Researchers experimenting with live zebrafish witnessed a 200% increase in the strength of intestinal contractions soon after the organisms were exposed to the cholera-causing bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The strong contractions led to expulsion of native gut bacteria.

The discovery, detailed in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, “was remarkable and unexpected,” the authors write.

The researchers – from the University of Oregon, Georgia Institute of Technology, and Memorial-Sloan Kettering Cancer Center – used genetic manipulation and cutting-edge three-dimensional microscopy to monitor what happens when the disease-causing microbe is initially introduced into the larvae of zebrafish, an organism commonly studied as a model for understanding health and disease in vertebrates, including humans.

The multidisciplinary team of physicists, molecular biologists, and microbiologists focused on the harpoon-like injection capabilities of the type VI secretion system. This appendage, found in many bacteria including Vibrio cholerae, transfers toxic proteins into competing healthy cells.

The scientists engineered Vibrio cholerae mutants with variations in that secretion system and then observed the behavior of the microbes as they invaded zebrafish colonized with Aeromonas veronii, a native species in that animal’s gut.

SWIFT ACTION
Instead of simply killing native Aeromonas gut bacteria upon contact, as expected, when Vibrio cholerae entered the gut the native bacteria were swiftly flushed out.

“The secretion system induced dramatic increases in the strength of the peristalsis process, the contractions that move gut contents down the gastrointestinal tract much like squeezing a tube of toothpaste from the end to the top,” says coauthor Brian K. Hammer, a microbiologist and associate professor in the School of Biological Sciences at Georgia Tech.

The researchers hypothesized that the unexpected bacterial manipulation in the digestive system might be driven by a particular piece of the type VI machinery known to bind to actin, a cellular scaffolding protein. When the scientists deleted the actin-binding domain from the bacterial gene, they saw that Vibrio cholerae lost its ability to enhance peristalsis and its ability to expel native Aeromonas.

The findings shed new light on how the waterborne Vibrio cholerae functions. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Vibrio cholerae triggers more than 3 million cases of acute diarrheal illness and 100,000 deaths in people worldwide each year.

“Knowing the strategies by which the bacterium is able to invade the intestine can open doors to therapies that might disrupt these paths,” says corresponding author Raghuveer Parthasarathy, a professor of physics at the University of Oregon, whose imaging and analysis techniques were used in the study.

Because the type VI secretion system is also found in native gut bacteria, including those in the human gut microbiome, it could be harnessed for therapies, including specially designed probiotics, to promote beneficial species or to defend against disease invasion, Hammer says.

“We suspect that other gut microbes, both pathogenic and beneficial, might similarly make use of this secretion system to reshape their environment,” Parthasarathy says.

Most previous research on this secretion system has relied on studying bacteria outside of animals – on a Petri dish for example, or by examining fecal samples – to infer what is happening in the gut during infection.

While the research team captured the impact of invasion by Vibrio cholerae, understanding just how it takes root in the host, such as what specific cells in the animal are targeted, is an open question, Parthasarathy says.

“We still have no idea how the action of his secretion system’s harpoon is causing the changes in the muscle contractions,” Hammer says. “We suspect that what we are observing may be an immune response to irritation in the gut lining. But what cells in the gut are being poked?”

How the findings may reflect the colonization of Vibrio cholerae in humans is not known, but the role of the secretion system makes a similar result plausible, the researchers wrote in their conclusion.

BIRTH OF COLLABORATION
The findings emerged from a collaboration born in 2015 when Hammer, Parthasarathy, and coauthor Joao Xavier, a researcher at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, discussed joint research possibilities during a conference, Scialog: Molecules Come to Life, in Tucson, Arizona.

The Scialog (Science and Dialog) was organized by the Research Corporation for Science Advancement and sponsored jointly with the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, with additional support from the Simons Foundation. The goal of Scialog is to rapidly catalyze new interdisciplinary collaborative teams, such as the one formed by Hammer, Parthasarathy, and Xavier, to work on high-risk, high-reward projects. 

