Kudos November 2023
Celebrating Tufts Faculty and Staff
Kudos is a monthly submissions-based roundup celebrating university faculty and staff—awards, honors, thought leadership, new arrivals, and more. Share your own great news or recognize a colleague at go.tufts.edu/kudos.
Aerielle Allen, assistant professor of psychology, Lisa Shin, professor of psychology, and Samuel R. Sommers, professor of psychology and chair of the Department of Psychology, received a NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award from the National Institutes of Health to fund a five-year study entitled “The Effects of Racism on Brain and Physiological Pathways to Health Disparities.” In addition, Tufts’ co-investigators are Heather Urry, professor of psychology, and Felipe Dias, assistant professor of sociology. Read more about the study on Tufts Now.
Kwasi Ampene, professor and chair of the Department of Music, received a 3G Legend and Lifetime Achievement Award at the 12th edition of 3G Annual Awards and Celebrity Bash in New York City. The award was in recognition of Ampene’s outstanding contribution to highlife music in Ghana and the United States and the music industry in Ghana.
Helen Anderson, senior associate director of career services at The Fletcher School, was recently recognized for 30 years of service to The Fletcher School.
Courtney Bogins, preclinical services supervisor in the Department of Comparative Medicine Services, received the NEBAALAS Laboratory Animal Supervisor/Manager Award. Bogins was noted as making outstanding contributions to laboratory animal science and technology.
Jennifer Burton, professor of the practice in the Department of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies, Julie Dobrow, senior lecturer in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Study and Human Development, and the Robbins House Museum in Concord, Massachusetts, received a grant from the Expand Mass Stories initiative from Mass Humanities. The funds are supporting the new Half the History film Ellen Garrison: Scenes from the Life of an Activist. Production on the film began in October with filming taking place in Concord.
Alex Flynn, E26, student in the School of Engineering, was the first Jumbo men’s rower to ever win an international medal when he was part of the second-place team in the PR3 mixed four with coxswain event at the 2023 World Rowing Championships this fall.
Jacqueline Garcia and Garrett Scarpa, both Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences students, were awarded NIH F31 Fellowships.
Kelly Greenhill, associate professor of political science, has been named a 2023–24 Council on Foreign Relations Ambassador for Higher Education.
Kerri Greenidge, Mellon Associate Professor in the Department of Studies in Race, Colonialism, and Diaspora, was recognized during the 2023 Museum of African American History Stone Book Awards presentations. This year’s award had 90 eligible entries submitted by noted publishers including Harper Collins, W.W. Norton, Penguin Random House, and university presses from across the country. Greenidge was honored for her book The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family. Read more on Tufts Now.
Gary Goldstein, professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, received a $148,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science for the project EXCLAIM – EXCLusives via Artificial Intelligence and Machine learning.
Brian Hatcher, Packard Professor of Theology in the Department of Religion, was awarded the Vidyasagar-Dinamoyee Puraskar Prize for 2023 (along with the poet and author Ketaki Kushari Dyson). The award comes from the Vidyasagar Academy in Kolkata, India, with support from the Government of West Bengal. Hatcher was not able to attend the ceremony but did contribute a video talk for the event.
Robert Kalish, associate professor of medicine at the School of Medicine, recently received the Marian Ropes Physician’s Achievement Award for Patient Excellence in Rheumatology at the Arthritis Foundation’s Commitment to a Cure Gala in Boston.
Srivalleesha Mallidi, assistant professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, received the 2023 Sunrise Award from the School of Engineering, which recognizes the scholarly accomplishments of a junior faculty member within the school.
Babak Moaveni, professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, was named the Structural Health Monitoring Person of the Year by Structural Health Monitoring: An International Journal.
Peter Neumann, professor of medicine at the School of Medicine, won the Value in Health Paper of the Year Award for his paper “The History and Future of the ‘ISPOR Value Flower’: Addressing Limitations of Conventional Cost-Effectiveness Analysis.”
Karen Panetta, dean of graduate education and professor of mechanical engineering and computer science at the School of Engineering, was named one of the top 100 people in artificial intelligence by Business Insider.
Glen Pedneault, preclinical technologist in the Department of Comparative Medicine Services, received the NEBAALAS John F. Zucker Animal Technician Award. Pedneault was honored for making outstanding contributions to laboratory animal science and technology.
Keleigh Sanford, director of research administration, Luke Baccari, research administrator, Jane Bush, research administrator, Fallon De La Cruz, research administrator, Dianne Deschenes, research administrator, and Carlo Eracleo, research administrator, all members of the School of Engineering research administration team, were recently named Outstanding Research Administration Team of the Year by OVPR’s research administration unit.
Aria Stewart, VG20, a second-year D.V.M. student at Cummings School of Veterinary medicine, earned a Compassionate Care Scholarship from the Humane Society Veterinary Medical Association.
