Impacting the World
Vol. 7 • No. 1 • Spring 2025
Office of Research and Sponsored Programs
TAKING CARE
From the earth to the skies, MTSUconnected researchers cultivate projects that improve people’s lives
COLLECTION
04 A PERENNIAL PARTNERSHIP
MTSU professor Song Cui teams up with a Kansasbased sustainable agriculture agency to prove less tilling tastes great
12 WINNING THE READING WARS
MTSU’s Literacy Studies Ph.D. program, one of the first in the country, draws national support in its quest to solve America’s literacy crisis
20 GLIDING ALONG
MTSU Aerospace professor Nate Callender adds a potentially life-saving wrinkle to the pilot literature on “engine-out glide”
IMPACTING THE WORLD
Vol. 7 • No. 1 • Spring 2025
Office of Research and Sponsored Programs
28 TRAFFICKING SIGNS
MTSU professor and student help inform law enforcement training to assist sex trafficking victims
36 AN ATMOSPHERE OF CHANGE
MTSU alumnus Jared Frazier launches his computational science career abroad to impact weather and climate research across the globe
44 A CLEARER PICTURE
MTSU Computer Science graduate Lucas Remedios wields artificial intelligence (AI) in the fight against a silent killer
University President Sidney A. McPhee • University Provost Mark Byrnes • Vice Provost for Research and Dean, College of Graduate Studies David Butler • Director, Office of Research and Sponsored Programs Rachel McGinnis • Vice President for Marketing and Communications Andrew Oppmann • Senior Editor Drew Ruble • Director, Creative and Visual Services Kristy D. O'Neal • Designer Sherry Wiser George • Associate Editor Carol Stuart • Contributing Editor Nancy Broden • Photographers Andy Heidt, J. Intintoli, Cat Curtis Murphy, James Cessna • Special Thanks Katie Medrano
Address changes should be sent to Advancement Services, MTSU Box 109, Murfreesboro, TN 37132; alumni@mtsu.edu. Other correspondence should be sent to Drew Ruble, 1301 E. Main St., MTSU Box 49, Murfreesboro, TN 37132. For online content, visit mtsumagazine.com. 460 copies printed by Pollock Printing, Nashville, Tennessee. Designed by MTSU Creative and Visual Services. 0425-1498 – Middle Tennessee State University does not discriminate against students, employees, or applicants for admission or employment on the basis of race, color, religion, creed, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, disability, age, status as a protected veteran, genetic information, or any other legally protected class with respect to all employment, programs, and activities sponsored by MTSU. The Assistant to the President for Institutional Equity and Compliance has been designated to handle inquiries regarding the non-discrimination policies and can be reached at Cope Administration Building 116, 1301 East Main Street, Murfreesboro, TN 37132; Christy.Sigler@mtsu.edu; or 615-898-2185. The MTSU policy on non-discrimination can be found at mtsu.edu/iec.
TAKING CARE
THROUGH REALWORLD PROJECTS, THE WORK OF MTSU-CONNECTED RESEARCHERS IS CHANGING LIVES.
Higher education research is a great investment for people and society. Researchers, faculty, staff, and students at Middle Tennessee State University are involved in research and public service initiatives that help Tennesseans.
This edition focuses on Taking Care to tell the stories of how research— both in our campus community and by our alumni—is impacting fellow Tennesseans as well as people across the nation and around the earth. Through real-world projects, the work of MTSU-connected researchers is changing lives and potentially saving lives in key areas of agriculture, aerospace, education, medicine and health care, public safety, and weather prediction.
This magazine highlights a small number of the many projects for Tennessee, our nation, and the world ongoing at the University or involving our graduates. In this issue, we dive deep into how federal, state, and foundation grant dollars at MTSU and some alumni at private organizations play a pivotal role in boosting the food supply, solving issues related to literacy, making aviation safer, helping sex trafficking victims, improving weather forecasting, and wielding artificial intelligence in health care.
These stories of persistence, innovation, and empathy showcase our commitment at MTSU to help the citizens of our state, nation, and world live better and more rewarding lives.
David Butler
Vice Provost for Research and Dean, College of Graduate Studies
About the cover EYE-OPENING
IRIS
Tennessee’s official state cultivated flower is the iris, a hardy perennial with over 200 species and a range of colors that brightens lives—although the purple iris is widely accepted as the state symbol. Named for the Greek goddess of rainbows, the iris is joined by two state wildflowers: the passion flower (the previous state flower) and Tennessee echinacea (cornflower).
A PERENNIAL PARTNERSHIP
MTSU PROFESSOR SONG CUI TEAMS UP WITH A KANSAS-BASED SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE AGENCY TO PROVE LESS TILLING TASTES GREAT
Tennessee’s motto is “Agriculture and Commerce.” Agriculture has always been Tennessee’s No. 1 industry and synonymous with its brand.
Food grown in the Volunteer State is planted in carbonrich topsoil. But topsoil is disappearing at a terrifying rate across the United States. According to a study by Cornell University, almost 2 billion tons of farmland are lost to soil erosion every year. From a food supply standpoint, it’s nothing short of a crisis.
WILD SUNFLOWER
Kansas state flower
Article by Drew Ruble
by J. Intintoli
Tennessee farmers boast a proud history of employing conservation methods to reduce the erosion of topsoil across the state. That’s one of many reasons the nonprofit Land Institute, based in Salina, Kansas, has its eye on Tennessee. Through the selective breeding of seeds and the development of perennial grain crops that don’t need replanting annually, the Land Institute is a national leader in ecologically sensitive agriculture.
Now, as a result of a recent partnership between the institute and MTSU Agriculture professor and researcher Song Cui, perennial plants like grain, sorghum, and sunflowers are being tested in Tennessee soil.
It’s creating new opportunities for Tennessee farmers.
A WILLING PARTNER
Perennial grains like those the Land Institute pioneered grow long roots that extend deep into the ground. By doing so, they build healthy soil, better absorb water, protect soil from erosion, retain nutrients, foster biodiversity, and remove carbon dioxide from the air.
The Land Institute’s signature product to date is Kernza, a perennial grain it developed, which flourishes in the Midwestern U.S.
Photos
Kernza produces a grain yield for about three years—a significant improvement over annual crops requiring tilling each year.
Major food manufacturers like General Mills and supermarket chains such as Whole Foods are already deep in the Kernza business. Consumers nationwide can easily find Kernza products, including beer, on grocery store shelves. That commercial success is crucial. Because it’s not enough that a product is supported by consumers with an ecologically friendly mindset. Pragmatically speaking, to truly dent the market and bring about change, it also has to taste good, and farmers have to be able to make money growing it.
Ebony Murrell, crop protection ecologist at the Land Institute, said her organization is very proud of Kernza’s market success. It remains the institute’s most successful grain to date.
Murrell and her colleagues at Land Institute are working on other perennial grains, including perennial sorghum, a hybrid between annual sorghum and Johnson grass, which is a weed, and sillflower, a prairie grass that is a cousin to the annual sunflower.
The question for the institute now is: Can Kernza (and other perennial crops) viably grow in other parts of the country and world?
To that end, Land Institute has launched a movement to scale perennial agriculture, building connections to ensure that perennial grains will be developed on every continent except Antarctica. In doing so, it supports more than 200 researchers in more than 30 countries.