As a result, their three labs received an award from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and the Simons Foundation to pursue their Scialog idea. The National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust, and Kavli Microbiome Ideas Challenge also supported the research.

PHOTO CAPTION
Trajectories of Vibrio cholerae bacteria (blue) swimming inside the gut of a larval zebrafish. The gut is visible as a gray background. The total duration of the movie that was “squashed” into this image is 3.5 seconds, and the total image width is about 0.3 mm. (Courtesy of Raghuveer Parthasarathy)

The College of Sciences has selected Matthew Baker as the inaugural Associate Dean for Faculty Development. The position was created to complement the positions of Associate Dean for Academic Programs and Associate Dean for Research. Baker is a professor in the School of Mathematics. He will begin his new role on July 1, 2018.

The Associate Dean for Faculty Development in the College of Sciences is responsible for developing, implementing, and assessing programs that enhance the instructional, research, and career opportunities for faculty. Key areas of responsibility include faculty hiring; mentoring of faculty; faculty retention, promotion, and tenure; and diversity, equity, and inclusion at the faculty level.

“I’m delighted that Matt is willing to be the first holder of this important leadership position,” College of Sciences Dean and Sutherland Chair Paul Goldbart says. “As a mathematician of global renown, an educator celebrated for the clarity of his lectures, and a faculty member with demonstrated accomplishments in service to Georgia Tech and the worldwide mathematics community, Matt is well positioned to advance our deep commitment to the professional development of faculty members as thriving, fulfilled researcher-educators who have extraordinary impact.”

Baker joined Georgia Tech in 2004 as an assistant professor of mathematics and was promoted to full professor in 2011. As a pure mathematician, he is treasured by the international mathematics community for the depth, power, and creativity of his research in some of the most demanding aspects of pure mathematics, such as algebraic and arithmetic geometry. His accomplishments have been recognized by numerous awards, including his election as a Fellow of the American Mathematical Society in 2012 and selection for the Simons Fellowship in Mathematics in 2017.

As an educator, Baker is deeply committed to enhancing students’ experience, even in the most challenging mathematics courses. This has brought him awards for teaching excellence from both Georgia Tech and the University System of Georgia. Baker is also a thoughtful and effective leader, as he demonstrated during his service as Director of Undergraduate Studies in the School of Mathematics. 

“I’m honored to have been selected, and I look forward to being part of the College of Sciences leadership team,” Baker says. “I am eager to build upon the faculty-mentoring activities that Associate Dean for Research Julia Kubanek has introduced in recent years. I hope that my unique perspective as a mathematician is helpful in addressing issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion – and of fairness and transparency in hiring, promotion, retention, and salary considerations. I look forward to supporting the needs of our diverse, accomplished, and ambitious faculty.”

Georgia Tech has selected Flavio Fenton and Raquel Lieberman as the joint recipients of the 2018 Faculty Award for Academic Outreach, administered by the Center for Teaching and Learning. The award recognizes faculty members for productive academic outreach going beyond their normal duties to enrich the larger educational community with their subject matter knowledge.

Both Fenton and Lieberman were recently promoted to professor, respectively, in the School of Physics and the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry; both are members of the Parker H. Petit Institute of Bioengineering and Bioscience.

Both are scholars who are committed and dedicated to fostering and supporting the interest of K-12 students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). They especially look out for students who are historically underrepresented in STEM or are from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds. Their aim is to help young students see themselves as scientists, even when these students do not have many role models who look like them.

FLAVIO FENTON: Various venues for outreach
Flavio Fenton has established connections with middle and high schools in the greater Atlanta area, by himself and through GoSTEM, a Georgia Tech/Gwinnett County Public School District collaboration to strengthen the pipeline of Hispanic students into college STEM education. He has also organized and led workshops to involve undergraduate students in research.

His work doesn’t end there. Fenton has been involved in the Atlanta Science Festival since its inception.  Through the annual celebration of science, Fenton helps to bridge the gap between scientists and nonscientists and to encourage young people to pursue studies in STEM.

“Flavio has shown himself to be a leader in communicating science to the broader public and generating excitement about research outside of Georgia Tech,” a colleague says.