Nasir Wynruit, E25, is one of 12 students nationwide to receive a 2023 AMS Undergraduate Opportunity Award, financial assistance designed to help students pursue careers in mathematics. The awards go to students chosen at colleges and universities randomly selected each year from the AMS’s institutional members.
Frank Zamudio, Ph.D. student in the neuroscience program at the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, received an NIH F31 fellowship application for his proposal entitled “Role of novel projection-defined basal amygdala subregions in fear memory expression.”
Joyce Cummings Center earned PROCON, an architectural and construction management firm, a national Excellence in Construction® Eagle Award and National Design-Build Award. Read more on Tufts Now.
Harmony Allison, assistant professor of medicine, is quoted in an article about peptic ulcer disease in the Huffpost.
Ayse Asatekin, associate professor and Steve and Kristen Remondi Fellow in chemical and biological engineering, Luca Mazzaferro, Ph.D. candidate in the School of Engineering, and Samuel Lounder, EG22, authored “Amphiphilic Polyampholytes for Fouling-Resistant and Easily Tunable Membranes” in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.
Nadine Aubry, professor and senior advisor to the dean of the School of Engineering, was recently elected as an international fellow of the United Kingdom’s Royal Academy of Engineering. Read more on Tufts Now.
Viking Bohman, international relations Ph.D. student at The Fletcher School, authored an opinion piece about decoupling from China in South China Morning Post.
Chance Bonar, postdoctoral fellow at the Center for the Humanities at Tufts, authored an article entitled “This Christian text you’ve never heard of, The Shepherd of Hermas, barely mentions Jesus—but it was a favorite of early Christians far and wide” in The Conversation.
Sean Cash, associate professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Josh Erndt-Marino, affiliate at the Friedman School, Dariush Mozaffarian, dean emeritus of the Friedman School and distinguished professor, and Julia Reedy Sharib, senior research coordinator at the Friedman School, published a study about consumption of sugary beverages, which was published in the journal Nature Communications. Reach more about the research on Tufts Now.
Bhaskar Chakravorti, dean of global business and professor of the practice at The Fletcher School, is quoted in a Washington Post article titled “Meta introduces ChatGPT competitor, AI tools amid industry arms race.” He was also featured in a StratNews Global segment about India.
Tom Dannenbaum, associate professor of international law at The Fletcher School, spoke with the New York Times about how international law offers a framework to analyze what is occurring in Israel and Gaza.
Irina Dragan, visiting faculty in the Department of Periodontology, Robert Gyurko, associate professor of periodontology and predoctoral program director, Naciye Guzin Uzel, assistant professor of periodontology and director of research education, and Paul Levi, adjunct lecturer of periodontology, published “The Effect of Dental Flossing Instructions and Technique on Interproximal Bleeding: A randomized control trial” in the Journal of Dental Hygiene. Read more on Tufts Now.
Daniel Drezner, professor of international politics at The Fletcher School, introduces his new column titled Eagle View for Chatham House’s magazine and explains how he will address populism, climate change, the global economy, and much more through a U.S. lens.
Kelly Sims Gallagher, dean ad interim and professor of energy and environmental policy at The Fletcher School, is quoted in two articles in The Guardian, one about the climate crisis and the other about the UK prime minister’s “climate U-Turn.” Gallagher also participated in the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet Global Leadership Council Meeting.
Miranda Grace, School of Medicine laboratory manager, Karl Munger, Dorothy Todd Bishop Research Professor and chair of the Department of Developmental, Molecular and Chemical Biology, and Sharon Wu, M24, authored a study about the HPV8 E6 protein, which was published in the journal mBio.
Noel Heim, lecturer in the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences, co-authored an open-access paper that was published in Royal Society Open Science. The paper tests how factors that typically protect species against extinction during background or normal times in the geological past are altered during mass extinctions.
Eitan Hersh, professor of political science and associate professor at Tisch College, is quoted in a Washington Post op-ed piece on the relationship between corporations and the democratic process.
Evan Horowitz, executive director of the Center for State Policy Analysis (cSPA), shared his outlook for projected Massachusetts tax revenues for fiscal 2024 and implications for the 2024 budget with Commonwealth Magazine.
Linden Hu, Paul and Elaine Chervinsky Professor in Immunology and vice dean for research at the School of Medicine, Peter Gwynne, assistant professor of microbiology at the School of Medicine, and several other Tufts researchers have received $7 million in new grants to understand the underlying causes of chronic Lyme disease. Read more on Tufts Now.
Karen Jacobsen, professor of global migration at The Fletcher School, spoke to “The World” radio program about the 1951 International Refugee Convention and its relevance today.
Maulik Jagnani, assistant professor of environmental economics at The Fletcher School, outlines his research about crop fires in rural India in VoxDev. Jagnani worked on this research with two colleagues at other universities.
