Posted on May 27, 2003

In Andalusia, in the south of Spain, lies the ancient city of Cordoba –
a site where Union liberal arts and engineering students are crossing paths with technology.

Through an innovative miniterm in Cordoba, Spain, Union students took an intensive course last summer, combining cultural study combined with technology. “The Scientific and Cultural Legacy of Al-Andalus” was taught by Pilar Moyano, chair of the Modern Languages and Literatures Department, and Tom Jewell, professor of civil engineering and interdisciplinary miniterm coordinator. The two created this interdisciplinary experiment, with support from the Christian Johnson Endeavor and the Keck Foundation. The experiment was so successful that it will take place again this summer.

Why Cordoba? Moyano explains that during a Golden Age of the Arab civilization, between 800 and 1200, while the rest of Europe was in the
Dark Ages, “this capital city
of Andalusia was the most important city in the West, not only because of its size and the quality of its infrastructure and services, but also because it was the center of science and culture.” Abu l'Qluasim Khalaf, one of the greatest influences on Western brain surgery, was born here. The earliest astrolabes used in Europe were imported from Cordoba, and it was here where new mathematical and astronomical theories were developed,
and where new concepts of irrigation and agriculture were implemented.

“There was also a feeling of citizenship and tolerance that helped encourage prosperous and harmonious relations among people of three different cultures and religions-Christian, Jewish, and Moslem,” Moyano adds. “There were many developments in literature, music, art, and intellectual activities. Modern technology was first introduced by the Romans and, later, applied and improved on by the Arabs, to provide running water, sewers, hospitals, paved and lit streets, and beautiful promenades, gardens, and fountains.”

The three-week course at the University of Cordoba concentrated on fieldwork at various historical and archeological sites (including a synagogue, a mosque, and Roman bridges, roads, and aqueducts) and intercultural study and dialog with professors and students. Information-gathering side trips took them to places such as Seville, Granada, Toledo, Merida, Segovia, and Lisbon, and sites in southern Portugal.

Engineering students paired up with liberal arts students looked at the elements making up the rich legacy of Cordoba, beginning with the Roman influence. All students lived on campus, alongside native Spanish students. They studied the history, culture, politics, and engineering infrastructure development of southern Spain and traveled to many historical sites in the area. Students kept journals-recording both academic and personal material.

The pairing of engineering and liberal arts students was valuable for all, says Moyano. “They had to be able to converse with their partners on technical issues as they worked together on their projects. They had to reach out to one another, and to learn to think in different ways.” And it wasn't just the students who learned: “I learned so much in the process of listening to the professors there, to Tom, to the students. It helps me, having this kind of exchange with an engineer, learning how my colleagues in engineering think.”

Doug Klein, director of the College's Center for Converging Technologies, says, “This is a good example of converging technologies-an opportunity to present our students with problems that cross disciplinary lines, especially when it involves any aspect
of science and technology.”

This year, preparing for a second miniterm to Cordoba, Moyano sought additional engineering perspectives, brainstorming with Klein and Cherrice Traver, professor of electrical engineering. This year's program will be organized around using geographic information system (GIS) software in various kinds of mapping. Explains Traver, “GIS is a methodology for representing and analyzing geographic information. It can be used to transform these representations into forms that help clarify trends, enable planning decisions, and do many other things.”

In Cordoba this summer, says Klein, “Students will be mapping and writing about history-producing a kind of historical guidebook to the city, with computer-generated visual layers like transparencies.”

Teams of students will look at historic layers, such as Islamic Cordoba, to see which parts of the modern city are relics from this culture. Then they'll document their choices by taking photos and doing research. When they return, they'll be able to turn this data into a web site or stand-alone map file.
This miniterm, in short, will demonstrate to students the potentials of GIS software.

Says Traver, “We would like students to come away with the same exposure to the history, culture, politics, and other social aspects of the region, but the technical aspect of the experience will be different. We will teach students the fundamentals of digital mapping, in this case, as a way of understanding the development of the city of Cordoba.”

