January 22, 2020
Funding Connection

The American Chemical Society’s  New Directions  grants program provides funds to scientists and engineers with limited—or even no—preliminary results for a research project they wish to pursue, and who intend to use the PRF-driven preliminary results to seek continuation funding from other agencies. 

The  Department of Justice  is seeking applications for funding  innovative doctoral dissertation research  that is relevant to preventing and controlling crime, and ensuring the fair and impartial administration of criminal justice in the United States. 



Updates from Global Food Systems
Global Food Systems is presenting a workshop on Small and Urban Farming to be held 8:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 19 in the Bluemont Room at the K-State Student Union.

This workshop, designed with input from a diverse group of faculty at K-State, is the first offering on this topic through GFS. The intent of the workshop will be to promote discussion and identify areas of possible synergistic interest in social, political and technical challenges of this important part of the Kansas economy.

The workshop will provide information on maintaining financial integrity of agricultural operations as well as the importance of diversity in cropping systems on soils and the environment. 

Join us to learn about the impact that small farming and plant diversification has on disease and insect control as well as water and nutrient use, and how this affects the economy both in Kansas and nationally. This workshop will provide a venue to interact with local and regional leaders in the field as well as provide an opportunity to identify fields of research at K-State that intersect with this focus. Faculty in all disciplines should consider attending as many areas of study are integrated into this topic. 

Please register to attend by Wednesday, Feb. 12, 2020.

Email me at molewnik@k-state.edu with any questions about the event.  

-Maureen

Events and announcements
Research Brownbag Discussions
Bring your lunch and join Vice President for Research Peter Dorhout and staff to learn how the university is addressing the changing compliance landscape around international travel, research data management, attending conferences in embargoed nations and new regulations. Discuss your concerns or questions that you have around these topics. What is K-State doing to protect our researchers? What are best practices and protocols at this time?

All brownbags will be held from noon-1:30 p.m. in 205 K-State Student Union on the following dates:

  • Monday, Jan. 27 – Topic: Creating a welcoming environment for international scholars
  • Monday, Feb 17 – Topic: Export controls and international travel
  • Monday, March 16 – Topic: Data management and CUI – don't get scooped
  • Monday, April 13 – Topic: TBA-Suggestions from campus
  • Monday, May 11 – Topic: TBA-Suggestions from campus

Registration is not required. Please reach out to comply@k-state.edu with any questions.
Arrell Food Institute recognizes global leaders who are ensuring future food security for the planet, and hopes to inspire new leaders to take bold steps towards change. Scientific excellence and community engagement are necessary to overcome the challenges our world will face in feeding 9 billion people and beyond.

Two prizes, of at least $100,000 CAD each, are awarded annually.

This is a limited submission. Notify the Office of Research Development of the desire to nominate someone by January 24, 2020 ; draft nominations by February 7, 2020. Notifications should be sent to  ordlimitedsubs@k-state.edu .


Proposals for the spring 2020 Global Food Systems Seed Grant Program are being accepted by the Office of Research Development through 5 p.m. CST on Wednesday, February 26, 2020.

1-5 p.m.
Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020
Wildcat Chamber, K-State Student Union

Learn about:
  • Grant terminology and important processes at universities
  • Rules of grant writing
  • Successful writing strategies for grant proposals
  • Budget and budget justification
  • Review criteria and agency proposal review

Register to attend by February 14, 2020


8:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020
Bluemont Room, K-State Student Union

Learn about the impacts that small farming and plant diversification have on disease and insect control as well as water and nutrient use, and how they affect the economy both in Kansas and nationally.

This workshop will provide a venue to interact with local and regional leaders in the field as well as provide an opportunity to identify fields of research at K-State that intersect with this focus. Faculty in all disciplines should consider attending as many areas of study are integrated into this topic.  

Register to attend by February 12, 2020.
Demonstrate Broader Impacts at Girls Researching Our World (GROW) on February 22
K-State faculty, staff and students are invited to design and facilitate a hands-on science, technology, engineering, and/or math activity for middle school students at the Girls Researching Our World (GROW) workshop on Saturday, February 22, 2020 on the K-State campus in Manhattan.

Workshop: Grand Challenges in Soft Matter and Opportunities for Microgravity Research
There will be a DSOFT sponsored focus session at the APS March Meeting in Denver on March 3, 2020, at 2:30-5:30 p.m. followed by a workshop at 5:30-7:30 p.m. aimed at developing a roadmap of the fundamental questions and challenges in soft matter with particular emphasis on the role of microgravity. The roadmap, along with new discoveries, will influence the future of the field and address the resources that will be needed. The workshop and roadmap will inform NASA funding for future research areas in soft matter and complex fluids under two Space Policy Directives: (1) research that will enable human expansion across the solar system and (2) a better understanding of Soft Matter systems in space for use on Earth and in space.

You are invited to participate in the workshop and also to provide pre-meeting input to the workshop by describing what areas you would like to see discussed in the report including any specific microgravity-related experiments, concepts, observations, modeling and theory. Please send email to Paul Chaikin ( chaikin@nyu.edu ) and cc Noel Clark ( noel.clark@Colorado.edu ) and Sidney Nagel ( srnagel@uchicago.edu ) to indicate your interest in participating in the workshop.  To provide input for the workshop, whether you are planning to attend the workshop or not, please provide a response to the NASA Request for Information ( https://tinyurl.com/NASA-RFI-NNH20ZTT001L ).
Agency news and trending topics
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s… a bit of both. Meet PigeonBot, a biohybrid, flying robot that combines the propeller, fuselage, and tail of a man-made aircraft with the wing structure and actual feathers of a pigeon. smithsonianmag.com

A National Institutes of Health study found that chronic treatment with mirabegron, a drug approved to treat overactive bladder, activated brown fat in a small group of healthy women and had several other beneficial metabolic effects . nih.gov

Arizona State University biologist Jon Harrison and Virginia Tech engineer Jake Socha have published the first study that demonstrates how insects adjust their cardiovascular and respiratory activity in response to gravity. nsf.gov

Understanding precipitation-vegetation interaction is of great importance to implementing adaptation and mitigation measures for terrestrial ecosystems. Many studies have explored the spatial pattern of precipitation-vegetation correlation along the precipitation amount gradient. While the impacts of other precipitation characteristics remain poorly understood. nature.com

Cycling hypoxia (cyH), also called intermittent hypoxia, occurs in solid tumors and affects different cell types in the tumor microenvironment and in particular the tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs). As cyH and TAMs both favor tumor progression, we investigated whether cyH could drive the pro-tumoral phenotype of macrophages . nature.com
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