Emily Karlin, assistant clinical sciences professor at Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, John Rush, clinical sciences professor at Cummings School, and Lisa Freeman, clinical sciences professor at Cummings School, authored research entitled “Untargeted metabolomic profiling of dogs with myxomatous mitral valve disease and congestive heart failure shows metabolic differences associated with the presence of cardiac cachexia” in American Journal of Veterinary Research.
Barbara Kates-Garnick, professor of the practice at The Fletcher School, and Eric Hines, professor of the practice and Kentaro Tsutsumi Faculty Fellow in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, co-authored an article for Engineering News Record titled “Viewpoint: Now is the Time to Invest in U.S. Offshore Wind.”
Anna Kijas, head of Lilly Music Library, wrote an essay on digital scholarship for a special issue on the current state of music librarianship in Notes: Quarterly Journal of the Music Library Association. Kijas is also co-founder of Saving Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Online. The organization received a Grand Prix award in the Heritage Champions category of the 2023 European Heritage Awards/Europa Nostra Awards.
Sunil Kumar, president of Tufts University, was profiled in a recent Boston Globe article, in which he spoke about promoting campus diversity, ways to increase confidence in higher education, and more.
Keren Ladin, associate professor in the Department of Community Health, had her article titled “Shared Decision Making Among Older Adults With Advanced CKD,” named one of five recipients of the AJKD Editors’ Choice award recognizing outstanding articles this year. The piece was published in the November 2022 issue of American Journal of Kidney Diseases.
Susan Landau, professor in cyber security and policy at The Fletcher School and professor of computer science at the School of Engineering, authored an article entitled “The Shapeshifting Crypto Wars” in Lawfare.
Penn Loh, distinguished senior lecturer in urban and environmental policy and planning, authored a new study in the Journal of Climate Resilience and Justice entitled “Pandemic Response and Mutual Aid as Climate Resilience: Learning from Community Responses in the Boston Area.”
Patte Loper, professor of the practice at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University, is part of the Liveable Worlds exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design. The exhibition, which turns attention to practices of world-building amid conditions of environmental and social duress, is on view until December 15.
Melissa McCracken, William R. Moomaw Professor in International Environment and Resource Policy and assistant professor of international environmental policy at The Fletcher School, spoke on the intersection of water and conflict at the City University of New York’s Climate Week Conference.
Chris Miller, associate professor at The Fletcher School, is quoted in a Foreign Policy article, a New York Times article, and a Newsweek article. Miller also wrote an article for the Financial Times, co-wrote an article for Politico, and joined a recent GeoTech Wars podcast episode.
Alberto Medina, senior communications specialist at Tisch College, joined “The Green” to discuss how Gen Z voters have impacted past elections and their potential influence for 2024.
Maureen Murray, associate clinical professor and Gabriel and Valerie Schmergel Term Director in Wildlife Medicine, and Marieke Rosenbaum, assistant professor of infectious diseases and global health at Cummings School, spoke to NBC 10 Boston about bald eagles being killed by rodenticides and efforts to control the rat population in the city.
Fiorenzo Omenetto, Frank C. Doble Professor in Biomedical Engineering, and Giulia Guidetti, research assistant professor in biomedical engineering, published “Photonic crystals built by time in ancient Roman glass” in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. Read more on Tufts Now.
Mihaela Papa, senior fellow at The Fletcher School, co-authored “Leadership and performance in informal institutions: the internal dynamics of BRICS” in Contemporary Politics.
Wendy Puryear, scientist at Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, commented in Science Magazine about cases of avian flu found in some species of birds in Galapagos National Park.
Kareem Roustom, professor of the practice in the Department of Music, traveled to Quebec to attend rehearsals and a performance of his String Quartet No. 1 at the Domaine Forget music academy. In Oregon, he was the composer-in-residence at the Willamette Valley Chamber Music Festival. At the Grand Teton Music Festival in Wyoming, he attended rehearsals and the world-premiere of a large-scale work for mezzo-soprano and orchestra titled “The Clustered Vine: Songs of Love, Loss, & Remembrance.” This commissioned work was performed by mezzo-soprano Kelley O’Connor and conducted by Sir Donald Runnicles, leading the Grand Teton Music Festival Orchestra and can be streamed online. Roustom traveled to Tallinn Estonia for the 70th birthday concert of renowned and Grammy award winning Estonian conductor, Tõnu Kaljuste. In addition to the music of Estonian composers Arvö Part and Veljo Tormis, this concert included two of Roustom’s works, Dabke for string orchestra and Hurry To The Light for women’s voices and string orchestra. It was broadcast on national radio and can be streamed online.
