Graduate School Newsblog

Category: News

Interesting stories about and for our students.

Students Earn NSF Graduate Research Fellowships

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Four Michigan Tech students have received graduate research fellowships from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Six other Tech students received honorable mentions in the competition. Nationwide, the NSF awarded 2,000 fellowships and 1,835 honorable mentions.

Mark Hopkins, (graduate student) mechanical engineering-engineering mechanics; Brennan Tymrak, mechanical engineering-engineering mechanics and Peace Corps Master’s International; Jennifer Fuller, civil and environmental engineering; and Liz Cloos, electrical and computer engineering, received NSF fellowships for graduate study. Bryan Plunger (graduate student, mechanical engineering-engineering mechanics), Alan Olds, Evan Lucas, Hilary Morgan (graduate student, geology), Byrel Mitchell (graduate student, mechanical engineering-engineering mechanics) and Patrick Bowen (graduate student, materials science and engineering) earned honorable mentions.

NSF graduate research fellowships recognize and support outstanding graduate students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) disciplines who are pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees. The fellows receive a $30,000 annual stipend for three years, plus international research and professional development opportunities and supercomputer access. Each fellow’s institution receives a $12,000 allowance.

“This group is exceptional and well deserving of the awards and honors,” said Jodi Lehman, coordinator of sponsored programs enhancement. Lehman worked closely with the NSF graduate research fellowship applicants. “Their success is also largely due to faculty and administrators who are committed to providing our students with the challenging academic experiences, innovative research, leadership training, and local and global outreach opportunities that make Michigan Tech applicants competitive.”

by Jennifer Donovan, director, public relations
Published in Tech Today

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It’s Boom Time in Small-town Wisconsin

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What’s causing the booms in Clintonville? Residents of the small Wisconsin town have been hearing deep, rumbling sounds from time to time since March 18. To find out why, a professor and his grad students are lending their expertise.

Greg Waite, assistant professor of geology, along with graduate students Josh Richardson and Kathleen McKee, installed four seismometers and eight sound sensors around Clintonville, with help from City of Clintonville workers. They are trying to record anything that could relate to the booms that began last month.

“These types of noises have been reported for small shallow earthquakes in many places worldwide,” Waite said. “However, the noises in Clintonville were somewhat difficult to explain, because earthquakes are uncommon in Wisconsin, and most of sounds were not accompanied by felt earthquakes.”

For the full story, see Boom.

by Dennis Walikainen, senior editor
Published in Tech Today

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Michigan Tech Remains the Nation’s Top Peace Corps Master’s International Graduate School

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Michigan Tech ranks as the No. 1 Peace Corps Master’s International (PCMI) university nationwide for the seventh consecutive year. With 31 PCMI graduate students currently serving as Peace Corps volunteers, Michigan Tech has earned top spot in the 2012 rankings of Peace Corps’ Master’s International and Paul D. Coverdell Fellows graduate schools.

The Peace Corps’ Master’s International program allows students to incorporate Peace Corps service as credit toward their graduate degree. The Coverdell Fellows Program provides returned Peace Corps volunteers with scholarships, academic credit and stipends to earn an advanced degree after they complete their Peace Corps service.

“The heart of the program is the students we attract, not just in numbers, but in quality,” said Professor Blair Orr (SFRES), PCMI director. “They bring an interest in the world at large and the desire to help others. They return from two years in a different country with stories of new friends, new ideas and a different perspective on how things do work and should work. They have succeeded professionally and personally in a different culture. Many of the skills and traits they acquire along the way are also the skills that employers are looking for.”

Michigan Tech became a Master’s International partner in 1995. Offering eight distinct graduate programs affiliated with Peace Corps, Michigan Tech has the largest number of Peace Corps Master’s International programs in the country. They include Applied Science Education, Geological and Mining Engineering and Sciences, Mechanical Engineering, Rhetoric and Technical Communication, Biological Sciences, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Applied Natural Resource Economics, and Forestry.

Michigan Tech’s PCMI graduate students have served in many countries, including Armenia, Belize, Bulgaria, Fiji, Kenya, Madagascar, Morocco, Paraguay, Uganda and Zambia. More than 190 Michigan Tech alumni have served in the Peace Corps overall. There are also students enrolled in the program who are on campus fulfilling the academic portions of their master’s degree, including Megan Abbott, who recently returned from Belize, and Colin Casey, who is back from Uganda.

2012 Top Peace Corps Master’s International institutions:
(The number in parenthesis is the number of students enrolled in the program and serving overseas as of Sept. 30, 2011.)