Described as “a diversity pioneer,” Fenton reaches out to Hispanic students and to women in particular, encouraging them to pursue careers in STEM-related fields. He and his Ph.D. student Andrea Welsh co-organized the 2016 Conference for Undergraduate Women in Physics at Georgia Tech. He regularly participates in the GoStem Annual Latino College and STEM Fair and the after-school Pathways to College programs. He usually has K-12 students participating in research projects in his lab.

“Since I joined Georgia Tech, I have been thrilled by the disposition and the many opportunities our institution offers for outreach,” Fenton says. “I found it to be a privilege and also a responsibility to disseminate science and to excite middle and high school students into studying STEM fields and to show them how much fun it is to learn science.”

RAQUEL LIEBERMAN: Providing research experience to students and teachers
Raquel Lieberman possesses a “deep commitment to using her academic expertise to further the learning of K-12 teachers and students,” a colleague says.

For seven summers, Lieberman hosted high school science teacher Casey Bethel as a researcher in her lab. Bethel was named Georgia’s 2017 Teacher of the Year.  He accomplished this feat in large part because of the improvement in teaching methods and gain in scientific knowledge he achieved as a regular summer researcher in Lieberman’s lab.

With Bethel, Lieberman developed K-12 science classroom materials, which they have published and shared at conferences. She has repeatedly hosted in her lab students from Atlanta area schools, including New Manchester High School, in Douglasville, where Bethel used to teach.

Under Lieberman’s mentorship, some of these students contributed to high-impact scientific publications and participated in high school science competitions. A measure of Lieberman’s impact is the exponential growth in the number of Bethel’s students who now pursue undergraduate STEM majors. Some of them have even gone on to attend and graduate from Georgia Tech.

When describing Lieberman, a colleague quotes the English actor Idris Elba: “Talent is everywhere; opportunity is not.” In this colleague’s view, no one does more than Lieberman to address inequity and to ensure that all students have opportunity.

“Collaborating with Mr. Bethel,” Lieberman says, “and seeing our partnership grow and propagate from our lab to across the nation is truly one of the most rewarding aspects of my career to date and one that I hope continues far into the future.”

William C. Ratcliff has been named the recipient of the 2018 Sigma Xi Young Faculty Award. The award recognizes outstanding research achievements by a faculty of rank no higher than assistant professor. Ratcliff is an assistant professor in the School of Biological Sciences.

An evolutionary biologist, Ratcliff studies how organisms change over time. In particular, he wants to understand how multicellular organisms can evolve from single cells. This question remains one of the fundamental problems in biology.

His approach is “extremely creative,” a colleague says. “Rather than trying to infer what happened hundreds of millions of years ago, William cut the Gordian knot by evolving novel multicellularity in the laboratory....Few scientists would attempt such an ambitious experiment.”

In a 2016 interview, Ratcliff explained his approach.

“In our lab, we do evolutionary time travel in a test tube, by creating new multicellular organisms, using yeast and algae, in a way that’s simple but which we can examine with huge precision, using all the tools of biology, mathematics, and physics. We’re not trying to explain what happened historically. Rather, we’re trying to show how it can happen in principle.

“We’re interested in how the geometry of cellular clusters influences the outcome of evolution, tipping the balance between cellular cooperation and conflict, and how cells lose their Darwinian autonomy, evolving from individual organisms into parts of a new organism. These are fundamental principles that should be broadly applicable.”

Ratcliff has shown that multicellularity can evolve quickly. The simple multicellular “snowflake” yeasts he has evolved in the lab – by selection for rapid settling through liquid media– possess a multicellular life cycle, reproducing through small propagules, like stem cuttings. Over 1,500 generations, they adapted to the selection pressure by growing faster and evolving a more hydrodynamic shape. They also evolved a simple division of labor, using programmed cell death to sever links between cells and produce more propagules. Experiments with a unicellular algae have yielded broadly similar results.

“[T]his award really reflects the strength of our research community and the benefits of working in an environment so conducive to collaboration.”

