NMSU Panorama - Winter 2018

PANORAMA

RESEARCH EDITION

New Mexico State University Alumni & Friends Magazine

Volume 70 Winter 2018 • FREE

Limitless Dedication

NMSU students commit their research to some of the world’s leading issues and problems. +ALSO INSIDE: Researcher receives NSF CAREER award

Letter from

the President

W

elcome to the first research-focused edition of New Mexico State University’s Panorama Magazine, replacing NMSU’s Research & Resources magazine.

With this addition, NMSU alumni and friends will now receive three editions of Panorama each year: in the fall, winter and spring.

The new Panorama-Research Edition will carry on our decade-long tradition of providing an annual report on the excellence in research taking place in our labs, fields and classrooms, but will also combine some of the elements readers are used to finding in the pages of Panorama’s regular fall and spring editions.

This new approach will allow us to continue to bring news of the best and brightest research activity, but will also view the university with a broader lens, to include other important scholarly and creative activity happening throughout our campuses.

One of the hallmarks of NMSU is the outstanding opportunity we provide for students to gain valuable research experience while completing their undergraduate studies.

and Creative Arts Symposium, our students have many ways to get involved with meaningful, important research activities.

We hope you’ll enjoy exploring the pages of this new edition of Panorama as it chronicles the many ways we are helping our students open new doors to learning, spark new ideas and innovations, and participate in life-changing research and creative experiences.

Garrey Carruthers ’64 ’65 NMSU President and Chancellor of the NMSU System

Whether it’s assisting a professor in a lab setting or participating in a campus-wide program like the Undergraduate Research

This issue of Panorama is produced by the office of Marketing and Communications, New Mexico State University, 575-646-3221.

President and Chancellor Garrey Carruthers ’64 ’65

Correspondences may be sent to Marketing and Communications, MSC 3K, New Mexico State University, P.O. Box 30001, Las Cruces, NM 88003-3590 or panorama@nmsu.edu. Panorama is published three times annually. ISSN 2470-0649

Interim Vice President for Research Luis A. Vazquez

New Mexico State University is an equal opportunity, affirmative action employer and educator.

The magazine can be found at panorama.nmsu.edu.

Editor Darrell J. Pehr Assistant Editor Angel Mendez Art Director Gerald Rel Contributors Tiffany Acosta, Minerva Baumann ’13, Adriana M. Chávez, Linda Fresques, Kristie Garcia ’07, Laura Goldstein ’15, Anja Hansen, Billy Huntsman ’16, Andrés Leighton, Jane Moorman, Darren Phillips, Erik Stenbakken, Ximena Tapia

NMSU ALUMNI ASSOCIATION INTERNATIONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS President Tony Martinez ’96 ’98

President, NMSU Foundation Andrea Tawney

President-Elect Scott Sponsellet ’96 ’98

Chief Operating Officer, NMSU Foundation

Secretary/Treasurer Kay Brilliant ’71

Tina Byford ’00 ’11

Past President Crystal Lay ’02 ’10

Associate Vice President for Alumni Engagement and Stewardship Leslie Cervantes ’86 Associate Vice President for Marketing and Communications Justin Bannister ’03 ’13 Director of Marketing and Web Communications Melissa Chavira ’03 ’05 ’11

Executive Council Kim Archuleta ’95 ’02, Steve Duran ’90, Connie Lee ’69 ’73, Carol Smallwood, Daniel Sonntag ’14, Andrea Sparkevicius ’91 ’99, Adam Thompson ’08 Copyright 2018 New Mexico State University POSTMASTER: Send address change notifications to Panorama, MSC 3590, New Mexico State University, P.O. Box 30001, Las Cruces, NM, 88003-88001

Contents Winter 2018 P6

A student research tradition

For 22 years, NMSU program has inspired undergraduate research

P10

Matching up with industry

P14

Engineering capstone projects to get a dose of reality

The science of movement

NMSU Kinesiology research tracks physical activity across the lifespan

P12

Tearing down walls, shattering stigmas

P18

Renovations of Eloy Torrez Learning Communities expected this summer

Blue corn craze

Researchers work to spread traditional New Mexican crop

P22

Communication disorders NMSU professor researching how to treat aphasia in stroke patients

Also Inside

2 Faculty Profile.........................26 Student Profile........................28 In Partnership.........................30 In Brief.....................................

Research expenditures, awards and sources................

33

COVER PHOTO BY ANDRÉS LEIGHTON

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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IN BRIEF

Robert Herrera pitches his company, Hatch, for possible investment during Aggie Shark Tank in October. The company offers data encryption using technology developed by New Mexico State University computer scientists Reza Tourani and Jay Misra.

NMSU data encryption technology receives investment at Aggie Shark Tank

A data encryption technology developed by New Mexico State University computer scientists for use in Internet of Things hardware devices is being commercialized by an El Paso-based venture capitalist who secured investment during the 2017 Aggie Shark Tank event hosted by Arrowhead Center.

Robert Herrera, an early stage venture capitalist and LP investor associate on behalf of Joseph Advisory Services, is building the company – called Hatch – which provides IoT hardware and platforms with data encryption and decryption using low computing power and memory requirements, daily security key updates, and a faster and more secure connection than others in the market. Hatch’s service will be distributed via a cloud platform that signs up devices and provides updates directly to combat security threats.

Developed at NMSU by Hatch co-founders Reza Tourani, an NMSU Ph.D. candidate in computer science who also serves as Hatch’s chief technology officer, and Jay Misra, an associate professor in computer science who also serves on the company’s board of advisers, Hatch received a commitment of up to $100,000 in investment from two Aggie Shark Tank investors – Estela Hernandez, an enterprise adviser at Arrowhead Center, and Beto Pallares, managing director and co-founder of Cowork Oasis, an innovation community for El Paso entrepreneurs.

Herrera said his company’s long-term vision is to become the standard of security for all new IoT hardware devices.

Internationally known fertility researcher speaks to students

New Mexico State University alumnus Klaus Wiemer, an internationally renowned and award-winning researcher in fertility and embryology, visited the campus in October to engage with NMSU professors and students and present a public talk titled “Human IVF-Where are we now?”

Wiemer, the lab director/part owner at Poma Fertility as well as owner of KEW Technology, graduated from NMSU in 1985 with a master’s degree in reproductive physiology. He later earned his Ph.D. in reproductive physiology with an emphasis on embryology from Louisiana State University.

“My time at NMSU proved to be invaluable,” said Wiemer. “It helped me become the person I am today and helped prepare me to face all the challenges we face today both as a professional and a person.”

He was one of the first embryologists in the U.S. to achieve pregnancies with human blastocysts, a structure formed in the early development of mammals, which is 2 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

transferred during an in-vitro fertilization treatment. Having successfully directed several IVF programs in the United States, Wiemer went on to oversee several IVF labs all of which consistently produced some of the highest pregnancy rates in the country.

“I felt like this was truly something that could let me work for a greater good of helping people.

And yet at the same time I was getting into this field early enough that it would really allow me to make some major contributions in people’s lives,” Wiemer said.

IN BRIEF

NMSU Extension faculty participating in nationwide student health research

New Mexico State University is one of several schools participating in the USDA grantfunded Fruved project based at the University of Tennessee, but NMSU researchers are hoping to use some of the data to determine how healthy NMSU students are.

Fruved, which is short for fruits and vegetables, began in 2014 with four intervention and four control schools, and has since expanded to 90 campuses nationwide. This year, NMSU received a $3,000 mini-grant from the Fruved project to be a control school. Students living at Garcia Hall were asked in participate in surveys about their nutrition, physical activity, sleep and stress levels while being treated to a healthy breakfast.

Lourdes Olivas, an associate faculty member of the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences’ Extension Family and Consumer Sciences department, said audits were also conducted of the Taos Restaurant and Frenger Food Court to determine how healthy those campus dining options are, and audits were also conducted on recreational services and facilities on campus. Surveys were also given to department heads, deans and other campus administrators about their perceptions of what should change in order to have a more healthy campus.

Olivas said participation in Fruved has led her to create the Thrive program, which features informational sessions to teach students about proper nutrition, exercise, stress management and financial wellness.

Being involved in the Fruved project is part of the NMSU Cooperative Extension Service’s mission to provide community outreach.

ADRIANA M. CHAVÉZ

Connor Hudson, a dietetic internship student at New Mexico State University’s College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences, looks over a sample of a survey given to students this fall at Garcia Hall as part of the Fruved project. New Mexico State University is one of several schools participating in the USDA grant-funded Fruved project based at the University of Tennessee, but NMSU researchers are hoping to use some of the data to determine how healthy NMSU students are.

NMSU’s Vazquez earns national award

Luis Vazquez, interim vice president of research for New Mexico State University, received a national award from the American Psychological Association. He received the Distinguished Career Contribution to Service award from Division 45 of the APA, which is the Society for the Psychological Study of Culture, Ethnicity, and Race.

The award was presented at the 125th APA Convention in Washington, D.C., in August.