  • Michigan Technological University (31)
  • Tulane University (27)
  • University of Washington (26)
  • Monterey Institute of International Studies (26)
  • University of South Florida (22)

About the Master’s International Program
Peace Corps partners with more than 80 colleges and universities nationwide to enable students to earn a master’s degree while serving in the Peace Corps. Students begin their studies on campus, serve overseas for two years, then return to school to finish graduate work. As part of the service, volunteers work on projects related to their master’s studies. The program began at Rutgers University–Camden in 1987 and since then, more than 1,000 volunteers have participated. For more information, visit Master’s Program.

About the Peace Corps
Since President John F. Kennedy established the Peace Corps by executive order on March 1, 1961, more than 200,000 Americans have served in 139 host countries. Today, 9,095 volunteers are working with local communities in 75 host countries. Peace Corps volunteers must be U.S. citizens and at least 18 years of age. Peace Corps service is a 27-month commitment, and the agency’s mission is to promote world peace and friendship and a better understanding between Americans and people of other countries. For more information, visit Peace Corps.

by Jennifer Donovan, director, public relations
Published in Tech Today

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Students take first-place in New Venture Competition

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Baisikeli Ugunduzi
Wade Aitken-Palmer (far left) and Ben Mitchell (second from right) show their winnings at the New Venture Competition.

Some ideas just stick in your mind. At the Bob Mark Memorial Elevator Pitch Competition last November, Ben Mitchell presented his idea for fixing bicycle tires in Africa, so villagers could make a living. It was simple and meaningful, and we were floored. Six months later, so was everyone else.

He and Wade Aitken-Palmer took first-place in the New Venture Competition held recently at Central Michigan University. Their idea, called Baisikeli Ugunduzi (Swahili for “modern bicycle”), captured $30,000 for first prize and another $10,000 for Best Social Venture, for sustainability and social impact, among other reasons. Their invention is a tube that eliminates flat tires.

Mitchell, a PhD student in Mechanical Engineering-Engineering Mechanics, and Aitken-Palmer, a student in the Applied Natural Resource Economics Peace Corps Master’s International program, have been working on the business idea since last year, and Mitchell said the inspiration began with his stint in the Peace Corps a couple of years before that. Thanks to the big win, he is planning a trip to Kenya in May to begin with more market testing.

“We are working with bicycle taxi drivers, who can go through many tubes in a month,” Mitchell said. “The tubes will have to be produced in Taiwan, as there are no production facilities in Kenya.” Assembling will take place in Africa, however, and that will create some jobs. “Our first hire will be a mechanic,” he said. “And he could do some modifications as well.”

When they began, Mitchell said he had some catching up to do on the business side of things, but they did have a more thought-out design and a more developed prototype than most, thanks to their engineering backgrounds. And he has high hopes for the future. “Some 50 million sub-Saharan Africans depend on bicycles,” he said. “As our mission says, we work with mechanics and bicycle taxi unions to design, produce and distribute products that add value to working bicycles and improve the livelihoods of bicycle taxi drivers, messengers and those who earn a living on their bicycles.”

Mitchell also pointed out Central Michigan’s role in hosting the event. “They did a tremendous job coordinating the whole event, with all the judges and student teams,” he said. “It was very well orchestrated.” Central has also invited Baisikeli Ugunduzi back to talk about how it all develops in the future.

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ESC/BRC Research Poster Forum Winners Announced

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The Ecosystem Science Center and the Biotechnology Research Center announced the award recipients of the eighth annual ESC/BRC Student Research Forum, held March 30.

Graduate students received four grand prize awards and six merit awards. They were selected from among the 59 posters and abstracts about research related to ecology, the environment and biotechnology.

Each center also awarded a grand prize to an undergraduate researcher in a separate division of 17 submissions.

Posters are on display in the atrium of the Forestry building through April 13.

For more information, see ESC/BRC.

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Alumnus Presents at Humanities Distinguished Lecture Series

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Gerald Savage, professor emeritus at Illinois State University, will present “Beyond Politeness: How Might We Make Social Justice a Central Value in Technical Communication Education” at 7 p.m., Thursday, March 29, in the Noblet Forestry Lecture Hall. There will be a reception to follow in the atrium.

Savage received master’s and PhD degrees in rhetoric and technical communication from Michigan Tech in 1991 and 1995. He will discuss communication across national and cultural boundaries and focus on “inequities of power and hierarchy.”

Savage comes as a part of the Humanities Distinguished Lecture Series

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Students place at SEG Challenge Bowl

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Two students from the geological and mining engineering and sciences department were runners-up at the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG) Challenge Bowl recently. Josh Richards, a PhD candidate in geophysics, and Chad (Danford) Moore, a senior in applied geophysics, took second place at the Sixth Annual Sooner Challenge Bowl at the University of Oklahoma in Norman.