From these observations, fundamental insights have emerged about the evolution of multicellular complexity. For example, mutations that are beneficial to the multicellular aggregate but costly to the single cell can accelerate evolution of increased multicellular complexity. In addition, his work has shown how the 3D geometry of yeast clusters allows a rudimentary form of development to arise, guiding the emergence of new multicellular traits from mutations that only directly affect the properties of single cells. Taken together, Ratcliff’s research upends conventional wisdom that the transition to multicellularity must have been slow and difficult and must have required extraordinary conditions.

Ratcliff’s scientific creativity is recognized by generous external support for his research, including the prestigious Packard Fellowship. Even the popular press has noticed: Popular Science named Ratcliff one of the Brilliant 10 in 2016, the magazine’s way of “honoring the brightest young minds reshaping science, engineering, and the world.”

“William has helped define the field of modern multicellularity research,” the same colleague says, “and in so doing, has become one of its leaders.”

“I am of course deeply honored by this recognition” Ratcliff says. “But this award really reflects the strength of our research community and the benefits of working in an environment so conducive to collaboration. Since arriving at Tech in 2014, my research directions have evolved much like snowflake yeast have – in wonderful and unexpected ways. This has been the direct result of having such amazing students, collaborators and colleagues.”

School of Mathematics Professor Robin Thomas is one of 28 members of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) Class of 2018 Fellows. The fellowship recognizes distinguished members of SIAM for their exemplary research and outstanding service to the community.

Thomas has long been an exemplar of research excellence and dedication to mentoring Ph.D. students and postdocs. For his remarkable record of teaching, service, and research, Thomas received Georgia Tech’s highest award to a faculty member – the Class of 1934 Distinguished Professor Award – in 2016.

A world leader in graph theory, Thomas has published more than 100 research papers in top journals, including Annals of Mathematics and the Journal of the American Mathematical Society. His extraordinary research record includes several major results any one of which would be considered a lifetime highlight. Thomas has received the prestigious Fulkerson Prize twice, in 1994 and 2009, as well as the Neuron Award for Contribution to Science in 2011.

Among Thomas’ notable achievements, perhaps none is more astounding than his work on the Four Color Theorem (4CT). The theorem was first proved in 1976 by Kenneth Appel and Wolfgang Haken, using a computer. However, this computer proof cannot be verified by hand, and even the part that could supposedly be checked by hand is complicated and tedious. To dispel doubts about the Appel-Haken proof, Thomas – along with Neil Robertson, Daniel Sanders, and Paul Seymour – published a new and much simpler proof in 1997.

As a possible generalization of the Four Color Conjecture (now a theorem), Hugo Hadwiger offered a conjecture in 1943 that was easy to prove for t ≤ 3. The case for t = 4 is difficult and equivalent to 4CT. In 1993, Thomas, along with Roberston and Seymour, proved that the case t = 5 can be reduced to the 4CT by showing that the smallest counterexample to the Hadwiger conjecture for t = 5 must be an apex graph. The proof, which is computer-free, is a tour de force. Thomas, Robertson, and Seymour received the Fulkerson Prize in 1994 for this work.

Thomas again received the Fulkerson Prize in 2009 for his work – along with Maria Chudnovsky, Robertson, and Seymour – on the proof of Berge’s conjecture, which consumes 179 pages in Annals of Mathematics.

“Robin has a remarkable record as a teacher and a mentor,” says School of Mathematics Professor and former interim chair Prasad Tetali. “His tireless efforts to challenge and encourage young talents at critical early stages of their careers has had a profound impact on the lives of a large number of Ph.D. students and postdocs,” including the following:

• Zdenek Dvorak (Charles University, Czech)
• Bertrand Guenin (University of Waterloo, Canada)
• Daniel Kral (University of Warwick, UK)
• Chun-Hung Liu (Princeton University)
• Sergey Norine (McGill University, Canada)
• Dhruv Mubayi (University of Illinois, Chicago)
• Sang-il Oum (Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology)
• Luke Postle (University of Waterloo, Canada)
• Xingxing Yu (Georgia Institute of Technology)

SIAM Fellows help advance the fields of applied mathematics and computational science. The Class of 2018 Fellows will be recognized during the SIAM Annual Meeting, on July 9-13, 2018, in Portland, Oregon. 