Brian Schaffner, professor of political science, and several recent graduates of the Department of Political Science, including Scott Blatte, Yonatan Margalit, Carolina Olea Lezama, Aadhya Shivakumar, and David Wingens, authored a research article entitled “Critical Race Theory and Asymmetric Mobilization” in the peer-reviewed academic journal Political Behavior.
Richard Siegel, associate professor of medicine, is quoted in an article about “food noise” in The Healthy.
Kelly Siegel-Stechler, senior researcher at the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tisch College, is quoted in Education Week about new research on required civics education tests and youth voting outcomes.
Tara Sonenshine, Edward R. Murrow Professor of Practice in Public Diplomacy at The Fletcher School, authored an op-ed in The Hill about the battle over borders.
Sumeeta Srinivasan, senior lecturer in the Department of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning, authored a paper entitled “Risk factors for persistent fatal opioid-involved overdose hotspots in Massachusetts 2011–2021: A spatial statistical analysis with socio-economic, access, and prescription factors” [PDF].
Charles Sykes, John Wade Professor in chemistry, was recently recognized with the Henry Albert Award of the International Precious Metals Institute. The Henry Albert Award recognizes Sykes’ identification and development of an entirely new type of chemical catalyst. Read more about Sykes’s work on Tufts Now.
Bethany Tietjen, predoctoral fellow at The Fletcher School, co-authored “Climate Change and Urban Migration in Sub-Saharan African Cities: Impacts and Governance Challenges” in the Journal of Climate Resilience and Climate Justice with Karen Jacobson, Henry J. Leir Professor in Global Migration at The Fletcher School, and Justin Hollander, professor of urban and environmental policy and planning.
Monica Duffy Toft, professor of international politics, director of the Center for Strategic Studies, and academic dean at The Fletcher School, co-authored a new book entitled Dying by the Sword: The Militarization of U.S. Foreign Policy, with Sidita Kushi, former research director at the Center for Strategic Studies and now an assistant professor of political science at Bridgewater State University. Toft founded the Center for Strategic Studies’ Military Intervention Project, through which 40 Fletcher graduate students and postdocs researched this issue for five years and compiled a comprehensive dataset that is now publicly available. Read more about the recently published book on Tufts Now.
Joel Trachtman, professor of international law at The Fletcher School, joined an EconoFact podcast to discuss how international trade policy can align with global commitments to reduce inequality, transition to a clean energy future, and promote sustainable development.
David Valdes, lecturer in English, authored a new book, Finding My Elf, published by HarperTeen. In a starred review, Kirkus Reviews called it “an elf-ing good time,” while Publishers Weekly wrote that “via a breezy yet thoughtful approach, and with the boys’ gently blossoming romance inciting warmth and cheer, Valdes (Brighter Than the Moon) conceives a holly-jolly rom-com filled with enough humor, heart, and holiday spirit to deliver an upbeat stocking stuffer.”
Richard Vogel, professor emeritus at the School of Engineering, was selected as the Walter B. Langbein lecturer by the American Geophysical Union. Vogel will speak about hydrologic modeling at the American Geophysical Union’s annual meeting.
Abiodun Williams, professor of the practice at The Fletcher School and Tisch College, penned a letter to the editor of The Guardian sharing why he believes it is important to recognize the limitations of UN civilian police operations.
Josephine Wolff, associate professor of cybersecurity policy at The Fletcher School, was quoted in an NBC article about credit monitoring services.
Abay Yimere, postdoctoral scholar at The Fletcher School, wrote an article entitled “Addis Ababa faces growing climate change risks like heat, drought, and floods, study warns” in The Conversation.
Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine was featured in a Spectrum News 1 article about a drill simulating the transport of an injured working dog on the Grafton campus. Cummings School’s Foster Hospital for Small Animals and first responders collaborated with UMass Memorial Life Flight to stage the drill.
Researchers at the Food is Medicine Institute at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, through support from the Rockefeller Foundation, published a report titled “True Cost of Food: Food is Medicine Case Study,” detailing the health and economic benefits of implementing Food is Medicine programs across the country. Read more about the research on Tufts Now.
Tufts University Silklab researchers authored “Bimodal Gating Mechanism in Hybrid Thin-Film Transistors Based on Dynamically Reconfigurable Nanoscale Biopolymer Interfaces” in the journal Advanced Materials. Read more about the research on Tufts Now.
Teresa Aloi, program administrator at the Tufts Gordon Institute, was promoted from program coordinator.
Janel Blood, executive administrative assistant in the School of Engineering Dean’s Office, was promoted from administrative assistant.
Kim Ellwood, senior program coordinator in the School of Engineering Graduate Programs Office, was promoted from graduate program coordinator.
Jenny Mooney, graduate program administrator in the Department of Computer Science, was promoted from program coordinator.
Sandie Schulenburg, graduate program coordinator in the Department of Computer Science, was promoted from administrative assistant.