Vazquez has been part of Division 45 of the APA since the early 1990s. He has served as president of the division and council representative in the past. He has also participated in mentorships with students, lobbying efforts and other leadership positions.

“I’ve always been involved with this division; it’s like home to me,” Vazquez said.

Vazquez

Vazquez is very passionate about the work Division 45 does, and said he felt very honored and surprised when he found out he had been selected for this award.

“You don’t get a Contribution to Service award unless you’re willing to pay it forward and willing to help those who usually don’t get help and usually don’t have a voice,” he said.

“To me, it’s quite an honor. I do things because I want to, not for the recognition, because I really don’t care about that,” he said. “What I do care about is what happens to those who come after me, what happens to those around me, and what happens to those who don’t have the same opportunities that I do.”

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IN BRIEF

Celina Apodaca is the lab technician for DACC’s water technology lab.

DACC refurbishes water laboratory

Thanks to the passage of a countywide 2015 general obligation bond and a state bond in 2014, Alex Sanchez Hall at Doña Ana Community College is seeing renovations that make the building more functional, more efficient and better suited to educate students.

The total cost for the project, which included extensive remodeling, building stabilization, roof work as well as a new fire alarm system, totaled $4.95 million.

“Thanks to voters for passing the bond issue as the original building at DACC built in 1978 is once again a stable, functional and beautiful place for students to learn,” said Kelly Brooks, DACC Vice President of Business and Finance. “There are new classrooms which are refreshed and refurbished with new chairs, tables and projectors and a 4 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

brand new water technology laboratory.”

The crown jewel of the construction is a new state of the art water technology laboratory. The renovated laboratory includes two water plants, an Ultra-Pure water purification plant which was already in place. In the past, the system prepared students to go into the microchip manufacturing industry with companies such as Intel, Motorola and Kurita America. As water becomes scarcer, the cleaning of brackish or highly contaminated water is beginning to utilize this technology

The second water plant is a new $150,000 wastewater treatment plant which includes a nutrient removal system. Nutrients impact the environment and potentially public health. The plant is designed to remove nitrogen-ammonia and nitrates. The system converts ammonia to nitrates and

then removes the nitrates through the process of denitrification. The plant is a small version of what students will experience on the job upon graduation.

“This renovation gives students a leg up when moving to the workforce and reflects a quality educational experience,” said Terry Mount, director of Commercial Technologies. “The up-to-date nature of the facility will instill a sense of pride in our students.”

The addition of the new plant will enhance the student experience, according to Celina Apodaca, a former water tech student and current lab technician. “The wastewater package plant will give students the opportunity to develop their skills for wastewater treatment plant operation through the biological, chemical and physical analysis of wastewater.”

IN BRIEF

Grape expert joins NMSU

Giese – who is located at the Agricultural Science Center at Los Lunas – also serves as an assistant professor for NMSU Extension Plant Sciences. For 12 years, he was the lead instructor for viticulture and enology at Surry Community College, also in Dobson.

Giese earned his doctorate in horticulture from Virginia Tech. He received a bachelor of science in agriculture and master of science in horticulture from the University of Arkansas.

Not only did he teach at Surry Community College, he established its viticulture

KRISTIE GARCIA

Gill Giese joined New Mexico State University in July as its Extension viticulture specialist.

Giese spent the last four years as a commercial winemaker at Shelton Vineyards in Dobson, North Carolina. Spanning over 100 acres, more than 400 tons of grapes are grown and processed from the vineyard each year, where Giese and his staff bottled between 25,000 and 30,000 bottles of wine annually. Giese brings his viticultural and winemaking knowledge to the NMSU College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences.

Gill Giese joined New Mexico State University July 3 as the Extension viticulture specialist.

and enology two-year degree program and curriculum.

As a research specialist for six years with the University of Arkansas Food Science Department, he managed a six-acre research vineyard and pilot winery.

Giese’s appointment at NMSU is 75 percent Extension and 25 percent research.

This combination – in addition to the state’s unique wine industry – is what attracted him to NMSU.

The growing conditions in New Mexico are challenging mainly due to the wide variety and diversity of vineyard sites, as well as significant changes in temperature.

“I’ve been talking to New Mexico winegrowers who have been successful overcoming different challenges, such as heat during ripening and survivability during the winter,” Giese said.

In addition to addressing growing challenges, one of Giese’s priorities is to help growers increase both quality and production efficiency. Giese understands the importance of the economic impact the wine industry has on the state.

“Wine has a rippling effect on the economy, whether it’s the agricultural and winery related supply chains, retail and restaurants, or festivals” he said. “New Mexico is a beautiful state with a storied wine history, and tourism is part of the modern economy. Wine can play a major role in tourism, as it is threaded throughout history and the human experience.”

Computer science professor receives grant to discover biological patterns

A professor in New Mexico State University’s Department of Computer Science recently received a National Science Foundation grant to develop automated methods to discover molecular patterns from human and mouse genomics data.

Joe Song plans to implement these methods of data science to developmental biology.

“This grant will address a long-standing question in biology regarding how different cells, such as brain and muscle cells, carrying the same genome can have distinct biological functions,” he said. “It

is generally believed that the molecular networks of our genes are wired differently to execute diverse programs across cell types. We will develop novel data science methods to delineate how molecular networks are rewired in major cell and tissue types in humans and mice.”

Song’s research will be funded by the $814,942 NSF grant, from the NSF’s Advances in Biological Informatics program through its Division of Biological Infrastructure, from July 1, 2017, for three years.

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A

STUDENT

trad

For 22 years, NMSU program has inspired undergraduate research

T

he William Conroy Honors College at New Mexico State University will host the 23rd annual Undergraduate Research and Creative Arts Symposium on April 27. Early in the spring semester there will be a call for applications, and interested students can submit an abstract to give an outline of their planned presentation.

URCAS was the brainchild of former Honors College Dean William Eamon.

“He wanted to find ways to encourage undergraduates to get involved in research and scholarly activity and to really highlight what they do,” said current Honors College Dean Miriam Chaiken.

Students from every college on the NMSU campus are eligible to participate in URCAS, presenting their research either in paper or poster presentations or in creative-arts presentations.

“Paper and poster presentations are the most common for students in the STEM fields,” Chaiken said. “But last spring we had one session dedicated to dancers. They were students in the Kinesiology and Dance Department and these students had, for their senior project, choreographed dances for their fellow students to perform.”

Other nontraditional presentations include English majors reading poetry or Creative Media students presenting screenplays or even short films.

The research included in the presentations is highly diverse, and topics have included everything from international economic policy, to analyses of Plato’s writings, to the degrees of strength of varying concrete mixtures. “The presentations run the entire gamut of what people at this university do 6 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

DARREN PHILLIPS

By Billy Huntsman ’16

Students present their research posters at Corbett Center during the 2016 Undergraduate Research and Creative Arts (URCAS) symposium.

and research,” Chaiken said.

“Many of the students have spent the academic year working on their research, but some have been involved for several years prior to presenting at URCAS,” Chaiken said.

The students may have first gotten involved in their research by being part of a professors’ research group, a graduate

students’ group, or their research may be completely independent.

Most of the students who present are juniors or seniors but the event is open to any undergraduate-level student.

Engineering student Glen Throneberry’s presentation focused on differently shaped wings and their benefits for nano air vehicles. “The work I did for that

RESEARCH

dition

project inspired me to attend NMSU for graduate school and work on similar research,” Throneberry said. “The presentation was very beneficial as I have had to give many research presentations since then and it was a good opportunity to practice my presentation skills in a low pressure environment surrounded by my peers.”

Biochemistry student Daniela Barraza’s presentation was on the transmembrane receptor Btub, which is a bacterium prevalent in fresh water. “My goal is to determine its role given that understanding the biogenesis of the outer membrane in gram-negative organ-

isms is key for the identification of potential antibiotic targets,” she said. “This fall we were able to submit a scientific manuscript based on this project to the journal of Molecular Microbiology and we are very excited about that!”

Barraza credits her experience in URCAS with developing her competitiveness as a graduate-school candidate.

“My experience at URCAS helped me get prepared to participate in the national conference called SACNAS,” she said. “It also made my graduate school applications stronger! I recently received Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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Top left: Clara Hansen, a junior biology major, presented her project on vocal communication of budgerigar parrots at the 2017 Undergraduate Research and Creative Arts Symposium (URCAS).

Top right: Ryan Kirby and 11 other Sundt Honors Seminar course students studied climate change in Hawaii over spring break in 2016.

Kirby is pictured here at the Honolulu Fish Auction. His group’s 2016 URCAS presentation focused on socioeconomics, specifically, how climate change affects the financial stability of a place like Hawaii.

Bottom right: Jake Bennett, right, and other students present their research posters at Corbett Center during the 2016 Undergraduate Research and Creative Arts (URCAS) symposium.

Bottom left: Sara Kelley’s and Kevin Perez’s 2016 URCAS presentation explained the biodiversity of arachnids in the Nutt Grasslands of New Mexico and whether solar facilities have an effect on the ecology of arachnids.