The students will work on team projects to develop several historical map layers. One layer might show, for example, the original Roman roads and aqueducts, or perhaps all mosques that existed in the year 1000. They will do field research in Cordoba, taking digital photographs of historical sites, researching old maps in the library, and studying political boundaries for particular eras. The result will be a rich, multimedia “story” of how the city developed over a number of centuries.

Says Traver, “The mixture of engineering and nonengineering students should provide a balanced perspective to the projects. Engineering students, not to be too focused on the technical aspects, will be guided by humanity and social science students in the history, culture, and political context of the chosen theme. Likewise, engineering students will have an opportunity to apply their math and science background to a new technical area and work with their teammates in using the tools on real projects.”

“Converging technologies,” adds Klein, “is an umbrella large enough to incorporate this bringing of liberal arts and engineering students together to work on a technological project. This Cordoba project -producing an interactive historical guidebook – is much more engaging for students than thumbing through traditional guidebooks, and can be extended to any term abroad, to any country we send students to.”

Converging Technologies at Union Web site

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Posted on May 27, 2003

The College's Department of Modern Languages and Literatures has a United Nations flavor.

Pilar Moyano, department chair, notes that among the full-time faculty, “one is from Chile, two from China, one from Colombia, one from France, four from Germany, one from Japan, one from Puerto Rico, one from Senegal, two from Spain, and seven from the United States. We also have adjunct faculty who were born in Brazil, Bulgaria, Italy, Japan, and Russia. And we have four students-language assistants who come to us for a year-from France, Germany, Japan, and Mexico.”

And it's important to realize that it's not just words and sounds and grammar that are taught in their classes, she adds. “You can't teach these things without teaching other peoples' view
of the world. You have to understand how people think, feel, and behave if you are going to express ideas in their appropriate cultural context. In other words, the study of languages, national literatures, and cultures facilitates the understanding
of alternative ways of organizing experience, which leads to
better comprehension of the world and one's place in it.”

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Posted on May 27, 2003

One of the objectives of the College's developing program in Converging Technologies is to bring together engineering and liberal arts majors. Recently, we asked one of the interns in the Office
of Communications – an English major – to write about nanotechnology. Her report:

To engineering students at Union, I'm sure the word nanotechnology is old hat. But my reaction was more along the lines of “nano-what?”

Right up front I'll tell you that in my three and a half years at Union I had always made my home in the English Department. My contact with the Olin Center or the Science and Engineering Building was pretty much confined to stopping in for shelter during bad weather. Still, when I was challenged to leave the comforts of the Humanities Building and face this unexplored foreign territory, I cheerfully figured it would be part of a broad liberal education.

I first sat down with Professor of Physics Seyfollah Maleki, whose eyes lit up as he began to delve into the world of nanotechonology. “From my perspective,” he said, “nanotechnology is on such a scale that you're really crossing from one system of reality to the other. We understand atoms and so forth, but right at that seam, things become interesting.”

Simply put, he explained, nanotechnology is the ability to work at the molecular level. To put this into perspective, ten nanometers is approximately 1,000 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair. The ultimate goal of nanotechnology is to discover properties and gain control of “nanostructures.” Nanotechnology brings together the fields of chemistry, physics, biology, computer science, and engineering with the aim of creating devices that will control matter at the molecular level. The benefits to society will come in such fields as
medical diagnostics, photonics, luminescent displays, and biological and gas sensors.

The term nanotechnology may be new to me, but it has been a legitimate branch of science for more than twenty years. It has recently surged in popularity because of government and industry funding. Professor Maleki told me that nanotechnology is revolutionizing the applications of
science technology. “My
generation was brought up with the notion of Einstein-a basic understanding of nature,” he said. “What was valued were the fundamentals. In the twenty-first century, the sciences are now focusing on applications of these fundamentals.”

As Professor Maleki guided me through the depths of the Science and Engineering basement, showing me the latest instruments for mapping atomic topography, I realized that there were still new things for me to see at the College. And I realized that I had not understood the extent to which Union was taking steps to ensure that its students have an edge in the “real” world of technology and science.

