Faculty-Staff Achievements, March 18, 2014
Award
Denise Brooks McQuade, senior teaching associate, Department of Biology, received the Mary S. Erskine Award
for Excellence in Scholarship and Mentorship at the 25th annual Northeast Under/graduate Research Organization for Neuroscience (NEURON) conference
Feb. 23 at Quinnipiac College, New Haven. The award, named for a deceased Boston
Univeristy biology professor best known for her pioneering research on the neuroendocrine
regulation of mating behavior in rats, is presented to a faculty member who makes
significant scholarly contributions and substantial investments in mentoring trainees.
Activities
President Philip A. Glotzbach has been elected to the board of directors of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities. Read more here.
Catherine Hill, F. William Harder Professor of Business Administration, attended the NY-BEST conference March 13-14 in Troy. NY-BEST is a battery storage industry group that formed in 2010. The conference focused on expanding New York’s markets for energy story on the grid.
Sarita Lagalwar, Williamson Professor of Neuroscience and assistant professor of neuroscience, and
Denise Brooks McQuade, senior teaching associate, Department of Biology, escorted a group of students to
the NEURON conference Feb. 23 at Quinnipiac College, New Haven. The following presentations
took place:
--Casey Hearing ’14, Mayumi Kohiyama ’15, Cara Kraus-Perotta ’16 and Sara Lagalwar,Degradation mechanisms in Spinocerebellar Ataxia Type 1.
--Nicholas Toker ’15, Maia Moog ’16, Natasha Noelfils ’16 and Sara Lagalwar, Prion-like propagation of protein aggregrates.
--Emily Carbone ’14, Austin Ferro ’15, Jenny Zhang ’16 and Sara Lagalwar, Mitochondrial OXPHOS Dysfunction in Spinocerebellar Ataxia Type 1.
--Michael Coffel ’14, Renee Schapiro ’15 and Denise Evert,Hemispheric Specialization and Self-Relevant Stimuli Mediate Emotional Stroop Effects.
--Emily Carbone ’14,Mitochondrial OXPHOS Dysfunction in Spinocerebellar Ataxia Type 1.
McQuade’s students:
--Katherine Alwan ’14, Emily Carbone ’14, Ketan Yerneni ’17,The role of 5-alpha reductase on the development of digit ratio in mice.
--Harriet Bird ’14, Porter Hall ’16, Anh Vu Nguyen ’17,An objective analysis of methods used in digit ratio experiments published from 2011
to 2013.
Student Opportunity Funds supported travel for the students.
Denise L. Smith, professor of health and exercise sciences, gave a presentation on “Advancing Firefighter Health and Safety” at the International Women in the Fire Services conference held in Tucson, Arizona, in February.
Publications
Bernie Possidente, professor of biology, is a coauthor (with K.-F. Chen, D. A. Lomas, and D. C. Crowther) of “The central molecular clock is robust in the face of behavioural arrhythmia in a Drosophila model of Alzheimer's disease,” published in Disease Models & Mechanisms, 2014. Research by Tiffany Benway ’08 contributed to the article.
In addition, Possidente made two recent presentations on this topic:
--Society for Research on Biological Rhythms meeting in 2012 in Florida. His coauthors were Brianna Sleezer and Sarah Clinton, both Class of 2012.
--Behavior Genetics Society Meetings in 2010 in Seoul, Korea. His co-authors were Benway and Class of 2010 grads Molley Kidder, Amy Veinoglu, and Alex Wennber.
Support for this research at Skidmore came from the Petrlik Foundation.
Denise L. Smith, professor of health and exercise sciences, is coauthor on a paper titled “Firefighter Health and Fitness Assessment: A Call to Action,” published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, Vol. 28, Issue 3, March 2014. The paper was written in collaboration with colleagues from UCLA who were members of the Physiological Health Assessment System for Emergency Responders (PHASER) Study Group with Smith. The Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate sponsored the study.
In the News
Kate Graney, associate professor of government, was a source for a story titled “Little hope locally for Sunday’s vote,” published March 16 in the Albany Times Union. In addition, she was interviewed March 17 on WNYT-TV, the Albany NBC affiliate, about the outcome of the vote on Crimea joining Russia.
Rachel Seligman, assistant director for curatorial affairs and associate curator of the Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, was a source for an Associated Press story on the death of Solomon Northup. The story was published March 17 in The Daily Gazette, and available via news outlets throughout the country.
Bob Turner, associate professor of government, was a source for “District evolved over the decades: May still be an uphill battle for Dems,” published March 16 in The Saratogian.