DIGGING INTO THE DETAILS
Enter Cui, who became a partner to investigate some of the institute’s lines in plant breeding in Tennessee last year.
“They might be shooting for higher yield, better adaptivity, adaptivity to a new environment, a lot of things,” Cui said of the institute’s interest in MTSU and farming in Tennessee. “So, that’s the way I started a conversation with them. They told me what they need, and I offered whatever we can do here. They have varieties of breeding lines that no one has ever grown in the Southeastern United States. Now we are!”
Kernza, sorghum, and sillflower are the three crops currently associated with the MTSU grant. (Land Institute is testing wheat and lentil products elsewhere.)
KERNZA PRODUCES A GRAIN YIELD FOR ABOUT THREE YEARS—A SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENT OVER ANNUAL CROPS REQUIRING TILLING EACH YEAR.
MTSU's Song Cui
Murrell said the institute is thrilled to be partnering with Cui and MTSU and to spread perennial agriculture to the South.
“We are excited about bringing in a lot of these novel cover crops and cropping rotations and intercropping to institutions across the South and Southeastern U.S. that historically don’t get nearly as much love or as much attention for their sustainable agriculture practices,” Murrell said.
“And I’m delighted that Song is really making a strong effort to do this.”
Cui most recently planted Kernza in November 2024. Their roots are huge and very deep—at
THE
Cui also planted about 600 perennial sunflowers, as well as perennial sorghum, last summer. In addition to his research, all crops are used for teaching purposes.
“You’re looking about almost zero management,” Cui said. “It’s one time planting and getting them established, maybe some weeding at the very beginning, but then they kind of take care of themselves.”
That’s a far cry from traditional agricultural methods, which Cui describes as an ecologist’s nightmare. Each time a farmer tills the soil, about 40% of the carbon in it is emitted out into the air. Tilling also requires the use of fossil fuels to power it.
INSTITUTE IS THRILLED TO BE PARTNERING WITH CUI AND MTSU AND TO SPREAD PERENNIAL AGRICULTURE TO THE SOUTH.
Sunflowers growing through a Tennessee winter at the MTSU farm
Kernza long roots
“Then, at the end of the year, you’re going to have to harvest, and you’re going to have to do something about the field again,” Cui said. “You either have to plant a different cover crop, or you just leave it, releasing all the carbon. Then, the next year, the cycle begins again.”
By comparison, with a perennial system in place, once established well, “you don't have to do anything for years,” Cui said. That’s because the root depths on the perennial grains are about 10 to 20 times deeper than typical annual crops. “And those roots are where the carbon goes. That's the other benefit.”
MAKING THE CASE
Cui’s early success with perennial plants is creating buzz in the Tennessee farm community.
“Tennessee farmers are interested in growing these,” he said. “The interest out there is just huge. As soon as I start talking about perennial sunflowers, people start talking to me and calling me. They’ll say, ‘Hey, can I have some seeds? I want to grow it.’
“We must try to achieve a better future, a more sustainable farming future, for the nation. That’s kind of the bigger picture of all the projects we’ve been working on.”
According to Cui, the Land Institute’s interest in MTSU extends beyond his specific project.
THE
ROOT DEPTHS ON THE PERENNIAL GRAINS ARE ABOUT 10 TO 20 TIMES DEEPER THAN TYPICAL ANNUAL CROPS.
Perennial sunflower roots
A Worldwide Effort
A group of 153 Nobel and World Food Prize laureates wrote a letter in 2025 calling for significant political and financial support for “moonshot” initiatives to meet the food needs of a growing planet and support the longterm health of the planet.
The letter’s authors noted the need for concentrated investments in agricultural research and development to address variable and unpredictable weather, declining food yields, soil and land degradation, natural resource scarcity, and biodiversity loss.
To rectify these agricultural and environmental concerns, the authors reference the urgency for several moonshot initiatives, including a perennial agriculture transformation and an emphasis on new crop development for nitrogen fixation and diverse cropping systems at the global scale.
“We are advocating for transformational efforts across the food value chain, from inputs to production to the post-harvest phase. Building on recent advancements in biology and genetics, moonshot initiatives that could be considered include: enhancement of photosynthesis in crops such as wheat and rice, biological nitrogen fixation of major cereals, transformation of annual to perennial crops, development of new and overlooked crops, innovations in diverse cropping systems, enhancement of fruits and vegetables to improve storage and shelf life and to increase food safety, and the creation of nutrientrich food from microorganisms and fungi,” the letter read.
The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas, a science-based research organization working to develop an alternative to current destructive agricultural practices, is dedicated to advancing perennial grain crops and polyculture farming solutions. The institute and MTSU are currently working together on a series of grants related to perennial crops.
Other MTSU agriculture programs the institute has pegged for potential future research endeavors include the Fermentation Science program and the Tennessee Center for Botanical Medicine Research.
“They value us as an institution,” Cui said, “and we all work together very closely. That’s the part they really love.
“Other than just growing perennial crops, they like the fact that we can explore the value of it. Is there a better use of it than solely for producing greens for human consumption? Maybe there are medicinal properties. Maybe there is value in the oils. Can you make good wines or sake out of it? Actually, we have preliminary data already supported that says, ‘Yes, you can! You can do all sort of things with it!’”
The School of Agriculture’s facilities include several farms, a dairy, four greenhouses, a fermentation lab, and the Horse Science Center. Students in the department apply what they learn in a variety of real-life settings.
MTSU Agriculture faculty teach that feeding the world in a sustainable way is key to the future, and its students participate in research and experiential learning that progress toward that goal.
The new partnership on perennial crop production is just the next step.
Land Institute’s silflower, a perennial oilseed crop
SOW SEEDS
Reap rewards learning from MTSU agricultural and scientific experts.
Impact the world’s future by earning an advanced agriculture-related degree from MTSU. Help feed the planet, develop drugs from nature, or conduct research in other biological areas.
• Fermentation Science master’s program
Consisting of both scientific and management coursework
• Molecular Biosciences doctorate
Interdisciplinary program with agriculture, biology, and chemistry faculty
*MTSU also offers a Horse Science master’s with Equine Education, Equine Physiology, and Industry Management concentration options.
WINNING THE READING WARS
MTSU’S LITERACY STUDIES PH.D. PROGRAM, ONE OF THE FIRST IN THE COUNTRY, DRAWS NATIONAL SUPPORT IN ITS QUEST TO SOLVE AMERICA’S LITERACY CRISIS
Imagine being unable to read instructions on prescriptions dispensed by a doctor or pharmacy. Or street signs as you navigate to a destination you’ve never visited. Think about what it would be like to be unemployed but unable to read the application needed to get a job. Or even to try to enjoy karaoke on a Saturday night with friends when you simply can’t read.
According to the National Literacy Institute, 21% of U.S. adults are illiterate, while 54% have a literacy comprehension below a sixth-grade level. Those figures combine to rank the United States 36th globally in literacy.
ROSE
U.S. national floral emblem
Article by Drew Ruble
Progress is being made in the Volunteer State. Just last year, Gov. Bill Lee announced that Tennessee students now lead the nation in reading proficiency gains thanks to our state’s “strong K–3rd grade literacy strategy,” grounded in phonics and teacher training, which he introduced in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Tennessee students now have access to nationleading tutoring and summer school programs to help them achieve reading proficiency,” Lee stated. “We hired and empowered more teachers to use proven phonics-based instruction where students learn to read by sounding out words, syllable by syllable.”