This past winter term, for example, the College offered
a course in the “Frontiers in Nanotechnology and Nanomaterials.” Three professors from three different fields-Professor of Chemistry Michael Hagerman, Professor of Mechanical Engineering Philip Kosky, and Maleki-came together to teach the only undergraduate nanotechnology class in the United States. “We have a class of engineers, chemists, and physicists,” said Maleki.

“It's a fun project because everyone is thinking outside their field,” commented Hagerman. An added dimension to the course is that the professors are not only teachers but also students, as they learn aspects of nanotechnology from the perspectives of their colleagues and students.

Careers in technology are going to increase in the Capital District in coming years. Underway is a $400-million project to establish Sematech North, a branch of International Sematech, the consortium of ten semiconductor companies based in Austin, Texas. Tokyo Electron Ltd. has announced a $300-million facility next door to Sematech North. GE is investing $100 million in its Global Research center near Schenectady. These and other developments mean that there will be a need for graduates with a diverse knowledge of technology, specifically nanotechnology.

On campus, IBM's recent donations have established a new microcopy center for materials characterization-the kind of new facilities and equipment that are preparing Union for the “revolution” of technology. Professor Douglass Klein, director of the College's converging technologies
program, said that Union is on the right track to becoming an important part of the area's economic growth. “We're teaching students to be good thinkers and good communicators,” he said. “It's a positive asset for understanding the different disciplines and how they connect.”

My next foray took me into Steinmetz Hall, where I met one of these “good thinkers,” mechanical engineering major Smitesh Bakrania '03. His senior thesis focuses on the nanotechnology related area of aerogels. “It started as just research over the summer. After a while, you realize that there are lots of things to be done in the field-and I got interested.”

Bakrania, originally from Tanzania, studies the properties of aerogels, commonly known in the world of science as “frozen smoke.” Aerogels have a silicon dioxide structure and have been made to contain up to ninety-nine percent air (the average width of a single pore on an aerogel is approximately ten nanometers, or one billionth of a meter). I hesitantly held a piece of the “frozen smoke,” no bigger than the tip of my pinky, and was surprised by its fragility and light weight. Bakrania constructs these aerogels by mixing different solutions and drying them at high pressure and temperature. With each solution mix, the properties of the aerogels are thought to slightly alter. Bakrania is interested in studying these alterations in properties in order to find an effective and efficient aerogel; the properties he examines include thermal conductivity, density, reflectance, and porosity.

Why does it matter, you ask? “If you can control the size of a pore, you can control what molecules are let through the aerogel,” he said. In other words, aerogels may eventually be used as gas sensors. (Chemistry students Rebecca Wolfe '03 and Desiree Plata '03 are studing the application of aerogels as gas sensors.) One day we may be able to put chemical sensors inside an aerogel and send it to Mars to calculate the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere. In fact, NASA is already using aerogels for an upcoming experiment to collect and analyze dust particles from a comet.

Bakrania is not studying the applications of aerogels, however. He is improving the art of making the “perfect” aerogel of the future. “We're just trying to understand what's going on-still trying to perfect [the aerogel],” he said. Next year, he will attend graduate school to begin work on his PhD in mechanical engineering, and he is thinking about concentrating in the field of nanotechnology.

Although I concentrated my exploration on nanotechnology, I know the College has several other areas in converging technologies.

In bioengineering, there is a course that covers the basic principles of biomechanics and applies them to disease processes and bioengineering devices. I thought some of the subjects of recent term papers sounded fascinating
-“The Biomechanics of Distance Running,” “Total Knee Replacement,” “My Total Artificial Heart: Design, Components and Materials,” and “Control of Prosthetic Limbs, With a Focus on Myoelectric Control.”

I learned that mechatronics is a design philosophy that encourages engineers to integrate precision mechanical engineering, digital and analog electronics, control theory, and computer engineering in the design of “intelligent” products, systems, and processes. And I was intrigued by an anthropology course in pervasive computing called Culture and Technology, which examines the role of technology in cultural change and the role of culture in technological change.

