11/12/12 - Phil Novack-Gottshall (Biological Sciences) presented a talk on November 5 titled "Trilobite survivorship during the Late Ordovician mass extinction is associated with geographic, environmental and ecological breadth” at the national meeting of the Geological Society of America in Charlotte, N.C. The presentation is an outgrowth of undergraduate research he mentored with students Emily Miofsky and Chris Castle (Biological Sciences), who were co-authors, and was supported by a Summer Research Grant from the Faculty Development Committee. While at the conference, he also participated in the Executive Council meeting of the Paleontological Society as the editor of their newsletter Priscum.

11/5/12 - Phil Novack-Gottshall (Biological Sciences) recently co-authored an editorial titled “A lack of attribution: closing the citation gap through a reform of citation and indexing practice” that was accepted for Taxon, the journal of the International Association of Plant Taxonomy. 

10/24/12 - Tim Marin (Chemistry and Physics) had a paper published entitled "A vacuum ultraviolet filtering monochromator for synchrotron-based spectroscopy Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment, 698, 11, 44–48.

10/16/12 - Pete Nelson (Physics and Biology) was the invited speaker at the 2012 Fall Chemical Education Seminar Series at Purdue University on October 3. His presentation was titled, “Teaching introductory STEM with the Marble Game.” This work was funded by National Science Foundation Grant DUE-0836833.

9/24/12 - Tim Marin (Chemistry) published a paper as part of his ongoing collaboration with Argonne National Laboratory and Brookhaven National Laboratory to investigate the implications of radiation damage to ionic liquids for nuclear fuel cycling applications. The paper is entitled "Toward Radiation-Resistant Ionic Liquids. Radiation Stability of Sulfonyl Imide Anions. Ilya A. Shkrob, Timothy W. Marin, Sergey D. Chemerisov, Jasmine Hatcher, and James F. Wishart. Journal of Physical Chemistry B, 2012, 116, 9043-9055".

9/21/12 - JSNM Curator, Karly Tumminello, attended the Illinois Association of Museums annual conference this week in Collinsville, IL. There were some amazing presenters, lectures, and workshops this year. We now have many new ideas for our museum.

9/17/12 - Kari L. Stone (Chemistry) was recently awarded a Transforming Undergraduate Education in Science (TUES) grant titled "Multi-University Integration of Solid-State Chemistry and Powder X-ray Diffraction into the Undergraduate Curriculum" funded through the National Science Foundation. This project is in collaboration with Michael Marvel, Ph.D., of Aurora University. This grant award will fund a new course at Benedictine that focuses on the area of solid-state chemistry.

9/17/12 - The National Science Foundation’s Robert Noyce Scholarship Program has awarded a $1.2 million grant to Benedictine University for the College of Science project, “Expanding and Strengthening the Secondary STEM Teacher Training Program.” Allison K. Wilson (Biological Sciences) is the principal investigator of the project. Andrew G. Wig (Physics), Niina J. Ronkainen (Chemistry), Thomas G. Wangler (Mathematics) and John F. Zigmond (Education) are the co-principal investigators. The duration of funding is five years (January 1, 2013-December 31, 2017). The grant will provide $900,000 toward scholarships for as many as 110 Benedictine University undergraduates and Alternative Certification professionals who intend to be secondary science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) teachers chiefly in the fields of physics, mathematics and chemistry.

9/10/12 - James Sostak, MD ('01 Health Science) is currently practicing with the Fox Valley Orthopaedic Associates (read his bio). He will share his expertise on the hip scope, a noninvasive procedure used to treat and diagnose a range of hip problems, at "Dinner with the Doc" on Wednesday, December 12. (This event is sponsored by Cadence Health's Central DuPage Hospital - for information or to register call 630-933-4234).

9/7/12 - Regina Schurman, EdD, RCEP, CPA (MSCEP) presented her poster "Is There a Model For Success? Exploring the Journey of Exercise Physiology Graduates Seeking Employment in Cardiac Rehabilitation Programs" at the AACVPR (American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation) meeting held in Orlando, Florida on September 7. 838 practioners from around the country were in attendance.Click for a copy of her handout.

8/20/12 - Joshua Blomgren, MD ('01 Biochemistry) did a live interview on ABC7News about Kids' Concussions. Dr. Josh Blomgren, a sports medicine physician with Midwest Orthopedics at Rush (read his bio), treats a wide variety of sports injuries, including shoulder, knee, back injuries and concussion. He is a co-team physician for the Chicago White Sox, team physician for the Chicago Red Stars, and serves as a medical provider for Bank of America Chicago Marathon.

8/9/12 - Evan Ariano ('13 Biology) presented a poster at the Ecological Society of America conference August 9-12 in Portland, Oregon.

7/3/12 - Kiel Lazarski ('06-Biochemistry) defended his doctoral thesis on June 22, 2012 in the Chemistry Department at Northwestern University. His wife, Caitlin Ondracek ('06-Molecular Biology), defended her doctoral thesis on June 12, 2012 in the Microbiology and Immunology Department at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Kiel will be starting his post-doc in September working for Prof. John Porco at Boston University on biomimetic natural product syntheses. Caitlin will be starting her post-doc with Prof. Leonard Guarente at MIT studying the role of sirtuins in aging and cancer.

