Research by faculty and graduate students at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) was published in the prestigious Nature family of scientific journals four times in October, including work in molecular biochemistry, earth science and quantum photonics. Overviews of the findings by UMBC researchers follow below, with links to further coverage.

Synchronize Quantum Watches
Nature, October 14
UMBC physics graduate students Alejandra Valencia and Giuliano Scarcelli teamed with UMBC physics professor and co-principal project investigator Yanhua Shih on a method for synchronizing distant clocks, an important function for telecommunications and global positioning satellite systems. Their experiment showed that quantum entanglement of photon pairs allowed the synchronization of two clocks three kilometers apart to within picoseconds of each other. The research was also featured in Applied Physics Letters and Science News.

As the World Turns, It Drags Space and Time
Nature, October 21
UMBC Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology (JCET) scientist Erricos Pavlis co-led a team that proved how shifts in satellite orbits are caused by the Earth warping space and time as it rotates, a phenomenon first predicted in 1918 by Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity. The international team of NASA and university researchers studied the orbits of two satellites over an 11 year span to arrive at the first direct proof of what is known as "frame dragging." "It's like a bowling ball spinning in molasses," said Pavlis. "As the Earth rotates, it pulls space-time in its vicinity around itself, which shifts the orbits of satellites near Earth." The findings were covered by newspapers and science websites across the globe.

Iraqi Fire Pollution Rivaled 1980 Mt. St. Helens Eruption
Nature News, October 25
JCET volcano expert Simon Carn led a group of earth scientists who used satellite monitoring to show how pollution caused by the ongoing war in Iraq has rivaled the output of one of the most powerful volcanic eruptions in recent history. Carn's group observed how a June, 2003 fire at a sulphur plant near Mosul, Iraq, probably started by arsonists, caused the largest man-made release of polluting sulphur dioxide ever recorded, which was similar in magnitude to the same type of pollution released by the 1980 Mount Saint Helens volcanic eruption. The story was covered by BBC News online and other national and international science media.

Why Retrovirus Replication Takes Two
Nature News & Views, October 28; Nature, Sept. 30
UMBC molecular biochemist and AIDS researcher Michael Summers, the only Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) investigator at a Maryland public university, and UMBC HHMI research associate Victoria D'Souza discovered a potential answer to a question that has baffled scientists for 20 years, namely how and why retroviruses must make two copies of their RNA in order to successfully infect other cells. By studying MoMULV, a retrovirus commonly used in the lab to learn more about lethal viruses like HIV, the UMBC team discovered a potential "RNA switch" instrumental to this process that could lead to a next generation of antiretroviral drug therapies. The work originally appeared in Nature on Sept. 30 and was then reviewed in the Oct. 28 "News and Views" section of the journal.

About UMBC Research:
UMBC's research funding has quadrupled during the past decade to over $85 million and the campus ranks sixth nationally in inventions disclosed and ninth nationally in U.S. patent applications filed per million dollars spent on research. UMBC, which is ranked 16th nationally in NASA funding, is home to three major collaborative NASA research centers. Michael Summers, the only Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at a Maryland public university, has led student researchers in solving three of the seven protein structures which make up HIV. In 2000, Summers was one of only 10 recipients nationwide of the National Science Foundation's Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring.

The science of light – photonics – is as ubiquitous as oxygen in today’s technology driven world. Go to the grocery store, make a phone call, listen to a CD or watch a movie on DVD and odds are photonics made it possible.

UMBC is fortunate to be at the forefront of the photonics field, thanks to the Center for Advanced Studies in Photonics Research (CASPR), where exciting advances in basic science and novel applications are being made.

CASPR unites the efforts of prominent photonics researchers throughout UMBC into a single interdisciplinary collaborative center of nearly 20 researchers drawn from UMBC's Departments of Computer Science & Electrical Engineering, Physics, Math & Statistics and Chemical & Biochemical Engineering, plus 20 graduate students. The center is supported under grants from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, the National Science Foundation, Naval Research Laboratories, Army Research Laboratories and the Army Research Office.