So, what did I discover in my search? I discovered that while I'm still most comfortable in my home in the English Department, there are some exciting things going on in
the science and engineering departments. Nanotechnology is revolutionizing technology as we know it, and Union
faculty and students are taking an initiative.

Converging Technologies at Union Website

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Posted on May 27, 2003

From handling daycare at a nursery to helping crime victims through a DA's office, to interviewing members of Congress, to helping revitalize a city, to helping offenders find alternatives to prison, internships are a vibrant chapter in the lives of many Union students. We talked with five of them about their involvement in the city.

A perfect fit at the
Schenectady Day Nursery

Adriana Zavala '03 had two finals the last Friday of the fall term, but between the two she chose to work with “her” infants and toddlers one last time.

“It's so hard to leave,” she sighs. “I've seen some of them grow up!”

Zavala interned at the Sche-nectady Day Nursery over the summer, and was invited to return part time in the fall, this time for pay. “I can't imagine her not working there,” comments Assistant Professor of Sociology Melinda Goldner, her academic adviser. “She just comes alive when she talks about it. It's a perfect fit for her.

“What's nice about this internship is she can test out
a potential career,” Goldner continues. “She can also develop leadership skills, organizational skills, and can take them into any career she pursues. Often we think of internships as leading to specific careers-and that's great when it happens, but it isn't necessary. ”

Zavala, a sociology major and Japanese minor who is interested in child development, got to work in the infant and toddler section of the nursery, a nonprofit agency that serves local families, about ninety percent of whom are in financial need. Fleet Bank gave the College money for six internships last summer, enabling Zavala and five other students to work at various local agencies. “The agencies got a free employee, and we gained experience,” she says.

Zavala is planning on taking some time off after graduation, possibly to work in social services. “I'm still exploring the field. I want to get as much experience as I can, especially with low-income families.”

“It's important to add,” points out Goldner, “that students like Adriana aren't doing this just to get job experience – they're idealistic and energetic, and they really want to help.”

Advocating for victims at the Rensselaer County District Attorney's Office

“It was essentially a real-life 'Law and Order' Special
Victims Unit,” comments Stephanie Block '03, summarizing her internship in the Rensselaer County District Attorney's office.

Working as a victims' advocate gave the psychology major a dramatic chance to pursue dual interests in psychology and the law. She was part of the Victims Assistance Program, a team that helps victims cope as well as testify, and makes sure that restraining orders are enforced. The team helps provide continuity after law enforcement arrives on the scene, recognizing that victims need all kinds of help.

The first few days on the job, Block spent reading about victims' rights in the criminal justice system, and separating forms on child abuse into categories. “Gradually, they began to let me speak with the victims on the phone, and sit in on counseling sessions, and then meet with them. I had the opportunity to go to court-I sat in on pre-trials and trials. It was a great opportunity to learn about the judicial system and to make a contribution.”

Block was involved in some high-profile case, according to her academic adviser, Linda Stanhope of the Psychology Department, with whom she discussed her interviews with victims. Block was able to speak with prosecutors about the cases, and sit with lawyers over lunch and pick their brains.

In this real-world setting, she was faced with some complex issues: How do you define a battered woman? How much pressure do you put on her to testify? And what is the greater good? And she was surprised at how much personal contact she had with victims of domestic violence. “It was incredibly disturbing, and it also showed me how passionate I felt about this work. ”

The internship has influenced Block's academic and career directions. “I can see myself being a prosecutor one day.” But for now, she is considering Ph.D. programs in psychology, and possibly law school after that.

Helping to bring back
downtown Schenectady

Steve Erickson '03 is working to help revitalize a city.
An economics major, he's serving as an intern, along with classmates Xilong He and Jonathan Menz, at the Downtown Schenectady Improvement Corp., an organization that promotes Schenectady as rich in history, culture, infrastructure, and opportunity.

Erickson goes out and talks with businesses, trying to interest them in locating in downtown Schenectady. He also promotes and takes photos of local businesses that are already in place. He's been able to build on personal skills in his work, and has experienced a lot of freedom and opportunity to be creative.

