Gang Lu (Physics & Astronomy) has received $45,074 from the Office of Naval Research in continuing support of a project entitled “Large-scale Modeling of Electron Dynamics and Excitations in Functional and Structural Materials.”

Gang Lu (Physics & Astronomy) has received $124,926 from the Office of Naval Research in continuing support of a project entitled “Large-scale Modeling of Electron Dynamics and Excitations in Functional and Structural Materials.”

The California State University, Northridge Department of Information Technology hosted its sixth annual Technology Fair on July 27 in the University Student Union Grand Salon, to inform faculty and staff about the latest trends in higher education technology.

“The CSUN Technology Fair has been held annually since 2011,” said Hilary Baker, chief information officer and vice president of information technology (IT). “It provides a forum for all IT staff, college technical staff and other interested employees to gather for two speaker presentations about topical IT subjects, and to interface with our key CSUN technology vendors.”

Representatives from HP, Lynda, Apple, Microsoft, Box, Shi, Dell and OnBase showcased the newest products on the market, while discussing their uses in higher education. Two speakers talked about current, relevant technology issues.

Morley Winograd, executive director of the Institute for Communication Technology Management at the USC Marshall School of Business, was the event’s morning speaker. He spoke about different generations and how each generation has engaged with technology through the decades.

Campuses will adapt to the increased technology use of the current generation and will become more interactive and connected to the web, Winograd said. He called data sharing the “new way of life,” adding that encyclopedias have been replaced by Wikipedia and open-access sources.

“Many grow up learning that wisdom is in the cloud,” he said.

“Morley Winograd’s presentation about millennial students and the new plurals (post-millennial) generation helps us better comprehend our current and future students, to determine how we can best help them succeed,” Baker said.

In the afternoon, Lisa Feldman, assistant U.S. attorney for the cybersecurity unit at the Department of Justice, spoke about online crime and how to guard against it.

She talked about the dangers of cyberbullying for younger generations and explained how users can identify and prevent malicious internet traps such as geotracking (identifying someone’s location through a picture), catfishing (faking someone’s social media profile) and phishing (fraud through malware).

“Information security awareness to protect our campus data is a shared campus responsibility, so listening to Lisa Feldman talk about cybersecurity was compelling,” Baker said.

“People have commented on how relevant the topics were to their professional and personal lives,” added Ben Quillian, associate vice president of information technology. “CSUN has been directly affected by the information security issues presented, and many attendees have been personally affected by identity theft and cyber crime as well. Being well informed helps people protect themselves.”

More than 200 people attended this year’s Technology Fair, including CSUN President Dianne F. Harrison.

“We are very happy with the turnout for this year, as we had a number of people from around campus join the event — as evidenced by another full room,” Quillian said. “Our goal is to provide information that is engaging, relevant and helpful in supporting student and employee success on campus.”

Amanda Zieve (right) is the assistant lighting designer for Howell Binkley (left), a two-time Tony award winner. With the help of Zieve, Binkley won his second Tony for Hamilton in June. Photo provided by Amanda Zieve.

If you want to see the Broadway sensation Hamilton, be prepared to spend between $179 for a standard seat and $849 for a premium seat — if you’re lucky enough to score tickets, which sell out within minutes of going on sale.

Tickets for the upcoming Aug. 8 show in New York sell for $7,000 each on the secondary ticket sales market.

One of the many reasons for the colossal success of the Pulitzer prize-winning musical was its crisp, stellar lighting. Lighting designer Howell Binkley won one of the musical’s 11 Tony awards in June for Best Lighting Design in a Musical.

The assistant lighting designer was former CSUN graduate Amanda Zieve ’06 (Theatre).

“I’ve never been a part of something so commercially successful before,” Zieve said. “Even people who aren’t familiar with theater have heard of this show.”

The mega-hit Hamilton may be the most successful Broadway show Zieve has worked on, but it’s far from her first.