COURTESY PHOTO

ANJA HANSEN

an invitation to interview at one of my top choices for grad school and it all goes back to the experience that I have acquired through opportunities like URCAS.”

“We really encourage freshmen to attend URCAS even if they’re not presenting so they can get a sense of what it’s all about,” Chaiken said.

Faculty members from the Honors College moderate the URCAS sessions.

“It’s always been interesting that the faculty request to be assigned to sessions that don’t have anything to do with their disciplines, because they always learn something from the experience,” Chaiken said.

For example, a beloved late professor of German, Richard Rundell, frequently asked to be assigned to sessions dealing with engineering and animal science.

“He said he always learned something new from the students,” Chaiken said. “As professors we’re lifelong learners and that’s the best part of working with undergrads who are really engaged in what they’re doing. They convey their enthusiasm for their subject matter in these presentations.”

Chaiken said the number of NMSU students who participate in URCAS has steadily increased over the past 22 years.

Just this past year, she said, URCAS had more than 110 students apply to present their research and many others participated in the preparation for the event. “URCAS is, from start to finish, a studentrun event,” Chaiken said. “The college coordinates the logistics and the budgets, but the design of the program, the advertising poster, the content of the presentations, and posters, and performances are all the product of undergraduate students.”

Chaiken said the college collaborates with the Art Department’s graphic-design class, and teams in this graphic-design class develop thematic logos for URCAS’s advertising poster. “The winning individual or team becomes the project director for all the rest of the production of the URCAS materials, which includes an advertising poster, a T-shirt design, PowerPoint template, and the event program.”

A number of mentoring programs at NMSU encourage their students to participate in URCAS and provide mentorship along the way, such as the Maximizing Access to Research Careers (MARC) program, the Alliance for Minority Participation (AMP) program and the College Assistance Migrant Program (CAMP).

As an example of this encouragement and mentorship, during the summer, six students in CAMP participated in a six-week Medicinal Plants Workshop. This workshop gave them experience in background investigation, classroom presentations, project planning and time in the lab.

“It’s really a good way to get a taste of what we have to do when we’re presenting papers or posters at a conference,” Chaiken said. “The students gain confidence in their abilities, being in front of a crowd and making their research intelligible for people who aren’t familiar with their field.”

Chaiken said the experience also looks good on a resume for students who later apply for graduate school.

“This shows both graduate schools and potential employers that the student has not taken the path of least resistance,” Chaiken said.

“These students set an ambitious goal for themselves.”

As URCAS take place at the end of the spring semester, “when everyone is really tired,” “but you come to URCAS and you get reenergized by the productivity of all of these students,” Chaiken said. “It reminds all of us why we are so happy to be working at a university. It’s why we’re here.”

COURTESY PHOTO DARREN PHILLIPS

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Matching up with industry Engineering capstone projects to get an added dose of reality By Linda Fresques

T

aking a cue from industry, New Mexico State University’s College of Engineering is taking a longstanding requirement of graduation and creating a unique real-world learning experience to better prepare students.

Capstone projects are the culminating experience of all engineering undergraduates’ academic life, giving them an opportunity to apply the knowledge gained through coursework to solve a problem through engineering design. Teams of 10 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

seniors collaborate on projects in the fall and spring semesters of their final year.

Industry partners and employers are increasingly seeking more than pure engineering knowledge: business and communication skills and the ability to work in interdisciplinary group settings are also highly desired.

College of Engineering Dean Lakshmi Reddi has envisioned several changes to the capstone experience at NMSU, beginning with industry-driven projects.

COURTESY PHOTO

“The idea is to form a partnership between academia and industry.”

–College of Engineering Dean Lakshmi Reddi

This solar-powered airplane model, led by Andres Gross, mechanical and aerospace engineering assistant professor, has been the subject of four capstone projects. Later two visiting German students worked on it and a master’s student wrote his thesis about it.

“The idea is to form a partnership between academia and industry. We want to have students work on real-world projects that solve problems. The experience won’t be hypothetical anymore,” said Reddi. “You can’t give a student more valuable experiential learning than challenging them to find a solution to a real problem.”

With the recent naming of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Professor Gabe Garcia as the interim director of the capstone programs, development of industry partnerships is already underway. Garcia recently met with industry representatives from Raytheon, Motorola and Honeywell to discuss funding opportunities and structure of the capstone projects needed to meet industry requirements.

“Industry participants in the interdisci “These are all interdisciplinary fields,” plinary capstone projects will benefit greatly said Reddi. “We need to change the scope of because it gives them early access to top our programs to meet industry and workforce engineering students who are about to gradu- needs. We need to develop cluster areas that ate, provides a new perspective on a problem address the requirements of industrial needs.” they want solved, increases their visibility

The third part of the capstone transat NMSU and surrounding community, formation calls for the design activity to and provides access to college resources and be integrated throughout the curriculum, faculty expertise,” said Garcia. beginning at the freshman level instead of

Garcia’s next step will be working with introducing the capstone project during a industry to help identify potential projects student’s senior year. and developing the support structure at the

“Freshman students won’t have all the college level for the interdisciplinary projects. knowledge to fully comprehend and develop

NMSU mechanical engineering alumna a project. They will move from the elementaTerry Lockwood is a strong proponent. ry to the complex, gradually refining as they “Since the projects provided go. They will have developed a by industry, government or portfolio documenting a fully To get involved in the the national laboratories will developed project by the time capstone program, be challenges that these orgathey graduate,” said Reddi. contact Gabe Garcia, nizations currently face, they Completing these handsAssociate Professor, will reap the benefit of fresh on experiential capstone projMechanical and and creative perspectives that ects requires that students have Aerospace Engineering, the students bring to the projaccess to equipment, software gabegarc@nmsu.edu, ect and to the solution,” said and materials. It is the good 575-646-1945.

Lockwood, who works in the fortune of the NMSU College Office of Ethics and Compliof Engineering to have three ance at Motorola Solutions. top-notch facilities in the form

A second important component of mak- of the Aggie Innovation Space, the Manuing capstone projects more attuned to realfacturing Technology Engineering Research life experience is to make them interdisciplin- Center and the Student Project Center. ary, requiring students majoring in a variety

“I’m very excited about our facilities,” of engineering disciplines to work together. said Dean Reddi. “Some of the schools that

“It’s not productive for students to work already have developed engineering design in their own silos,” said Reddi. “They will programs don’t have facilities as good as ours. be unpleasantly surprised when entering the Our challenge now is to package our facilities workforce because engineering problems are to be accessible to all students for collegealways multidisciplinary. For example, the wide, experiential design projects. These civil engineer working on a bridge will likely facilities are a huge asset.” have to work with electrical engineers to

Another great asset is the level of support develop sensors and track the wear and tear the college receives from industry partners, of the bridge. A mechanical engineer will national laboratories and alumni. need the assistance of an electrical engineer

Said Lockwood, “I believe this program to develop the communication system for an has the potential to greatly strengthen the unmanned aerial vehicle.”

NMSU College of Engineering’s partnerships

Reddi hopes to expand on this approach with organizations that hire their graduates, further to engineering education to shape the along with providing resume-worthy, handsdegree offerings in the college, adding majors on, real-world experience and training for such as advanced manufacturing, energy students as they cap off their undergraduate engineering and software engineering. tenure.”

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Renovations of Eloy Torrez Learning Communities expected this summer

C

By Angel Mendez

COURTESY PHOTO

Tearing down walls, reating a home away from home – a family of supportive classmates and professors – is New Mexico State University’s secret to meeting an increasing workforce demand and creating a stout pipeline of talented engineers with new skillsets.

Starting this past fall, the College of Engineering integrated the Eloy Torrez Family Learning Communities into its curriculum and culture among all of its students. Work toward the goal, focused on mentoring students to improve retention rates, shows early signs of success.

“These new opportunities to work with their peers and professors one-on-one is enriching students’ collaborative and entrepreneurial skillsets,” said Lakshmi Reddi, College of Engineering dean. “These communities are shattering engineering stigmas of silo-based work and instilling high-demand, employability skills in every one of our graduates.”

A $315,000 gift from Eloy Torrez, a 1970 NMSU alumnus in electrical engineering and a distinguished alum of the College of Engineering, prompted college leaders to renovate the environment where engineering students peer mentor one another through some of the program’s toughest courses. Adam Bouma, mechanical and aerospace engineering graduate student, serves as one of many peer learning facilitators in the learning communities.

“It’s very fulfilling for me personally,” Bouma said. “I struggled during my freshman year, and I watched several of my classmates switch programs because of the rigor that’s required of an engineering pathway. Having this new opportunity to coach my younger peers through the tough courses I faced early on is training both mentors and mentees how to communicate and how to work together to solve problems.”

As a peer learning facilitator, Bouma commits 20 hours per week, attending lectures for Engineering 100, a general engineering course required for all freshmen, and teaching at least one workshop or lab, as well as hosting office hours for personal mentoring in the learning communities.