PHOTO CAPTION
Robin Thomas, center, is pictured with his advisor, Jaroslav Nešetřil, and some of his former students at a conference held in his honor in 2012. The Conference on Graph Theory took place at Georgia Tech to celebrate Thomas’ work and his 50th birthday. 
 

Joseph Rabinoff and Matthew Torres are two of Georgia Tech’s 2018 CTL/BP Junior Faculty Teaching Excellence Award winners. Jointly supported by the Center for Teaching and Learning and BP America, the award recognizes the excellent teaching and educational innovation that junior faculty bring to campus. 

JOSEPH RABINOFF: Helping both students and faculty
Joseph Rabinoff was recently promoted to associate professor in the School of Mathematics. Because many undergraduates take the fundamental mathematics courses he teaches, Rabinoff has had a broad impact on Georgia Tech undergraduates.

Students say Rabinoff makes mathematics relevant and engaging, especially the introductory classes he teaches. For his part, Rabinoff seeks to ensure that all students, whatever their majors, understand and even appreciate the material.

Rabinoff was heavily involved in developing the curriculum and course materials for Math 1553, Introduction to Linear Algebra. This is an engineering core course that is taken by thousands of Georgia Tech students every year. He created lecture slides, interactive demonstrations, and online homework problems. With colleague Dan Margalit, Rabinoff wrote a free online textbook for the course, “Interactive Linear Algebra.”

Beyond the classroom, Rabinoff spearheaded the creation of the School of Mathematics’ course repository and has been the main contributor to its infrastructure and content. The repository contains up-to-date curated materials that a new teacher can just pick up and use.

The students are the most exciting part about being at Georgia Tech, Rabinoff said in a 2016 Q&A. “Some students are extremely hard-working and talented. I derive a lot of pleasure from interactions in class and office hours,” he said.

In turn, students praise Rabinoff for his enthusiasm, engaging lectures, friendliness, accessibility, and, yes, his “super” “Rabinoffice” hours, which one students says “are fantastic during exam weeks.”

“It is an honor to be recognized with this award,” Rabinoff says. “The students I see every week in class and in office hours are great kids, and all of the effort is for them.  Pedagogy is special in this way: The reward is not abstract; it is visible every time I see in a student's face that a light went on in their head. I’m very fortunate to have the opportunity to teach in a place like Georgia Tech.”

MATTHEW TORRES: Teaching life skills
Matthew Torres also was recently promoted to associate professor, in the School of Biological Sciences. Although he always knew he would be a scientists, he never thought about being a teacher. At Georgia Tech he has recognized that, “first and foremost,” he is a teacher.

Having embraced the role of an educator, his dedication is obvious to students and colleagues. Students regard him not only as an excellent teacher, but also as someone who believes in them and sees their potential. Students say Torres’s mentorship goes beyond biology: Torres helps them develop critical skills that will serve them throughout their lives – such as written and spoken scientific communication, self-reflection, and how to confront failure productively.

Colleagues say Torres is a natural teacher, taking every opportunity to teach and mentor students in Georgia Tech and beyond. He gives students personal attention and invests time and resources to ensure student learning. A colleague describes Torres as “dedicated, caring, thoughtful, and highly successful in both teaching and research.”

Torres regularly invites undergraduates to do research in his lab, participating in work to address chemical biology questions that Torres’s research seeks to answer. These undergraduates are listed as coauthors on publications. In running his lab and in his teaching, Torres instills open communications and mutual respect as values that advance everyone’s progress.

Community engagement is important to Torres. He has volunteered to mentor high school students from the Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science, and Technology. He routinely gives laboratory tours to local high schools focusing on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

“Winning this award is fantastic, but I’m also very lucky,” Torres says. “Lucky enough to have had wonderful students – undergraduate, graduate, and beyond – willing to join me on a journey in pursuit of greater understanding and scientific progress. Such a journey can’t happen because of a teacher alone – it takes bright, receptive, and brave students to help guide the way.”  