Just a year after graduating from CSUN, Zieve worked alongside Binkley on the Broadway play The Farnsworth Invention, the first of 14 Broadway shows she’s done with him. Others include Million Dollar Quartet, Jesus Christ Superstar, A Christmas Story: The Musical and most recently, Grey Gardens.

“Some people work their whole life to get to that level [on Broadway] — it doesn’t happen very often because of the level of competition,” said Garry Lennon, one of Zieve’s CSUN theatre professor. “It’s remarkable.”

Zieve first met Binkley, a two-time Tony Award winner, while working at the La Jolla Playhouse in San Diego during the summer of her sophomore year at CSUN.

“I was working as a production assistant for the stage management team, but had gotten more interested in the lighting side,” Zieve said. “Howell [Binkley] came into the Playhouse one day and saw me reading a lighting book, and since that day, he’s been a total mentor to me and has taught me a lot about what I need to know [about lighting].”

Zieve said that working in the theater business takes a lot of hard work and dedication, but is completely worth it in the end.

“I’ve had to travel eight months out of the year and can sometimes be at work from 8 a.m. to midnight,” Zieve said. “But I just really enjoy the work and have never thought of it as a job.”

Some of Zieve’s typical responsibilities include attending meetings and rehearsals, voicing her opinion on several key decisions, and tracking and coordinating the placement of all the spotlights.

Zieve grew up in Colorado and went to high school in San Diego, but she decided CSUN was the best fit for her when it came time for higher education.

“I got accepted to other California schools, but chose to come to CSUN after I toured the school and talked with some of the theatre professors,” Zieve said. “I loved my time [at CSUN] and was able to graduate in three and a half years.”

Sami Maalouf, David Boyajian, and Tadeh Zirakian (Civil Engineering & Applied Mechanics) have received $392,233 from the California Department of Transportation in support of a project entitled “16_DESIGN 01: Estimating Service Life for Steel Pipe in Non-Abrasive Environments.”

California State University, Northridge holds this year’s record for the largest increase in research publications rates in North America, according to a listing of top tier peer-reviewed journals selected by the journal Nature.

The list, created by Nature Index, is made by analyzing research institutions in North America and their research output percentages from 2012 to 2015. Articles in chemistry, life sciences, physical sciences, and earth and environmental sciences published in journals chosen by Nature were the markers.

CSUN Dean of the College of Science and Mathematics Jerry Stinner said being listed among the top 25 Rising Stars is a great honor for the university.

“What a tremendous validation of everything we’ve been trying to accomplish in the college, in all five departments,” he said.  “To say that I’m proud of the faculty is a complete understatement. For Nature to recognize the incredible achievements and hard work of my faculty is beyond anything I could have wished for. The external recognition by a premier science journal is simply incredible.”

CSUN held the highest percent increase in publication rate at more than 190 percent, followed by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the U. S. Geological Survey, Carnegie Mellon University and Stanford University. CSUN is the only public institution of higher education in California listed.

The college includes the Departments of Biology, Chemistry and Biochemistry, Geological Sciences, Mathematics, and Physics and Astronomy. Stinner noted that research by faculty in all of the departments contributed to the listing.

CSUN biology professor Jonathan Kelber makes cancer cell samples to analyze in his lab. Photo by Lee Choo.

CSUN biology professor and cancer researcher Steven Oppenheimer, who has taught at CSUN for more than 45 years, said the listing had him “just flabbergasted.”

“This is a blockbuster,” he said. “I think this is the most important research advance for CSUN in the history of CSUN. In my 45 years here, I’ve never seen anything like this — ever. It shows that of all organizations in the country, CSUN made the greatest advance in research from 2012 to 2015 ­— more than Stanford, more than Harvard, more than anywhere! This is unbelievable. It is simply amazing. It’s a reflection of the great work that is being done here.”

Fellow cancer researcher Jonathan Kelber, a CSUN assistant professor of biology, added that the listing is a major bonus for the university because of Nature’s high profile.