“We can talk about coursework,” Bouma said. “Or, we focus on life skills and career pathways. Sometimes, we even host impromptu design sessions for competitive, creative fun.”

Since the start of this academic year, about 480 students have used the learning communities almost 2,000 times. Using pre- and post-surveys, data gathered so far shows that 96 percent of students agree that these tutoring sessions helped them understand the information they are seeking and almost 100 percent agreed their tutor showed commitment in helping them understand Serving as one of the peer learning the material. facilitators in the learning communities is Adam Bouma, a mechanical and aero Reddi expects the number of visits to increase once renovations of the learning communities space engineering graduate student. are completed this summer. Designs of the new environment inside the Ed and Harold Foreman Engineering Complex call for tearing down walls to create new areas with mobile furniture, collaborative tables, glass walls and more all inside fishbowl-style rooms.

Once the new space is finished, Reddi plans to increase activity inside the learning communities by inviting guest speakers from the profession and local businesses, offering specialized workshops and emphasizing use of the space for students’ capstone design projects.

Beyond offering a sanctuary for all engineering students, Reddi believes this space will eventually break down systematic diversities faced by subgroups pursuing engineering careers.

“The learning communities will help merge different mindsets and create interdisciplinary teams that focus on solving multidimensional, real-world problems,” Reddi said. “Because these students are so engrossed in solving a common problem, they forget they have different majors, skin tones or backgrounds. Young women, first-generation students and Hispanics truly benefit from this type of network. Yet, the diversity they bring to the table because of those differences creates a variance of ideas and is the beauty and key in effective problem-solving.”

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shattering stigmas

Bouma sees these experiences already taking place and hopes that once the learning communities get a new face, the local business community and the college’s alumni will provide additional, real-world support.

“I would love to see more experts from the field, either locally or within our alumni, host discussions or pose real-life issues that engage this community in new ways,” Bouma said. “We’re eager to learn in the classroom but know the working world awaits us. Sharing their professional experiences and ideas with us would help us

better prepare for that future.”

To meet the Eloy Torrez Family Learning Communities mentors or to learn more about the program, visit https://engr.nmsu.edu/meet-the-tutors/.

With the help of more than 20 supporters, $300,000 has been raised for facility renovations and an additional $610,500 has been raised for endowed and current support of the program itself. Please contact Mark Gladden at markglad@nmsu.edu if you would like to help support the Engineering Learning Communities.

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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Science of movement

NMSU Kinesiology research tracks physical activity across the lifespan

E

ryn Murphy arrived at New Mexico State University as an undergraduate student on a swim scholarship and quickly fell in love with NMSU’s Department of Kinesiology and Dance.

She received her bachelor’s degree in kinesiology from NMSU in 2013, received her master’s degree in exercise science from Western Washington, and is back at NMSU working on her doctorate in kinesiology.

“The instructors and professors here are so incredibly supportive and pushed me to take chances that I absolutely would not have taken without that push,” said Murphy, whose research focuses on falls in older adults. “To walk into a program that already has established lines of research made a lot of my work easier in that I had a support system that was interested in what I was working on and wanted to work on. NMSU has one of the most amazing kinesiology programs ever.”

Many people may not realize that extensive and groundbreaking research into the human progression of physical activity, from childhood to adulthood, is going on in labs at Rentfrow Hall and the James B. Delameter Activity Center at NMSU, as well as participating schools and community centers locally. The former dance studios at the Activity Center have been turned into kinesiology lab spaces.

Some of the kinesiology department’s research is extending well beyond the NMSU campus labs. Kinesiology professor Kim Oliver has been working on several 14 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

By Adriana M. Chavéz

projects across the globe to study physical activity among teenage girls.

“I have been studying curriculum and instructional strategies for working with adolescent girls for the last 20 years,” Oliver said. “I started by trying to understand how girls learn to think and feel about their bodies because that has such an impact on their health-related decisions. I was hoping to find ways of making physical education more relevant for girls because adolescence is when girls start dropping out of physical activity.”

For the past two years, Oliver and other researchers have been working with physical education teachers in public schools in Glasgow, Scotland, to learn more about how implementing an “activist” approach to physical activity affects girls’ participation.

In a separate project, kinesiology associate professor Phillip Post and College of Health and Social Services associate professor Rebecca Palacios are studying elementary school-age girls and their physical activity through the Aggie Play program.

Post and Palacios have received funding from the Paso del Norte Health Foundation’s Healthy Eating and Active Living initiative and the Mountain West Consortium Clinical and Translation Research initiative to support Aggie Play, which is modeled after the Bay Area Women’s Sports Initiative, a nonprofit program in California that uses female college student athletes from local universities to engage elementary school girls in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity for an hour once a week after school.

Last year, Aggie Play was successfully

implemented at Hillrise Elementary School.

Using active women role models from NMSU athletics and the kinesiology department, girls in third through fifth grade participated in physical activity games twice a week throughout the school year.

“The results of the final assessment showed that girls participating in Aggie Play demonstrated improved fitness and self-efficacy to engage in physical activity compared to girls at a control site, Alameda Elementary School,” Post said.

Because of the program’s success, the Paso Del Norte Health Foundation has awarded Aggie Play with $212,000 to continue the program over the next two years.

Meanwhile, professors like Bob Wood are looking at adults and healthy aging.

Wood, a gerontologist, is focusing on predicting the risks of falls among senior citizens and the benefits of tai chi among the elderly.

“It will be within the next 15 years or so that all baby boomers will be 65 years of age and older, and even more pronounced are the number of people who will be 85 years of age and older,” Wood said. “This is one of the areas where we have a really keen interest, because the healthcare needs of these individuals and their need for assistance in order to live independently or in assisted care or a nursing care environment are increasing substantially every day.”

The kinesiology Ph.D. program was approved in 2015 and began admitting students in the 2016-2017 academic year. It is the newest Ph.D. program at NMSU.

ANDRÉS LEIGHTON

the

ANDRÉS LEIGHTON

Top: New Mexico State University’s kinesiology students Joshua Krause, left, and Josi Gabaldon demonstrate equipment to measure the metabolic rate inside one of the new labs at Rentfrow Hall.

Extensive and groundbreaking research into the human progression of physical activity, from childhood to adulthood, is going on in labs at Rentfrow Hall and the James B. Delameter Activity Center at NMSU, as well as participating schools and community centers locally.

Right: Extensive and groundbreaking research into the human progression of physical activity, from childhood to adulthood, is being conducted in labs at Rentfrow Hall and the James B. Delameter Activity Center at NMSU.

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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Research by the numbers

110

MORE THAN

$60 million

students who participated in the 2017 Undergraduate Research and Creative Arts Symposium

12

Total research awards at NMSU’s community colleges over the past 10 years

Number of NMSU’s off-campus AGRICULTURAL SCIENCE CENTERS

More than

$1 billion Total research awards to NMSU over the past

22

Years NMSU has hosted the annual UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH AND CREATIVE ARTS SYMPOSIUM

10 years

112 16 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

Years since NMSU’s

FABIAN GARCIA SCIENCE CENTER was founded

Reusing oilfield water

ERIK STENBAKKEN

Researchers seek solutions to water scarcity

Shown in his lab with former graduate student, Adam Dettmer, left, Kenneth “KC” Carroll, associate professor of water resource management in the NMSU Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, is one of the researchers studying various aspects of oil and gas industry produced water in Southeastern New Mexico.

W

ater is scarce in Southeastern New Mexico, and as demand increases for freshwater, there is a need for alternative water sources.

Faculty and staff from New Mexico State University and the New Mexico Water Resources Research Institute joined researchers from around the state last year for a feasibility study on the reuse of produced water.

One of the most relevant findings from the study is that the most feasible use of produced water generated from the oil and gas industry is for that industry to reuse its own produced water, instead of using freshwater.

Robert Sabie Jr., geographic information systems analyst for NM WRRI, said this cost-effective solution would allow freshwater to be reserved for drinking water.

“Also, agriculture doesn’t require the same standards as drinking water, so essentially we might be able to offset some of that water use and create a longer, more sustainable aquifer,” Sabie said.

Kenneth “KC” Carroll, associate professor of water resource management in the NMSU Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, said the oil and gas industry in West Texas and Southeastern

New Mexico produces large amounts of water. With water shortages in that area, it’s important that researchers identify alternatives to purchasing fresh water from farmers and to reinjecting produced water into the subsurface as a wastewater.

Sabie, project manager for the study, said it’s a good sign that the oil and gas industry is reusing produced water more and more. That helps the industry cut high costs of transporting, treating and injecting the water into designated injection wells. By reusing their own produced water, companies are able to use less costly and semi-mobile regulated treatment plants closer to the oil and gas extraction areas.

WRRI Director Sam Fernald was principal investigator. NMSU collaborators included Carroll, as well as Pei Xu, associate professor of environmental engineering in the NMSU Department of Civil Engineering.

“We need to find an engineering solution to solve the problem,” Xu said. “My job was to investigate the treatment technologies and the cost to treat the water.”