Georgia Tech has named Jeffrey Skolnick the recipient of the 2018 Sigma Xi Sustained Research Award. The award recognizes Skolnick’s exceptional sustained imagination and productivity in the fields of systems biology, computational biology, bioinformatics, cancer metabolomics, protein structure prediction and evolution, drug design, and simulations of cellular processes.

Skolnick is the Mary and Maisie Gibson Chair, the Georgia Tech Alliance Eminent Scholar in Computational Systems Biology, and a professor in the School of Biological Sciences. He is also the director of the Center for the Study of Systems Biology.

In his research, Skolnick has developed algorithms to predict protein structure and function and ligand-protein interactions. Applications include drug discovery and prediction of off-target uses of already approved drugs.

Skolnick pioneered the field of ligand homology modeling, using the modeling algorithm FINDSITEcomb to infer protein function, predict a protein’s binding site, and screen virtual ligands. The insights from this work has enabled use of even low-resolution protein structures in virtual ligand screening. Skolnick is applying this knowledge to find other diseases that approved drugs could treat.

Drugs of interest include granisetron (Kytril), an antinausea and antiemetic agent; progesterone, a female hormone; acetaminophen, a pain reliever; and naproxen an anti-inflammatory and analgesic agent. Among diseases that existing drugs might help treat are cancer, pain, cardiovascular diseases, neurological diseases, cystic fibrosis, and diseases caused by genetic variations.

“The biochemical seeds of life could be prevalent.”

Using another algorithm, Skolnick has found a way to boost the odds that disease organisms will not quickly develop resistance to an antibiotic. The algorithm identifies compounds that target two or more receptor sites on proteins that inhibit a key cellular function. To develop resistance to such drugs, microbes would have to simultaneously develop mutations in all the target receptor pockets. Simultaneous mutations would be more challenging to the bugs than developing resistance in only one receptor site. The technique has been validated for a drug-resistant Escherichia coli.

Skolnick’s adventures with protein structures and functions have profound implications for the origins of life. For example, Skolnick and coworkers have shown that the ability to catalyze biochemical reactions is an intrinsic property of protein molecules, defined only by their structure and the principles of chemistry and physics. Accordingly, evolution is not necessary for the existence of proteins’ biochemical functions, although evolutionary selection may have optimized proteins for specific roles.

“The biochemical seeds of life could be prevalent,” Skolnick said about the work in 2016. “If you rain meteorites containing amino acids and somehow these polymerize to form small proteins, then a subset of these would fold to stable structure and a small subset of these could engage in rudimentary metabolism, all without any selection for biochemical function. Thus, the background probability for function is much larger than had been previously appreciated.”

By extension, extraterrestrial life could be ubiquitous.

The ability to do out-of-the-box research has been a hallmark of Skolnick’s career. “I am most grateful,” Skolnick says, “to the environment provided by Georgia Tech and to my collaborators who have enabled these ideas to come to fruition.”

On March 17, 2018, Georgia Tech’s GoSTEM program held its Sixth Annual Latino College and STEM Fair (LCSF). The fair attracted Latino families from Atlanta and beyond to visit Georgia Tech. About 600 people from schools and colleges as far as southwest Georgia attended. Participants filled the Student Center with new and familiar faces – each excited to learn about college and STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) opportunities.

The fair is one of the major annual events hosted by GoSTEM. The program is a partnership between Georgia Tech and Gwinnett County Public Schools. It was established to strengthen the pipeline of Latino students into post-secondary STEM education.

LCSF provides support and resources to Latino students and families through interactive workshops, information sessions, and discussion panels. “This event provides families with valuable information and resources to help promote and support the education of children, primarily in the Latino community,” said Director of the Office of Hispanic Initiatives at Georgia Tech Jorge Breton. “It also makes attendees aware of the important role higher education – and, more specifically, STEM fields – play in today's world.”