“From my understanding, the list is generated from looking over publications in certain journals. That’s a really important caveat,” he said. “Nature Index identifies certain journals to watch that have big impacts in science. What they’re doing is not looking at all publications. [Nature Index] preselects which journals they are looking at. Many of these journals are high profile. They are banking on these journals [to be] predictive of current or past success of institutions. In that regard, it’s more exciting … I think it is encouraging.”

CSUN anthropology professor Hélène Rougier’s recent article on the origins of Eastern European Neandertals received the university’s highest score in outreach, called an altemetric score, according to Nature Index.

Rougier, whose department is in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, expressed gratitude for the listing and said the work of CSUN’s researchers speaks for itself.

CSUN anthropology professor Hélène Rougier (center) identifies human skeletal remains among the collections from the Goyet cave in Belgium with colleagues from her project team, paleoanthropologist Dr. Isabelle Crevecoeur from Bordeaux University (right) and archeozoologist Cédric Beauval from Archéosphère in France (left). Photo provided by Hèléne Rougier.

“I’m very thankful that people are interested in this work,” she said. “I’m sure it’s going to help to present and share this kind of research with a larger audience. CSUN has been supportive of my work. I’m very glad for CSUN, because we try to do research and I really feel support from the university.”

Kelber noted that Stinner provided him with exceptional support when coming to the university, which led the professor and his team of students to find causes of certain forms of cancer in their research, he said.

“Jerry Stinner, our dean, has been really giving faculty the resources — space and financial — to get research programs started up,” he said. “Our lab wouldn’t have been successful in getting the grants that we have or the research we did unless we had startup funds to buy the equipment. It is a big part, having a dean who has placed a huge priority on scholarship. He wants us to be engaged in the highest level of scholarship possible and has supported us for it.”

CSUN’s place on the Nature list is also thanks to support from CSUN’s leaders, including Stinner and biology department chair Larry Allen, Oppenheimer added.

“The way in which Jerry Stinner, Larry Allen and others have done this is by hiring scores of top faculty, first-choice faculty, for over a decade and supporting them with the best support anywhere,” he said. “This support starts with the president and the provost and the dean and the chair of biology. [CSUs] are not generally known for massive ​​quantities of research, but this [ranking] shows that here we are. Cal State Northridge — the greatest increase in top papers of any other place in North America. It is simply amazing.”

Allen reiterated that the work of the college for the past decade toward supporting its faculty has contributed to having CSUN on the listing.

“But most importantly,” he said, “it reflects the success of our undergraduate and graduate-based research model in producing both great science and invaluable training opportunities for our students.”

On Aug. 22, President Barack Obama named one teacher from the state of California as the science recipient for Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching — California State University, Northridge alumna Erica Rood.

“I was just overwhelmed,” said Rood M.A. ’15 (Elementary Curriculum and Instruction). “Just overwhelmed. … I was so excited to be receiving an award for something I’m very passionate about. It’s such an important thing to teach kids, and I was really ecstatic to be making news about science.”

Rood, who is also a part-time faculty member in CSUN’s Department of Mathematics, is a third-grade teacher at CHIME Institute’s Schwarzenegger Community School, a charter school in Woodland Hills.

What sets her apart from other teachers, said CHIME Executive Director Erin Studer, are the methods Rood uses to reach her students. Though she is a general education teacher, she has a strong passion for science and has combined her other passions — theater and dance — to help students get a better understanding and joy from the complicated subject.

“She’s a renaissance teacher in so many ways,” Studer said. “She uses all her talents in her lessons. I think that’s what makes her such a gifted teacher. She sees all the connections.”

The process for the presidential award began nearly three years ago when CSUN professor Wendy Murawski nominated Rood for the honor. (Rood had taught Murawski’s son.) Rood had to submit a 30-page paper explaining her background and a video of one of her lessons, with a written reflection of that lesson. In the video, Rood explained the difference between soil and dirt, and how plants use dirt and soil to survive. She dressed up in a lab coat with goggles and had her students incorporate poetry and art.

Rood, who has a bachelor’s degree in musical theater from UCLA, said this was a typical way that she reaches her students. Studer vouched for that.