She’s working on the ongoing project with assistant professor Yanyan Zhang, evaluating environmental toxicity of produced water and treatment needed to reduce toxicity and ensure safe reuse.

Carroll studied how hydrogeologic or geologic formation variability – how deep and which rocks the water comes from – will affect the produced water quality.

He also researched the spatial variability of the produced water quality and the chemical composition of water in the Permian Basin formations that is being pumped to the surface.

“In addition to salinity variations, we found quite a bit of variability in the type of salts dissolved in the waters,” he said. “We also discovered that a significant amount of water migrated deep into the Basin from the land surface, which enhances our understanding of the water flow behavior in deep subsurface basins like the Permian.”

The study helped establish a clearer picture on the regulatory framework, Sabie said. Three state agencies were regulating water, so researchers helped them iron out details for a permitting process.

The study included researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology and New Mexico Energy, Minerals, and Natural Resources Department. Funding was provided by the Environmental Protection Agency through the New Mexico Environment Department.

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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BLUE CORN CRAZE Researchers work to spread traditional New Mexican crop

By Ximena Tapia

18 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

B

COURTESY PHOTO

lue corn has been getting a lot of national attention in the past few years because research has shown that pigmented foods tend to have high nutritional value. Richard Pratt, director of the Semi-Arid Cropping Systems Research Innovation Program and professor at New Mexico State University, has spent many years researching corn, and he says that this blue corn craze is good for New Mexico.

“More and more people are interested in authentic New Mexican cuisine. Part of our cultural heritage is these traditional varieties of corn that make really good food products,” he said.

Blue corn is well known in many of the New Mexican pueblos and is grown by the Navajo and other Native Americans and traditional communities in New Mexico.

“It is becoming increasingly mainstream due to the success of blue corn chips, the awareness that colored foods provide good sources of anti-oxidants and the interest in having more local foods in our economy and our diet,” Pratt said.

He has been researching corn for about 30 years, but has been conducting blue corn research for about 10 years. Pratt says he and his colleagues are trying to find out more about the many blue corn varieties in New Mexico.

One of the studies they have conducted is trying to see whether corn grown in Northern New Mexico will adapt to the lower elevations in the borderland, and vice versa.

Pratt said they have seen, “instances of specific adaptation where they don’t go to higher or lower elevations very well,” but they have also seen varieties with broader adaptation.

Pratt also serves on the advisory board of the New Mexico Landrace Corn Project. The mission of the project is, “getting seed out of the seed banks and into the fields again so it can help people and communities improve their well-being and their bank accounts,” he said.

When the project started a little over a year ago, they obtained enough seed to plant about 150 acres of blue corn. Through the project, the university helps New Mexico farmers sell their corn to bigger companies.

“We have producers, buyers and the university working together. We’re trying to help the farmers not just produce corn that has higher value, but also help them with sustainable agricultural practices,” Pratt said. “There is a growing body of consumers who don’t just want the product, they want to know that it came from sustainable farms.”

They work closely with the Masienda Bodega company to achieve this goal.

“They are reaching out to work with small farmers and find who still has those traditional varieties,” he said.

Masienda is a New-York based company that sells specialty corn tortillas with corn imported from Mexico. When starting the New Mexico Landrace Corn Project and beginning to work with Masienda, Pratt thought, “If they can import corn from Mexico, why don’t we grow our traditional varieties in New Mexico as well? They’ll have lower transportation costs and we’ll have economic opportunities for small New Mexico farmers, too.”

Pratt says it is important to make New Mexico’s blue corn known because “it’s a gem of New Mexico.”

New Mexico State University Professor Rich Pratt has been conducting blue corn research for about 10 years.

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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New Mexico State University

It’s a great time to be an Aggie! Every day, NMSU students push past the limits of their imaginations to discover a world of boundless opportunities. Our students excel beyond their own expectations in their studies, in research labs and on the field. Under the guidance of outstanding faculty, renowned researchers and supportive staff, NMSU students are transforming their dreams into reality.

Help us continue this momentum of excitement by referring a student to become a part of the Aggie experience! Scholarships are available for in-state, out-of-state and transfer students.

Students can start their journey at admissions.nmsu.edu!

All About Discovery!™ 20 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

From idea to industry Organic pesticide developed at NMSU receives patent, moves closer to market

S

By Lauren Goldstein ’15 first set out to familiarize himself with EPA regulations regarding pesticides, which proved to be an arduous undertaking. While he imagined this as the first step, after joining a regional I-Corps program – a National Science Foundation program designed to employ customer discovery to bring innovations to market – Smith found that he would have to first conduct field tests to validate the efficacy of his product, now named NMX.

His efforts drew national attention.

Upon finishing the regional program, Smith and his team, which included Luke’s father, and his NMSU faculty colleague Soum Sanogo, an associate professor of entomology, plant pathology and weed science, along with Hugo Morales, a faculty member at Universidad Chihuahua, were accepted into NSF’s National I-Corps. They received $50,000 for further work toward commercialization by identifying markets and marketability, and conducting 100 interviews with potential customers.

Ongoing tests on California spinach crops have proven the efficacy of NMX. In

ANDRÉS LEIGHTON

ometimes a person’s best ideas bubble to the surface at unusual times. Luke Smith’s breakthrough idea came during a graduate school summer spent bagging onions.

The repetitive, dirty task gave him ample mental space to consider new opportunities and connections. His father, Geoffrey Smith, a biology professor and researcher at New Mexico State University, had recently told him about an organic pesticide – a biocide – that he’d helped develop in the university laboratory. The biocide used essential oils and offered a safe alternative to conventional chemical pesticides and solutions.

As Luke heaved another sack onto a pallet, he thought, “how could I use this here?

How could this innovation help fill a need for organic farmers?”

Smith, then a graduate student in accounting at NMSU, unfolded an entire business plan for his company, EcoSeal, while he stacked mesh bags in an onion shed.

To pursue the ambitious plan, Smith

Luke Smith, left, and his father, Geoffrey Smith, discuss a sample during the research phase of the project.

other greenhouse and field tests, it has been shown to be effective in combating chile root rot, chile wilt and bacterial spot disease. Additional field tests on chile and onion crops in New Mexico are in progress.

Smith has continued to develop his product with support from Arrowhead Center, NMSU’s entrepreneurship and innovation hub. He has worked with Studio G, NMSU’s student and alumni business accelerator, as well as the LAUNCH proofof-concept center and the New Mexico Small Business Assistance Program, which connected him with the expertise and resources of New Mexico’s national laboratories.

In a milestone for the entrepreneur, Smith recently learned that NMX has been approved for a patent. Terry Lombard, NMSU’s director of intellectual property and technology transfer, said the patent represents a big win for the company and NMSU, as it strives to take more products of faculty research to market.

“The impact of this is significant, not only for Luke and his company, but for NMSU and for multiple fields of use that this technology offers to commercialization partners,” Lombard said. “The intellectual property becomes more valuable with the protection of a patent, providing companies the benefit of a competitive advantage for the life of the patent. It’s an exciting commercialization milestone for this invention.”

Smith said the work of Lombard and the tech transfer office was instrumental in securing the patent and advancing the technology.

“The commercialization journey for NMX Green has been an exciting one,” Smith said. “The recent awarding of the utility patent is a huge step forward, allowing us to continue on the path to the market.”

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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Communication disorders NMSU professor researching how to treat aphasia in stroke patients

O

By Adriana M. Chavéz

This project will lay the groundwork for future large-scale biofeedback intervention for professionals in the field of communication sciences and disorders.

–Bijoyaa Mohapatra

22 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

ne of the most frustrating effects of a stroke is the inability to use, produce and comprehend language, also known as aphasia. Many aphasia sufferers become anxious and frustrated with not being able to communicate and understand others like they did before their stroke.

Bijoyaa Mohapatra, an assistant professor in communication disorders at New Mexico State University, wants to better understand how to treat aphasia with behavioral neurocardiac intervention and if it can improve specific moods such as stress and anxiety, as well as cognitive functions such as attention and memory.

Mohapatra, who recently received funding from the NMSU College of Education’s Emerging Scholars initiative for her research, is studying whether the effects of behavioral neurocardiac training can improve overall quality of life in stroke patients.

According to the National Aphasia Association, stroke is the third leading cause of death in the United States. Out of 750,000 strokes occurring each year, approximately one-third of strokes result in aphasia, which is caused by damage to areas of the brain produced by stroke. Most people with aphasia also have associated mood and emotional problems that significantly impede their language, attention and memory functions.

“This study will utilize a computer-based biofeedback system to train slow breathing maneuvers and monitor cardiac variations,” Mohapatra said. “If positive changes in mood and cognitive abilities are observed in these individuals after intervention, it will support the proposition that biofeedback training can be used to treat these core deficits that are commonly seen in brain damaged individuals. This project will lay the groundwork for future large-scale biofeedback intervention for professionals in the field of communication sciences and disorders.”