For the 2018 LCSF, GoSTEM partnered with the Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking for the first time. The museum hosted two workshops for students to construct their own paper towers. Students also learned to code in a music-mixing workshop using EarSketch, a computing environment developed by Georgia Tech’s School of Computer Science and School of Music.

In the roundtable discussion called “Ask Me (almost) Anything,” students in grades 8-12 sat down one-on-one with Latino Georgia Tech students to ask questions about college life. Activities like the roundtable enabled young students to interact with role models and realize for themselves that attending college and pursuing STEM careers is possible for everyone.

“A lot of these students have never even thought about going to college; so for the kids enrolled in our programs, we open that door for them,” said Amanda Smith, Educational Outreach Coordinator at CEISMC. “They are excited about it, and the parents see that excitement and want as much information as they can find to help their kids on that journey.”

Information sessions and discussions covered various college- and STEM-related topics. GoSTEM’s partners from Gwinnett County Public Schools participated in these discussions in several ways.

Lauren Nichols, a Georgia Tech alumna and chemistry teacher at Meadowcreek High School, took part in the first “STEM Career Conversations” panel, and Desiree Tallent, a school counselor at Lilburn Middle School, gave a presentation about helping students stay on track.

Many activities were conducted in Spanish and English. Programs were in English and Spanish. Spanish-speaking volunteers assisted in translations.

The concluding event was a panel discussion involving Latino parents, students, and professionals. It was conducted in Spanish and translated into English.

Activities are bilingual so parents who speak only Spanish can also access the information provided by LCSF. “[At LCSF] parents can feel comfortable asking questions and engaging with the presenters in a meaningful way,” said Diley Hernandez, Program Director for GoSTEM.

She continued: “It provides a welcoming environment for families and it lets them know that Georgia Tech is a place where their kids can be comfortable and valued – and their culture and language is valued, too.”

By Rosemary Pitrone - CEISMC Communications

Frank Stewart and Darren Joshua Parris are the recipients of the 2018 Education Partnership Award for their collaborative Summer Workshop in Marine Science (SWiMS) program. The award, from the Center for Teaching and Learning, recognizes genuine and substantial partnerships between the faculty and students of Georgia Tech and the K-12 community. Also receiving the award is their K-12 partner Jennifer Jones, a chemistry teacher at Rockdale County High School.

Stewart is an associate professor in the School of Biological Sciences and the advisor of Parris, a fifth-year Ph.D. student.  

“I am honored and humbled to have the SWiMS partnership recognized by this award,” Stewart says.  “SWiMS has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my career, largely because it fosters connections to people like Jennifer and Josh.  These are the connections that are honored here and that are so critical for advancing science literacy in our schools and elsewhere.”

Stewart conceived SWiMS in 2012 as a way to promote understanding of ocean science and microbiology. With oil spills, coral reef collapse, sea level rise, and ocean acidification often being front-page news, he believes the general public should have a basic understanding of these phenomena. For Stewart, these issues are just as important to policymakers and the general public as they are to researchers.

SWiMS is a five-day workshop to help middle and high school teachers develop curricula and project-learning exercises to teach marine science in the context of global change. “My overarching goal was to use marine science to enhance earth and life science education in middle and high schools, specifically targeting those in academically underperforming districts in Fulton County,” Stewart says. SWiMS draws on the expertise of marine scientists at Georgia Tech and education experts at Georgia Tech’s Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics, and Computing (CEISMC).

Parris joined the program in summer 2015. “To put it bluntly, this program would likely not have been possible without Josh,” Stewart says.

Parris has roles throughout all stages of the program. He wrote, edited, and tested several of the education modules used in SWiMS. During workshops, he serves as instructor, preparing rigorously to guide the workshop participants.  

SWiMS includes a two-day trip to Sapelo Island, a barrier island located in McIntosh County, Georgia. The trip provides participants firsthand experience and an opportunity to collect samples to take back to their classrooms. For this trip, Parris has served as primary field team leader, planning the logistics as well as conducting activities.

