process worked as it should. But Cornell requires students to write up their results like scientific papers, taking into account all the unknowns. “Nothing forces you to understand what you are doing better than trying to tell someone else what you are doing,” he said. “It’s a whole lot more work for me but it turns out much better.”
Undergraduate Courtney Hollar prepares to image a sample using atomic force microscopy as part of her research studying magnetic shape memory alloys.
B ENEFITS FOR S TUDENTS
Students like Courtney Hollar can talk specifics about the benefits of a multi-faceted learning environment. A junior majoring in mechanical engineer-
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ing, Hollar recalled her experience enrolling in an introductory materials science class, a discipline she didn’t think she knew much about. She was pleasantly surprised to discover she already had a good grasp of the coursework because of her experiences as an undergraduate research assistant, studying the properties of magnetic shape memory alloys. “I didn’t realize at first how much research has to offer, but it really is involved in everything I’m learning,” said Hollar, who conducts research
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Dr. Ken Cornell discusses preparation of West Nile virus vaccine protein samples with graduate student Reece Knippel. The samples will be analyzed by liquid chromatographymass spectrometry, utilizing the instrumentation in the background purchased with a $600,000 instrumentation grant from the National Science Foundation.
K-12 CONNECTION
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Boise State partnerships allow university students to work with K-12 students across the curriculum. A good example is the GK-12 pro-
Graduate student and GK-12 fellow Cheri Lamb says that working with young students has enhanced her understanding of microbiology fundamentals. 28 | BOISESTATE.EDU
gram, funded by the National Science Foundation. The program pairs graduate students in biology, raptor biology, geology, geophysics and hydrology with educators at Boise’s Foothills Learning Center, the Boise WaterShed Environmental Education Center and the MK Nature Center, where they collaborate to develop hands-on learning activities for local K-12 students. Graduate fellows incorporate their own research and disciplinary expertise into lessons and activities for their students and the general community. The fellows’ work also helps make the research more accessible to future scientists. “This combination of research and teaching helps our graduate students better communicate the importance of their work and it helps K-12 students understand that science is not finished – it’s something that is active and ongoing, and it is something that they can do,” said Dr. Karen Viskupic, research faculty in the Department of Geosciences who oversees the GK-12 project. At the Foothills Learning Center, operated by Boise Parks and Recreation, school children and families learn about the area’s high-desert environment. Many of those pre-
sentations are given by GK-12 fellows, who often benefit just as much as their students. “I have found that to distill complex topics like microbiology to a fifth-grade level requires a firm understanding of fundamentals,” said Cheri Lamb, a third-year biology graduate student and current GK-12 fellow. “As a fellow I have had the opportunity to talk about science with young students both in and out of the classroom and am inspired by their curiosity and courage to explore science. Working with these students has kept my view of my own research fresh and exciting.” Jennie Rylee, environmental education coordinator for the Foothills Learning Center, said the learning extends far beyond the lecture or presentation. “We get these young, brilliant and enthusiastic scientists who come in and breathe new energy and 5 3= new life into our programs, and the children 2x end up getting both the knowledge these students have plus a whole new perspective on what it means to be a scientist,” she said. Often, faculty research also extends to writing textbooks, presenting about teaching at conferences or otherwise affecting the pedagogy.
THE FUTURE OF LEARNING
Some Boise State research involves students in evaluating new technologies that support teaching. Dr. Doug Lincoln, a professor of marketing and chair of the Department of Marketing and Finance, has developed a research-based approach to using clickers to enhance class-
research on market principles, such as the use of consumer rebates. He often discusses his findings in class – who shops, how much they are spending, the effectiveness of offering rebates and so on. “The benefit of doing research in my discipline is that it gives legitimacy to what the students are reading in the textbook,” he said.
“The benefit of doing research in my discipline is that it gives legitimacy to what the students are reading in the textbook.”