Lee’s formula aligns with what educators today believe are best practices for improving literacy rates: employing scientifically proven methods of teaching reading while also creating an army of literacy experts who can teach others what they know to be effective. MTSU’s Literacy Studies Ph.D. program in the College of Education is specifically designed to create those experts. In doing so, it is addressing the shortage of
scholars, PreK–12 leaders, nonprofit leaders, and policymakers equipped to bridge the gap between growing research in literacy and educational practice, policy, and professional preparation.
54% OF U.S. ADULTS HAVE A LITERACY COMPREHENSION BELOW A SIXTH-GRADE LEVEL.
Drawing on faculty from MTSU’s College of Education, College of Behavioral and Health Sciences, and College of Liberal Arts, the interdisciplinary doctoral program is rapidly developing literacy leaders who can effectively translate research to practitioners—and it is becoming a national model along the way.
External proof of the program’s value came in 2024 when a prominent educational foundation sought out and awarded the program a sevenfigure grant to continue its work.
BUILD EXPERTISE, THEN SHARE
Amy M. Elleman, professor and director of MTSU’s Literacy Studies Ph.D. program, earned a B.S. in Psychology at the University of Maryland in Heidelberg, Germany, and an M.Ed. and Ph.D. at Vanderbilt University. Elleman’s research focuses on factors central to reading comprehension, including vocabulary, inference, and knowledge. She has expertise conducting meta-analysis and examining the efficacy of reading interventions.
“We are one of the first Literacy Studies Ph.D. programs in the nation,” Elleman said of MTSU’s program. “There are a few out there. But they are few and far between. And none have really looked at the literacy issue with our interdisciplinary lens, or really with our focus on translating research to practice in the classroom.”
Research is emerging from the program. But an equal emphasis is placed on teaching doctoral students what works in reading instruction and how to train others.
“As our graduates move into leadership roles, they are positioned to translate research to practice,” Elleman said. “And there aren’t that many doctoral programs doing that work.”
Don’t just take Elleman’s word for it, though. Last year, a large, not-for-profit foundation, which asked not to be identified for this article, discovered MTSU’s program and reached out to the University to request its participation in a grant-funded project.
The anonymous foundation funds programs nationally that are building the pipeline of teacher educators who are deeply knowledgeable about the body of research on reading and can be translators of research to practice.
Specifically, the foundation seeks to grow the number and capacity of high-quality doctoral programs in reading (like MTSU’s) across the country and to attract more candidates to those programs.
MTSU received $1 million from this foundation to develop more doctoral students who will graduate and go into high-level leadership positions of change.
Beginning in 2025, the foundation will pay tuition and stipend support for two cohorts of seven new students, paying for their entire education for four years. This will result in an additional 14 high-quality graduates ready to impact literacy education upon graduation.
In addition to Elleman, Eric Oslund, professor and chair of the Elementary and Special Education Department, and Timothy Odegard, Murfree Chair of Excellence in Dyslexic Studies and professor in the Psychology Department, serve as principal investigators on the grant.
Amy Elleman, director of MTSU’s Literacy Studies Ph.D. program
Photo by J. Intintoli
BRINGING NOVEL SOLUTIONS
About a third of the MTSU program’s graduates go into teacher preparation in higher education positions. A third end up in nonprofit spaces, working with community literacy centers to get kids reading. Another third end up back in leadership practices in K–12 schools, training teachers how to use evidence-based practices to improve literacy.
IT’S A RARE OCCURRENCE FOR A GRANT-AWARDING BODY TO KNOCK ON YOUR DOOR . . . BUT THEY WANT TO INCREASE THE PIPELINE OF LITERACY LEADERS IN THE COUNTRY.
“That’s precisely the type of people this funding agency wanted when they set out to identify programs to support,” Elleman said of the sevenfigure grant. “MTSU perfectly fit the bill.”
She added that “it’s a rare occurrence for a grantawarding body to knock on your door and say, ‘You know, we think you’re doing good work. We’d like to talk more about what you do.’ But they want to increase the pipeline of literacy leaders in the country doing this translational work. They want high-quality individuals coming into the program. And then we want them out doing this leadership work.”
It’s not just funding agencies taking notice of MTSU’s cutting-edge program. Educators nationwide are increasingly recognizing the MTSU program’s vital role in literacy education and are reaching out to get involved.
EDUCATORS NATIONWIDE ARE INCREASINGLY RECOGNIZING THE MTSU PROGRAM’S VITAL ROLE IN LITERACY EDUCATION.
“People are very interested in what we do because they see the importance of it,” Elleman said. “We’ve had more prospective students and experienced teachers contact us in the past year than ever before.”
A big part of the program’s appeal to professionals stems from MTSU’s interdisciplinary approach.
“We have neuroscientists with a psychology focus on our team.” Elleman said. “We have assessment people. We have educators. We have people who specialize in dyslexia or multilingual learners. So,
we have a number of people with very different educational lenses working to solve this problem.
“The interdisciplinary approach is unique and is bringing novel solutions that perhaps as educators alone we wouldn’t have thought about. Our students get exposure to all of these perspectives. They work with people who have very different knowledge bases and come up with ideas that are new and even counterintuitive, offering a fresh way to look at the problem than in these silos that we’ve been in.”
To accommodate growth, the MTSU College of Education is enhancing remote instruction options. It is currently outfitting a space on campus with the technology needed to offer synchronous flex courses blending classes of students on campus with experienced teachers nationally.
MTSU RECEIVED $1 MILLION FROM A NATIONAL FOUNDATION TO DEVELOP MORE DOCTORAL STUDENTS WHO GO INTO HIGH-LEVEL LEADERSHIP POSITIONS OF CHANGE.
“Flex is going to help us expand the program and also to get the national recognition that we’ve slowly been moving toward,” Elleman said. “These professionals want to attend MTSU because we are doing exactly what they want to do. They want to learn how to translate it and get it into other teachers’ hands, because they know they didn’t have that knowledge when they first became an educator, and they couldn’t help their students. They had to try to figure this all out on their own. And they don’t want someone to have to do that again.”
A MODEL FOR OTHERS
But MTSU can only produce so many expert educators. The program finds itself in an interesting situation where it essentially wishes to create its own competition. The literacy problem in America is so large and complex that MTSU’s program altruistically hopes it can serve as a model for other academic programs nationally to duplicate its efforts.
“We absolutely need more programs like this one,” Elleman said. “We need them in multiple arenas to solve this problem. And we need them with this interdisciplinary lens and this researchto-practice focus to change this problem. We have the research. Now, it has to make it into teachers’ hands.”
An old proverb states that “the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago; the second best time is now.” The wisdom of the saying is that while the ideal time to start something might have been in the past, it’s still not too late to begin taking action today.
MTSU is taking massive action to solve the rampant illiteracy problem in Tennessee and across the United States. And with national organizations already spotlighting and financially supporting MTSU’s work, the actions being taken today may finally provide the answers society desperately needs.
OPEN DOORS
Make a difference in the lives of children and families.
