As an educator, Dawn M. Woods, Ph.D., noticed that many PK-16 students have few opportunities to engage in learning experiences supporting them to identify as doers of mathematics, characterized by seeing sense in mathematics, perceiving it as useful, and believing that steady effort in learning mathematics pays off. Because of this, her research is twofold: understanding the role mathematics identity (i.e., one’s participation in and across activities in mathematical learning spaces and the sense one makes of oneself in relation to these activities) plays in the learning of mathematics; and supporting pre- and in-service teachers to design and enact equitable high-quality mathematics instruction. Currently, Dr. Woods is working on a five-year National Science Foundation funded project, entitled “Sparking ‘Number Talks’ to Strengthen Mathematical Identities.” In collaboration with students, families, and school and community partners, Woods leverages everyday, out-of-school activities to design number talks (i.e., 10-to-15 minute math discussions where students mentally solve mathematics problems and share their mathematical reasoning) fostering the growth of students’ mathematical identities and skills.

Taras K. Oleksyk, Ph.D., focuses on genomics, evolutionary genetics and comparative genomics, with a particular interest in genome evolution and its implications for adaptation and disease. Through all these efforts, connected by genomics and bioinformatics data analysis, Dr. Oleksyk wants to understand diversity in the context of recent human evolution and contribute to personalized medicine. His training was in analyzing genome diversity in admixed populations, contributing to analyses identifying candidate genes through GWAS and admixture scans. His collaborations with the 1000 Genomes Project and the 1+ Million Genomes Initiatives led to population genomic studies in Puerto Rico and Ukraine, highlighting the potential for novel genetic discoveries in understudied regions. Currently, Oleksyk’s lab develops genomic research in Eastern European countries to uncover genetic factors influencing Type 1 diabetes, aiming to improve disease prediction and therapy. Additionally, he is dedicated to the genetics of endangered species, using genome assembly, variant analysis, and selection scans in both wild and domesticated animals to help design conservation strategies.

Compared to other medical imaging methods, ultrasound is widely considered to be low-cost and portable. However, it requires significant training and expertise to collect and interpret these images with high accuracy, limiting where and how ultrasound is used in medicine. Therefore, the goal of the Medical Acoustics for Global Health, Imaging, and Clinical translation (MAGIC) lab at Oakland University is to use engineering to improve the availability and quality of ultrasound and other similar imaging methods. To accomplish this, Alycen Wiacek, Ph.D., and her team are developing innovative signal processing and artificial intelligence-based algorithms and applying them to real and simulated patient data. The applications for their technologies are still expanding and currently include pain free breast cancer screening, noninvasive visualization and characterization of blood clots, methods to guide physical therapy treatment, and improved biopsy accuracy with augmented reality. Overall, her work has the potential to change the places and ways that health care professionals can help patients, increasing access to high quality, noninvasive medical imaging technologies.

Ngong Kodiah Beyeh, Ph.D., conducts research that focuses on structural, organic, and supramolecular chemistry and bio materials. His team is particularly interested in utilizing weak bonds to connect and assemble soft hybrid polymeric materials with many applications. Current research focus includes; exploration of halogen bonding for the design of self-healing materials; identifying organic macrocyclic compounds as potential therapeutic agents for treating diseases such as cataracts; designing new protein-based materials to separate a range of pollutants from heavy metals to hazardous organics from water, and; using suitable organic macrocycles as dispersants for petroleum asphaltenes to help facilitate the flow and transportation of petroleum products. All projects sit at the chemistry, polymer science, materials science and biology interface.

Zijuan Liu, Ph.D. is interested in exploring the roles of biometal transporters in neurological disorders such as autism, dementia and Alzheimer's. Trace elements, including essential and toxic elements, such as zinc, manganese, arsenic, selenium, and copper, are closely associated with human diseases, and their brain access is tightly controlled by respective membrane transporters. Dr. Liu’s research focuses on the expression and regulation of these essential transporters under various neurological pathological conditions. Liu’s long-term goal is to discover prevention and therapeutic approaches for those hard-to-treat human diseases.

Colin Wu, Ph.D., conducts lab research that focuses on the mechanisms of DNA repair. His lab is interested in understanding how repair proteins recognize and remove damaged DNA structures in human cells. Malfunctions of these proteins are associated with the early onset of genetic diseases including cancer and heart disease. However, there are many unclassified protein variants that have unknown health risks. Dr. Wu’s long-term goal is to develop novel strategies to identify and stratify variants that are especially harmful. By accomplishing this, he aspires to enhance the fundamental understanding of DNA repair proteins and ultimately contribute to the development of targeted interventions and treatments.

Individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) often engage in problem behavior, such as aggression or self-injury, to communicate their wants and needs. Michael Kranak, Ph.D., conducts translational and clinical research to help those individuals with IDD find their voice. Importantly, Dr. Kranak focuses on improving behavioral treatments for individuals with IDD so their treatment gains are long lasting in their natural environments, leading to the highest qualities of life possible. His work has been funded by both the NIH and contractually through local school districts.

Amany Tawfik, M.D., studies molecular and cellular mechanisms of neurovascular injury in retinopathies, including diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular degeneration. In particular, the role of nutritional deficiencies, specifically folic acid and vitamin B12, and their relation with amino acid homocysteine in the impairment of vision. Dr. Tawfik uses basic research techniques to enhance the understanding of how elevated levels of homocysteine contribute to the development and progression of diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular degeneration, the most common causes of blindness worldwide.

Erin Dwyer, Ph.D., is working on a project about slavery and poison in the Atlantic World, tentatively titled “Bitter to the Taste.” It builds on her first book, “Mastering Emotions: Feelings, Power, and Slavery in the United States,” to further explore the emotional politics of fear, focusing on enslaved poisoners in the United States and the Caribbean in the 18th and 19th centuries. “Bitter to the Taste” examines slaveholders’ anxieties about being poisoned by those they enslaved, including how these real and imagined fears manifested in culture, laws, courtrooms, and daily interactions between slaveholders and enslaved people.

Dr. Sakyi’s current research seeks to develop a peer health intervention to support families of children with disabilities. The goal is to improve quality of life, increase access to services and reduce depression among families of children with disabilities in Ghana. Caregivers of children with a disability would be provided with training and resources to deliver counseling, deliver basic rehabilitation services, promote stigma reduction strategies and link families to resources.

Freshwaters such as wetlands, streams and rivers are hotspots for biodiversity that provide societies across the globe with indispensable goods and services. Increasingly, however, these ecosystems are impacted by human activities, reducing biodiversity and compromising the ability of freshwaters to provide vital ‘ecoservices’ such as clean drinking water, protein provisioning and recreation. Dr. Tiegs and his team in the Aquatic Ecology Lab employ fi eld-based experiments and observations to better understand how human activities impact freshwater ecosystems, and how undesired effects can be ameliorated through ecological restoration. Recent projects investigated the effects of warming on small streams in Iceland and Ecuador, the impacts of invasive snails on trout streams in the Great Lakes region and how light pollution alters freshwater and terrestrial insect communities in southeast Michigan.

Dr. Glover is the principal investigator for The End of Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) undergraduate program, a Michigan initiative funded by the Michigan Health Endowment Fund. The program will help 2,000 nursing students achieve the primary palliative care skills they need to enter professional practice. While almost every nurse will care for a dying patient at some point during their career, the need for primary palliative nursing care is vital. ELNEC undergraduate program was developed by experts to facilitate nursing student’s acquisition of primary palliative care competencies. Upon completion, nurses will have the requisite skills to care and advocate for patients with serious illness and their families.

Dr. Ligocki’s research covers a wide range, from the need for critical media literacy in K12 schools, to the best approaches to preparing future teachers in becoming transformative educators. However, it all falls under the umbrella of making changes in education. Previous studies have focused on how young people engage with and understand all types of media and texts. Ligocki’s current work focuses more on what new teachers need in order to be successful in their first years of teaching, while also working to make changes in regard to systemic issues in formal education.

Dr. Navin’s work addresses ethics issues in public health and clinical medicine, and it often incorporates original social science research. Along with a colleague from University of Western Australia (Kaite Attwell), Navin is currently finishing a book for Oxford University Press about the ethics and politics of childhood vaccine mandates. He is also working on multiple papers about clinical decision making for people with cognitive disabilities or mental illness.

