Issue 133   |   October 06, 2013   |   Archive

News & Events

Explore the World of an Explorer

The UH-Manoa Ethnobiology Society will be hosting “An Evening with National Geographic” featuring speaker Maria Fadiman on October 7 from 6 to 8 p.m. in St John 11, with heavy pupus to follow the presentation. Dr. Fadiman, who was recognized by National Geographic as an Emerging Explorer, is an ethnobotanist specializing in Latin American and African rainforest cultures. If you would like to attend, please RSVP to Melissa at 630-486-2926 or email ethnobio@hawaii.edu.

Eat Up Some Information

Come to the 3rd annual Food Day for food, fun, information, and a chance to hear a presentation by Jinan Banna (HNFAS). She will discuss the issue of food insecurity and the importance of improved access to healthful food, which many low-income families in Hawai‘i lack. The event takes place in the Campus Center Ballroom on October 24 from noon to 1:30 p.m. Food Day supports access to sustainable, healthful, and affordable food; it will be celebrated this year in schools and community festivals nationwide. Its mission is to inspire public support for sustainable farming, local food, and healthful lifestyles. Another guest speaker will be Chelsea Bell of Hawaii Meals on Wheels, who will discuss her work providing hot, nutritious meals to Hawai‘i’s kupuna. UH Sodexo Chef Carl Peterson will be providing a food demonstration in collaboration with Donna Ojiri, CTAHR alumna and the general manager of Sodexo. There will be food tasting, booths featuring ways to get involved, information on careers in food and nutrition, and games. Last year’s Food Day was well attended, so RSVP this year to ensure your spot at the table and get the chance to connect with Hawai‘i’s food and agriculture community!

Grants & Awards

A Full Crop of Honors

Dean Maria Gallo has been named a Crop Science Society of America (CSSA) Fellow for 2013. The international science organization will present this, its highest honor, to her and 10 others from across North America on November 6 during its annual meeting in Tampa, Fla. Fellows are elected by select CSSA members based on professional achievements and meritorious service; they comprise just 0.3 percent of the society membership. Dean Gallo is honored for her work on plant genetics, using molecular biology and biotechnology techniques to improve the performance and quality of tropical energy and agronomic crops. The college’s former Dean William Furtick and the late soil scientist Goro Uehara also received the honor, as did these CTAHR alumni: Kenneth G. Cassman, Ganesan Srinivasan, Soon-Kwon Kim, Donald Plunkett, and Surajit K. DeDatta. Another CSSA Fellow (and founding member) is CTAHR plant breeder and corn expert James Brewbaker (TPSS, pictured), who this year has also been selected to receive another honor, CSSA’s Presidential Award. This award recognizes outstanding contributions to crop science through education, national and international service, and research. Dean Gallo will receive the award on his behalf. For more than 60 years, “Dr. B” has developed new varieties of crops for improved nutrition, yields, and pest and disease resistance. Recruited by CTAHR to establish a sweet corn improvement program, he was instrumental in developing the seed corn industry into the state’s most valuable agricultural crop. He has also done extensive work on tropical legume trees, and he established Hawai’i Foundation Seeds to manage parent seed stocks. Congratulations to Dean Gallo and Dr. B!

Innovate, Innovate, Innovate!

The Howard G. Buffett Foundation and the University of Wisconsin-Madison are inaugurating the 2014 Agricultural Innovation Prize. The competition is open to U.S. undergraduate and graduate students across all academic disciplines and runs through spring 2014, when teams will compete for the chance to win $215,000 in prize money, with a grand prize of $100,000, making this the largest agriculture-focused student competition in the world. The contest encourages student teams to develop innovative plans to address social and agricultural challenges within food systems, improving the standard of living and quality of life for the world’s population. The top 25 teams will be invited to the final round at the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Wisconsin Institute for Discovery. Entries are due February 28, 2014, so start preparing now to win the big prize! Dean Gallo encourages students to enter and has promised to offer help to anyone who’s planning to do so.

Grants From Sun Grant

Samir Khanal (MBBE) recently received a highly competitive bioenergy grant from Sun Grant Western Regional Center funded through the U.S. Department of Transportation. This 2-year, $200,000 grant aims at developing an anaerobic digestion (AD) bio-refinery using high-yielding tropical bioenergy feedstocks in a decentralized closed-loop system for producing diverse high-value co-products and/or liquid/gaseous biofuels. Pictured is a Swedish woman filling her car with biomethane. Find out more about Samir’s anaerobic digestion research here! The Sun Grant Initiative is a national network of land-grant universities and federally funded laboratories working together to further establish a bio-based economy; these institutes are at the forefront of research and innovation involving bioenergy and biofuels production. CTAHR is also a home of the Western Insular Pacific Sun Grant Subcenter, led by Andy Hashimoto (MBBE).

Bugs From Afar

The distance education course “World of Insects” developed by Adam Tanners, Justin Hedani, Michelle Carino, and Eddie Gose, with Helen Spafford (PEPS) as subject matter expert, was ranked second by the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) for their Distance Education Crystal Award. This award recognizes “innovative and outstanding multimedia-based distance learning courses.” The team is invited to receive their award at the Department of Distance Learning luncheon at the AECT’s International Convention on November 1. Being such distance learning stars, though, they may just decide to attend the luncheon by Skype!