“Erica has such a knowledge of how a well-run classroom should work, how to capture students’ attention, how to capture them with routines and songs,” Studer said. “It’s kind of a theatrical masterpiece how she orchestrates the running of a classroom, because it’s such a well-designed learning environment. Kids are ready and present to engage.”

Rood said CSUN helped her make an impact. She was part of the CSUN Elementary STEM Master’s Degree Program — a partnership with NASA and Teachers College at Columbia University, focused on science, technology, engineering and math education.

“CSUN is unique, in a sense that no one else was offering the program,” Rood said. “Just by offering the option, it found a pulse in my heart I felt strongly about.

“The faculty at CSUN have been so wonderful, to help me grow, to mentor me through the application and have been so supportive of increasing the professional development with graduates and faculty members,” she added. “All my teaching philosophies have come from [CSUN’s education] program. They’re good about sharing best practices in the classroom.”

Rood will receive the award in Washington, D.C. on Sept. 8. President Obama may even be present for the event.

At just 33, Rood is already a star in the classroom.

“I’m a girl with some ambition,” she said. “[And] teaching kids is my hobby. It excites me. It relaxes me. It’s my life. And I am a born teacher.”

On Aug. 11, the Los Angeles Unified School District honored 22 teachers at its Teacher of the Year Luncheon on the campus of the University of Southern California. It was an afternoon where Matadors stole the show.

Seven of the 22 Teacher of the Year honorees are California State University, Northridge alumni — Marcella Deboer ’97 (English) M.A. ’00 (English) , Tracy Johnson Elchyshyn ’91 (Liberal Studies), Patricia Kalma ’05 (Teaching Credential), Isela Jacome ’00 (Teaching Credential), Diana Rivera ’03 (Teaching Credential), Amber Willis ’02 (Teaching Credential) and Brenda Young ’02 (Teaching Credential).

“It shows that our long-term commitment to excellence is paying off,” said Michael Spagna, dean of the Michael D. Eisner College of Education. “We’re trying to produce the most effective teachers we can who will stay in the community, and that’s exactly what we’re doing.

“We’re very excited about this,” he added. “Anything that can bring cultural appreciation to teachers, we’re all about, because they have the most noble profession and don’t always get the kind of pats on the back they need.”

The honored teachers were genuinely touched by the accolade.

“At first I was shocked. It’s great to be recognized because I know that teachers don’t get a whole lot of recognition in the classroom,” said Willis, a science teacher at Downtown Magnets High School who has been teaching for 15 years.

Deboer, an English teacher at Cesar Chavez Learning Academies who has been teaching for 17 years, said, “This is confirmation that I’m doing a good job on what I worked so hard for.”

Many of the teachers credited CSUN for giving them a boost and setting the stage for their future success in education.

“The special education program at CSUN is very exceptional, very fantastic,” Rivera said. “I had great professors — especially for behavior and classroom management, and working with kids with autism and literacy. It gave me a really good basis for what I do in class [today].”

For Rivera, teaching was a second career. She was a lawyer who worked for Disney, but decided to shift gears and specifically looked to CSUN’s special education program to lift her to the next part of her professional life. Today, Rivera is a transitional kindergarten to third-grade teacher at Granada Elementary Community Charter School, and she has been teaching 13 years.

Young, an English teacher at John R. Wooden High School who has been teaching 15 years, also switched careers. She worked in public relations prior to teaching.

“CSUN was great for me,” Young said. “I entered teaching as a mid-career profession, one of the older ones in my [CSUN] classes. … CSUN helped me plug in all the necessary things to learn how to be an educator. I felt CSUN treated me as a professional already.”

Jacome was born in Ecuador and came to the U.S. at 17 years old. She was the first in her family to go to college and now is helping others achieve. Jacome is an English teacher at James Monroe High School and has been teaching for 10 years.

“It was a student who nominated me [for Teacher of the Year], so I was very touched that I touched this student in a way that she thought, ‘Oh wow, my teacher is amazing,’” Jacome said. “It inspires me to work harder because you always want to make sure you’re doing the right thing for the students.”