In short, he says, he's “glad I got assigned to this job.”

Erickson has noticed many new businesses and positive changes in the city. From his perspective, is Schenectady coming back? “I think so. From what I've seen-with the planned new movie theaters, and the expansion of Proctor's and Schenectady County Community College-in ten years this place should be amazing!”

Erickson's adviser is Harold Fried, professor of economics, who offers an economic internship course every winter. Says Fried, “Most students find the internship experience pretty eye-opening. Being in the trenches can change their minds about what they want to do. It's also a big commitment-ten to twelve hours a week on the job, plus weekly classes and required readings, reports, journaling, papers, and presentations.”

Combining politics and
writing at the Congressional Quarterly

Ask Sue Drossman '02 about her Washington internship with Congressional Quarterly and she excitedly tells you that this was where “I learned what true journalism is all about.” She laughs as she recalls “having pieces ripped apart that I thought had no political bias whatsoever.”

Drossman talks about the day she learned the most about politics: “I was trying
to summarize a House Resolution that I was asked to do ASAP. But I had no leads, and the office had no idea what bill was about. The Committee had no clue either. By lunchtime, my editor and I realized that we'd have to figure out which lobbying group it had come from. I wound up calling every welfare-based think tank in Washington. Looking back-imagine a nineteen-year-old conducting interviews-I still can't believe I could handle this!”

Drossman came to Union as an English major, took Introduction to American Politics, and fell in love with both writing and politics. So it made sense to apply for an internship at CQ, probably the top political informational source in the country. She won the David S. Kaplan Internship, which allowed her to go to Washington. (The Kaplan Internship was created to honor the late David S. Kaplan, a Union alum who had also interned at CQ and went to work there after
he graduated.)

Professor Zoe Oxley, of the Political Science Department, was Drossman's academic adviser. “Many organizations in Washington have come to rely on interns for a significant part of their work,” she says. “And the students get hands-on political experience, applying what they've been learning, seeing what really goes on, and reflecting on it. It's good for personal and career development. And for faculty, we get to know students in a different context, and we get to know them very well.”

Drossman is now a first-year Ph.D. student at SUNY Albany, focusing on political theory and teaching an introductory course to American politics. She says the Washington experience was invaluable in many ways: “It also made me realize that this wasn't exactly what I wanted to do with my life. I realized that a more philosophical, academic track was for me -rather than the hustle and bustle of politics.”

Getting an insider's look at the criminal justice system

On Barrett Street, a narrow side street just off State Street in downtown Schenectady, Tamara Carl '04 is working with the staff at the Center for Law, Order, and Justice through several programs that offer alternatives to prison. She loves the work so much that she plans to come back after her internship-as a volunteer -and she's trying to interest her sorority in volunteering.

Says Carl, “You get to see lawyers and judges in action. I always sit next to the D.A. in court [where the LOJ representatives sit].” Points out Professor John Zumbrunnen, coordinator of internships in the City of Schenectady for the Political Science Department and Carl's adviser, “She's getting a different view of the criminal justice system.”

Carl works wherever LOJ staff need her in the alternatives to sentencing programs: bail assistance, community service (offenders repay the community for their crimes by working for government and nonprofit agencies in lieu of fines or prison), restitution (offenders repay their victims through financial reparations as an alternative to prison), and diversion (an educational program that teaches children and first-time adult offenders about the consequences of criminal behavior
-“they watch videos, go to meetings, visit jails, and get a hard look at what they could be facing if they don't shape up”).

She also sits in on noncustodial visitations at LOJ-with children and parents or grandparents-and writes up the visits. “It's fun working here-people really care and it shows.”

Carl, a political science major and a theater minor, plans to go to law school and become a corporate lawyer.

In a research project she was part of at LOJ, Carl reviewed several years' worth of intake forms to uncover basic trends for four of its programs- looking at factors such as
race, age, gender, season, judge, court, and whether public or private attorneys were involved. Explains Zumbrunnen, “The students work on projects that will be significant to the people they're working for. We ask them, is there anything you want to know? This way, we're serving Union and the community.”