Mohapatra said she is reaching out to stroke survivor support groups in Las Cruces and El Paso to recruit people to participate in the study, which is ongoing. Mohapatra is still recruiting participants for the study.

“This biofeedback intervention is a promising new treatment and more economical alternative to expensive neurofeedback interventions in stroke and aphasia,” Mohapatra said. “It has potential for use in clinical practice as a supplement to traditional speech-language therapy.”

Mohapatra said her study is just one example of all the important research going on in the Department of Special Education and Communication Disorders.

“Research projects such as this not only demonstrate the potential of the research faculty within the department but also their ability to integrate and conduct interdisciplinary research work,” Mohapatra said.

To learn more about participating in the study, contact Mohapatra at bmohap@nmsu.edu or aphasialabnmsu@gmail.com.

ANDRÉS LEIGHTON

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

23

OUTREACH

CULTIVATING Visitors to the New Mexico State University Agricultural Science Center at Los Lunas learn about the mechanical chile picker research being conducted at the farm.

Los Lunas science center meeting needs of commercial, urban agriculture

N

ew Mexico State University’s Agricultural Science Center at Los Lunas is alive with a wide array of research from commercial agriculture to urban horticulture that addresses the changing social environment of the middle Rio Grande valley.

“I’m pretty excited about where the station is headed,” said Mark Marsalis, superintendent and Extension forage specialist. “Historically, this station has been more commercially focused, but now we have a 24 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

By Jane Moorman very good blend of work I’m doing, which is more commercial production of alfalfa and grass pastures, combined with the more urban horticultural angle.”

The center houses the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences’ new statewide Extension specialists, Gill Giese, viticulturist; Ashley Bennett, integrated pest management; and Marisa Thompson, horticulturalist, as well as Kelly White, Master Gardener program coordinator. With appointments combining research with Extension outreach, the specialists are

bringing new projects to the 207-acre farm.

Bennett and White have obtained a U.S. Department of Agriculture grant for delivery of IPM education and outreach to New Mexico communities.

“We will receive $634,286 over the next three years to implement several projects,” Bennett said. “The grant will support a research and demonstration garden at the Los Lunas Agricultural Science Center, advanced IPM curriculum for the Master Gardener program, education on pollinator health and conservation, IPM strategies for parks and

recreational lands, and it will develop a citizen science program to monitor beneficial insects in the urban areas.”

NMSU has grape variety trials in Las Cruces and Farmington, and formerly in Los Lunas. Giese is reestablishing a vineyard at the farm to conduct research.

“The growing conditions in New Mexico are challenging mainly due to the wide variety and diversity of vineyard sites, as well as significant changes in temperature,” Giese said.

In addition to addressing growing challenges, one of Giese’s priorities is to help growers increase both quality and production efficiency.

“I want to work with county Extension Service agents to help growers,” he said. “I’d like to get all the growers on the same page, help them improve wine quality and facilitate marketing in order to make a consistent profit.”

New during the 2017 growing season was a collaboration with New Mexico Tech and Sandia National Labs on a project looking at the gas emissions from agricultural fields.

“Benjamin Duval from NM Tech’s biology department is measuring with very sophisticated equipment the greenhouse gases that come off the soil when we do a plowing or irrigation,” Marsalis said. “Last summer, every time we ran a plow on our sorghum trial site, he was there measuring what was released. When we plow we are breaking carbon that releases carbon dioxide and other nitrogen-based gases, which are more potent than other greenhouse gases.”

New Mexico State University undergraduate student Gabrielle Hastings helps harvest South American papa criolla

Los Lunas is participating in a statepotatoes during research at the Agricultural Science Center at Los Lunas. NMSU collaborated with U.S. Department of Agriculture research geneticist Kathy Haynes to see which breeding lines will grow in New Mexico. wide sorghum variety trial, determining irrigation and fertilizer amounts.

Sorghum as a forage is a good candidate crop for reduced water situations, harsher growing conditions and marginal soils. It is also very efficient at nitrogen use.

“I agree there is a future for sorghum once water becomes a really limiting issue, as it is in other parts of New Mexico and the world,” Marsalis said. “Sorghum is a very high biomass producer. It produces a lot of tons however you use it – bioenergy, green manure or feeding animals. It can be baled as hay, or chopped into silage.”

Ongoing research includes variety trials of chile for mechanical harvest, landrace chile production, and pecan and jujube fruit tree cultivar tests. Additionally, a pinto bean variety trail was held this year.

In NMSU’s agricultural science center system Los Lunas is unique because of its partnership with USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service. Since the creation of the farm in 1957, NRCS has had a plant material center on the site.

“Los Lunas is one of 25 USDA plant material centers in the United States,” said Bernadette Cooney, the plant material center manager. “In our research department we are participating in a multi-year crop-cover study of eight different species comprised of 61 different cultivars that is being done at all of the centers. The study is to determine which species work best in the different regions.”

Historically, the center has focused on foundation seed production of cool and warm season grasses, and producing cottonwood and willow riparian restoration material.

JANE MOORMAN

JANE MOORMAN

RESEARCH

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

25

FACULTY PROFILE

A river of research

N

agamany Nirmalakhandan, professor of civil engineering at New Mexico State University, was named as the first holder of the Ed and Harold Foreman Endowed Chair in Civil Engineering in 2011. In 2016, this prolific researcher and esteemed teacher received a renewal of that five-year honor, making him the only holder of the chair.

Khandan, a member of the NMSU faculty since 1989, has a substantial portfolio of research in environmental engineering to his credit. Most notable are his efforts connected with the Engineering Research Center for Re-Inventing the Nation’s Urban Water Infrastructure (ReNUWIt), a National Science Foundation funded effort with the goal of reinventing America’s aging and inadequate water infrastructure.

The multi-university ReNUWIt team is led by Stanford University and includes Colorado School of Mines and University of California, Berkeley. First awarded in 2011, Khandan was named co-principal investigator of ReNUWIt and leader of the center’s work at NMSU. Based on the outcomes during the first five years, ReNUWIt received a second five-year round of NSF funding in 2016.

Through ReNUWIt funding to NMSU, Khandan has graduated five Ph.D.s with two more in progress; and graduated 14 master’s degrees with five more in progress. Some 22 community college students, 28 high school students and three high school teachers have also been involved in Khandan’s projects funded by ReNUWIt.

Khandan also coordinates a variety of NMSU research projects funded by ReNUWIt and collaborates closely with the other ReNUWIt researchers at NMSU. The collaborative effort garnered this group of ReNUWIt researchers the NMSU University Research Council Team Award for Exceptional Achievements in Creative Scholarly 26 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

Activity in 2017.

“As originally intended, NSF will ramp down funding for ReNUWIt during its last three years, so the goal now is to make it sustainable. We are collaborating among ourselves and with other NMSU colleagues to receive new funding,” said Khandan.

Several collaborative projects are being pursued by various faculty members, including Khandan and Pei Xu, civil engineering associate professor. In 2017, they were successful in receiving a major grant from the Bureau of Reclamation to combine their ReNUWIt projects for potable water recovery.

“We are working to combine our research to treat wastewater for agricultural, irrigation and potable purposes. Dr. Xu Civil Engineering Professor Nagamany Nirmalakhandan. works with membrane technology and I work number of graduate students,” he said. “It with algae. We have demonstrated that we has made us a strong team and brought can recover very high quality water working more visibility to our engineering program together,” said Khandan. and the university.”

It was Khandan’s research with fund Khandan received a bachelor’s degree in ing from a variety of sources focused on mechanical engineering from University of sustainable environmental engineering and Ceylon, Peradeniya, Sri Lanka, and spent 12 renewable energy usage that earned him years as a mechanical engineer working in and NMSU a spot for NMSU as part of the water industry. He came to the United the prestigious NSF Engineering Research States for graduate school and discovered Center to create ReNUWIt. environmental engineering, earning master’s

“The best part about having this and doctoral degrees in this field from long-term funding is that we can take our Drexel University in Philadelphia. His MS/ research out of the laboratory and go into Ph.D. adviser was formerly a professor the real world to demonstrate the practiin the Civil Engineering Department at cal applicability of our research. It has also NMSU and Khandan practically filled his given us the opportunity to recruit a large adviser’s former position at NMSU.

ANDRÉS LEIGHTON

Khandan leads NMSU Engineering Research Center focused on water infrastructure By Linda Fresques

FACULTY PROFILE

A new level of support NMSU professor’s NSF CAREER award supports devices for search and rescue teams By Minerva Baumann ’13

DARREN PHILLIPS

A

fter receiving one National Science Foundation award for nearly $500,000, New Mexico State University professor Zachary O. Toups received a prestigious NSF CAREER award to fully establish his research on wearable human-computer interfaces.

Toups, an assistant professor in computer science, received the five-year NSF CAREER award of $550,000 to study wearable computers that may someday help urban search and rescue teams work more effectively.

Toups’ work will develop new systems, from a grounding in games, to support urban search and rescue. Such teams go to the scene of a disaster and search the debris to find survivors.