– Dr. Doug Lincoln, Department of Marketing and Finance
Lincoln also is the longtime editor of the international Journal of Marketing Education. Being editor of a top journal in his field increases the department’s reputation and the image of the college and helps him keep abreast of cutting-edge pedagogical approaches. That in turn helps attract better faculty and students. Research also helps faculty members stay on top of new advances in their field, which can in turn set in motion the chain of events Lincoln described. The better a university looks outside of its hallowed halls, the more likely it is to attract donors, grants and other funding sources to strengthen its mission. “When our research is out in the community,” Cornell said, “it helps our profile as a university as well.”
Dr. Doug Lincoln is studying how mobile technologies can enhance student learning.
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room instruction. The remote-control devices allow students to give immediate responses to quizzes and chime in on class discussions in situations where they might feel uncomfortable speaking up. Lincoln first incorporated the devices in the classroom in spring 2007, and the results were so positive he has used them in classes such as Principles of Marketing ever since. Previously, he had used scan sheets to collect student responses, but the results were never available until the following class. Clickers allowed him to gather instantaneous feedback, better shape the direction of class discussions and maximize use of class time. “I did follow-up interviews with my spring 2007 students on how they felt about clickers and a year later while on sabbatical leave I conducted a national survey with other professors to understand factors impacting their adoption of clicker technology,” he said. Lincoln published his findings from both experiences in two journal articles in the Marketing Education Review and has made two national conference presentations on how best to use clickers in the classroom. His research analysis has benefited hundreds of students in his classes, clickers have been incorporated by several of his Boise State colleagues, and his journal articles have helped improve teaching for thousands more across the nation. As one of the university’s six 2.0 m-Learning Scholars, Lincoln is now investigating how mobile technologies should be used to enhance student learning both in and outside the classroom. Students enrolled in his spring semester Principles of Marketing class were each loaned an iPad, and Lincoln is studying where and how the devices add value to student learning in ways not possible using more traditional course pedagogy and supporting technologies. In addition to looking at the pedagogy, Lincoln does
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STUDENT VENTURES DAVE SCHENKER Mechanical Engineering undergraduate “Ever since I heard about cars and trucks running on vegetable oil, I thought it was a cool idea and I wanted to build the fastest one. Each member of our team played a key role in making this happen.”
With panache and enthusiasm, Boise State student researchers are making an impact that extends far beyond campus. Meet a few of these students and recent graduates.
Cofounder of student club Greenspeed THAT designed, built and raced the world’s fastest vegetable oilpowered vehicle Research: Schenker led the student team in building a souped-up 1998 Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck that runs completely on vegetable oil. In November, he drove and raced the vehicle at California’s El Mirage, clocking a record speed of 155 mph.
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COURTESY HOLLY SALEWSKI
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Approach: Working with Dr. John Gardner, a mechanical engineering professor and director of the CAES Energy Efficiency Research Institute, Schenker researched everything from fabrication costs and design factors to the chemistry of burning biofuel and the physical demands of driving a race vehicle. With no starting budget and backed by donations, Schenker and his team built the truck, valued at around $125,000, and hauled it first to Utah’s Bonneville Salt Flats and then to the Mojave Desert, where it set the new world record. The truck was displayed earlier this year at the Washington Auto Show in Washington, D.C.
ashley cross
Lead author of peer-reviewed essay in Down and Out in Ada Count y: Essays on the Great Recession
Communication undergraduate “I had never done a professional interview before, so getting that experience and understanding what’s happening in the lives of these people has been an important experience for me.”
Research: As part of a capstone class in Boise State’s innovative summer field school, Investigate Boise, Cross and eight other participants produced peer-reviewed research as undergraduates. Cross examined the use of social services within Idaho’s most populous county to be included in a collection of essays on various aspects of the Great Recession that will be published this year.
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Approach: Through first-person interviews with service providers, Cross investigated the extent of the recession’s impact on the services relied upon by vulnerable populations. Class members, including Cross, were paired with an expert in their field of focus to provide support, insight and mentoring throughout the process. “Incivility is being recognized as a significant problem in workplaces and classrooms. The research that we participate in is important because uncivil environments can escalate into threatening and even violent environments.”