Dr. Cucullo’s research interests are largely focused on the cross interactions between the cellular elements of the neurovascular unit; the development of multidrug resistance at the blood-brain barrier (BBB); biomarkers of BBB disruption; environmental and cellular modulation of BBB functions, and their relevance to the onset of neuroinflammation, stroke/ischemia and the pathogenesis of secondary brain injury. In the past 10 years, his research has focused on characterizing the impact of chronic smoking and vaping on the cerebrovascular system and its potential impact on promoting neurological disorders and worsening the outcomes of brain injuries related to stroke, traumatic brain injury, neuroinflammation and, more recently, COVID-19.

Dr. Papadimitriou is a sociologist and medical rehabilitation researcher interested in how people with disabilities and their caregivers make meaning of their health care experiences. She uses what she learns from their experiences to develop more inclusive and collaborative health care practices. Dr. Papadimitriou works with multidisciplinary and interprofessional teams to study peer support — people with physical disabilities trained to support peers with disabilities to improve community participation and health care outcomes — and relationship-centered assessment — for persons experiencing disorders of consciousness due to brain injury to improve shared decision-making between health care providers and family caregivers. This work leads to greater shared benefits for persons with disabilities, their caregivers and health care providers.

Photoreceptors live in your retina, at the back of your eye, and they have a very distinct shape — without which healthy vision is impossible. Dr. Goldberg has devoted much of his career to studying the molecular basis for how this unique shape is achieved. One of the biggest challenges to treating diseases involving rods and cones (the two types of photoreceptors) has been a lack of understanding about their fundamental structure when healthy. By discovering how normal rod and cone structures are achieved, Dr. Goldberg and colleagues are laying the groundwork for development of treatments that could be deployed much earlier in disease progression.

Seeing is believing — Dr. Yang’s research focuses on developing platforms to visualize and probe electrochemical transformations on site and during operations. These platforms will integrate a range of advanced testing methodologies and characterization techniques to allow simultaneous visualization, sensing and analysis. With these in-situ (i.e., on site) and operando (i.e., during operations) platforms, Dr. Yang’s team aims to understand, predict and ultimately control energy materials and their electrochemical transformations in their native environments and at the most fundamental levels. This research will impact the design and performance of energy-storage devices, which are critical for many important technologies including portable electronics, transportations and integration of renewable energy.

Focusing on organic and biomaterial chemistry, Dr. Beyeh’s research team is particularly interested in using weak interactions to self-assemble soft hybrid polymeric materials with many applications. Dr. Beyeh’s current research focuses on the design of self-healing hybrid materials through halogen bonds, identifying cavity containing organic compounds as potential therapeutic agents for treating eye cataracts, designing new protein-based materials as water sensors for heavy metals and hazardous organics, and using special organic compounds as unique dispersants for petroleum asphaltenes, which can help mitigate crude oil transportation challenges. These projects sit at the chemistry, polymer science, materials science, and biology interface.

Dr. Malik’s research interests include trustworthy and decentralized neuro-symbolic artificial intelligence (AI) in cybersecurity and health care. In cybersecurity, he focuses on developing forensic examiners for authenticity, integrity and veracity of audio and videos by using explainable artificial intelligence (XAI). He also works on hybrid cryptographic and generative AI models for secure group communication. In health care, he focuses on prediction of neurological disorders with focus on subarachnoid hemorrhage prediction, and infectious diseases using clinical text and medical imaging by using neuro-symbolic learning and automated knowledge graph generation, XAI and fairness-enabled AI, and federated learning. Dr. Malik’s research is supported by various international, federal and state agencies such as the National Science Foundation, Brain Aneurysm Foundation, and Michigan Translational Research and Commercialization Innovation Hub.

Denha works in Adam Avery, Ph.D., lab, researching how mutations in a protein called ßIII-spectrin causes the neurodegenerative disease spinocerebellar ataxia type 5 (SCA5). SCA5 affects the cerebellum, which is responsible for balance and movement coordination. Understanding the underlying mechanism by which mutant ßIII-spectrin affects the normal function of the neurons helps in developing future therapeutics for the currently untreatable SCA5. To understand the disease mechanism, Denha employs a unique combination of assays ranging from biochemistry and biophysics, to fruit fly genetics.

Learn more about Denha's research.

In Spring 2020, Dr. Munyan’s scholarship team examined the incidence of traumatic stress among frontline nurses during the COVID-19 pandemic. They sampled over 200 nurses who reported high levels of traumatic stress related to their work. They used the Traumatic Stress Questionnaire, a screening tool used to identify individuals at risk for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). More than 65 percent of nurses had scores above the threshold that indicated risk for developing PTSD.

Dr. Yang’s team’s research includes studying organic geochemical processes in the hydrothermal systems on Earth and beyond. They design and carry out experiments to simulate natural hydrothermal environments, to understand the reaction pathways and mechanisms with respect to prebiotic synthesis and the origin of life. They also explore the potential application of Earth-abundant materials in green and sustainable chemistry. They are also interested in biogeochemical (microbial) processes in soil and aquatic ecosystems, including the Arctic tundra, wetlands and the Great Lakes. One of their current projects focuses on transformation and cycling of soil organic carbon, phosphorus and pollutants (e.g., mercury) in the Lake Michigan sand dune ecosystem.

Dr. Haworth studies sensorimotor mechanisms underlying human movement. As co-director of the OU BEAR Lab (Biomechanics, Ergonomics and Abilities Research), Dr. Haworth, with physical therapy and medicine students, focuses on developing knowledge and methods to support patient-centered physical medicine including advanced health monitoring and care delivery. The state-of-the-art space is designed and equipped to measure and modify various aspects of mobility and state of mind, using markerless 3D motion capture, force plates, EMG, eye tracking and computer-vision based affect assessment. Current studies examine barriers to mobility in persons with osteoarthritis, cancer survivorship, autism and other special populations.

Elphick’s current research is centered on spectrum analysis using a nanoscale device called a Spin Torque Nano Oscillator (STNO). The STNO is ultra fast and can scan over a wide microwave frequency range in a small amount of time relative to the time scale of microwaves. Due to its construction, it eliminates the need for some supporting circuitry and is appealing to manufacturing due to the fact that it is complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) compatible. The research is focused on studying the effects of the STNO’s imperfections on its performance in spectrum analysis

Using knowledge flows and regional economic characteristics, Dr. Mukherji’s team has developed innovation absorptive capacities for U.S. metropolitan statistical areas. These absorptive capacities are found to be important for regional economic performance. During the early stages of the pandemic, as cases and mortality data were published on a daily basis, it became evident that there were large disparities in the incidence and mortality rates across regions. Dr. Mukherji developed an index that captured the vulnerabilities of 770 counties across the U.S. to the virus. This index demonstrates the vulnerability of the counties depending on socioeconomic and demographic conditions. These indexes can be developed for infectious diseases to prepare for future health crises.

Dr. Rabii is a qualitative researcher whose primary training is in criminology and urban sociology. His research focuses on the sociology of race and ethnicity, masculinity and immigration. The research can be categorized into two tracks. First, exploring how positive discourses about race, immigration and masculinity mask and perpetuate inequalities. The second focuses on the experiences of immigrants and people of color within the criminal justice and immigration justice system. Important to the research are the concepts of colorblindness, hybrid masculinities and immigration.

Computers are dangerous. OK, not computers themselves, but the way they’re used to communicate with strangers online and face-to-face. Dr. Zytko’s research explores and designs solutions for risk of harm associated with computer-mediated communication, particularly against women and LGBTQ people, such as sexual violence and harassment. He’s currently exploring AI and virtual reality as design “materials” for these solutions. He’s using participatory design to enable women to craft new AI interventions for safety while using social matching systems such as dating apps. He’s also exploring the role of virtual reality storytelling to impact attitudes and behavior around public health issues.

Communities create connections. From neighborhood book clubs to ideological movements, communities offer like-minded people an opportunity to unite over a common thread. But while this can connect some, it can also become a barrier for others. In her new project — “Singing to Utopia: Lesbians, Feminists and Music, 1968–1998” — Dr. Reger explores the U.S. women’s music community and the formations and fractures within this culture. She found that some women were being excluded from the mainstream music scene, among other groups, which indirectly gave rise to a vibrant women’s music community.

Read more about Formation and Fracture.

We’ve known for decades that our intestines are populated by a large collection of microbial organisms, mainly bacteria that help with digestion and can boost our immune systems. But in the last ten years or so, researchers like Dr. Rhee have begun to develop a much more nuanced understanding of what else those bacteria can do — or not do — to our bodies. Rhee’s specialty is mucosal immunology, which is the study of immune responses in our mucus membranes, including the throat, lungs, and, of course, intestines. For now, Dr. Rhee’s studies are focused primarily on gaining a better understanding of the biological processes by which gut bacteria can impact brain health.

Read more about Gut Feeling.