Current CASPR investigations involve a broad spectrum of future-looking technologies including:

• theoretical and experimental research in ultra-broadband optical telecommunications by Gary Carter, Yung J. Chen, Tulay Adali, Curtis Menyuk, John Zweck, Susan Minkoff, and Joel Morris;
• fabrication and studies of photonic semiconductor materials, optical devices, and electronic structures for new generations of spaceborne high-power/high-temperature lasers, terahertz radiation generation, high speed single photon detectors, and sensors by Fow-Sen Choa, Terry Worchesky, Michael Hayden, and Li Yan;
• studies of optical properties of nanostructures and other novel materials in an Ultrafast Optics Laboratory by Anthony Johnson and Elaine Lalanne;
• science of quantum photon entanglement and its applications, such as precision clock synchronization, remote spectroscopy, and remote lensless imaging by Yanhua Shih, Morton Rubin, and Arthur Pittenger.

For a full description of current and future CASPR projects please visit the CASPR web site to view or download the 2004 and 2005 CASPR Annual Reports.

CASPR director Anthony Johnson is not only focused on pushing the boundaries of research in his field, but is also determined to change the face of science in America.

Johnson, a past president of the Optical Society of America, was drawn to UMBC because of its strong photonics research foundation. He got his start at Bell Laboratories in the same Cooperative Research Fellowship Program as UMBC Graduate School Associate Dean Janet Rutledge. Rutledge and longtime photonics colleagues Menyuk and Carter encouraged him to apply to lead CASPR.

One project that Johnson and CASPR are eagerly awaiting news about is UMBC’s participation in Mid-Infrared Technology for Health and the Environment (MIRTHE). The $17 million NSF proposal teams CASPR and UMBC with lead institution Princeton University, the Johns Hopkins University, Rice University, Texas A&M University and the City University of New York.

“Our team has made it to the final nine from 110 pre-proposals and is a strong competitor to make the final cut to four funded proposals,” he said. “This would be a major engineering center at UMBC if we are selected. We are incredibly excited about the future of CASPR.”

Johnson’s optimism for the future of CASPR is tempered by concern about the big picture for American science. “We’re so used to being number one, but it’s not at all clear that we’re going to stay number one in science and technology,” he said. “We need to wake up and provide better support for our federally funded research, because that’s where our innovations come from.”

John Cannizzo, an associate research scientist with UMBC’s Joint Center for Astrophysics was part of a global team who recently unveiled some secrets of a little understood, powerful cosmic explosion in the prestigious journal Nature.

Cannizzo was one of an international team of nearly 80 astrophysicists who co-authored a paper entitled “A short γ-ray burst apparently associated with an elliptical galaxy at redshift z=0.225” published in the Oct. 6, 2005 issue of Nature. The lead of the paper’s 77 authors was N.Gehrels of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

The paper looked at the lesser-understood of the two types of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), known as ‘short and hard’ GRBs. Longer duration GRBs are less powerful but have an easier to study afterglow. They have been extensively studied and are known to be caused by explosions of massive stars in faraway galaxies.

Short GRBs don’t have a long afterglow and are thus more elusive. With the help of NASA’s Swift satellite, launched last November, a short burst, GRB 050509B, was viewed, precisely measured and studied. Over 20 years after short GRBs were first recognized, their likely origin was revealed as a merger between neutron stars of a binary system and the instantaneous production of a black hole.

Links to more information:
NASA Press Release

There are miniature, sci-fi movie monsters buzzing around the bucolic fields of Maryland’s wineries and orchards, but you have to know where to look.

Grab a magnifying glass, kneel down near the fallen grapes and peaches and soon you’ll see tiny fruit flies flitting from meal to meal and laying their eggs. Look closer and you may see a stealthy intruder injecting the unsuspecting fruit fly larva with its own eggs that will soon make the flies the surprise special of the day.

For UMBC senior Kate Laskowski, this shape-shifting horror show worthy of a David Cronenberg or Alien movie is just another day in the field. The biological sciences major with a chemistry minor from Easton, Md., has spent nearly three years studying parasitoid wasps, a fascinating insect that could someday help us better understand human aging.