Most impressively, Stewart says, Parris continues to engage with teachers after the workshop. He helps teachers with curriculum-related problems arising during the school year and continues to prepare modules for teachers upon request. He recently visited Central Gwinnet High School to lecture about marine pollution.

 “I am very grateful to have been a part of the SWiMS program,” Parris says. “I have been able to see firsthand the positive impact scientists can have outside of research.  SWiMS is an awesome example of using partnerships between scientists and educators to advance science education in schools.”

Jones began as a participant in the workshop in 2015, returned as a mentor in 2016, and joined again in 2017 as an education consultant. A veteran teacher of 16 years, Jones had a keen sense of which concepts would translate into the classroom and which wouldn’t. Her unique insight was vital to identifying and troubleshooting obstacles and translating the curricula into targeted lesson plans. She also helped other teachers develop classroom-specific plans.

The collaboration of a scientist, a Ph.D. student, and a high school teacher has yielded remarkable outcomes. “The SWiMS program has enhanced my instruction in the classroom,” Jones says. “My students were able to understand that topics in science overlap: marine science touched Earth science, which touched environmental science, which touched chemistry. I am grateful to all the participants; they have inspired me to explore and expand my teaching so that students may experience science in a memorable way.”

James J. Wray has been selected to receive the 2018 Outstanding Achievement in Early Career Research Award. An associate professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Wray is a planetary scientist who studies the surfaces of planets. He is motivated by the search for life in the universe or conditions that support life. His research focuses on Mars and icy moons in the outer solar system.

Wray’s research has advanced understanding of the surface properties of Mars. He and his students use spacecraft imaging, spectral, and in situ data to explore surface compositions, search for organic molecules from the soils and rocks, and map minerals across the Martian surface. His work has contributed substantially to our understanding of water on Mars throughout the planet’s geologic history.

Modern Mars is cold, dry, and inhospitable, despite the planet’s rich aqueous history. Yet in 2011, a team including Wray found dark streaks that form and propagate down the warmest Martian slopes in summer and fade in winter. The process, called recurring slope lineae (RSL), was reported in Science.

RSL could be driven by water flows or by dry granular flows. Wray and then-Ph.D. student Lujendra Ojha developed methods to analyze the process. Using NASA’s imaging spectrometer for Mars and infrared spectrometry, they detected water-bearing perchlorate localized to RSL during active periods.

The finding, reported in Nature Geoscience in 2015, caught the public’s imagination, because – at least on Earth – life as we know it requires water. Scientists widely discussed the confirmation of wet activity on modern Mars. The paper has been cited close to 200 times, indicating its wide impact.

“With record federal support and renewed public and commercial interest, it is a fantastic time to be a planetary scientist.”

However, water is not enough. Using instruments in Curiosity, the car-sized rover exploring a crater on Mars, Wray contributes to the next step in the search for life outside Earth: finding organic building blocks for biochemistry. Wray has focused his efforts on the search for nitrogen-bearing compounds in Martian rocks and soil and on establishing a global inventory of carbon, including the carbon locked in carbonate-bearing rocks.  

The work on water on Mars has influenced research and planning at NASA. Wray has participated in a group that studied the implications of RSL on international policies to protect planets. He is involved in the design of the next robotic orbiter to characterize RSL throughout the Martian day.

Wray enables NASA’s “Journey to Mars” program, which aims to send humans to Mars by the 2030s. With the help of his expertise on spectral analysis of the Martian surface, a research team recently found massive subsurface ice sheets, which could be accessible to astronauts. 

Beyond Mars, Wray is focused on the icy moons of giant planets, such as Jupiter’s Europa and Saturn’s Enceladus. His work is informing high-level discussions of what instruments would be most useful for outer-solar-system missions.

“I am humbled to receive this honor from Georgia Tech, where so many others are also doing outstanding research that is changing the world every day,” Wray says. “I am grateful to my supportive colleagues at Georgia Tech and beyond, and most of all to the students I have been able to work with here, who have consistently exceeded my grandest expectations. With record federal support and renewed public and commercial interest, it is a fantastic time to be a planetary scientist.”