ASU Feature Archive - Fall 2004

Reaching beyond borders

Conference boosts ASU’s status as ‘thought leader’

A Year to Remember

Biodesign Institute brings world-class labs to ASU

Magnificent musician
MacIntyre adds Marshall Scholarship to impressive resume

ASU senior Scott MacIntyre has done more with his 19 years on Earth than many others his age. And he’s done it despite being virtually blind since birth. MacIntyre’s accomplishments as a musician, dancer, athlete and student have earned him a 2005 Marshall Scholarship, among the most prestigious awards for graduate study in the world. Read more

Defining Teotihuacan
Findings shed new light on ancient city

Center of commerce or ancient superpower? Archeologists for years have looked for clues to define the ancient city of Teotihuacan, located outside of Mexico City. New findings from excavations by ASU researcher Saburo Sugiyama in the Pyramid of the Moon point to a military culture – but in many ways they also deepen the mystery of the city. Read more

New Center for Environmental Biotechnology takes different look at pollution, waste

It’s been said one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Bruce Rittmann, an international leader in environmental engineering and member of the National Academy of Engineering, will put that saying to the test in his role as director of the new Center for Environmental Biotechnology at the Biodesign Institute at ASU. Rittman’s approach, which combines engineering with microbiology and chemistry, reclaims polluted water and generates energy from waste substances. Read more

ASU establishes International Institute for Sustainability to address regional and global environmental threats

A founding gift of $15 million from philanthropist Julie Ann Wrigley has enabled Arizona State University to create the International Institute for Sustainability. The institute will study the ecological, economic and societal issues that play a vital role in the viability of the planet. Read more

Emeritus College draws on wealth of faculty talent

ASU has announced the formation of the Emeritus College, an organization that will provide a home and focus for the continued intellectual, creative and social engagement of more than 800 retired or soon-to-retire faculty members. Read more

Albee to discuss state of theater and the arts in America

Edward Albee, who has defined modern American theater with four decades of provocative, controversial and brilliant plays, will speak on the power of the arts as a catalyst for change at the Flinn Foundation Centennial Lecture. His talk, on November 16 in Gammage Auditorium, is free and open to the public, though tickets are required. Read more

Fulton gift establishes Decision Theater for the New Arizona

With a generous gift from Ira A. Fulton, ASU will build an advanced visualization environment that will enable policy makers and others to see, in detailed three-dimensional representation, the environmental consequences of their actions. Read more

Image by Mark Dee, DWL Architects

Lifetime Achievement Award honors Zah’s focus on students

Student success is Peterson Zah’s number one priority. Thanks to his work, ASU’s Native American student population has doubled since 1995 and its retention rate is among the highest of any major college or university in the nation. On October 30, the National Indian Education Association took note of the first president of the Navajo Nation’s body of work, awarding Zah its prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award. Read more

Quality involvement keeps ASU in the community

ASU is deeply involved in serving the needs of its community. Activities include tutoring schoolchildren, providing health and legal clinics for low income families, giving cultural performances, and offering free lectures on key public issues. A searchable online listing of ASU’s community outreach now contains more than 250 programs offered by 102 different units in more than 466 locations. Read more

$5.4 Million Gift to Spur Student Innovation

ASU students with bright ideas now have a funding source to turn those ideas into business ventures. Orin Edson, a successful entrepreneur, is giving the ASU Foundation $5.4 million to establish the Edson Student Entrepreneur Initiative at ASU, which is slated to begin operation by January 2005. Read more

Science Magazine Features ASU Findings on Dynamic Inner Earth

At the surface of Earth, life on a geologic scale is calm and peaceful save the occasional earthquake caused by the rub and slip of Earth’s tectonic plates. But below Earth’s surface, scientists are finding a far more dynamic and tumultuous region than previously thought. Read more

Edward C. Prescott Awarded 2004 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences

Edward C. Prescott, the W. P. Carey Chair of Economics in the W. P. Carey School of Business and a senior monetary advisor at the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank, has been awarded the 2004 Nobel Prize in economic sciences, the first-ever Nobel Prize received by an Arizona State University scholar. Prescott was lauded for a lifetime of original thinking that has addressed some of the most important long-standing questions in macroeconomics. He shares the prize with Finn Kydland of Carnegie Mellon University and the University of California, Santa Barbara. Read more