Laskowski, a UMBC Presidential Fellow with a 3.93 GPA, has studied the wasps at Boordy Winery in northeastern Maryland, a peach orchard in Severn, Md. and in the lab of her mentor, UMBC biological sciences professor Jeff Leips. She recently traveled to Cardiff, Wales, where she turned heads as the only undergraduate student at a research conference on the wasps.

“The poster that she presented on her research won first prize, beating out all other presenters that included graduate students and post docs,” said Leips.

According to Leips, the wasps’ creepy means of reproduction was the inspiration for the Alien series of science fiction thriller films. The wasps literally rob the cradle of other insect species, injecting their eggs into living fruit fly larvae. The tiny time bomb lies dormant for four to five days until the larva pupates, or spins a cocoon around itself. Only then does the baby wasp hatch, killing its host and simultaneously providing itself with a food supply and comfy, secure home in which to grow.

More importantly to Laskowski, is the wasps’ interaction with fruit flies or Drosophila, the standard studied life system for geneticists. A particular fruit fly gene, known as Ddc, seems to be an enzymatic tradeoff between how long the fly lives and how well they can avoid a parasitoid attack. Long-living flies are more likely to get hit, while those better resistant to wasp attacks seem to be shorter-lived.

“Ddc accounts for a 15 percent variation in longevity in the fruit flies,” said Laskowski, “So myself and many other researchers in the Leips Lab and across the world are very curious about what else Ddc could teach us about human aging.”

In the past decade, UMBC Associate Professor of Political Science Devin T. Hagerty’s region of expertise, South Asia, has gone from being an understudied corner of the globe to one of the most closely watched. In 1998, India and Pakistan added nuclear weapon capability to what was already one of the tensest borders in the world. Then 9-11 focused U.S. public opinion and foreign policy on Afghanistan, the Taliban, stopping the spread of Al Qaeda and the continuing search for Osama Bin Laden.

Hagerty recently completed two books: Fearful Symmetry: Indo-Pakistani Crises in the Shadow of Nuclear Weapons, co-authored with Sumit Ganguly (July 2005, Oxford University Press and the University of Washington Press), and South Asia in World Politics, of which he is editor(May 2005, Rowman and Littlefield). He is also the editor of Asian Security, a pioneering academic journal that takes a global, interdisciplinary look at security issues in the region.

After Oct. 7’s devastating earthquake--adding humanitarian disaster to the already volatile sociopolitical mix in this global flashpoint--UMBC Research News caught up with Hagerty and the region he studies.

Help us understand Pakistan better – compare it to Iran, India or Saudi Arabia.

Economically it’s still a very depressed country; it’s extremely poor. Literacy is very low, only about 20 to 30 percent for all the population, and for women it’s more like five to 10 percent. The society has cut off almost all opportunity for women. Health care is non-existent or shoddy. There’s also a big drug addiction problem due to all the opiate production in the region–an estimated 1 to 1.5 million heroin addicts. There are many ethnic divisions–Punjabis, Sindhis, Muhajirs, etc., along with the ongoing internal rifts amongst Islam today.

What is the role of Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf in the “global war on terror” and the stakes for him in the hunt for Bin Laden?

It’s hard to think of a leader in a more precarious position. He’s got his own domestic pressures, plus he’s survived at least three assassination attempts in recent years.

He gets a lot of criticism from the West for not being perceived as doing enough to fight terror or find Bin Laden. But it’s important to realize that he did something never done before since Pakistan was founded in 1947. He has sent regular Pakistan Army forces to the lawless border region in an effort to fight Al Qaeda and other violent fundamentalist groups there. I tend to have more sympathy for him than most Western observers.

How would Pakistan react if Abu Zarqawi is successful in his goal of sparking a Shiite-Sunni civil war in Iraq that could spread throughout the Middle East?

Pakistan has a heavily Sunni majority, but probably would try to avoid choosing sides in that scenario.

Actually, there is as much of an ideological civil war going on within Islam today. They are really working out what it means to be a Muslim in the 21st century. On one end of the spectrum are the Wahhabis who want to turn back the clock several centuries with a strict fundamentalist interpretation of the Koran, and on the other are progressive Sunnis who believe the Koran is open to interpretation. In the same sense, a very similar debate is going on within Christianity today.

