For the second year in a row, UMBC has been awarded an E2 Energy to Educate grant from Constellation. E2 Energy to Educate grants support learning-focused, team-oriented projects that yield specific results, reach at least 100 students, and align with one of three energy knowledge and innovation focus areas:

• Energy science: the science required to create new energy solutions
• Energy technology: how energy technology is making it to market
• Energy education: the interface of information technology and energy technology

Dr. Nimrayla Roy, Assistant Professor of Information Systems, leads the UMBC project team. A group of 200 information systems students are engaging in a project where wireless smart plugs are monitoring and compiling data on the power consumption of small to medium load appliances. The data will then be analyzed by the students who will build a web-based portal for visualizing detailed historic and real-time energy consumption. Ultimately, these systems will make energy consumption visible and actionable. The students will also investigate motivational practices to convince individual consumers to reduce their energy footprints.

UMBC thanks Constellation for their continued support!

Professor Zhibo Zhang (UMBC) and Dr. Steve Platnick (GSFC) organized a mini-workshop on cloud-aerosol remote sensing at UMBC on 10 April, 2015 (11:30am to 5pm). There were seven invited speakers gave presentations on various topics related to cloud and aerosol remote sensing from satellite instruments.

 Hyoun-Myoung Cho (JCET): A framework  for understanding and quantifying the sub-pixel inhomogeneity on cloud optical thickness and effective radius retrieval from MODIS

Frank Werner (UMBC): ASTER--‐MODIS analysis and comparison: Preliminary Results

Chenxi Wang (ESSIC/UMD): Ice Cloud Retrieval Comparisons between the MODIS C6 and OE--IR

Roy Prouty (UMBC): Influence of above--‐cloud aerosols on the angular distribution of cloud bi--‐directional reflectance: implications for direct effect estimation.

Gala Wind (SSAI): Cloud Optical and Microphysical Properties from MSG SEVIRI;

Thomas Fauchez (ORAU): Inhomogeneity effect on infrared-based cirrus cloud property retrieval.

Benjamin Marchant (USRA): A (short) Introduction to Image Processing for Remote Sensing Applications;

Come see Daniel Dagenhart's research in the development of treatment for HCV. About 150-200 million people in the world are infected with Hepatitis C (HCV), a virus that leads to cirrhosis of the liver as well as hepatocellular carcinoma. In the United States, an estimated 3.2 million people are infected with this virus. There is no vaccine currently available, and current treatments are not completely effective. His poster presentation will show the research he has done in this topic.

Come to URCAD this Wednesday to see Stephanie Castner's dance, Touched, which was presented in the fall 2014 First Works Dance Showcase.

"Through the creation of my piece, Touched, I was able to explore how to abandon traditional, stylistic conformity and integrate technique, partnering, and choreographic elements of both modern and jazz dance." - Stephanie Castner

An April 13 article in the New York Times took an in-depth look at the Henry Rayhons case which has drawn national attention in recent weeks.

Ann Christine Frankowski discusses her research at a symposium in 2013.

Ann Christine Frankowski, associate director of the Center for Aging Studies, was quoted in the article and discussed how dementia symptoms tend to fluctuate and patients can often be lucid in the morning and significantly impaired in the afternoon. “What may be appropriate on one day may not be appropriate the next week, or at a different point that same day,” she said.

In the article, Frankowski also discussed what she has discovered in her research with some staff member attitudes towards sex in assisted living facilities:

In other facilities, though, Dr. Frankowski said: “I find staff members saying ‘It’s wrong. Old people don’t do this, they had spouses in the past, they have family member that would be concerned.’ ”

“Sometimes they will say to the resident, ‘Do you really want your daughter to know about this?’ And the staff members do really and truly believe they are doing the right thing.”

To read the full article in the New York Times, click here.

More than 150 years after the first mail was delivered via the Pony Express, Vox  published an article examining the service that lasted for only 18 months. Christopher Corbett, professor of the practice in the English department, was quoted in the article. He is author of Orphans Preferred: The Twisted Truth and Lasting Legend of the Pony Express.

“In the American memory, that man is still riding across the country,” said Corbett when reflecting on the Pony Express. He also discussed how the mail service’s business model played a major role in its undoing.

The business was always doomed. “It hemorrhaged money from the first day,” Corbett said. “It was a bit of a madcap idea from the get-go … the structure of the business was deeply flawed.”

In the article, he also described the legacy of the Pony Express in American memory: Corbett says the appeal of the Pony Express is obvious: it’s an American myth without American tragedy. The bloodshed, suffering, and seediness of the Wild West aren’t part of the myth of the short-lived delivery service. “It’s a benign memory of the Old West,” he says. “It’s a powerfully romantic figure on the back of a fast horse.”

To read the full article in Vox, click here.

In its April education section, the Baltimore Sun published an article on programs that prepare students to provide effective, evidence-based care for patients. UMBC’s Psychology Training Clinic, part of the Psychology Training, Research, and Services Center at the South Campus Research and Technology Park, was featured in the article. Rebecca Schacht, a clinical assistant professor of psychology and director of the clinic, was quoted extensively in the story and discussed the new clinic, which provides low-cost therapy for people struggling with anxiety, depression, substance abuse and post-traumatic stress syndrome. Graduate-level students provide care under supervision of licensed psychologists.

“This is really the standard for training,” Schacht said. While students also train in community outpatient clinics, “you don’t get as much oversight there. It allows us to have more contact with our students to train them in evidence-based treatment.” Patients at the clinic agree to be recorded, and then the professors review the tapes with the students. “It benefits the students and the patients because there’s a lot more focus,” Schacht added. “You really think more deeply about each person.”

Students at the clinic study the latest research which benefits patients and Schacht noted the training at the clinic will provide the field with effective practitioners. “One of the biggest determinants in whether people get better is the relationship with their therapist,” she said. For more information about the clinic, click here.