Become a literacy leader and bridge research and practice to make an impact. The nationally renowned and interdisciplinary Literacy Studies Ph.D. program works closely with the Tennessee Center for the Study and Treatment of Dyslexia at MTSU, which provides:
• Scientific evidence as a producer and translator of research
• In-service and other trainings for schools and educators
• Public workshops for parents and community stakeholders
• Regional conferences to raise awareness of dyslexia and causes of reading failure
• Assistance on identifying dyslexia and related learning differences
Additionally, MTSU offers an online M.Ed. in Literacy to equip educators as literacy specialists in schools.
GLIDING ALONG
MTSU AEROSPACE PROFESSOR NATE CALLENDER ADDS A POTENTIALLY LIFE-SAVING WRINKLE TO THE PILOT LITERATURE ON “ENGINE-OUT GLIDE”
Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger was the US Airways captain who guided his Airbus A320 with 155 passengers aboard to a safe landing in the Hudson River on Jan. 15, 2009, after a flock of Canada geese knocked out both of his airplane’s engines.
TENNESSEE ECHINACEA (Coneflower)
A Tennessee state wildflower
Article by Drew Ruble
The feat, remembered as the “Miracle on the Hudson,” made such an indelible impression that Oscar-winning director Clint Eastwood retold the story in a Hollywood movie titled Sully
In the film, and in real life, Sullenberger adjusted the plane’s pitch to maintain an optimal glide speed, calculating the correct speed and altitude at which to raise the plane’s nose and slow its descent, creating a softer landing.
Sullenberger’s calm calculations under pressure and his deft touch kept the plane from stalling or dropping hard into the water, maintaining level wings, and kept the plane from flipping or breaking up—outcomes that would have no doubt led to loss of life.
A few avionics companies have developed on-board systems to help pilots navigate “engine-out glides” like what Sullenberger faced.
Existing, in-cockpit displays provide “glide range rings” that inform pilots how far the aircraft should be able to glide at any given moment, as well as the locations of nearby airports. Developed by tech heavyweights like Garmin and Boeing (ForeFlight), avionics software of this type is now an industry standard.
But recently, MTSU professor and associate chair of the MTSU Aerospace Department Nate Callender introduced a way to improve engine-out glide performance that adds a critical new component to the pilot literature. It could prove to be a life-saving development in future flight.
WHEN A PILOT LOSES THE ENGINE, MAKING THE AIRPLANE A GLIDER, THE SAFEST LANDING LOCATION MAY NOT BE STRAIGHT AHEAD.
CRUCIAL CALCULATIONS
Callender made his discovery while working as an expert witness on a court case dealing with a single-engine airplane that lost its engine in flight.
As a part of the court case, Callender used his flight-testing background to design and lead a flight test to determine the aerodynamic performance of this airplane.
He then used that information to make glidepath predictions to the different airports that were available to that airplane at the time of the accident.
In the course of doing those calculations, Callender discovered something novel. Something Callender said pilots don’t know and are not presently taught.
According to Callender, when a pilot loses the engine, making the airplane a glider, the safest landing location may not be straight ahead. A turn will likely be necessary to get there.
How best to turn in an engine-out glide, Callender said, is not taught. Meaning pilots don’t know whether to use a very low bank angle or a really steep bank angle to make the turn.
“I was able to identify the bank angle that gives a pilot the most glide distance when they have to conduct a gliding turn,” Callender said.
“Essentially, current, readily available avionics software does not account for the distance that you would lose if you have to turn in the glide.”
To fill this gap, Callender conducted an optimization of gliding turns to safe landing locations that resulted in a set of equations and associated graphs. This provided the optimum bank angles for different directions that a pilot would have to use in a gliding turn (based upon how far they’d have to turn in an emergency engine-out scenario).
“The equations take into account how high the aircraft is above the ground, its altitude, the glide performance of the airplane (glide ratio), and the amount of turn required,” Callender said. “So, let’s say the safe landing location is directly to
your right or left, requiring a 90-degree heading change. Or, if it’s directly behind you, that’s a 180-degree heading change. The inputs into the equation are: how far you have to turn, how high you are when you start, and the airplane’s glide ratio.
“The lower the bank angle, the better your glide ratio will be. But the radius of your turn will be very large, which means you’ll cover more physical distance, and the whole time you’re losing altitude. So, you steepen the bank angle, which decreases the glide radius and minimizes the time that you’re descending, and it puts you on an intercept course sooner, allowing you to
level your wings and get back to the airplane’s wings-level glide ratio.”
Callender said avionics companies could incorporate this information into their software. In the interim, pilots can add this information to their knowledge base.
“It would be a lot to expect a pilot in the cockpit to remember an equation and to do the mental math with complex equations, even on a calculator, in an emergency,” Callender said. “However, you could expect them to know that the optimum bank angle is a variable that you need to think about if you have to turn to different
MTSU’s Nate Callender (r) talking with a U.S. Navy pilot
Photos by J. Intintoli
locations in an engine-out glide. And for the most part, the more turn that’s required, the steeper the bank angle needs to be.”
Callender has published this information in multiple places, as well as presented his results at various conferences including at the National Association of Flight Instructors (NAFI), the University Aviation Association, the Society of Flight Test Engineers, and the National Training Aircraft Symposium, a conference attended by a mix of practical aviation trainers and academic departments like MTSU’s.
NAFI president Paul J. Preidecker said Callender’s recent presentation at the NAFI annual conference was very well received.
“Dr. Callender presented detailed mathematical data into easy-to-understand conclusions and recommendations for best practices. His focus on safety and risk mitigation aligned very well with the conference,” Preidecker said. “Dr. Callender offered to send attendees his Glide Optimization Tool, which is a practical, easy-to-use tool to help determine glide performance in an engineout situation. Several pilots requested this information.”
Representatives of both Boeing and Garmin were in attendance at Callender’s presentation to engineers. He has encouraged each company to consider this potential enhancement to their software.
A LIFE IN GLIDE
That Callender would discover something new regarding engine-out glide should come as no surprise given his background.
Callender’s first experience as an actual pilot was not in a plane but in an unpowered glider, learning to stay aloft and to monitor the air and ground for potential sources of lift—whipping winds moving upward in waves.
Callender would eventually become a pilot, earning his master’s in Aviation Systems and his
EVEN TO THIS DAY, GLIDING IS A BIG PART OF HIS LIFE—AND ACADEMIC PURSUIT.
Ph.D. in Engineering Science from the University of Tennessee Space Institute. Prior to joining academia, he worked for the Army technical test center in Fort Rucker, Alabama, doing flight testing for the Army primarily in helicopters (the attack division, responsible for flight tests on Apaches, Blackhawks, Chinooks, and others).
Even to this day, though, gliding is a big part of his life—and academic pursuit.
For the last 20 years, one of the courses that he regularly teaches is Aircraft Performance. Glide performance is a portion of the curriculum.
“In my opinion, it’s one of the most important classes because glide performance is what pilots need to think about when things go wrong,”
Callender said. “Because in airplanes, especially single-engine airplanes, like what most of our students learn in at MTSU, if you lose the engine, you become a glider.”
Callender also teaches a course called Theory of Flight, teaching the basics behind how aircraft fly, how engines work, and the math and physics involved. He even wrote a grant for that course that enabled him to begin providing students hang-glider training, which he taught near Lookout Mountain in southeast Tennessee.