“My experience deepened my understanding of marketing, finance, human resources and overall strategy, which is essential for managing a business.”
MBA, 2009
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Jon Daley Diane Kenski B.S. Nursing, 2010
Cofounder of start-up software company Consensio Works, LLC
Author on paper published in August 2011 Journal of Nursing Administration
Research: Daley helped develop and propose a comprehensive strategy for Boise State’s College of Business and Economics that involves heavily integrating real business projects into classroom curriculum in increasing numbers. His research revealed a major hurdle in doing so – attracting, tracking and managing such a large number of collaborative projects. Daley used the results of his research as a basis for launching a new business. Consensio Works software is designed to simplify the task of establishing and managing business-classroom collaboration.
Research: While at Boise State, Kenski assisted Dr. Cynthia Clark, a professor of nursing, on research that looks into incivility in higher education and nursing practice. Their work was published and Kenski also presented her findings in 2010 at the Western Institute of Nursing Conference in Glendale, Ariz. Kenski is now an RN working in the operating room at an orthopedic surgery center operated by St. Luke’s.
Approach: He conducted online research, as well as personal interviews with business leaders, professors and students.
Approach: She helped design and launch online surveys, performed literature reviews and helped analyze the data collected. Because the data had both qualitative and quantitative elements, she was able to experience the diversity of nursing research alongside Clark. EXPLORE—2012 | 31
“I’m fascinated by statistical analysis and how data can be used to generate evidence and determine the best course of action.”
THREE POSTER PRESENTATIONS ACCEPTED FOR 2012 MIDWESTERN PSYCHOLOGY ASSOCIATION CONFERENCE IN CHICAGO
Approach: A McNair Scholar, Velazquez said his experiences in the program prepared him for his current research endeavors by building his writing skills and providing him opportunities to learn and practice research protocols. Much of his current work involves writing a research paper for the reliability study done with Landrum.
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Research: Working under the direction of Dr. Eric Landrum, a professor in the Department of Psychology, Velazquez conducted research to test the reliability of an assessment tool used to measure workplace civility. His other projects involve studying how much knowledge students who took an introductory psychology course retained two years later, and a third project also involves the Organizational Civility Scale developed by Dr. Cindy Clark in the School of Nursing and by Landrum.
Efren Velazquez Psychology Undergraduate
“It is very rewarding that I could conduct research in a field that involves my mind, my love and my life.”
M.S. Kinesiology, 2010
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Research: As an ultrarunner who participates in cross-country footraces commonly 50-100 miles in distance, Krouse knows very little research exists on ultrarunners, especially women. Her published thesis details the motivation, goal orientation, demographics, training habits and coach utilization of 344 women ultrarunners. Krouse now teaches physical education at the College of Western Idaho.
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Rhonna Krouse
Lead author on paper published in August 2011 Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research
Approach: Participants recruited through email list-serves and popular ultrarunning websites completed an online survey. The data was analyzed and used to create a narrative about their characteristics, motivations and training habits. With additional information about women ultrarunners, coaches are better prepared to work with this population and ultrarunners can improve their performance.
“Studying and practicing entrepreneurship has enhanced my toolkit of knowledge and experience and has allowed me to develop the necessary analytical and practical skills for success in today’s global marketplace.”
“I’ve always been interested in wave propagation, so conducting research in this area for my doctoral thesis has been a very good fit.”
Conducted market research used by Idaho companies as the foundation of their international marketing and exporting efforts Research: Zdravkova completed internships with the Idaho Department of Commerce in Guadalajara, Mexico, and Taipei, Taiwan, as well as with the U.S. Department of State at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City and the Idaho District Export Council, where she researched, analyzed and recommended business opportunities by evaluating target segments and market entry strategies. Approach: She utilized online and library resources, as well as personal interviews and surveys for her marketing research. Zdravkova has accepted a position with a Taiwanese manufacturing and trading company in marketing and product development.
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“I like the fact that I am trying to figure out complex problems that could benefit the environment for decades to come.”