Nanoscale technology may revolutionize mobile devices

An advanced nanoscale memory and switching technology from Axon Technologies Corporation, an ASU technology spinoff, may be coming soon to your cell phone, digital camera and MP3 player. The powerful and flexible technology, developed by Professor of Electrical Engineering Michael Kozicki, has been licensed by two of the three largest memory suppliers in the world. Read more

Fabulous at 40 – Herberger College of Fine Arts Celebrates Milestone

Like a great painting, symphony, or classic play, ASU’s Herberger College of Fine Arts is getting better with age. Forty years ago, the Arizona Board of Regents approved consolidating ASU’s art, music, speech and drama programs under a single college. Today, each of the college’s disciplines is nationally ranked, and many of its programs are listed in the top 20 by U.S. News & World Report. A handful of the college’s best programs have been chosen to commemorate the birthday. Read more

ASU tapped for NSF-funded Decision Center for a Desert City

The National Science Foundation is funding a new $6.9 million center to study the decision processes used to plan and manage water resources and desert city growth. The Decision Center for a Desert City (DCDC) could have a profound effect on the future of urban growth in arid regions. Read more

ASU tops $33 Million in K-12 Education Grants

Grant awards to ASU’s Center for Research on Education in Science, Mathematics, Engineering, and Technology (CRESMET) have brought the university’s recent total for K-12 education program grants to $33 million. CRESMET has received more than $18 million for projects to improve science and math outcomes for middle and high school students. Read more

Valdez brings stylish ‘Zoot Suit’ to Gammage

Playwright Luis Valdez weaves fact and fiction to depict the fate of 22 young Mexican Americans brought to trial for a murder they did not commit in “Zoot Suit,” presented on Sept. 25 at Gammage Auditorium. ASU Associate Professor Eduardo O. Pagán examines the zoot suit culture in his book and historical research. Read more

$10 million education grant awarded to improve K-8 education

The U.S. Department of Education awarded ASU’s College of Teacher Education and Leadership almost $10 million to strengthen teacher training and increase student achievement in high-poverty urban and remote districts in the State of Arizona. This is the largest grant received to date for a program housed at the West Campus. Read more

Grant bolsters work to develop HIV/AIDS prevention drugs

The National Institutes of Health has awarded a $7.4 million grant to The Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University to develop plant-derived topical medications to prevent HIV/AIDS and other sexually-transmitted diseases. The grant will fund a a collaborative research center headed by Charles Arntzen, who co-directs the Biodesign Institute’s Center for Infectious Diseases and Vaccinology. Read more

ASU researchers identify a human cause in worldwide amphibian decline

Frogs and salamanders like the one shown at the left have been rapidly disappearing around the world. In an upcoming article in the Journal of Molecular Ecology, a research team headed by Arizona State University ecologist James Collins has identified an important clue in the mystery of this mass die-off — and the culprit is a seemingly harmless human activity. Read more

Popular speaker Sir Crispin Tickell returns for public lecture

Last year Sir Crispin Tickell dazzled a standing room only audience at ASU with a lecture on global warming science and policy issues. This Thursday, September 9, he returns to the Tempe campus for a public lecture on the role of sustainability in addressing issues of human population increase; degradation of land and accumulation of wastes; water pollution and supply; climate change; and destruction of biodiversity. Read more

Athletes strut their academic stuff as “Scholar Ballers”

When the ASU Sun Devils hit the football field this fall, look for the new “Scholar Baller” insignia on some players’ jerseys. The Scholar Baller patch signifies a student-athlete’s commitment to excellence in the classroom as well as on the playing field. Read more

Biodesign Scientist Suggests that Men and Women May See the World Differently

Stereotypes about the superior color sense of women may be rooted in genetics. Brian Verrelli, a researcher at the Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University, is co-collaborator on a study suggesting that natural genetic selection has provided women with a frequent ability to better discriminate between colors than men. Read more

Searching for the Real George Washington

A team of researchers is using 3D laser scanners in search of the real George Washington. Washington lived before photography, and paintings and sculptures made during his lifetime all have stylistic qualities that remove them from true representations, says Ashuman Razdan, ASU’s lead researcher on the project and a Computer Scientist and Director of the Partnership for Research in Spatial Modeling. Razdan is teaming up with anthropologist Jeffrey Schwartz of the University of Pittsburgh to first laser scan busts of Washington, some of his artifacts (glasses and dentures) and then to forensically reconstruct three real-life likenesses of Washington when he was 19, 45 and 57. ASU will be the repository of the “digital George Washington.” Read more about this project on CNN or Reuters or http://prism.asu.edu.