Jacome said she would one day like to come full circle and teach at CSUN. She shared the same experience that some of her fellow Teachers of the Year found at the university.

“I had some amazing professors who supported me and encouraged me and were there for me, even long after the credential program,” Elchyshyn said. “They encouraged me to come back and talk to them and ask questions. Their lesson-plan drawers were open.”

Kalma said, “I did the [Accelerated Collaborative Teacher Preparation Program] at CSUN. It was an amazing program because the teachers really knew up-to-date and current research and what was really needed in the classroom, and they showed us by doing hands-on activities, how to teach with hands-on activities for the students. So I feel like it really prepared me well for my first year.”

Michael Spagna (Education) has received $12,483 from the Los Angeles Unified School District in continuing support of a project entitled “Professional Development Services in Support of Private Schools.”

Joshua Schwartz (Geological Sciences) has received $18,885 from the National Science Foundation as supplemental support of a project entitled “CAREER: Investigating Controls on Arc Flare-Ups and the Growth of Lower Continental Crust.”

Jill Razani (Psychology) has received $108,750 from the National Institutes of Health in continuing support of a project entitled “Predictors of Functional Ability in MCI.”

Shereazad “Jimmy” Gandhi and Bingbing Li (Manufacturing Systems Engineering and Management); Ryan Holbrook and Lois Shelton (Management); and Vidya Nandikolla (Mechanical Engineering) have received $1,698 from Venturewell as supplemental support of a project entitled “Pathways to Innovation.”

Nicholas Kioussis and Gang Lu (Physics and Astronomy) have received $302,661 from the U.S. Department of Defense in support of a project entitled “Computer Cluster for Materials Research and Education.”

Danielle Bram and Regan Maas (Geography) have received $235,000 from the U.S. Forest Service in support of a project entitled “US Forest Service Region 3 National Hydrography (NHD) Spatial Data Update.”

Mark and Terri LIsagor

California State University, Northridge nutrition professor Terri Lisagor and her husband, Mark, will celebrate their 48th wedding anniversary this year. Their marriage is filled with respect and admiration for each other and is marked by a mutual commitment, forged while they were college sweethearts five decades ago, to leave the world a better place than they found it.

To that end, the pair has arranged a planned gift to CSUN that will ultimately leave $1 million to establish an endowed scholarship for students in the Resilient Scholars Program, which serves students who were formerly in the foster youth system, and another endowment that will support faculty research, travel, and professional development in the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences.  The endowments will provide future students and faculty members opportunities the Lisagors only dreamed of during their undergraduate days.

“Back when we were undergraduates, tuition was only $80 per quarter. The costs students have to bear are so much more today,” Terri Lisagor said. “Mark and I believe that cost shouldn’t be an insurmountable barrier to higher education for students, and we hope that this will help a few resilient scholars who have overcome extraordinary circumstances.”

As a long-time member of the faculty, Lisagor has seen the lasting ripple effects of her colleagues, and also understands the importance of research, service and preparation. “Scholarship takes time,” Lisagor said. “I feel that I was born to teach, and service is just a natural extension of what we do. But finding time to do serious scholarship, particularly with everything else we do as faculty, can be challenging. It would be great if this helps make it easier for future colleagues.”

Lisagor grew up in the San Fernando Valley. She graduated from high school in 1966, determined to go to college despite her family’s lack of support for her higher education aspirations. She enrolled at UCLA with dreams of becoming a teacher. Terri worked full time to pay for her education, taking a full load of courses each quarter to ensure that she graduated in the prescribed four years.

She met Mark Lisagor in a freshman math class. He too was working full time to pay for his education.

“We went out for a few dates whenever we both could get time off from work,” she said. “It had only been a couple months when Mark said, ‘I think we should get married.’ I said ‘Okay. So, how do you pronounce your last name?’ Fortunately for us, it worked out.”

Lisagor is pronounced “Liss’-uh-Gor.”