Thomas Blum
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B.A. in International Business, minor in Entrepreneurship, December 2011
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Vera Zdravkova
Geophysics Ph.D. student
Lead author on recent papers published in Journal of Geophysical Research and AIP Review of Scientific Instruments Research: Blum works with Dr. Kasper van Wijk, a geophysics professor, on research that involves using elastic waves to characterize fractures in subsurface rock layers. His work has applications for siting geothermal power plants, for oil and gas exploration, and for hydraulic fracturing. Approach: Inside the Physical Acoustics Lab, Blum trains a laser on a cylinder of plastic that has a fracture embedded in it. A seismic wave is sent into the cylinder, and the laser measures its propagation through the material – data that can be used to develop tools to pinpoint the location and properties of the hidden fracture.
Helped Design and Patent a New Portable Uranium Sensor Research: Scaggs is leading scientific consultations with a commercial company as they move into field testing a portable uranium sensor patented by Boise State. Working in Dr. Dale Russell’s chemistry lab, Scaggs helped design, build and test a sensor that detects uranium in water in the range of 10 parts per trillion.
Jon Scaggs Chemistry graduate student
Approach: The probe based on Russell’s patent is now field deployable. It is capable of trapping uranium ions on its surface using an organic molecule that selects uranium out of the water, according to shape, size and electrical charge. Then, the sensor quantifies the amount of uranium in the water by means of an electrical impulse. The device can be inserted directly into any water sample, such as a well, a waste stream, a lake or a river. EXPLORE—2012 | 33
In Print
Uneasy Bedfellows: Politics and By ANNA WEBB
D
Religion
r. Jill K . Gill comes to her study of religion and politics from a personal place – an early, intense exposure to a mosaic of thought and culture.
Her parents divorced when she was young. They both remarried, and she spent her youth traveling between their homes. Her mother and stepfather were liberal agnostics. Her father was a mainline Protestant Presbyterian. Her stepmother was a passionate Pentecostal. In one house, television preachers were regarded as unsavory sorts who bilked old women of their life savings. In the other, Pat Robertson’s “700 Club” was standard fare. Gill experienced all of it, including long evangelical revivals during her teenage years.
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Dr. Jill K. Gill’s new book explores the shifting powers of the Protestant left and the evangelical right during the Vietnam War era.
“I traversed between these very different religious environments and saw different worldviews and sources of truth that clashed. I also saw that these worldviews led to different political views on social issues. It certainly helped build into my DNA a curiosity about religion and politics,” said Gill, an associate professor and graduate coordinator for the Boise State history department. Her new book, Embattled Ecumenism: The National Council of Churches, the Vietnam War, and the Trials of the Protestant Left, began as her dis-
In Print sertation in the early 1990s at the University of Pennsylvania. Gill tells two stories – one small, one large – about religion and politics, and the shifting powers of the Protestant left and the evangelical right during the Vietnam War era. The “small” story is about the role of the National Council of Churches in the anti-war movement. In the years leading up to the war, this umbrella group of left-leaning churches was mainstream, with remarkable political clout. The members of the NCC were the “big dogs” said Gill, with privileges like regular audiences at the White House that would become unthinkable for liberal churches in the decades that followed. During the war, the NCC began to promote ever more radical ideas of social justice: seeing humanity, including the Vietnamese, as one people (a classic ecumenical ideal), and seeing the Vietnam War as a mirror reflecting America’s own social maladies. Judith Austin, a retired historian and editor with the Idaho State Historical Society and one of Gill’s advisors on the book, finds this idea of a mainline religious body speaking so publicly in opposition to a war or any other long-term action of the federal government stunning to contemplate. From the late 1940s to mid-1960s, Austin lived three blocks from NCC headquarters in New York City. More significantly, she attended Sunday school and high school with the son of John Coleman Bennett, a leader within ecumenical circles who is featured in Gill’s book. She also is an active Presbyterian who participated in church-based rallies against the Vietnam War in Boise. “The leaders of the NCC were willing to take a