“Working with Texas Task Force 1 (one of 28 federal search and rescue teams), the project team will create custom-built wearable systems to support their mission as well as purpose-built mixed reality training simulations that combine virtual simulation with physical-world settings,” Toups said.

“The team will closely collaborate with its existing task force partners, using observation of their existing training practices and interviews with task force leaders to develop models of task force training requirements and design considerations for wearable systems to support them. These will be disseminated both to disaster response teams and the human computer interface community.”

In Toups’ first NSF grant, in which he is collaborating with computer science professor Son Tran and psychology professor Igor Dolgov, the team is focused on the use of drones. The aim is to consider how wearable computers can support urban search and rescue contexts as science advances to move from multiple humans piloting one drone to one human directing many drones.

Both projects go hand in hand.

“They are complementary projects,”

NMSU graduate students Sultan Alharthi, left, and Hitesh Nidhi Sharma, right, along with Assistant Professor of Computer Science Zach Toups, demonstrate a wearable disaster response simulation game they developed.

Toups said. “The first NSF grant covers wearable interfaces for drone teams, while the CAREER grant covers wearable interfaces for human teams in search and rescue.

I expect drone piloting to be one use case in the future of search and rescue but not our only use case. I also expect there to be work around wearable designs in general that will transfer between the two projects, as well as equipment and software.”

NSF CAREER awards support junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacherscholars through the integration of education and research. Toups’ CAREER award will help him develop courses and outreach activities for NMSU students including projects based on a human computer interface class.

“With the support of this grant, I also

plan to create outreach activities for Doña Ana Community College to expose students from underrepresented groups to research and allow them to work with advanced computing technology,” Toups added.

Ultimately, Toups hopes his research will lead to a design catalog of existing interfaces and best practices for designing wearable and mixed reality interfaces that will guide the design of both wearable interfaces and training simulations for disaster response.

“The team will validate those simulations with the disaster response partners and use them to test and improve both the wearable technologies and the design guidelines the team creates,” Toups said. “Both the work itself and the lessons learned will be used to improve classes at NMSU.” Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

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STUDENT PROFILE

TO THE ENDS of the EARTH Chemical engineering senior finds passion for research at NMSU

By Tiffany Acosta

D

uring an advising session as a freshman at New Mexico State University, Norann Calhoun received a flyer for the New Mexico Space Grant Consortium. She started attending meetings for the program in fall 2014, and she will graduate in May with not only a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering but also with four years of experience as a student researcher.

“I love going into the lab, putting on my gloves and creating successful experiments,” Calhoun said. “I really enjoy it.

I’m able to apply concepts that I learn in the classroom, and so it keeps me inspired.

One day I will be taught a concept in the classroom and the next day I can apply it in my research. I can adapt and change.”

As a member of NMSU’s NASAsponsored Eclipse Ballooning Project team under the direction of Paulo Oemig, senior research scientist with the NM Space Grant Consortium, Calhoun traveled to Beatrice, Nebraska, in August 2017 to launch high-altitude balloons during the total solar eclipse. One of the goals of the experiment was to reach 100,000 feet to see the earth’s curvature and the eclipse. The team camped in a chicken coop for a week and launched 28 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

two balloons on two separate days.

“I learned a lot about myself. I learned a lot about the team I was with. It was wonderful and so much fun,” said Calhoun, a Tularosa, New Mexico, native. “It was a phenomenal feeling being the person to perform the countdown and sharing the experience with such an amazing team. It was such an empowering moment that I began to tear up. I’ve been working on my project for three years.”

“Norann is an extraordinary researcher.

A researcher is fundamentally curious. She is also unwilling to let barriers stop her from answering a question one way or another,” said Patricia Hynes, director of the New Mexico Space Grant Consortium.

“Norann demonstrated such creativity and ingenuity in developing and testing her technologies for the flights we supported, it was inspiring to support her,” Hynes added.

While her project had technical difficulties from the beginning, Calhoun is encouraged for the future because she is starting a team in spring 2018 to solve the design problems.

One of the challenges Calhoun faced with her experiment was establishing a reliable method for implementing a delayed parachute deployment.

“She found a skydiving firm to help her, they had the reliability she was looking

for,” Hynes said. “And it worked. There are many ways to fail as a researcher, only a few paths to success. She found hers.

She has what we need to say for certainty, we are developing researchers qualified to build, test and launch space hardware.”

Calhoun said she was thrilled with the result of the skydiving company collaboration, which created a device that delayed the parachute from opening.

“It was so amazing that I learned I can do unorthodox things in engineering, and it still works.”

Calhoun admits juggling the demands of classes and research can be challenging. “It takes a lot of time management because you have tests, class, study time and you have to make time for your research. If you have 10 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, you have to take advantage of that and go into the lab and do as much as you can and try to stay focused on each individual task.”

After graduation, Calhoun said she hopes to join the workforce and gain hands-on experience before possibly pursuing advanced degrees in the future.

“I’m trying not to sell myself short and reach for the stars,” she said. “I have such a wonderful backing, my parents, my family, my community, and they are pushing me to go forward and farther.”

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

29

TIFFANY ACOSTA

Paulo Oemig (center), New Mexico Space Grant Consortium research scientist, holds a high-altitude balloon during a test in June at the New Mexico State University Horseshoe while Krishna Kota (left), mechanical engineering assistant professor, and Norann Calhoun, chemical engineering senior, assist. A high-altitude balloon launch was part of the NASA-sponsored Eclipse Ballooning Project, which was held during the total solar eclipse in August 2017.

COURTESY PHOTO

IN PARTNERSHIP

FACING agricultural challenges Resilience in New Mexico Agriculture project enters third phase

A

griculture in New Mexico faces unprecedented challenges to the health of the industry.

An aging population of farmers and ranchers, increasing pressure on water and other natural resources, rising costs for land, energy, equipment and other production needs, unsustainable farmers’ and ranchers’ incomes, and complex regulations are some of the challenges the Resilience in New Mexico Agriculture project is contemplating.

New Mexico State University’s College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences and New Mexico First joined forces to lead a multi-year process to develop a strategic plan to help maintain a resilient New Mexico food and agricultural system.

The strategic plan, released in August 2017, is the culmination 30 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

By Jane Moorman

of input from 600 stakeholders in 13 regional meetings around the state, and six months of deliberation by a 35-member task force of industry leaders and experts during the past two years, along with public comment. The plan is now moving toward the next phase: implementation.

“The project has entered the third phase,” said project coordinator Michael Patrick, NMSU Extension economic development specialist. “Through implementation working groups, we are prioritizing the plan’s recommendations. A group will be focused on promoting policy, while NMSU will be providing the education and training needed to strengthen the industry.”

“The task force membership included a wide array of different elements of the agriculture and food industries,” said Heather Balas, New Mexico First’s president and executive director. “They worked

DARRELL J. PEHR

together to develop a platform of recommendations for both public sector and private sector leaders to strengthen agriculture to be sure we have a vibrant industry into the future.”

Task force committees developed recommendations and strategies in four subject areas: next generation of farmers and ranchers, water and land use, agricultural supply chain and agriculture economic viability.

NMSU’s Cooperative Extension Service has begun exploring options for a virtual training center, to help the next generation of farmers and ranchers.

“The first recommendation regarding the next generation is to develop a centralized beginning farmer and rancher center at NMSU to facilitate statewide outreach, education and technical services,” said Jon Boren, NMSU College of ACES associate dean and CES director.

“We will be developing a virtual component that will complement what our agricultural agents are doing in the field. It will be a center to support principally ranchers and farmers just getting started with vital information for their success,” he said.

To date, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, McCune Charitable Foundation, New Mexico Department of Agriculture, Santa Fe Community Foundation and Thornburg Foundation have all contributed funding to NMSU’s Cooperative Extension Service and New Mexico First.

The Cooperative Extension Service in particular has received nearly $300,000 since 2015, including a recently approved $63,000 grant from the Thornburg Foundation to provide initial funding for 2018 to support NMSU’s role in implementing the plan.

New Mexico First has also received funding from Thornburg for 2018 activities, and a group of funders is now working together to determine potential future funding for implementing the plan.

“The Thornburg Foundation sees great value in bringing diverse stakeholders together to develop a plan to address the critical challenges and threats facing our agricultural and food systems in New Mexico,” said Bryan Crawford-Garrett, Thornburg Foundation food and agriculture policy officer.

“These are complex issues, and now that we have the plan in place we are committed to supporting the implementation of the plan’s recommendations and tracking progress toward achieving those recommendations.”

The strategic plan allows these multiple groups to focus on 17 recommendations.

The strategic plan may be reached through http://nmfirst.org/legislative_updates/ new-mexico-agriculture-plan-released and click on New Mexico Agriculture Plan for a downloaded copy.

Many of these threats, such as uncertain water and natural resource availability and low producer income, are not unique to New Mexico, and other states have bolstered their agricultural sectors through common plans of action.

