Bee Hive Installed for Biology Research

This summer, a bee hive installed on land adjacent to Bloomsburg University's upper campus. The bee hive, funded through a Bloomsburg University mini-grant to Drs. Surmacz and Hranitz, will support undergraduate and graduate research. Honey bees pollinate many common crops and contribute an estimated $15 billion to the U.S. economy annually. Global declines in honeybee populations have been observed, with average losses of 30% of the hives each year. Many of these losses have been attributed to Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). In CCD, the majority of the adult bees disappear from the colony, leaving behind the brood and plenty of food. While no single cause has been linked to CCD, leading suspects are nutritional stress, pathogens, and pesticides.

BAHS researchers studying cellular stress in honey bees include faculty members Drs. Brubaker, Hranitz and Surmacz, graduate students Heather Llewellyn and Justin Heller, and undergraduate students Taylor Bozza and Rachel Nenstiel. Graduate student Hannah Anderson has been maintaining the hive.

Digital forensics majors identified as new cyber talent

Four Bloomsburg University digital forensics majors now have their eyes set on working for the Department of Defense as a result of earning a DoD Cyber Scholarship for this school year. Each cyber scholar receives full tuition, fees, a book allowance, and a stipend for living expense in exchange for civilian service at a DoD Agency upon graduation.

“We’re very proud of our digital forensics curriculum and the students we educate,” said Curt Jones, chairman of the mathematical and digital sciences department. “These scholarships are the result of these students’ ability and education provided by our professors. They’re only possible because of our designation as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense Education that Dr. Barrett obtained for us. Her excellent work in this area has now led to six students receiving these highly coveted scholarships.”

DoD’s Cybersecurity Scholarship Program is designed to increase the number of qualified students entering the fields of information assurance, information technology, and cybersecurity to meet the DoD’s increasing dependence on cybersecurity for war fighting and the security of its information infrastructure. “The scholarship award an excellent testament to the caliber of our digital forensic students,” said Diane Barrett, associate professor of mathematical and digital sciences. “It also demonstrates the high quality of the digital forensics curriculum and faculty expertise. This is an exceptional opportunity for our students to make a difference in the effort to secure the digital assets of our country.” Due to the sensitivity of the jobs within DoD, student names are being withheld.

BU is designated as a National Center of Academic Excellence (CAE) in Cyber Defense Education with a focus in the area of digital forensics. The CAE designation, jointly sponsored by the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security, recognizes that Bloomsburg’s digital forensics program has met stringent criteria in regard to its digital forensics curriculum, faculty and research, as well as demonstrated an institution-wide commitment to information assurance practices and cyber defense education. Students attending CAE designated schools become eligible to apply for related scholarships and grants through the Federal Cyber Service Scholarship for Service Program.
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Science in Motion at Bloomsburg University

Bloomsburg University is excited to be a part of the Science In Motion Program that is grant funded by the PA Department of Education. A cross-collaboration between BU’s College of Science & Technology, the College of Education, and the Regional STEM Education, Science in Motion (SIM) serves our regional middle and high schools by offering the very best STEM instruction.
Science in Motion provides middle and high school students with access to advanced science experiments, equipment, and instruction for enhanced STEM learning – all at no cost to the school.
Bloomsburg University Science in Motion provides:

• Science Equipment and prepared laboratory kits providing access to equipment not financially available in schools.
• Teaching support through a mobile education (traveling teachers) and staff preparation center with multiple sets of equipment and supplies need to give hands-on experiences.
• Professional development to science teachers provided by mobile educators and college network.

SIM was founded at Juniata College in 1987. There are currently 10 college and universities in Pennsylvania in the program serving over 200 schools. Bloomsburg University’s SIM provides services to schools in the Clinton, Columbia, Lycoming, Montour, Northumberland, Schuylkill, Snyder, and Union counties.

Science in Motion is coming to the Bloomsburg Fair!!!! 

Stop by the Farm Equipment Museum on Tuesday, Sept 24 from 10-2 to make liquid nitrogen ice cream!

 

Recent publications and presentations

Publications
Rebecca Toothaker, assistant professor in Nursing, recently had a paper entitled, "Development and Validation of the Just Culture Assessment Tool for Nursing Education" published in Nurse Educator.  This work was a collaboration with individuals from Texas Christian University, The College of New Jersey, Oakland Community College, and Indiana University of Pennsylvania.