stand on a major issue that went beyond politics. It would probably be an even more radical idea now,” she said. While the NCC was garnering its anti-war effort, the evangelical movement of the time had a different stated focus: saving souls, and operating at arm’s length from the secular political realm. For Gill, the larger story in Embattled Ecumenism is about the shift that took place as many laypersons rejected the message of the NCC, causing it to begin to splinter. The evangelical right was poised to rise. The movement came in from the political margins, with Republican encouragement, and captured public sentiment with a concept Americans longed to retain despite a bad war – that the country was, as Gill said, still the one “favored in God’s eyes.” “That moment of transition is what I try to explore here,” she said. Gill details the struggles of the liberal churches of the NCC – their unfortunate characterization as intellectuals without a sense of the common people; their inability to hold onto their young parishioners who often left for the secular world where social change could happen faster; and their inability to deliver their message (a criticism leveled against progressives today), or to have the preferred message for the time. Americans hungered in the 1960s for ecstatic spiritual experiences. The right, with its long history of dramatic soul saving, had the edge. “When people go to church, they want their individual questions answered, but the religious left was talking about being in community with
Embattled Ecumenism:
The National Council of Churches, the Vietnam War, and the Trials of the Protestant Left
By Jill K. Gill Northern Illinois University Press, 2011
PRESBYTERIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY, PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH (USA), PHILADELPHIA, PA
PRESBYTERIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY, PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH (USA), PHILADELPHIA, PA
Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, far left photo, addresses the General Assembly of the National Council of Churches in 1966. Dennis Banks, left, a leader of the American Indian Movement, addresses the 1969 NCC General Assembly. AIM was one of many activist groups either protesting or making requests of the NCC at this assembly.
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PRESBYTERIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY, PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH (USA), PHILADELPHIA, PA
Delegates, above, gather for the NCC constituting convention in 1950. At left is a 1967 pamphlet the NCC prepared to appeal for congregational engagement.
English Fragments: A Brief History of the Soul
By Martin Corless-Smith Fence Books, 2010
COURTESY JILL K. GILL
others,” said Gill. That included “others” in a worldwide sense. Gill does not dismiss the courage of NCC members, even in the face of institutional decline. “They spoke their truth, and got their heads chopped off for it,” she said. The war eventually became unpopular, not because of the social justice reasons promoted by the NCC, “but because of too many body bags, too much money spent and a belief that Johnson was not fighting it well,” said Gill. The NCC still exists as a large coalition of mainline churches, but institutionally it’s a shell compared to what it was before the Vietnam War. The NCC protested the war in Iraq, but could not get even a single meeting with the Bush White House, although the president met regularly with evangelicals. Gill’s colleagues say her book is a departure from the trend in religious scholarship that has, recently, favored the right. “Historians are now revisiting the personalities, philosophies, and political fortunes that dictated postwar liberalism’s rise and fall,” wrote Dr. Darren Dochuk, associate professor of history at Purdue University and author of From Bible Belt to Sunbelt: Plain-folk Religion, Grassroots Politics, and the Rise of the Evangelical Conservatism in his peer review of Gill’s work. “Even historians of evangelicalism are beginning to look for fresh takes on the movement by tracking the intellectual endeavors and political activism of its once viable ‘left wing.’” As for what’s next, Gill said there is still more for her to write about the Protestant left. But she’s going in new directions, too. Lately, that’s looking at the history of race dynamics in Idaho. Gill notes that Idaho was slow to adopt Martin Luther King Jr. Day, despite pressure to do so from the state’s growing and disconcerting identity across the U.S. as a home to the Aryan Nations. “Legislators eventually had to grab a ‘King Day’ shield to fend off those accusations,” she said. Gill wants to explore the larger question of how people understand race in a predominantly white state. “I’m just baby stepping my way into the issue, but it’s where my curiosity is taking me.”