Terri Lisagor giving a demonstration on dental hygiene in Guatemala in 2013. Photo courtesy of Terri Lisagor.

Among the things that drew the couple together was their shared passion for making the world a better place. While in college, they were actively involved in the anti-war movement, as well as other social causes. They lived on an American Indian reservation in the Southwest for two years, while Mark served as a dentist in the Indian Health Service. Their daughter, Kimberly, now an environmental activist and journalist, was born on the Navajo reservation. Their son, Adam, is a filmmaker in Los Angeles. Mark and Terri have two grandsons, and a granddaughter on the way.

Mark established a pediatric dental practice in Camarillo and Oxnard. Terri, using her background in elementary education, established an innovative preventative dental health education program for the families in his practice.

Motivated by an increased curiosity about nutrition, she enrolled at CSUN, eventually earning a master’s in food science and nutrition in 1990, and a doctorate in education from Pepperdine University in 2004.

While completing her master’s, Lisagor was invited to join the faculty in CSUN’s Department of Family and Consumer Sciences as a lecturer in food science and nutrition. Once she earned her doctorate, she was hired as a tenure-track faculty member. Now a full professor and past chair of the department, she said she is delighted to continue to work with students, faculty, administration and staff throughout CSUN.

Despite their professional obligations, the Lisagors continue to carve out time to volunteer. For the past several decades, Mark has worked with Global Dental Relief, leading teams of volunteers to provide free dental care for impoverished children around the world, including in Nepal, India and Guatemala. Lisagor often joins him on these trips, and frequently has included CSUN nutrition students on their teams to Guatemala to teach about nutrition and oral hygiene.

“We love giving back,” she said. “That’s part of why we decided to make this planned gift — it just seems natural. CSUN has been so important in my life, and this gift is a good fit for us. It matches our philosophy of giving back.”

Below is a video of one of a trip Lisagor took with CSUN students in 2013 to teach rural Guatemala families about oral hygiene:

California State University, Northridge academic and administrative leaders gathered Aug. 22 to prepare for the 2016-17 academic year — focused clearly on student success and boosting graduation rates. More than 100 leaders, including department chairs, deans of CSUN’s nine colleges and library, and administrators, met in Cypress Hall for their annual retreat.

“We are the pipeline for the future,” said CSUN President Dianne F. Harrison, kicking off the retreat. “We want to make sure our graduates are prepared for success. And you are the keys to making that happen.”

In her address, the president shared graduation goals for the year 2025, set forth by the California State University (CSU) chancellor’s office and the CSU board of trustees. For example, CSUN aims to increase the four-year graduation rate for students who start as freshmen from its current 13 percent (a number Harrison called “dismal”) to 30 percent by 2025.

“We know that two-thirds of our students must work at least one job to afford their education and support their families,” Harrison said. “We have said that our students are not the traditional four-year students, but we should not assume that one-third or more of our students cannot rise to meet these goals and complete their studies in four years, or two years for transfer students. We need to reset our mindsets about what is possible for our students.”

As they prepare schedules, faculty staffing and classes for the fall semester (which began Aug. 27), department chairs were urged by the president to consider redesigning courses in the future, as well as working with faculty to close achievement gaps for underrepresented minority students. In the 2025 graduation goals, CSUN aims to cut the achievement gap for those underrepresented students from the current 11 percent to zero.

The retreat’s sessions included breakout groups focusing on undergraduate and graduate policies, accessing data, and faculty and staff rights. Faculty members from across the university also had the opportunity to meet new Dean of the College of Health and Human Development Farrell J. Webb, as well as a number of new department chairs.

Keynote speaker Marcela Cuellar, an assistant professor of education at UC Davis, spoke to the group about the rapid growth and potential of minority-serving institutions — particularly Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI) like CSUN and those that serve students of Asian-American, Native American and Pacific Islander heritage — in California and across the nation. “HSIs have doubled from 1994 until now, and they represent 13 percent of all higher education institutions in the U.S.,” Cuellar said.