The SEG Challenge Bowl is an international contest testing students’ breadth and depth of knowledge about the field of geoscience. The quiz-show format features intense competition, as the contestants attempt to buzz in first with the answers to challenging geoscience questions.

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Tech Students Converge in Lansing for Graduate Education Day

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Four graduate students are going to Lansing for Graduate Education Day, Thursday, March 29. Governor Rick Snyder has declared the week of March 26 as Graduate Education Week, and more than 50 students from universities and colleges across the state will meet with legislators at the Capitol Building in Lansing.

Students will meet with their hometown legislators to discuss their studies and future plans and will also present their research and degree-related projects.

Attending from Michigan Tech are:

  • Mark Hopkins, a PhD candidate in mechanical engineering from Charlotte. He will be discussing his work on in-space electric rockets.
  • Stephanie Groves, a PhD candidate in biological sciences from Scottville. She will be presenting on converting industrial waste to biofuels and other products.
  • Emily Gochis, a PhD candidate in geology from Ann Arbor. She will discuss geoscience education.
  • Andrew Drees, a PhD candidate in electrical engineering from Stevensville. He will discuss a “smart grid” power system for use on Michigan Tech’s campus.

The governor and legislature have acknowledged that graduate education is key to Michigan’s economic growth and stability. Graduate education in Michigan is highly productive, contributing directly to the well-being of the state and its capacity to meet the challenges of the future.

Last year, Michigan’s four-year public and private colleges and universities awarded more than 20,000 master’s degrees and 5,000 doctorates, with Michigan ranking ninth among states in the US for the number of research-based doctorates awarded.

by Dennis Walikainen, senior editor
Published in Tech Today

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Students Excel in International Poster Competition

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Chemical engineering PhD student Brett Spigarelli with his team's carbon dioxide scrubber. His prize-winning poster focussed on improving the scrubber's efficiency. Sarah Bird photo
Two graduate students, Brett Spigarelli and Howard Haselhuhn, took first and third place in the Minerals and Metallurgical Processing Journal Student Poster Contest, held Feb. 22 in Seattle. Both are PhD candidates in chemical engineering.

The contest was part of the SME (Society for Mining, Metallurgy and Exploration) Annual Meeting. Thirteen graduate students from all over the world entered posters in the event.

The Tech students’ advisor, Chair Komar Kawatra (ChE), is on sabbatical as a Fulbright scholar in India and flew to Seattle for the competition.

“I am very fortunate to be working with graduate students like Howard and Brett,” said Kawatra. “They are highly motivated and just outstanding. One day I expect them to be CEOs of major corporations.”

Spigarelli earned the top spot for his poster on optimizing a carbon-dioxide scrubber that removes 50 percent of the CO2 passing through.

The scrubber, an 11-foot bench-model plastic pipe packed with glass beads, has a water-based solution flowing through it. From below, carbon dioxide bubbles up, reacting with chemicals in the liquid. The process not only captures carbon, it binds it in a solid form, making an undisclosed product that can be used as a construction material. The liquid itself can be recovered and used again.

The group has received a patent and hopes to build a pilot plant in cooperation with industry partner Carbontec Energy Corp.

Spigarelli’s prize-winning poster focused on making the scrubber as efficient as possible. In particular, he developed a model for determining the ideal concentration of chemical in solution to strip out CO2. “You want to remove as much carbon as possible, but you don’t want to use excess chemicals, because you want to save the company money,” Spigarelli said. “This process will give you the best results.”

Haselhuhn’s third-place poster also focused on water chemistry. At an iron-processing facility, he studied the technology used to remove impurities from iron ore. He found ways to improve the process and significantly boost productivity.

“The iron ore is ground down into very small particles, which are mixed in water,” he said. “The larger particles, which contain more iron ore, settle quickly, and the smallest ones, containing silica, stay suspended.” However, Haselhuhn discovered, sometimes the raw ore contains high levels of magnesium, which translates into higher concentrations of magnesium in the water. In turn, that causes silica particles to cluster together and settle out with the iron, rendering the separation process ineffective.

“By compensating for the excess magnesium, companies could reduce the loss of iron in their concentration process,” Haselhuhn said. “The results of this research will save millions of dollars per year and reduce the loss of an important natural resource.”

by Marcia Goodrich, magazine editor
Published in Tech Today

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Peace Corps Volunteer Tackles A Sensitive Women’s Health Problem in Uganda

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RUMPS Community Partners
RUMPS Community Partners

When Stacey Frankenstein-Markon discovered that girls in Uganda often used rags, old socks or wads of newspapers to do the job of sanitary napkins, she was shocked. She was even more horrified to realize that purchasing commercial pads was an impossible dream for most of them, since they come from families of subsistence farmers making about $1 a day in disposable income.

“Disposable pads cost $1 for an 8-pack,” says the 25-year-old Peace Corps volunteer, who with her husband, Tony Markon, is serving in Uganda as part of Michigan Tech’s Peace Corps Master’s International (PCMI) program in applied science education. “If a family has three daughters who need pads, that family would have to spend 20 percent of their income just on menstrual pads. Who can afford to do that?”

The pad problem also was leading girls to stay away from school, fearing that they might stain their clothes and be badgered by boys, Frankenstein-Markon said. Eventually, they fall so far behind that they have to drop out.

But thanks to the inventiveness of another Peace Corps volunteer who had served in the eastern Ugandan region just before the Markons got there in 2010, the Michigan Tech student has been able to help hundreds of girls practice better hygiene while they learn about menstruation, their bodies and women’s health. And not incidentally, stay in school.

She is doing it with RUMPS. The RUMPS (Re-Useable Menstrual Pads) project teaches girls to sew locally available toweling into washable pads. Before they start stitching, they learn about puberty, sex, pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. The Peace Corps volunteer and her community partners answer questions and encourage honest discussion about matters most of the girls have never considered mentioning in public.

With the help of their three Ugandan partners–Betty Adio, Alice Mundaka and Deborah Nabirye–Frankenstein-Markon has reached more than 1,800 girls, women and men. Adio is now reaching out to another 3,000 elementary school girls. Word is spreading, and seven other Peace Corps volunteers have developed RUMPS projects in their communities.

“I’ve cut out 3,600 RUMPS pads myself,” says Frankenstein-Markon. “I have spent 180 hours using scissors, bandaged six blisters and swept up more tiny bits of towel fluff than I ever imagined could exist.”

In October 2010, two faculty members visited the Markons and the RUMPS project. Brad Baltensperger, chair of the Department of Cognitive and Learning Sciences at and program director of the PCMI Applied Science Education Program, and Casey Huckins, an associate professor of biological sciences who heads the University’s new PCMI in biological sciences, spent a week in Uganda to discuss the graduate students’ research, to observe them teaching and to learn more about the experiences of Peace Corps volunteers.

“Stacey made a rousing presentation about women’s bodies and menstrual health to several hundred high school girls packed into a large classroom,” Baltensperger says “She was animated and direct, and she used innovative ways to get and maintain the attention of her audience.”

One of Baltensperger’s and Huckins’ fondest memories of their African trip is sitting around a pot of warm millet beer with several teachers at the end of the day. “Casey and I both joined in drinking from the communal container through three-foot long straws and talked about the challenges faced by teachers in Uganda,” Baltensperger recalls.

Frankenstein-Markon’s work has not gone unrecognized. For International Women’s Day earlier this month, the Peace Corps in Uganda nominated her for her efforts to “empower girls.” She was one of three winners from Africa recognized by the Peace Corps worldwide.

How do Ugandans respond to Americans broaching such a sensitive subject? “Overall, every community I have visited has reacted positively,” Frankenstein-Markon says. “In Uganda today, people are trying to overcome traditional taboos. I have found that talking about menstrual health has opened the door for other, deeper topics. I start by talking about body changes. Then I move on to how a woman becomes pregnant.”

Sometimes the question-and-answer component of RUMPS sessions does run into cultural roadblocks. She recalls one man saying, “Madam, how can I ask you about sex when my niece is in the audience?” Also, “most Ugandans do not want their children to hear about family planning,” Frankenstein-Markon says.

But she is far from discouraged. “For every five shy Ugandans, there is always one courageous woman who says, “Ladies, let’s talk about the clitoris,” another who asks, ‘Madam, I want to use family planning. What can I do?’ People want this information, and we can help them get it.”

A biological sciences major who earned her bachelor of science from Michigan Tech in 2008, Frankenstein-Markon heard about PCMI when she was a junior. When she learned that PCMI was about to start a program in applied science education, she had no doubts. “To be able to join the Peace Corps while earning a master’s degree was a no-brainer,” she says. “It is such a unique opportunity and environment to do your research.”

Next fall the Markons will be back at Michigan Tech to complete their master’s degree work. And then? “We may end up abroad again,” she says. Judging by her passion for her efforts in Uganda that would be no surprise.

by Jennifer Donovan, director, public relations
Published in Tech Today

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