“Right at the instant of writing, you feel the choice of the next word is somehow a bridge into the unknown.” — Martin Corless-Smith
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Meditations on the Soul With his latest collection, Dr. Martin Corless-Smith is playing with fragments of language. “Poetry manages small steps toward the ineffable,” he said, “but can’t ever make a whole of itself.” In that spirit, English Fragments is two books at once – half lyric poetry, half prose meditations on the soul. The two are in constant dialogue, cross-pollinating in what might be an impossible quest to understand the ever-fleeting concept of “being.” “Right at the instant of writing, you feel the choice of the next word is somehow a bridge into the unknown,” said Corless-Smith, who directs Boise State’s master of fine arts program in creative writing. “But once you’re there, the movement continues, and the word is fossilized. The poem is almost like the detritus of the effort of writing.” English Fragments is the third book in a trilogy, following Nota (2003) and Swallows (2006). Nota grew from spiral notebooks kept by Corless-Smith, an admitted Luddite, with poems and poem fragments written in longhand. In Swallows, the English native was obsessing about the idea of home. “I go back in the summer. The swallows are there. They’re famous for building homes, but are constantly on the wing. I felt interested in that, and its relation to writing,” he said. That idea, of looking for solidity and stasis, even though those states don’t exist in writing or for living beings, continues in English Fragments. “Of late, I’m settling into just wanting to write the poem and let it live or die on its own value.”
Last Word
Family Politics: The Idea of Marriage in Modern Political Thought
By Scott Yenor Baylor University Press, 2011
“Just as rights are only part of what makes a nation a nation, so also are consent and contract only part of what makes a family a family.” — Scott Yenor
The Family of Man Marriage and family, two eternally provocative institutions, are at the heart of Dr. Scott Yenor’s new book. Yenor calls on philosophers from Locke to de Beauvoir to show that our understanding of marriage as a “contract” falls short of its true meaning. Marriage transforms identities, said Yenor, associate professor in the Department of Political Science. Successful marriage requires that family members see themselves as part of a community. Family Politics: The Idea of Marriage in Modern Political Thought has its roots in Yenor’s own on-campus community – he uses meditations on family life in his upper-division classes in political thought to illustrate authors’ concepts. Students may arrive with an array of cultural touch points, he said, but an understanding of family is universal and is a useful frame of reference for the classroom. He found that authors’ views on family are often stand-ins for their views on nature and how humans relate to it. “Those who argued for expanding the scientific effort to control or conquer nature often also put forward ideas on how to eliminate or at least narrow the range of the family,” said Yenor. “Those who wanted to limit the influence of science would defend the family. That initial insight is what gave me the idea for the book.” His new work is not unrelated to his past writing on the Scottish enlightenment and the concept of a modern republic. “Both are concerned with the inadequacy of a rights-based liberal theory to provide an adequate account of what goes on in society,” said Yenor. “Just as rights are only part of what makes a nation a nation, so also are consent and contract only part of what makes a family a family.” – Stories by Anna Webb
The Singular Mission of Research and Teaching “Classroom” and “laboratory” may evoke different images, but at Boise State University they often are interchangeable. Our university has a proud tradition of integrating research and teaching across the curriculum in ways that enhance the education of our students and support our research mission. This issue of Explore highlights many examples of how learning is amplified in a research-intensive environment. Whether working alongside professors on research ranging from DNA studies to nursing incivility, writing peer-reviewed papers on a variety of topics, or conducting market research used by Idaho companies, Boise State students gain experience and knowledge that prepares them for challenging and rewarding careers. We’ve devoted an entire story to the fusion of research and teaching (pages 24-29), but in truth every article in this issue is to some extent about this subject. That’s natural, given that this approach forms the bedrock of Boise State’s programs and services. It is particularly noteworthy that undergraduates, as well as graduate students, are immersed in an environment where teaching and research are intertwined and where learning takes place in many settings. I like the word “fusion” when it comes to describing the relationship between research and teaching because it aptly describes the depth of the bond. This defining characteristic drives our university’s excellence today, and will continue to do so in the future.
– DR. MARK RUDIN, VICE PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH and ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT EXPLORE—2012 | 37
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