Chief Anne Glavin of CSUN’s Department of Police Services (DPS) spoke to the leaders about the importance of preparing themselves and their students for an “active shooter” emergency on campus. She showed a short video simulating such an event at CSUN, recently filmed on campus and produced by students and staff in the Department of Cinema and Television Arts and DPS. She urged all faculty to show the video in their classes and discuss it with students. The video and discussion guide are available on the DPS web page.

“We need to help students understand the survival mindset that we’re trying to get across,” Glavin said. “This video is going to give our students a greater sense of confidence that they can survive if, God forbid, something like this should happen at CSUN.”

In the afternoon, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Yi Li wrapped up the all-day retreat with a discussion with the faculty members and leadership. He also emphasized student success and increasing graduation rates, as well as the campus priorities of supporting research and diversity.

“CSUN is important because our students reflect the demographics of our community and the future demographics of our nation,” Li said. “This is going to be another busy year, but this is a great opportunity for us, with the focus on student success, research and diversity.”

Rosa Angulo-Barroso

Iron is keeping pregnant women healthy across the globe. But what impact can it have once the baby is born? Research by California State University, Northridge kinesiology professor and international collaborator Rosa Angulo-Barroso is exploring the effects of iron supplementation on the motor development of infants, and their preliminary findings are positive.

A study published in the Pediatrics Journal earlier this year, revealed that infants from Beijing, China, that received iron supplementation from six weeks to nine months had improvements in their gross motor skills compared to those who did not. Gross motor skills cover the use of large muscles and locomotion.

Angulo-Barroso explained the research results provide insight into how iron supplementation is vital to helping children do better in other aspects of their development.

“It is almost a cascading effect,” she said. “It creates more cognition, more emotional and social development. The fact that iron supplementing the kid in this six weeks all the way to nine months helps them have better scores is so important.”

However, infants who had a mild iron deficiency were just as likely to have issues in motor development as those who were iron deficient and anemic.

“Iron deficiency is very common,” Angulo-Barroso added. “The level of iron deficiency with anemia is different, since you have a low red blood cell count. We are not talking about that level of iron deficiency here. One is more severe than the other. And even though iron deficiency is a lower level, still, we are finding these effects [in motor development].”

Angulo-Barroso explained that while iron supplementation helped, more studies are being done to look at the status of iron levels in the infants and mothers, as opposed to just the iron supplementation. This way, more effects can be analyzed in the data set.

She said that the most important outcome of the study was that even if the iron levels are not severely low, having a slight deficiency can clearly impact the development of the children, and more tests can be done to help identify it.

“This is the interesting part to me, since kids don’t get screened for iron deficiency, just iron deficiency anemia,” she said. “[Most doctors] don’t look at other markers for iron deficiency, they only look at hemoglobin levels. Have your iron levels assessed, not only your hemoglobin levels.”

Angulo-Barroso has worked with and assessed the iron levels of various populations around the world for the past 17 years, including those from Chile, Costa Rica and the United States. She said she was shocked to discover how common iron deficiency was, no matter the country.

“A lot of these early developing countries did not have a policy of reinforcing iron in their formulas for the babies,” she said. “It was a lot easier to go to these countries and examine and finding a population that was iron deficient early in life. Because in the U.S. everything has been fortified, we thought it would be harder to find an iron deficient population. Amazingly, about 20 percent of babies in the Detroit area were iron deficient. We are continuing to explore more effects of iron on the development of these children.”

Rachel Friedman-Narr (Special Education) has received $52,488 from the California Department of Education in continuing support of a project entitled “Parentlinks.”

Virginia Vandergon (Biology), Matthew d’Alessio (Geological Science), and Norman Herr (Secondary Education) have received $24,000 from the UC Regents in continuing support of a project entitled “San Fernando Valley Science Project.” 

Sembiam R. Rengarajan and Ronald Pogorzelski ( Electrical & Computer Engineering) have received $24,000 from the United States Navy in support of a project entitled “Determine Optimum Search Strategies for Rapidly and Accurately Locating a Beam Pointing Direction.”