New Funding Opportunities Newsletter October 3, 2013

It’s getting close to the time when witches, monsters, and goblins will start populating house fronts, store aisles, and people’s imaginations. But the really scary thing isn’t some ghoul—it’s the specter of being without enough funding to complete your research project! Guard against that fear by applying for some treats now—start by perusing the latest Current Funding Opportunities newsletter. The opportunities likely to be of particular interest to CTAHR faculty include the following:

Spotlight on Our Community

The Secret Garden of St. John

Did you know there’s a hydroponic learning center on the 6th floor of St. John? Established with a grant from the Women’s Campus Club, it has seven different systems set up; they’re growing mizuna, tomato, red choi, and peppers so far, with space for more to come. The project hopes to expand, testing different vegetables to see how well they do in an urban growing environment, in service of its mission to educate everybody interested in urban hydroponics and gardening. The center is also hoping to attract further donations to improve and expand so that more people can benefit, adding such important components as permanent signs, different and more hydroponic systems, and alternate hydroponic nutrient solutions. Come by and visit the center, or email Robert Saito at rjnsaito@hawaii.edu for more information.

New Faces: Janis Morita

Now filling the invaluable position of Director of Administrative Services is Janis Morita, who joins CTAHR from ORS and is very familiar with grant submissions and the labyrinthine Kuali system, to everyone’s great delight. Dean Gallo writes, “Janis has excellent positive energy and will continue to improve our efforts to support the college. We are very happy to have her join us. Please welcome Janis to our CTAHR ‘ohana.” Welcome, Janis!

New Faces: Lydia Gerakas and Kellie Kong

CTAHR welcomes Lydia Gerakas (pictured right) to her new position—she’s joined the Academic and Student Affairs Office as Charly Kinoshita’s new secretary. She’s not new to the college, though; she just moved over from PEPS, where she previously served as department secretary. PEPS’s loss is Academic Affairs’ gain! Academic Affairs also gains by the addition of Kellie Kong, who is creating the brand-new position of distance learning coordinator. She’s a PhD student in Educational Technology and is hard at work to help bring select CTAHR classes to those who can’t get to campus. Luckily, she’s not too far away herself—just downstairs in Gilmore. The college is excited about its new additions!

Disney Fashionista

It’s always inspiring to hear about alumni who take what they learned at CTAHR and thrive. Claire Pimentel-Powers (FDM alumna) gives updates on her career since graduating from CTAHR: “During my college years at UH, I interned with Jeff Berman and Jan Berman, owners of the Jeffrey Barr multi-brand store in Kahala Mall, who used to teach at Rhode Island School of Design and then taught for a little bit at UH also. So between UH and the Bermans, I learned a lot. After graduation, I left for Los Angeles for a design assistant job, and have been working in the fashion industry ever since. With my LA mentor Glynn Barrish-Dreyer, I learned hands-on industry skills that weren’t taught in school. Since then I’ve designed for labels like Arden B, Guess, Marciano, Bebe, and Victoria’s Secret, to name a few. I had a branded line called Love Amour that was sold in the U.S. at boutiques and stores such as Lord & Taylor, Nordstroms, Bloomingdales, and Macy’s, plus the Galeries Lafayette in France and boutiques in Canada and Australia. Then after my sister got pregnant for the first time, I decided to be more philanthropic and started my own eco-friendly clothing collection, Covenant Green, for which my first buyer was the prominent celeb-loved store Fred Segal. After the economy tanked in 2008, I closed my fledgling company and started working with Disney, designing the Disney Couture collection. A few years after that, I ventured internationally with some partners, and now I have my own design, licensing and distribution company in U.S. and Asia, and Disney is the major brand that I design for:).” She considers her CTAHR mentors to be Jeff and Jan Berman, Linda Arthur, Marcia Morgado, Diane Chung, and Jenny Maligro. There’s one more CTAHR connection as well: Claire is the niece of Lydia Gerakas, late of PEPS and now of Academic and Student Affairs. Small world!

VP of Fashion

Andy Reilly (FDM) recently was elected vice president of Research and Scholarship for the International Textile and Apparel Association. The duties of his three-year term include planning future annual conferences, facilitating recognition of diverse types of research and scholarship, and promotion awards. Andy recently hosted the 2012 ITAA annual conference in Honolulu, and his skilled handling of this successful event undoubtedly contributed to his election.

Sustainable Extension

CTAHR and its ag partners came together to advance sustainable and organic agriculture in Hawai‘i by hosting a training session for agricultural educators across the state. The Sustainable and Organic Agriculture Program (SOAP), WSARE, the Agricultural Incubator Program, and the Hawai‘i Association of County Agriculture Agents held a two-day training event consisting of research-based updates, a national perspective on Extension by the Western Region director of Extension, and a field day to demonstrate how CTAHR-generated research is being put into practice at the Poamoho Research Station’s new SOAP learning center. Educators received updates on everything from the importance of having a healthy start to post-harvest marketing of locally grown commodities. One participant wrote, “We have some amazing things going on here. Proud to be at UH Extension!”

Help our community to keep in touch! Please send news items -- awards, grants, special projects, special people -- and pictures to Frederika Bain at ctahrnotes@ctahr.hawaii.edu.

Do you have an upcoming event that you'd like to promote? CTAHR faculty and staff can post events to the CTAHR website's calendar.

All CTAHR Notes readers can browse the calendar to learn more about the college's activities.