6/17/12 - Angela Peverly ('09 Chemistry) published a cover article in Analytical Chemistry:
Electrochemical Determination of Trihalomethanes in Water by Means of Stripping Analysis
Angela A. Peverly and Dennis G. Peters*
Department of Chemistry, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana 47405, United States
Anal. Chem., 2012, 84 (14), pp 6110–6115
DOI: 10.1021/ac301005t
Publication Date (Web): June 17, 2012

6/8/12 - Scott Toth ('09 Chemistry) published a cover article in Analytical Chemistry:
Selective Imaging of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients in Powdered Blends with Common Excipients Utilizing Two-Photon Excited Ultraviolet-Fluorescence and Ultraviolet-Second Order Nonlinear Optical Imaging of Chiral Crystals
S. J. Toth, J. T. Madden, L. S. Taylor, P. Marsac, and G. J. Simpson
pp 5869–5875
Publication Date (Web): June 8, 2012 (Accelerated Article)
DOI: 10.1021/ac300917t

5/18/12 - John Stoessel (Chemistry '60) and Andreas Papakostas (Health Science C93) were featured in the Spring 2012 edition of the Benedictine Voices Magazine. Click here to read the magazine. They are featured on pages 20 and 22 respectfully.

5/16/12 - Maggie Augustyn, D.D.S. ('99-Molecular Biology) was featured in two articles in the Trib Local Business Announcements. Click to read "Premium Dental Care and Friendly Service Offered at Elmhurst Dental Clinic" and "Elmhurst Dental Office Provides Dental Services in an Atmosphere of Laughter and Fun."

5/10/12 - Regina Schurman (Exercise Physiology) successfully defended her doctoral thesis: "Is there a model for success? Exploring the facets of sustainable professional employment among the graduates of clinical exercise physiology programs". This was the culmination of two years of classwork and the evaluation of 21 hours of interviews with professionals in the field of exercise physiology. Her analysis resulted in the development of a model of the criteria identified by these professionals that were essential for achieving professional success as a clinical exercise physiologist. Her work will directly impact the students in our masters programs and will serve as an important resource in the literature as exercise physiologists weigh the importance of licensure for their profession. Congratulations Dr. Regina Schurman!

5/7/12 - Pete Nelson (Physics and Biology) presented a paper titled “A new pedagogy for ion channels: they’re permeases, not pores!” at the Experimental Biology National Meeting held in San Diego, Calif. on April 21-25. This work was funded by NSF Grant DUE-0836833.

4/17/12 - Joey Hua, a junior biochemistry major, presented a poster at the 243rd American Chemical Society National Meeting in San Diego in March. She is also the recipient of the American Chemical Society Division of Inorganic Chemistry Undergraduate Award in Inorganic Chemistry.

4/15/12 - Cheryl Heinz (Biology) had four students present at the ACCA Student Research Symposium on April 15. Congratulations to Evan Ariano, Bilaal Hassan, Sweatha Jeevan and Stephanie Samuel for outstanding presentations!

4/10/12 - Tim Marin (Chemistry) and his Elemental Orchestra, featuring percussion, horns, piano, bass and guitar, provided the music during the presentation at the The Benedictine University Library as they marked the University’s 125th birthday and honor National Library Week by presenting “Library of Change: 125 Years of Music and History.” The celebration featured a live, mixed-media presentation which will examined the dynamic history of Benedictine University and the library through music, guest speakers, rarely-seen archival images and artifacts from the Benedictine University Library archives.

4/2/12 - Elizabeth Freeland (Physics) gave a colloquium in the Department of Physics at the University of Iowa on March 19 titled "Searching for New Physics: Neutral B-mixing and Lattice QCD.” She also gave a department seminar titled “Lattice calculations for neutral B mixing: a brief discussion of the details.”

3/19/12 - Pete Nelson (Physics and Biology) had a teaching resource, “Teaching Physiology with the Marble Game 2: Algorithms and Tylenol®,” peer-reviewed by the Archive Board of the American Physiological Society (APS). It is currently featured as an "Inquiry-Based K-12 Science" item on the front page of their National Science Foundation-funded online portal, “The APS Archive of Teaching Resources - A Collaborative Digital Library of Life Sciences." This resource covers introductory (second week) material in Nelson's BIOL 310 - "Physiological Modeling" and BIOL/CHEM/PHYS 323 - "Biophysics" classes currently offered at Benedictine and provides an introduction to computational science that is accessible to high school students. This work is funded by National Science Foundation Grant DUE-0836833.

1/23/12 - Robin Rylaarsdam (Biological Sciences) recently gave a research seminar at Loyola University/Stritch School of Medicine, Department of Molecular Pharmacology and Therapeutics, describing her work discovering Intragenic Suppressors of McCune-Albright Syndrome Mutations. The research is a first step in the rational design of new drugs for McCune-Albright Syndrome.