Callender’s fascination with gliding perhaps stems from what he describes as his earliest aviation memory.
“I had a dream when I was a kid where I was running on the beach and I put my arms out and I took off and I was just flying over the beach,” he said.
AVIONICS COMPANIES COULD INCORPORATE THIS . . . INTO THEIR SOFTWARE. IN THE INTERIM, PILOTS CAN ADD . . . TO THEIR KNOWLEDGE BASE.
Born and raised in west Tennessee in a little town called Halls, Callender’s first actual taste of flight came when he was just 2 years old.
He doesn’t remember it, but his family told him the story. His hometown was home to an abandoned World War II Army air base. It still has one active runway you can fly into today.
Callender’s grandparents and great-grandparents both lived near the property where the air base used to be. They had farmland there, and one of the abandoned concrete runways basically was the road that went past the front of their houses.
There was a missionary pilot who flew in when Callender was 2 years old and gave him a ride in his airplane.
“That’s what I’ve been told is my first airplane experience,” Callender said. “But from a young child, I’ve always liked and thought about aviation.”
These days, Callender’s thinking about aviation is leading to enhanced safety measures.
Air travel keeps getting safer, according to a study by MIT researchers. The risk of a fatality from commercial air travel was 1 per every 13.7 million passenger boardings globally in the 2018–22 period—a significant improvement from 1 per 7.9 million boardings in 2008–17 and a far cry from the 1 per every 350,000 boardings that occurred in 1968–77, the study found.
Nevertheless, safety improvements in flight are always welcomed, and commonly stem from new technologies.
Research like Callender’s has the potential to lead to technological advancements that improve aviation performance—and save lives.
[Editor’s note: Skip Anderson contributed heavily to this report].
WHEELS UP
The MTSU Aerospace Department not only offers undergraduate programs to help individuals and businesses navigate the friendly skies safely—it also provides a trio of Aeronautical Science M.S. programs to advance careers.
• Aviation Education
• Aviation Management
• Aviation Safety and Security Management
Applicants without an aviation bachelor’s can take bridge classes (FAA certificateholders receive some credits). Capstone and thesis options are available.
Let your career take flight in a sector of the aerospace industry.
TRAFFICKING SIGNS
MTSU PROFESSOR AND STUDENT HELP INFORM LAW ENFORCEMENT TRAINING TO ASSIST SEX TRAFFICKING VICTIMS
When the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation’s Human Trafficking Unit receives a 3 a.m. call after a state trooper notices a possible sex trafficking victim, the person in that pulled-over vehicle may initially reject an agent’s assistance.
Article by Carol Stuart
“You’re the police, and they’ve been groomed to hate you, and we’re there to take you away from what they’ve been told,” said Jeremy Lofquest, assistant special agent in charge of the unit.
But down the road, after receiving specialized assistance and therapies from service providers and programs, such victims sometimes return to express their gratitude and tell of their changed lives.
“ ‘Because you pulled me out of that car and you didn’t listen to me call you every name but Jeremy, and . . . showed me there is a way out of this, I’ve graduated high school now’—or gotten a college degree, gotten a job, or now living in their own apartment. You’re seeing someone get their whole life back on track that you don’t get to see in a lot of other criminal investigations,” Lofquest said.
Helping law enforcement officers throughout the state identify, rescue, and assist sex trafficking victims is an impetus for a research project launched by MTSU’s Rachel Davis, a Sociology assistant professor, and undergraduate Melissa Guinn.
A senior majoring in the new Cybersecurity Management program, Guinn aspires to apply her skills to tracking online predators, perhaps for the FBI, and hopes to also start a nonprofit for victim advocacy. While taking Davis’ Sex Trafficking course online, she approached her professor about collaborating on a project.
SURVEYING STATE OF THE STATE
Davis suggested using hypothetical vignettes to survey law enforcement across the state, similar to her own planned research project about people’s perceptions of campus sexual assault.
IRIS
Tennessee state cultivated flower
“I decided that I wanted to focus on law enforcement’s perceptions,” Guinn added, “because how they think of not only the victim but the scenario itself plays a part into the justice and the help that that victim is going to receive.”
The two developed vignettes about sexual assault and sex trafficking to help illuminate any concerns about officers’ training, recognition of situations, and specific challenges. They plan to present detailed findings to the TBI this semester, particularly related to runaway youth. They shared some preliminary results in a poster session at the American Society of Criminology conference last November, are presenting at the Southern Sociological Society this spring, and are seeking grants to expand the project nationally.
IT’S AN ISSUE THAT’S ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE STATE, BORDER TO BORDER.
“We’re really hopeful that this can highlight blind spots in law enforcement’s training related to sex trafficking and can highlight ways that we can strengthen our cultural response to sex trafficking and not just rely on law enforcement,” Davis said. “Because, as they mentioned in their responses, their hands are tied related to certain things.”
A BATTLE BORDER TO BORDER
In Tennessee’s metropolitical areas, sex trafficking victims are more likely trafficked through “pimp-driven” forced prostitution or by foreign nationals or transnational organizations, Lofquest said. In early January 2025, for instance, agencies at all levels raided a suspected brothel in Nashville allegedly involved in other criminal enterprises.
However, in rural areas, victims are often sex-trafficked by their families—or through other grooming situations—and investigations are more complex “to uncover the trafficking and not just view it as a child abuse or molestation or statutory rape,” Lofquest said.
MTSU's Rachel Davis inside Todd Hall
Photo by J. Intintoli
In each of the past two years, the agency received approximately 1,300 tips and leads for human trafficking (including labor trafficking), all checked out by analysts and its nine agents, but it had seen 30% year-over-year growth several years previously.
“It’s an issue that’s all the way across the state, border to border,” said Lofquest, a former U.S. Marine who then earned his college degree and became a TBI agent in Chattanooga.
A major public (mis)perception of typical sex trafficking—a child or other person being abducted from a parking lot and sold into sex slavery—is a much smaller percentage in the U.S. compared to worldwide, the local experts say. In other parts of the world, debt bondage also is a top type of human trafficking.
“It’s all horrible. It’s a horrific crime,” Lofquest said. “And we have it all in Tennessee. And we do what we can to attack it all.”
IDENTIFYING UNDERAGE VICTIMS
Law enforcement agencies in Tennessee may receive training on the topic from others that is well-intentioned and -designed. But the TBI, which has partnered with MTSU in other criminal justicerelated research, wants to offer local officers information relevant especially to Tennessee, including the state’s laws.
The agency welcomes Davis and Guinn’s research to gain feedback from subject experts that can be used in law enforcement training, as well as to increase public awareness.
One scenario in the survey—and the one requested by the TBI—actually proved to be the most interesting and “most concerning” according to early qualitative findings, Davis said.
The TBI wanted to know how officers would handle a scenario typical for juvenile or child sex trafficking: “They’ll get a call to go to a motel,
Davis (l) and MTSU student Melisssa Guinn
for instance, about a domestic dispute and then find an underage person there with evidence that maybe drugs are being used or evidence that sex has taken place,” Davis said. “And often it’s like a chronic runaway victim. And those are like telltale signs that this might be a trafficking case, but they wanted to know: ‘Will the officers identify it as a trafficking case?’ ”
Some did suspect potential trafficking, but most officers responding to the survey also indicated they would encourage parents to file an unruly petition in Juvenile Court—some, in part, to get the youth connected to services, Davis said.
