New Faculty - New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences

Thomas M. Cahill
Assistant Professor, Department of Integrated Natural Sciences

Dr. Cahill received his Ph.D. from the University of Nevada, Reno and has postdoctoral research experience in Canada and at the University of California, Davis. Dr. Cahill's research interests are in environmental and analytical chemistry, although his publication record reveals wide-ranging research interests. Dr. Cahill's primary research goal is to determine the effects of anthropogenic chemicals on ecosystems by linking the fields of environmental chemistry, which determines the fate and transport of a chemical in the environment, and ecology, which assesses the impacts of chemicals on ecosystems. The fields of environmental chemistry and toxicology have greatly contributed to understanding the environmental impacts of anthropogenic chemicals, but two areas of research emerge as critical in creating a comprehensive understanding of chemical effects in the environment. The first of these research areas is improving our understanding of chemical fate and transport in the environment with a particular focus on the secondary products. In many cases, well-meaning efforts to solve one problem have resulted in unexpected effects, either directly or through a secondary product. The examples include DDE, MTBE and trifluoroacetate, with the latter two being the result of chemicals introduced for the purpose of alleviating an environmental problem. Dr. Cahill's secondart area of research is the determination of the ecological impacts of chemicals. Toxicological evaluations provide considerable information, but they typically focus on the response of a single species in an isolated laboratory environment that is often devoid of the stresses of the natural environment. By coupling environmental chemical analysis with an ecological evaluation, it is possible to determine both the chemical concentrations and their ecological impacts.

Breanne Fahs
Assistant Professor, Department of Women's Studies

Dr. Fahs is a graduate of Occidental College, and the joint doctoral program in women's studies and clinical psychology at the University of Michigan. Dr. Fahs' research interests lie at the intersection between feminist theory and applied social science. Her dissertation, entitled “Female sexuality after women's ‘liberation': Negotiating repression and performance norms” examined the way in which women's sexuality and sexual health responds to (and is dictated by) conflicting social and cultural norms. She is currently working on several papers as an outgrowth of this project, including a more specific critical analysis of the sexual disorders within the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-IV-TR, as well as a detailed examination of the development of female sexual enhancement drugs. Dr. Fahs also maintains a variety of research interests, including a specific interest in radical feminism and the work of Valerie Solanas, author of SCUM Manifesto. She is also one of the founding members of the Luce Irigaray Circle, a group that works to further disseminate and explore the philosophy of French feminist Luce Irigaray via writing, teaching, and critical inquiry. In addition, she recently published an article about the psychoanalytic roots of feminist activism in response to female genital mutilation. She currently teaches courses about women and health, race, class, and gender, and will soon develop additional course material about gender, sexuality, and the psychology of women.

Ellen Freund
Assistant Professor, Department of Integrated Natural Sciences

Bertha Alvarez Manninen
Assistant Professor, Department of Integrative Studies

Dr. Manninen attended college at Florida International University , where she received a B.A. in philosophy and a B.A. in English literature in 1999. She went on to graduate school at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee , where she earned a M.A. degree in philosophy in 2001. Finally, her studies brought her to Purdue University , where she graduated with a Ph.D. in philosophy in August 2006. Dr. Manninen is interested in medical and biomedical ethics, e.g., the ethics of abortion, euthanasia, human cloning and eugenics, and embryonic stem cell research. She is also hoping to take her research into other areas of applied ethics that are more political, e.g., the issue of animal rights, gay marriage, and illegal immigration. Currently, Dr. Manninen is working on an article for the journal Metaphilosophy that explores the topic of whether respect for human embryos can be harmonized with embryonic stem cell research. She has a forthcoming article in the Journal of Medical Ethics concerning the moral permissibly of active euthanasia for terminally ill infants. Earlier this year, she published an article in the same journal where she explored the ethical implications of the rising trend of medicating young children with psychoactive drugs.

Barry Moon
Assistant Professor, Department of Interdisciplinary Arts and Performance

Dr. Moon received his Ph.D. in music composition from State University of New York, Buffalo in 1999. Prior to coming to Arizona State University , Dr. Moon held teaching positions at Brown University and Bath Spa University, in the United Kingdom . His research involves creating meaningful interactions between live performers and the computer. This has led to a body of musical compositions that are regularly performed throughout the world, and paper presentations at international conferences.

Omayra Ortega
Instructor, ABD, Department of Mathematical Sciences and Applied Computing

Ms. Ortega received her B.S. degree in mathematics and music from Pomona College in 2001, and masters' degrees in applied mathematics and public health from the University of Iowa in 2005. She is completing her Ph.D. degree in applied mathematics (expected in May 2007) from the University of Iowa. Her research interests include using differential equations-based mathematical modeling to better understand potential mechanisms for control of rotavirus with a focus on vaccination in underdeveloped countries. She is also interested in exploring the epidemiology of other infectious diseases where she can apply this method of modeling, especially emerging or re-emerging diseases that are presenting new challenges to the American public health community, while exploring other methods of modeling.

Nicole Roberts
Assistant Professor, Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences

Dr. Roberts received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of California, Berkeley in 2003 and completed her clinical internship and postdoctoral training at the Northern California Veterans Administration Health Care System and University of California, Davis Department of Psychiatry. Prior to joining Arizona State University , Dr. Roberts was an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee. Her research focuses on the study of emotion and on the cultural and biological forces that shape emotional responses. For example, this research investigates how ethnicity and culture influence emotional displays and experiences; how the daily hassles of life, such as job stress and sleep deprivation, impact emotion regulation among individuals and couples; and how the emotion system breaks down in patients with psychopathology or neurological dysfunction. Dr. Roberts uses both observational and psychophysiological measures in her work. Her research has been published in the Journal of Marriage and the Family , Journal of Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Neuroscience , and Emotion. Areas of teaching specialization include introductory psychology, multicultural issues in clinical psychology, physiological psychology, and supervision of undergraduate research and clinical practicum experiences.

Carl Wagner
Assistant Professor, Department of Integrated Natural Sciences

Dr. Wagner received a B.S. degree from Harvey Mudd College in 1998, and a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of California, Irvine in 2003. Dr. Wagner is an organic, synthetic chemist by training. The practice of organic chemistry in the laboratory allows an organic chemist to bring into existence the molecular structures and materials he or she imagines. The ability to create compounds with predictable structures and novel properties has always been an animating source of motivation for Dr. Wagner to practice chemistry. Synthetic targets of interest in his laboratory include small to moderately complex molecules of biological interest. Beyond their inherent biological properties, the design and synthesis of natural products and their analogues often serves as an instructive learning experience. His areas of interest include the synthesis of molecules of controlled functionality and properties, including novel optical, photochemical, and mechanical characteristics.

Yuntao Zhu
Assistant Professor, Department of Mathematical Sciences and Applied Computing

Dr. Zhu received his Ph.D. in mathematics from Washington State University in 2006. His current research interests are in applied and computational mathematics with a specific focus on computational algorithms for optimization problems. In particular, he works in the areas of stochastic programming, chance-constrained programming, semidefinite programming and applications in ad hoc mobile computer networks and wireless sensor networks.