What’s the current status of India-Pakistan relations?

Well, let’s just say relations are not warm (laughs). But they’re not particularly bad right now either. It’s sort of a stand off, but there is a “peace process” which is making progress.

Kashmir is the big elephant in the room. The region is not just a flashpoint, it’s part of each country’s self-identity. Pakistan views itself as the political homeland for Muslims of South Asia. India sees itself as a secular society that is tolerant of all faiths, although it’s predominantly Hindu. There is a really deep ideological dimension to the Kashmir conflict beyond simple lines on a map.

It’s hard to be optimistic about a Kashmir solution in the near future, it really is. It would take a huge act of joint political courage to resolve the situation.

Many people have a hard time squaring current U.S. administration “you’re either with us or with the terrorists” rhetoric vs. reality in Pakistan. Some would argue that from Bin Laden to A.Q. Khan, Pakistan leans more to sympathy with or support for terror. Why are we still allies with these folks?

We need them. I get this type of question in my classes.

It’s similar to the Cold War in that our allies were often very thuggish. National security calculations always look at the overriding thereat. We need the Pakistanis’ information and access--something only they can give us right now in the Muslim world.

If there were a rupture in our relationship with Pakistan, we would lose our ability to be effective on the ground in southern Afghanistan, where the Taliban is reconstituting itself, for example.

From the end of the Cold War to 9-11, we pulled back from the South Asian region and forgot about it, obviously in hindsight a terrible foreign policy mistake. In my opinion, the Bush administration feels it has no choice right now but to ally with Pakistan.

It’s a tough question. I always tell my students that if you like your answers nice and neat and consistent, then maybe international relations isn’t the field for you.

What about the recent Afghanistan elections? What is the hope for that country and where does it fit in the global picture now?

The big thing to remember is that if you had Googled “elections” and “Afghanistan” in the year 2000, you wouldn’t have gotten a lot of hits. Afghanistan is one of the most politically regressive countries in the world; it’s seen literally constant warfare since 1978. Two million people killed, about six million refugees to Pakistan, Iran and elsewhere.

The Soviet occupation tried to depopulate the countryside and push everyone into the cities, then the Mujahideen power struggle obliterated the cities. It’s a country in really bad shape.

Now a lot of progress is being made. Elections are a very hopeful sign. There’s now a true, multilateral presence there of international peacekeeping troops and NGO’s. NATO is leading aid efforts and organization in the countryside. In some ways it’s a more hopeful situation than Pakistan right now.

As someone who lived and worked in Australia for many years, what are your thoughts on how it is increasingly becoming a target of South Asian based terror groups? It seems like US allies have been systematically targeted. What do Australians think of the “war on terror” and their role in it?

Australia is a vital U.S. ally. Globally, they are one of our two or three closest allies along with the UK. They have an extremely close security and international relationship with the U.S.

Australians are very proud of the fact that in every war the U.S. has fought, they have supported us with boots on the ground, not just sending a hospital ship or moral support. I have a lot of respect for the Australian people.

I’ve been a bit surprised that there has yet to be a successful terror attack on Australia. It’s as big as the lower 48 United States, with 20 million people. They have excellent coastal defenses; the Royal Australian Navy is damned good.

That said, the alliance with the U.S. isn’t always popular in Australian society. It’s a real generational difference – folks in their fifties and sixties recognize the role the U.S. played in the WWII Pacific theatre. When Japan overwhelmed Singapore in 1942, the UK was out of the game. The US got in and has stayed in ever since.

The US relationship hasn’t been cost-free for the Australian government--John Howard and George W. Bush are very close and it has cost Howard some domestic political support, especially among younger people.

bwtech@UMBC Research and Technology Park

Athena Environmental Sciences, Inc. Announces Line of Environmentally Friendly Products
AthenaES has announced the launch of a new line of environmentally friendly products. The first of these is MagiGlue, a superior multipurpose glue with the unique property of being reversible with water, which makes MagiGlue perfect for temporary applications as well as standard glue uses. The glue is superior to standard multipurpose glues because it can be used in a greater range of applications-- MagiGlue adheres to not only paper, wood, fabric and most plastics, but also to metal and glass. It is also safe to use on photographs.