“We found that minors who were considered chronic runaways or minors when they began being trafficked were actually the most likely to be seen as delinquent or criminal compared to adult victims in other cases that were seen as a victim,” Guinn added. Some said they “should maybe even charge the parents.”
FIRST-GEN AND PARENT PERSPECTIVE
After Guinn graduated from Blackman High School in 2019, and before taking a break from college during the COVID-19 pandemic, she never envisioned an opportunity to do undergraduate research. She’s especially grateful for MTSU’s Undergraduate Research Experience and Creative Activity (URECA) grant program. URECA helps offset students’ need to work and paid for most of Guinn’s conference trip along with other MTSU student funds.
“I am a first-generation college student, so I was not expecting to do more with my college career than just focus on studying and getting my degree,” Guinn said. “. . . The fact that MTSU has a program for undergraduates to conduct research has been so impactful.”
Like many students at MTSU, which attracts a high number of first-gen and Pell-eligible students, Guinn works while attending college— holding an on-campus job.
Now a mom to a 2-year-old son, Guinn also is considered a nontraditional student as she returned to finish her studies by May 2026. She was already concerned about relaxed social
THE TBI WANTED TO KNOW HOW OFFICERS WOULD HANDLE A SCENARIO TYPICAL FOR JUVENILE OR CHILD SEX TRAFFICKING.
media regulations for children in the U.S., her generation’s unmonitored access to the internet, and “plenty of people” she knows affected by online victimization.
Deciding to take Sociology courses to obtain a sociological perspective along with her Cybersecurity Management technological training, Guinn found both a research partner and a “great mentor” in Davis.
EXPANDING NATIONWIDE
Although limited response from Tennessee jurisdictions on the sexual assault and sex trafficking survey affects Davis and Guinn’s quantitative analysis, quality qualitative data showed that most officers replying did recognize the need to bring in expert resources. However, a lot of the officers noted legal limitations to prosecute cases, such as definitions in Tennessee’s lenient statutory rape law; statutes of limitations; and coercion instead of verbal or physical refusal—especially when alcohol is present for both the victim and suspect, according to one respondent.
An east Tennessee native whose doctorate includes a concentration in Criminology, Davis also has published research relating to transactional sex and social media and has a book proposal in the works. Much of her research looks at how nonconsensual sex trafficking, consensual sex work, and transactional sex (like “sugar”-type arrangements) can be conflated and thus cause harm—such as criminalizing victims.
Some officers’ suggestions to charge a child victim, usually along with the alleged perpetrator, in the one scenario seemed connected with the way Juvenile Court operates, Davis said.
“It’s kind of a dual system where it doles out punishment AND services,” she said.
In a lot of cases, “the child may think that they are in a situation they want to be in” and otherwise decline services, Davis added. But a chronic runaway may be being trafficked by family members or others they’re living with, she said. Lofquest, meanwhile, notes that the TBI would never recommend putting a child into the criminal justice system just for services’ sake and promotes a victim-centric mindset.
Guinn and Davis hope surveying law enforcement across America will increase sample size, allowing more robust data analysis.
After all, the MTSU researchers want to offer any improvements to address sex trafficking, “whether that’s a policy improvement, a training improvement, awareness campaign improvement,” Guinn said, “just to help law enforcement members really see the victim and know how to best handle the situation that is victim-centered.”
CHANGE LIVES
Earn an advanced degree that helps improve people’s lives! MTSU’s graduate school offers options that range from solving social problems, to leading safety and criminal justice initiatives, to assisting and advocating for clients. These three programs provide pathways to admission with bachelor’s degrees from other fields:
• Sociology (M.A.)
• Criminal Justice Administration (M.C.J.)
• Social Work (M.S.W.) Be
AN ATMOSPHERE OF CHANGE
MTSU ALUMNUS JARED FRAZIER LAUNCHES HIS COMPUTATIONAL SCIENCE CAREER ABROAD TO IMPACT WEATHER AND CLIMATE RESEARCH ACROSS THE GLOBE
Jared Frazier’s new address in the small, seaside town of Kühlungsborn, Germany, is about 4,500 miles away from his roots in Spring Hill, Tennessee. It’s his latest stop on an exciting international journey of leading-edge weather and climate research and personal discovery.
CORNFLOWER
Germany's national flower
Article by Patsy B. Weiler
The bright young man, a 2022 MTSU graduate, was hired in September 2024 as a computational scientist at the Leibniz Institute of Atmospheric Physics, which is connected with the teaching and research program of the University of Rostock. His employer is one of 96 independent institutes under the umbrella of the Leibniz Association.
As an MTSU undergraduate, Frazier, now 25, excelled in academics and research—while carrying a pocketful of wanderlust. He participated in the Honors in Italy summer program by Honors College Associate Dean Philip Phillips. “This short time abroad really made me feel more confident about moving to a new country,” he said.
For Frazier, this experience was a springboard to the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands during 2022–24, where he completed his master’s in Computational Science with a focus on highperformance numerical method. His area of expertise is in a rapidly evolving and rigorous interdisciplinary field of study, located at the crossroads of computer science and applied mathematics, used to solve complex science and engineering challenges. Once he obtained his master’s, he applied for jobs in the U.S., but Frazier had a strong interest in gaining work experience abroad, a desire to be a software engineer/programmer with scientific application and to be on the cutting edge of research that had a good impact on humanity. A mile-high order for sure.
He found the perfect fit in neighboring Germany, about six hours away at the Leibniz Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IAP), where his co-workers hail from Cuba to Canada and the United States to Ukraine, “providing an international environment full of a really incredible mix of scientific and engineering experts,” he added.
At the institute, Frazier is enjoying a hands-on opportunity to interact with the ICON model—one of the world’s leading high-resolution computer modeling frameworks for weather, climate, and environmental prediction. It provides a nearly homogeneous coverage of the globe—for better, faster predictions of routine and severe weather events, particularly in Europe.
THE CODE TO PREDICTING
The IAP conducts research mainly on the middle atmosphere, particularly on the mesosphere and lower thermosphere (approximate altitude of 50 to 200 kilometers, or 31 to 124 miles), as well as on the dynamic coupling between atmospheric layers at different altitudes from the troposphere—which starts at the Earth’s surface and extends 5 to 9 miles—to the thermosphere. Between these two locations are the stratosphere, or the ozone layer, and on top of it the mesosphere, where meteors burn up.
Claudia Stephan, head of the IAP’s Modeling of Atmospheric Processes Department and Frazier’s supervisor, explains the focus of this area is to research the dramatic changes the terrestrial atmosphere is experiencing.
“The lower atmosphere is warming, while the middle and upper atmosphere is cooling,” she said. “As a result, the upper atmosphere is contracting, which has direct and substantial effects on the lifetime and trajectories of satellites and space debris. There are growing needs for operational weather forecasts of the atmosphere that extend beyond heights of 100 kilometers, or about 62 miles.”
Why is this so important?
“The rapid development of the civil, commercial, and military use of space requires an increasingly
precise determination of trajectories for rockets, satellites, space debris, and controlled reentry scenarios,” Stephan said. “Atmospheric layers at altitudes between 50 and 200 km (31 to 124 miles) play a crucial role, but accurately modeling these altitudes is a big challenge. Our department develops a numerical model that can provide relevant products from weather to climate timescales to address these emerging societal needs.”