With sufficient water supplies, researchers at NMSU science centers across the state can study the best ways to grow crops, such as these fields at the Agricultural Science Center at Artesia. New Mexico State University and the New Mexico First organization worked together to develop a strategic plan to address how to maintain a resilient New Mexico food and agricultural system.

Winter 2018 | New Mexico State University | Panorama

31

IN PARTNERSHIP

Delivering Data

NMSU’s Center for Community Analysis provides critical research for Doña Ana County By Tiffany Acosta

T

SYLVIA ULLOA/NEW MEXICO IN DEPTH

he Center for Community Analysis at New Mexico State University was established in 2016 through a grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, and is housed in the Office of Institutional Analysis on the NMSU campus. The CCA is charged with providing research and analysis for evidence-based decision making in Doña Ana County.

“There has been no central repository in our county that I know of, whose sole purpose is to centralize, analyze and disseminate data to the community in order to improve evidence-based decision making and collective impact efforts,” said Erica Surova, CCA program manager. “This lack of a centralized data unit has made

Evelynn Aguirre McClure gives her teacher Brittany Polanco a high five after working with her. This is Evelynn’s first experience in preschool.

She attends the New Mexico PreK program at Alpha School.

it very difficult for community organizations to share data and collaborate efficiently. Consequently, we see children and families slip through the cracks and needs go unmet.”

“We live in an age where we have more access to data than ever before, but it isn’t always being used or communicated effectively,” she said. “Our goal is to inform and educate, so data can be used for actionable, positive results. Our goal is to also attract partnerships with other organizations and expand our services beyond Doña Ana County. We recognize there is a need for data

32 Panorama | New Mexico State University | Winter 2018

analysis in more rural areas of New Mexico as well as the borderland region.”

Despite its young existence, the CCA has recorded significant achievements. It created the early childhood education gap analysis, with assistance from its early childhood education partners. Surova said this informaSurova tion is crucial because access to quality early childhood education from birth until 8 years of age is vital to brain development and socio-emotional learning.

The report found very low numbers of children in Doña Ana County participate in free or subsidized early childhood education programs – 36 percent under 5 years of age and only 21 percent 2 years of age and younger. The results also stated that about 70 percent of children under 6 may need a free childcare assistance subsidy with only 21 percent of children currently receiving that assistance. This data is now being used for a county-wide early childhood education referral system that will help families overcome obstacles to finding services for their children.

Surova said one of the surprises she’s found in her work is the impact high-quality learning has on a child’s developing brain.

“I think most of us don’t realize the achievement gap that we see in third grade reading scores, high school graduation rates, and even at the university level, has been identified as early as 18 months of age,” she said.

“Using data like this to change access to early childhood education could dramatically change the life trajectory of many New Mexicans, as well as save the state large sums of money that is now dedicated to fixing problems after they have already occurred. Instead of using data to fix problems, we could use data to prevent problems.”

With a high demand for community data, currently the CCA only has two staff members, Surova and a graduate student.

“The biggest challenge is growing the center with enough staff to keep up with the community demand, which is already high,” she said. “Gathering, preparing and analyzing data, especially data that is very specific to our community, is a time-consuming process.”

Interactive data dashboard and reports about the county and state are available on the CCA’s website at http://cca.nmsu.edu.

Research expenditures, awards and sources Federal Awards Awards FY2017 UNITS

FY 2017

Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences

$23,170,170

Arts and Sciences

$19,709,857

Business

$3,600,062

Education

$10,077,303

Engineering

$10,637,203

Health and Social Services

$2,183,361

Physical Science Lab

$9,903,638

NMDA

$2,397,217

Community Colleges

$4,645,645

Other

$5,795,660

TOTAL

$92,120,117

BY SPONSOR Other Federal 12.0% $11,054,414

DoEd 5.1% $4,698,126

NASA 4.8% $4,421,766

NSF 11.0% $10,133,213

DoD 11.4% $10,501,693 USDA 9.5% $8,751,411

DoE 5.4% $4,974,486 Northern Extension District ●

CES Tribal Extension Program

FISCAL YEAR

AMOUNT

2014

$128,734,467

2015

$126,528,827

2016

$110,118,461

Farmington ● Aztec San Juan Shiprock CES Tribal Extension Program

McKinley Extension Program

Bernalillo

McKinley

Zuni Reservation Extension Service (FRTEP)

Sandoval

Gallup

● CES Tribal

Zuni Reservation Extension Service (FRTEP)

Extension Program

Cibola

Socorro

Reserve Reserve

Estancia

Torrance

Socorro

Corona Corona Lincoln

Socorro

Carrizozo Lincoln

Socorro

Carrizozo

Truth or Consequences

Sierra

Silver City

Lordsburg Lordsburg

Alamogordo

Deming

Doña Ana

Deming

Luna

Luna

De Baca

Curry Clovis

Ft. Sumner

Portales

De Baca

Roosevelt

Portales

Roosevelt

Chaves

Lovington

Roswell

Artesia

Alamogordo

Doña Ana

Silver City

Curry Clovis

Ft. Sumner

Roswell

Sierra

Grant

Tucumcari

Chaves

Truth or Consequences

Grant

Quay

Guadalupe Santa Rosa

Torrance Guadalupe

Valencia

Quay

Tucumcari

Santa Rosa

Estancia

Mosquero

Mosquero

Las Vegas

San Miguel

Santa Fe

Valencia

Harding

San Miguel

Santa Fe

Los Lunas

Catron

Las Vegas

Mora

Santa Fe

LosAlbuquerque Lunas

Grants

Catron

Mora

Santa Fe

Bernalillo

Clayton

Harding

Mora

Albuquerque

Grants

Cibola

Mora

Taos

Los Alamos

Clayton

Union

Raton

Colfax

Alcalde

Sandoval

● CES Tribal

Southwest Extension District Southwest Extension District

STATE 13.4% $12,326,249

Abiquiu

Taos

Taos Alcalde

Abiquiu

Los Alamos

Gallup

Source of Awards OTHER 10.8% $9,910,788

(FRTEP)

Union

Colfax

Tierra Amarilla

Rio Arriba

Dulce Jicarilla Extension Office

Rio Arriba

San Juan

$116,943,421

BY PERCENTAGE

(FRTEP)

Raton

Taos

Jicarilla Extension Office

Apache Point Observatory

Apache Point Otero Observatory

Otero

Artesia Carlsbad Carlsbad

Lovington

Lea

Eddy

Eddy

Las Cruces

Las Cruces

Hidalgo Hidalgo

Facility Locations Facility Locations FEDERAL 75.9% $69,883,080

County ExtensionOffices Offices County Extension

County ExtensionSatellite SatelliteOffice Office County Extension

● ExtensionOffices Offices ● Tribal Tribal Extension

Federally RecognizedTribes Tribes Extension Program (FRTEP) Federally Recognized Extension Program (FRTEP) Cooperative Extension District Offices Cooperative ExtensionService Service District Offices Agricultural Science Centers Agricultural Scienceand andResearch Research Centers University Government University GovernmentAffairs Affairs

Carlsbad Environmental Carlsbad EnvironmentalMonitoring Monitoring and Research Center and Research Center

Arrowhead Center Arrowhead Center

NMSU Albuquerque NMSU Albuquerque CenterCenter

Santa Fe Ranch Demonstration Santa Fe Ranch Demonstration Site Site NMSU Campuses NMSU Campuses

Apache PointPoint Observatory Apache Observatory

Memorial Middle School Agricultural Memorial Middle School Agricultural Extension and Education CenterCenter Extension and Education

Lea

Eastern Extension District

Tierra Amarilla

Farmington

Aztec Dulce Northern Extension District Shiprock

Eastern Extension District

Expenditures

2017

HHS 16.7% $15,384,060

PANORAMA

NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION

New Mexico State University Alumni & Friends Magazine

U.S. POSTAGE PAID

MSC 3AS NEW MEXICO STATE UNIVERSITY P.O. BOX 30001 LAS CRUCES, NM 88003-8001

NMSU

ELECTRONIC SERVICE REQUESTED

www.nmsu.edu

SL/2-18/23092

Research Discovery Award

Several of NMSU’s outstanding professors have received the Research Discovery Award for their achievements in research and discovery through leadership and innovation. Catch them being recognized at NM State home basketball games!

NMSU Executive Vice President and Provost Dan Howard, left, presents Nancy McMillan, Regents Professor and department head of geological sciences, with the Research Discovery Award.

McMillan currently has a National Science Foundation funded research project, which will examine the mineral tourmaline in ancient sediment from Antarctica to determine its origins.

NMSU Chancellor Garrey Carruthers, left, presents Michael Johnson, professor of chemistry and biochemstry, with the Research Discovery Award. Johnson has two current research programs underway regarding the reactivity of molecules in confined media and the exploration of the fundamental and environmental chemistry of the ferrate ion.

NMSU Provost Dan Howard, left, presents Rolston St. Hilaire with the Research Discovery Award. St. Hilaire serves as both department head for Plant and Environmental Sciences as well as interim department head for Extension Plant Sciences in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences.