As research grants go, $5,500 is a small drop in what can sometimes amount to a bucket of nautical proportions. But recipients of this year's UO Faculty Research Awards recognize that even a relatively small sum can be critical in floating their work.
"(It's) very important for collecting preliminary data for future grant submissions," said Andrew Lovering, an associate professor of human physiology who will use his $5,500 Faculty Research Award for supplies and to travel for work with research collaborator Rob Roach at the University of Colorado, Denver.
"We study blood vessels in the lung that allow blood clots to bypass the lung capillaries and subsequently cause stroke," Lovering said. "Our proposal will investigate the effect of low barometric pressure, like that experienced at high altitude, on the regulation of blood flow through (the blood vessels)."
Lovering was among 21 UO faculty members to receive the 2014 Faculty Research Awards announced this week by Kimberly Andrews Espy, the university's vice president for research and innovation.
The awards are intended to stimulate research by providing faculty with support for research expenses. The funding – as much as $5,500 each – can be spent on travel, summer stipend, equipment, supplies, contractual services, shared facility use, graduate or undergraduate student research assistance and other uses. The awards cannot be used to replace faculty salary or buy out courses, or for construction or renovation.
Melissa Michaud Baese-Berk, an assistant professor of linguistics, received her award for a project that will probe how the speed at which someone talks influences a listener's perception.
"This award is extremely important, as it will allow me to collect pilot data that I will use for a larger grant application next year," she said.
The award will help her pay study participants, who need to be non-native speakers of English, and for an undergraduate research assistant to collect and analyze data.
"My collaborators and I have done some previous work that demonstrates that for native speakers and listeners, speech rate influences how many words the listener perceives," Baese-Berk said.
The study also will examine if listeners' expectations of what they hear are learned by experience in their native language, and whether speech rates interact with other factors, such as a person's accent, to disrupt what listeners perceive.
Anthropology professor Carol Silverman received a $5,500 Faculty Research Award to study the current globalization of Balkan Gypsy music in western Europe and North America.
"I am analyzing the styles, genres and political and economic contexts," Silverman said. "Often, the music is appropriated by non-Roma, with no benefit to Roma."
She'll use the award to devote time for travel and writing.
"Time to examine materials and reflect is extremely valuable in the life of a teaching professor," Silverman said.
Faculty Research Awards are made annually through the UO office of Research, Innovation, and Graduate Education, to university faculty from all disciplinary backgrounds.
Faculty members submit proposals to a Faculty Research committee appointed by the University Senate. Committee members evaluate are selected by a Faculty Research Committee through competitive review proposals on the basis of their intellectual merit and make recommendations to the vice president for research and innovation. Espy this year funded 21 awards – one more than the usual maximum.
The 2014 Faculty Research Award recipients:
Mark Alfano, assistant professor, philosophy, “Nietzsche’s Socio-Moral Psychology”
Melissa Michaud Baese-Berk, assistant professor, linguistics, “Indexing Linguistic Expectation through Speech Rate”
Aletta Biersack, professor, anthropology, “Mining Among Ipili Speakers: An Ethnography of Global Connection”
Scott Bridgham, professor, biology and environmental studies, “Controls over methane cycling in tropical wetlands”
Stephanie Clark, assistant professor, English, “Prayer and the Gift: Theories of Prayer in Anglo Saxon England”
Philip Fisher, professor, psychology, “Demonstration of Feasibility of Resting State Functional Connectivity MRI Study of Infants with Prenatal Substance Exposure”
Jennifer Freyd, professor, psychology, “Institutional Betrayal”
Bryna Goodman, professor, history, “Economics and the New Chinese Republic: Sovereignty, Capitalism, and Freedom in the Shanghai Bubble of 1921-22”
Evlyn Gould, professor, romance languages, “Salons and Cénacles in Fin de Siècle Paris: the Unsung Influence of Catulle Mendès”
Sara Hodges, professor, psychology, “Women’s Perceptions of Feedback in STEM”
Dong Hoon Kim, assistant professor, East Asian languages and literatures, “Between Self-Reliance and Globalism: Commercial Filmmaking in North Korea”
Loren Kajikawa, assistant professor, music, “Before Rap: DJs, MCs, and Pre-1979 Hip-Hop Performances”
Toby Koenigsberg, associate professor, music, “Transforming Piano Instruction: Incorporating Jazz Improvisation into the Curricula”
Rebecca Lewis, assistant professor, Department of Planning, Public Policy and Management, “Integrating Climate, Transportation and Land Use Planning in Oregon”
Andrew Lovering, associate professor, human physiology, “Effect of hypobaria on exercise and hypoxemia-induced Intrapulmonary shunt”
Christopher Michlig, assistant professor, art, “Broken Type: Intergeneration Sustainability and Letterpress Printing”
Nicole Ngo, assistant professor, Department of Planning, Public Policy and Management, “The global health impacts of intercontinental air pollution”
Carol Silverman, professor, anthropology, “Global Gypsy: Balkan Romani World Music”
Scott Stewart, senior research associate, Institute of Molecular Biology, “New Technology to Control Gene Expression in Zebrafish”
Kelly Sutherland, assistant professor, biology and Clark Honors College, “Distribution and predation potential of jellyfish at biological hotspots off the Oregon coast”
Elizabeth Tippett, assistant professor, law, “The Effect of Attorney Advertising on Medical Decisions”
- by Joe Mosley and Jim Barlow, UO Office of Public Affairs Communication