MagiGlue's bond can be reversed with water, which is excellent for temporary home projects such as holiday displays, dorm decorations, dashboard figures and many more. MagiGlue is also ideal for temporary manufacturing applications including labeling of products, appliance stickers, temporary signage, parts assembly operations and positioning and holding during micromachining operations. The glue is also suitable for wound dressings and other medical adhesive applications.

MagiGlue is made from all natural polymers. It contains no animal by-products, is petroleum-free, and is completely non-toxic.

RWD Technologies and BPT Partners Align Forces to Revolutionize Return on Investment in the CRM Industry
RWD Technologies, Inc. (RWD), a company that develops, implements, and supports products and services in the areas of training, consulting, and organizational performance, and BPT Partners, LLC, a leading customer relationship management (CRM) training and research company, announced today a strategic alliance expected to offer a number of unique services in the CRM industry, including expertise that will give companies a more successful capability to achieve their return on investment (ROI) as well as the means and tools to identify and deliver it. Read more.

SPI USA, Inc. and Omnia Biologics, Inc. Sign Collaboration Agreement
SPI USA, Inc. has announced an agreement to provide biotechnology and pharmaceutical consulting services for Rockville-based Omnia Biologics, Inc., which specializes in customized manufacturing for the development of vaccines, gene therapeutics and biodefense products. Read More.

techcenter@UMBC

Aurora Analytics, LLC Launches New Product Line
Aurora Analytics, LLC has launched a new product line known as G-MARK. The featured products are glucuronide diagnostic standards. Glucuronides are biomarkers to determine if alcohol consumption has occurred in humans for both clinical and forensics purposes. The Web-based launch in July was followed by U.S. and international sales in August, including the largest U.S. commercial testing laboratory.

AVIcode Hires New Sales VPAVIcode, Inc. recruited an executive from BMC Software--a major player in software circles--to drive sales of the smaller, local company's own lines. Mark Davis, who will serve as AVIcode's vice president of sales, comes from BMC Software (NYSE: BMC) a Houston-based software giant with offices worldwide and fiscal 2005 revenues of more than $1.46 billion. At BMC, Davis managed all aspects of sales operations for its mid-market product line, while overseeing field channel activities for all BMC enterprise and emerging growth customers.

"Mark is widely recognized in the field for his ability to dramatically influence both top- and bottom-line corporate performance, while building and managing sales teams that consistently deliver the big wins," said AVIcode CEO Mike Curreri.

Cognate's new CEO is biopharmaceutical veteran
A longtime executive of the biopharmaceutical industry has become the CEO of Cognate Therapeutics. Brandon Price, who most recently was vice president of biotechnology services for Cardinal Health (NYSE: CAH), one of the country's largest companies, has been named CEO and a member of the board for Baltimore-based Cognate, a privately held company attempting to develop drugs using adult-stem cells for cardiac, peripheral vascular and orthopedic indications. Read more.

InVitro Technologies, Inc. Forms Partnership with SOVLO Biotechnologies, Inc.InVitro Technologies, Inc. (IVT) and Budapest-based SOLVO Biotechnologies, Inc. have formed a strategic partnership to distribute SOLVO's leading in vitro ABC Membrane Transporter Assay Product line in the United States and Canada. InVitro Technologies is a leader in the development, production, sale and trade of in vitro testing products and services for studying chemical-biological interactions in vitro. Read More.

*UMBC Research Park and Incubator News

UMBC’s ACTiVATE Program, an innovative, year-long program, sponsored by a grant from the National Science Foundation to train women to become technology entrepreneurs, is accepting applications for its second year, to begin in January 2006. Classes will be held Thursday evenings and one Saturday a month at techcenter@UMBC.

The program is recruiting women with strong technical or business backgrounds who have an interest in high-tech entrepreneurship. Participants will access technology inventions from universities and research institutions in Maryland, put together plans to commercialize suitable technologies and, potentially, start new companies. The ACTiVATE Program will provide technologies, training and support infrastructure for participants, including instructors, entrepreneurs in residence and advisors from the local business community.

Interested women are invited to attend an open house on November 16 or December 6. Applications may be sent to Barbara Breslau, program manager, at Breslau@umbc.edu. For more information, visit www.umbc.edu/activate or contact Barbara Breslau, program manager (Breslau@umbc.edu, 443-543-5594). Leaders in the Baltimore business community are encouraged to recommend candidates to Ms. Breslau.

Read about UMBC alumnae who are participating in ACTiVATE.

bwtech@UMBC, UMBC's on-campus research and technology park, has announced that two new corporate tenants will relocate to the park's second building, 5523 Research Park Drive.

The new tenants are the healthcare communications and technology firm Physicians Practice, Inc., formerly of Glen Burnie, and the engineering/design firm Edwards and Kelcey, which moves its Baltimore office to UMBC from Caton Avenue.

Physicians Practice is publisher of Physicians Practice: The Business Journal for Physicians, the most widely circulated practice management journal for physicians in the country. The firm is also known for its award-winning Web site, www.PhysiciansPractice.com, and a weekly e-mail newsletter, Physicians Practice Pearls.

Physicians Practice comes to UMBC thanks in part to the close ties to the University by president, co-founder and UMBC alumnus Scott Weber, who graduated in 1985 with a degree in interdisciplinary studies. Weber, a former president of the UMBC Alumni Association, continues to advise students in UMBC's Alex. Brown Center for Entrepreneurship on starting up and running a successful business. The company, which will occupy most of the second floor, currently employs 45 people.

"UMBC offers an excellent strategic location for us to grow our business, with its thriving technology environment, wealth of intellectual capital, and convenient proximity to transportation," said Gerry Hartung, chief executive officer and co-founder of Physicians Practice. "We look forward to partnering with UMBC as our business continues to grow throughout the region and country."

Edwards and Kelcey is a nationally recognized engineering, design, planning and construction management firm which has been in business since 1946. Headquartered in Morristown, NJ, Edwards and Kelcey has 900 employees, 23 regional offices and is ranked 68th among the Top 500 U.S. Design Firms by Engineering News-Record (ENR). Edwards and Kelcey employs 25 transportation engineers and planners locally, and is currently providing services to the Maryland Aviation Administration, Maryland State Highway Administration, City of Baltimore, and other local DOTs.

K.R. Marshall, EK's Baltimore office manager said, "Our new location at UMBC will allow us to optimally service our transportation clients in the Baltimore region. With convenient access to BWI and downtown Baltimore, coupled with partnership opportunities with the UMBC engineering department, Edwards and Kelcey looks forward to continued success in the Maryland market."

bwtech@UMBC's first two buildings were developed by Grosvenor, one of the largest private real estate companies in the world with a global property portfolio of $7 billion. The park's 62,000 square-foot first building has been leased by the information technology firm RWD Technologies since 2001.

(7/05)

"In scholarly literature, there is a lot of interest about inner suburbs, those older suburban communities near the central city. We found that these areas suffer from increasing poverty and declining incomes. Therefore, we set off to better understand these urban dynamics," said Bernadette Hanlon, a public policy Ph.D. candidate at UMBC and one of two authors of "The State of the Inner Suburbs," an analysis of the urban decline surrounding Baltimore.

"There is room for public policy to intervene, to stop this decline, to process and revitalize the suburban communities," said co-author Thomas J. Vicino, public policy Ph.D. candidate. "We're at a crossroads, where the suburbs haven't declined as far as old Baltimore, and there is hope."

Both Hanlon and Vicino are researchers at UMBC's Center for Urban and Environmental Research and Education (CUERE). After a year of compiling massive amounts of data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Vicino and Hanlon developed a new system for classifying the suburbs that ring Baltimore's beltway.

"Because the inner suburbs are juxtaposed by outer suburbs, there's a lot of talk in Maryland of 'smart growth,' and where to direct new development," said Vicino.

"The State of the Inner Suburbs" is currently under consideration for publication in the Journal of Urban Affairs. The data was presented at the national Urban Affairs Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, and to a group of state legislators, politicians and other academics. It was also a front page story in the Baltimore Sun.

The report is potentially useful to legislators, from the migration of work and the composition of the work force to the deflation of property values. "I'd like to see the community and policy makers look to our research as a way to target investment in the communities," said Vicino, while Hanlon added, "We've done analysis on Baltimore, and we hope to continue our research in a comparative context in other urban areas throughout the country."

"The State of the Inner Suburbs" is available for download at: www.umbc.edu/cuere/inner_ring .

(7/05)

Spring usually brings Kevin Omland attention since he studies Maryland's State bird, the Baltimore Oriole, which migrate back to our region near the start of the season for the baseball playing O's. The assistant professor of biological sciences was recently interviewed on National Public Radio and in the Baltimore Sun about the search for new animal species.

What are the criteria for determining whether an organism is a new species?

We look for three or five pieces of evidence. For example, distinct appearance, plumage, color differentiation, an especially distinct pattern or marking, and so on, plus we also sequence DNA.

Our raven work is the closest we've come to finding a new species. We studied a form of raven in California that was so genetically different from ravens elsewhere in the world but gave absolutely no hint of that in its exterior appearance, behavior, or calls. In the end we found that if the only thing that's distinct is DNA, then it's not enough to be a new species.

How long does DNA sequencing take and can you do it here at UMBC?

Yes, our lab manages the DNA sequencing facility for whole university. Our undergraduate and graduate students learn all the skills required to sequence. In fact, one of our graduate students runs the DNA sequencing equipment and does about 99 percent of the sequencing work for UMBC.

You can teach a bright undergraduate student to sequence DNA in about two weeks, from the first feather or muscle sample to editing the final data on the computer.

Your previous work with ravens has shown that they are remarkably resilient, clever and adaptable to the encroachment of mankind on their habitat. Could you give some examples?

Well, ravens in the Mojave Desert really take advantage of dairy farms as a water source - they've learned to drink from cattle troughs. Ravens in urban areas are also very willing to do dumpster diving for everything from Pizza Hut crusts to parking lot French fries. Of course ravens also cruise up and down highways for miles in search of road kill.

Will you and your students be in the field this summer?

Yes. Baltimore Orioles returned to Maryland from wintering in Mexico and Latin America around May 1.

Where's the best Oriole watching site at UMBC?

We are studying Baltimore Orioles on campus near Pig Pen Pond. They stay high up in the treetops but they'll be there.

I've always thought that the pond next to the UMBC Library was another good habitat with its big trees and water source, but they don't use it. Orioles can be like humans, I guess, in that they seem to use each other as an index of which neighborhood is a good place to settle.

Were you a birdwatcher growing up?

Yes, I grew up in the country in Vermont and my parents were always camping and hiking with us. We always had a bird feeder in the yard or would gather around the back window to see deer or wild turkeys. I've always been drawn to the outdoors and wildlife.

Why did you decide to study orioles and ravens in particular?

We picked the Baltimore Oriole because it has such interesting feather coloration. The male has that wonderful, bright, almost fluorescent orange color. In contrast there's the orchard oriole which is much more chestnut colored.

I wondered why there's such color variation in oriole males from one species to other and why female Baltimore orioles are so dull colored. Both sexes of tropical oriole species found in Mexico have very bright coloring. We have a five-year National Science Foundation grant to study oriole coloration, particularly in females.

We thought ravens were perfect for studying speciation since they're found throughout the Northern Hemisphere. The Common Raven is found from Siberia through Alaska, Norway, Canada and on to the U.S. Because of this wide distribution, we suspected this species might show high levels of genetic diversity.

We also correctly suspected that the Chihuahuan Raven of the U.S. Southwest wasn't genetically distinct from the Common Raven. For our fast breaking paper, we showed that of the 2,000 animal species we surveyed, 23 percent didn't have distinct mitochondrial DNA. So ravens are the bird poster child of why DNA distinction is not enough to declare a new species.

So where are your favorite bird watching spots in the region?

On campus I'd say Pig Pen Pond or CERA. You can spot great birds at UMBC-owls, wood ducks and of course the most charismatic bird of all, the Baltimore Oriole.

Another good place is the Patuxent Wildlife Refuge off the Baltimore Washington Parkway. The National Wildlife Visitors Center there is a great place to go.

(7/05)