Frazier is part of the equation.
“Jared plays a key role in making our code sustainable, well-documented, and in optimizing the workflow from simulations to analysis and visualization. His efforts improve the quality of our work and the speed at which we can publish new findings,” Stephan said.
“The code is long and complex, and the amounts of data we produce are enormous. Jared helps managing the code development, finding the optimum settings to minimize computer resources, and designing software for analyzing the data as quickly and as efficiently as possible. With his creative solutions, he supports the entire team of model developers and researchers.”
FRAZIER IS ENJOYING A HANDSON OPPORTUNITY TO INTERACT WITH THE ICON MODEL—ONE OF THE WORLD’S LEADING HIGH-RESOLUTION COMPUTER MODELING FRAMEWORKS FOR WEATHER, CLIMATE, AND ENVIRONMENTAL PREDICTION.
Frazier said his daily life “consists primarily of talking with scientists at the institute about what their workflows look like regarding downloading, preprocessing, running computer simulations, and postprocessing. Then, I code up software solutions, including usage documentation, that can be used by our institute’s scientists.”
MTSU alumnus Jared Frazier at the Leibniz Institute of Atmospheric Physics
HIS
AREA OF EXPERTISE IS
IN A
RAPIDLY EVOLVING AND RIGOROUS INTERDISCIPLINARY FIELD OF STUDY, LOCATED AT THE CROSSROADS OF COMPUTER SCIENCE AND APPLIED MATHEMATICS.
Because of Frazier’s software engineering background and high-performance computing training, his work translates practically into a scenario where previously a scientist might have to wait four or more hours to process data and then visualize it using their scripts, to recently only having to wait about 30 minutes, not to mention the energy savings involved.
THE WORLD AT HIS FINGERTIPS
After graduating from MTSU, where his undergraduate research included studying weather patterns on the red planet as part of the Blue Mars project, Frazier decided to earn his master’s abroad for “essentially two reasons.”
“First, to work in an international environment to broaden my understanding of the scientific community and learn to adapt to unique cultures of different countries. Secondly, I wanted to deepen my software development skills, but with a particular focus on scientific problems,” he said. “My time at the university was good preparation for my work now at IAP. I really ‘discovered’ highperformance computing for myself and became fascinated with the details of how to develop efficient, scientific software.”
Although he didn’t know anyone in Europe, Frazier is flourishing. He became proficient in Dutch and is working on his German language skills.
“Just showing genuine interest in where people are from, picking up phrases or practicing whole languages really made me bond with people I never could have before,” said Frazier, who traveled to Paris for Christmas 2024.
Laura Clippard, MTSU’s undergraduate fellowships and Honors College coordinator, wasn’t surprised about Frazier’s latest venture. She mentored Frazier, who was an MTSU Buchanan Fellow— the University’s most prestigious scholarship for freshmen—when he successfully sought the esteemed Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship for undergraduate scientific study.
“He was always a proactive and a motivated student with a keen interest in international research, even as an undergraduate,” she said.
Submitted
“I am thrilled to see a former MTSU Honors student thriving in such a distinguished scientific organization.”
FREE TIME AND FORECASTING THE FUTURE
Outside Frazier’s work window, he can view the Baltic Sea. “Across from us is Denmark. Life is quiet here,” he said. “I live in a large province called Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, formerly in East Germany. Kühlungsborn has a beautiful view of the sea, a quaint boardwalk, and pier, as well as a smattering of bakeries and shops along the coast and in the town center.”
Away from his office, you’ll likely find Frazier “biking along the coast or just to nearby towns to
HE WAS ALWAYS A PROACTIVE AND A MOTIVATED STUDENT WITH A KEEN INTEREST IN INTERNATIONAL RESEARCH, EVEN AS AN UNDERGRADUATE.
see what there is to see,” he said. “When I stay in Kühlungsborn, I usually am reading books or listening to German podcasts, with the strong winds and hypnotic crashing of the waves in the background while walking along the coast.”
Some weekends, he visits the University of Rostock library, where the avid reader can obtain copies of free German student magazines to help with learning the language and keeping up with area
Lasers produced by the IAP's Kühlungsborn DopplerRayleigh LIDAR remote sensor, which takes measurements from the upper troposphere to the lower thermosphere
photo by IAP/Eframir Franco Diaz
events. He has also enjoyed the local German Christmas markets.
Reflecting on his time at MTSU, Frazier said, “It prepared me well for the future, to work and learn from international colleagues, since I spent a significant amount of time with Mengliang Zhang,” a former MTSU Chemistry assistant professor. "Through coursework ranging from artificial intelligence to physical chemistry, I learned how to approach a wide range of scientific problems as well as disseminate one’s findings in a professional manner and was fortunate to co-author several papers. I cannot emphasize enough the excellent quality of the staff and professors in the Honors College. They helped me apply for and win national and international fellowships and properly introduced me to the process of grant writing and application writing at a very competitive level.”
David Butler, MTSU vice provost for research and dean of the College of Graduate Studies, said Frazier was an “extraordinary student and ahead of his time” on MTSU’s Blue Mars project. “His innovative research used data to see if a Martian weather model could be created to allow for predictions. As humans land on the red planet, they will need to be aware of Martian dust storms, temperature fluctuations, and other factors that can make life and work on Mars more difficult.”
What’s on the horizon for Frazier? “It’s hard to say where I see myself. I think I will very likely stay in the domain of climatology/ numerical weather prediction,” he said. “Maybe I end up at a U.S. government lab, somewhere in industry, or maybe I stay in Germany for several more years. Time will tell. I’m open to anything.”
One certainty: The sky’s no limit for Frazier’s future trajectory.
STRIKE GOLD
As an MTSU undergraduate, you can get paid to conduct research or work on a creative project and enjoy your own “Aha!” moment. Grants ranging from $500 for beginners to $3,000 for experienced researchers are awarded each semester through the Undergraduate Research Experience and Creative Activity (URECA) program.
MTSU also boasts the:
• Undergraduate Research Center
• Student Organization for the Advancement of Research (SOAR)
MTSU undergraduates get research opportunities often available only to graduate students at many other large universities.
A CLEARER PICTURE
MTSU COMPUTER SCIENCE GRADUATE LUCAS REMEDIOS WIELDS ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) IN THE FIGHT AGAINST A SILENT KILLER
A study published in Academic Radiology found that, on average, radiologists must interpret one CT or MRI image every three to four seconds to keep their workday on track.
PASSION FLOWER A Tennessee state wildflower
Article by Drew Ruble
It’s a frightening pace considering patients’ lives often depend on scan readings to determine if something looks abnormal.
Help for weary-eyed radiologists has arrived in the form of artificial intelligence (AI) applications making imaging evaluation more precise and efficient, improving diagnostic accuracy.
Radiology Today recently quoted Bibb Allen, president of the International Society of Radiology, stating that “AI-lite” is already being used extensively in the field in numerous ways, including “computeraided detection for cancer” and “auto-segmentation of organs in 3-D post-processing.”
According to Bibb, AI can’t replace an experienced radiologist’s clinical judgement; but it can identify and flag potential abnormalities in scans, enabling human professionals to focus more on complex interpretations.
Said another way, AI won’t replace the radiologist. But the radiologist who uses AI will replace the radiologist who doesn’t.
The key is harnessing mass data—billions upon billions of medical scans collected in a common database—to enable AI to do its job.
That’s where computer scientists like MTSU graduate Lucas Remedios (’20), currently a Ph.D. student at Vanderbilt University, enter the picture.
As a researcher at the Medical-image Analysis and Statistical Interpretation (MASI) lab at Vanderbilt, Remedios is wielding AI in health care imaging to better understand one of humanity’s most insidious diseases—diabetes.
A DEEPER DIVE
Type 1 diabetes starts in childhood, wherein a person’s immune system kills the insulinproducing cells in their pancreas (thus, the need to supply it with external insulin). Type 2 diabetes is acquired later in life.
At least, that’s the currently accepted medical understanding.
“But there are still big, open questions in the diabetes space,” Remedios said. “I used to hear about diseases like diabetes and think, ‘Oh, they know all about that.’ And the medical field does know a lot about diabetes. But there’s a tremendous amount of unanswered questions as well.”
One question is if Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes— traditionally considered completely separate buckets—really are separate, or if they would be better described as part of a spectrum or gradient of the disease.
“To that end, I’m trying to help characterize what’s happening in the phenotypes [genetic traits] of people who have Type 1 versus Type 2 diabetes,” Remedios explained. “And the way I’m approaching it is by looking at abdominal medical images.”
Using anonymous digital scans taken at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Remedios is part of a team teaching computers to make measurements of organs like livers and pancreata in a standardized, comparable way. It’s work that would take years to accomplish using traditional methods, like having graduate students individually mark up scans. By comparison, Remedios and colleagues are effectively teaching computers how to view and measure images independently and more precisely.
“I’m essentially using AI to extract segmentations,” Remedios said. “It’s a way of saying, ‘Here’s exactly where the liver is, the pancreas, the spleen, the kidneys, and also visceral fat around organs, or subcutaneous fat, the pinchable fat, and the skeletal muscle in the abdomen. It’s like a fancy measuring tape—better than when you go to the doctor and they weigh you, look at your height, and calculate a BMI [body mass index]. We achieve a much more finegrain way of measuring what’s happening in body composition.”
ONE QUESTION IS IF TYPE 1 AND TYPE 2 DIABETES—TRADITIONALLY CONSIDERED COMPLETELY SEPARATE BUCKETS—REALLY ARE SEPARATE.
Remedios can extract a specific phenotype from the shape information, the volume of the organs, the interplay between the organs, and the fat in the muscle. The mapping of those organs then helps determine what a normal situation would be, versus an abnormal one. That leads to the ability to investigate what is happening in the phenotypes of Type 1 versus Type 2 diabetics and determine if there is crossover, or not.
Some diabetics do have features of the disease that look like both Type 1 and Type 2. Meaning there may indeed be a spectrum of the disease—a Type 1 diabetes, a Type 1.5 diabetes that’s somewhere in the middle, a Type 2 diabetes, and perhaps even a Type 2B or Type 2C diabetes—not dissimilar to the way other diseases like breast cancer are diagnosed. The consequences of better understanding this possible segmentation could be life-altering. Presently, if a doctor is treating a patient like they have Type 2 diabetes when in fact they have Type 1, they’re doing that patient a disservice, and treatment should be changed immediately.
MTSU alumnus Lucas Remedios near his Vanderbilt University research lab
Photo by Andy Heidt
REMEDIOS IS PART OF A TEAM TEACHING COMPUTERS TO MAKE MEASUREMENTS OF ORGANS LIKE LIVERS AND PANCREASES IN A STANDARDIZED, COMPARABLE WAY.
“I think, longer-term, appreciating that there may be more than two types of diabetes, and that there’s actually a spectrum of disease, well, that could be very helpful,” Remedios said. “And let’s just say imaging can play a real role in that.”
AI imaging could also lead to an earlier diagnosis of diabetes—or even forecast its likelihood of developing.
That’s the opinion of Jack Virostko, a mentor to Remedios who focuses on diabetes research at the University of Texas health care system. Virostko earned his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering at Vanderbilt, did his postdoctoral work there, became a junior faculty member, then left for Texas in 2015. But he still does collaborations on projects with Vanderbilt, including on the imaging side and the diabetes side, and he serves on Remedios’ Ph.D. thesis committee.
According to Virostko, modern medicine diagnoses diabetes pretty late in the game.
“Generally speaking, by the time that you go into your doctor’s office and they do an A1C measurement, a blood test that measures the average blood sugar/glucose, and your A1C is elevated, they say, ‘Alright, you have diabetes.’ And you say, ‘OK, so I guess I just got diabetes.’ And they say, ‘No, we don’t know for sure when you got it. But this has been developing over years, if not decades.’ ”
The imaging measurements Virostko and fellow researchers like Remedios are working on could help doctors identify that a patient is on a pathway to getting diabetes much earlier in the process than those standard blood measurements currently in use.
“We start by building a big database of what a normal human body looks like inside from head to toe, and then we start to look for discrepancies,” he said. “Now a doctor can look for things that are a little bit different from the typical. And perhaps say, ‘Let’s have a radiologist look at this and see if they see anything that’s off.’ . . . And maybe we identify this years and years before they’re traditionally diagnosed.”
A WORLDWIDE CURE
Remedios’ work pulls exclusively from millions of anonymous medical images at one hospital— Vanderbilt. Imagine the medical understanding that could be achieved once AI has access to interpret billions of scans from around the world, identifying suspicious areas that may not be obvious to the human eye. Doctors could much more easily correlate that data to identify patterns that are predictive of diabetes, or any other disease.
“The hope for us, specifically, is that we are able to characterize something new about these classes of diabetes,” Remedios said. “If I’m lucky, there’s a big discovery to be made. But if not, I’m working alongside thousands of other scientists around the world trying to chunk away little by little to build the knowledge so that we can eventually make big leaps forward.”
Virostko said one key to such medical discovery is inspiring more researchers like Remedios with a computer science background to get involved in health care projects.
“Lucas is really smart, really driven, and really grasps new things well,” Virostko said. “Some people who have a high level of technical training like Lucas tend to become a little bit siloed. But I think Lucas does a great job of learning new things and being curious about things.
“People like that can be really successful because they have the technical chops, but then they also have a broad curiosity and a broad ability to learn new things. And they realize they can apply their skill set to real-life problems.”
IMAGINE
THE MEDICAL UNDERSTANDING THAT COULD BE ACHIEVED ONCE AI HAS ACCESS TO INTERPRET BILLIONS OF SCANS FROM AROUND THE WORLD.
AI is clearly at the forefront of health care innovation. Data researchers like Remedios on the cutting edge of AI use appear poised to quickly close the gap between aspiration and implementation of new, lifesaving technologies.
LEVEL UP
Develop skills to advance in careers for the future and seek positions at business titans like Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Meta, Caterpillar, Deloitte, and HCA. All three of these high-tech graduate programs require only a bachelor’s from any field to apply, and both master’s degrees offer nonthesis and thesis options.
• Computer Science M.S.
• Data Science M.S.*
• Computational and Data Science Ph.D.
*MTSU also offers a graduate certificate in Data Science
Engineer a better world and fill in-demand, high-paying jobs.