Kate Beishline, assistant professor of BAHS, recently had a paper entitled, "Elevated telomere dysfunction in cells containing the African-centric Pro47Ser cancer-risk variant of TP53" published in Oncotarget. This work was a collaboration with individuals from The Wistar Institute and the Childrens Hospital of Phildelphia.

Shaheen Awan, professor of Communication Sciences and Disorders, recently had a paper entitled, "Spectral/Cepstral Analyses of Phonatio in Parkinson's Disease before and after Voice Treatment: A Preliminary Study" published in Folia Phoniatrica et Logopaedica.  This work was a collaboration with individuals from  the University of Jeddah, the University of Louisiana, and the University of Memphis.

Sean Hartzell, adjunct faculty of BAHS, recently had three papers published;  "Observation of a Cambarus bartonii bartonii (Common Crayfish) Overwintering in a Terrestrial Winter Microhabitat" published in Northeastern Naturalist; "Sexual Dichromatism of Dorsal Stripes in "Red-back" Morph Individuals in a Population of Eastern Red-vacked Salamanders (Plethodon cinereus)" published in Herpetological Review; and "Observation of a Cambarus bartonii bartonii (Common Crayfish) Overwintering in a Terrestrial Winter Microhabitat" in Northeastern Naturalist.

Kevin Ferland, professor of mathematical and digital sciences, published a paper, "Maximal Crossword Grids", in the Journal of Computational Mathematics and Computational Computing.  This was joint work with Robert Pratt of the SAS Institute.  It determines the maximum number of clues possible in a square crossword puzzle grid of any size.

Debra Stayer and Elizabeth Culver, assistant professors of nursing, published a paper, "Case Report of Nursing Care for a Pregnant Woman with Cystic Fibrosis", in the Journal of Obstetric, Gynecologic & Neonatal Nursing.  This work was a collaboration with Geisinger Medical Center.

Abby Hare-Harris, assistant professor of BAHS, published a paper, "Within-task variability on standardized language tests predicts autism spectrum disorder: a pilot study of the Response Dispersion index" in the Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders.  This was a collaboration with Geisinger Medical Center, Bucknell University, and Rutgers University.

Reza Noubary, professor of MADS, published a book, Reflections on Contemporary Life, An Outsiders Perspective.  The book recounts the life of a boy who through hardships, learns a great deal about the dynamic aspects of life and the changes that take place accordingly.

Chris Lynd, associate professor of MADS, published a paper entitled,  "Sequences Generated by Powers of the k^th-order Fibonacci Recurrence Relation", in The American Mathematical Monthly.  BU undergraduate James Sharpe was also an author on this publication.

Barry Minemyer, assistant professor of MADS, published a paper entitled, "Filling triangulated surfaces" in Geometriae Dedicata. This work was in collaboration with the Ohio State University. 

Rebecca Toothaker and Pamela Cook, assistant professors in Nursing, recently had a paper entitled, "Measuring Nursing Students' Perception of Just Culture within Nursing Programs: A Multisite Study", accepted for future publication in the January 2020 edition of Nurse Educator.  This work was a collaboration  across 18 schools nationwide with 20 nurse educators from the Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) Academic Taskforce.

Presentations

Peggy Shipley, assistant professor of nursing, presented a poster entitled, "Compassionate Love: A Concept Analysis" at the Beta Sigma Research Day at the Pennsylvania State University.

Julie Ambrose, instructor of BAS-TL, participated in a panel discussion "Learning to Lead, Leading to Learn" at the 2nd Annual Pennsylvania Leadership Studies Conference.
   
James Rommens, instructor of BAS-TL gave a talk entitled,"How a Lean Six Sigma Mindset can Help Project Managment", at the Project Management Institute Keystone Chapter Professional Speaker and Networking Event Series.

Chris Lynd, associate professor of MADS, presented a talk entitled, "The class of sequences of nested radicals" at the American Mathematical Society (AMS) regional conference at the University of Connecticut. The talk included published research from two BU undergraduates, James Sharpe and Devin Lesher.

Barry Minemyer, assistant professor of MADS, gave a Colloquium talk at Juniata College entitled "The geometry of n-dimensional triangles via edge lengths". He also gave a talk, entitled, "Warped product metrics on complex hyperbolic manifolds" at the 53rd Annual Spring Topology and Dynamical Systems Conference at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Conference Scholarship
Daniel McCurry, assistant professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, received a Research Corporation for Science Advancement scholarship to attend the American Chemical Society (ACS) New Faculty Workshop in Savannah Georgia.