In his work supervising interns, Zumbrunnen has
discovered, “There are a lot
of opportunities around Sche-nectady-it's a matter of going out and finding them. The nonprofits are desperate for help. And it tends to be the case that once you send them one Union student,
they want more. ”

Zumbrunnen has just been named to LOJ 's board of directors: “Beyond an opportunity to work with what I think is an excellent organization, I see serving on the board as a way to make connections with folks in the community to find more opportunities for our students to do work of the sort Tamara is involved in.”

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Posted on May 27, 2003

To complement and expand opportunities for Union's students to be involved in direct political action, John Zumbrunnen and colleague Richard Fox, both of the Political Science Department, plan to start a Political Engagement Center.

“Many college students want to be engaged in public service and problem solving in their communities, but they don't know how to do it in a way that might make a difference,” Zumbrunnen says. “The Political Engagement Center is designed to open more opportunities along these lines.”

The Center plans to focus on four modes of civic and political engagement:

• Community Problem-Solving-encouraging students to work directly with community leaders and organizations to identify problems and to create and implement solutions.
• Political Advocacy-While the Center is nonpartisan and
  ideologically neutral, it supports political advocacy by student groups working for or against political change.

• Investigative Research-In the tradition of investigative journalism, students will be encouraged to bring to the public's attention social and political issues that need to be addressed by the political system.
• Public Policy Research-Students will work closely with political advocacy groups, private organizations, government agencies, and state and local officeholders to gather information, conduct research, and issue reports to be used in ongoing policy debates.

Next academic year, a core group of faculty from various departments will begin to implement political action components in their courses while the Center seeks funding and other support, hoping to establish and maintain links with community organizations and agencies while providing grants and other resources to students for political action projects.

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Posted on May 27, 2003

The loss of biodiversity that can result from the development of rural countryside appears to be putting humans at increased risk of contracting Lyme disease, according to a paper published this winter in
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Kathleen LoGiudice, an assistant professor of biology at the College, and colleagues investigated the relationship between biodiversity and Lyme disease, an illness transmitted between ticks and many vertebrates, including humans.

The researchers captured thirteen species of birds and mammals that host ticks, and tested ticks feeding on the animals for Lyme disease. They then calculated the contribution of each species to the total proportion of infected ticks. The results show that as biodiversity declines, Lyme disease risk increases. This is because in areas with high biodiversity, more ticks feed on species that do not effectively carry or transmit Lyme disease.

However, in degraded areas of low species diversity, the ticks feed mostly on white-footed mice, which transmit Lyme disease to forty to ninety percent of the ticks that feed on them. The authors suggest that because mice are one of the last species to disappear as habitat is degraded, loss of biodiversity increases the chance that ticks will feed on mice and pass on Lyme disease to humans.

The findings could have implications for land use
policy, LoGiudice says-although she cautions that her research is preliminary and the results need to be repeated several times before they could be used as a guide for policy.

But if the same results were found in further research, one conclusion might be that development in rural townships-even those with minimum lot sizes as large as five acres-can cause forest fragmentation that results in less biodiversity and a higher density of mice. The challenge to planners, then, would be to maintain enough continuous forest that can serve as habitat for “dilution hosts” such as squirrels, shrews, opossums, and raccoons that do not as readily transmit the disease.

Lyme disease is spread by ticks that live in wooded and grassy areas. The disease, which is caused by a bacteria and transmitted to humans from the bite of infected black-legged ticks, affects about 17,000 people each year, mostly in the northeast U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control. New York State reported 5,036 cases outside of New York City in 2002, a twenty-six percent increase over 2001. The disease causes fatigue, fevers, and joint pains that can persist for weeks. Some patients develop severe arthritis. If not treated with antibiotics, Lyme disease can severely damage the heart and nervous systems.

LoGiudice was the lead author of the paper titled, “The ecology of infectious disease: Effects of host diversity and community composition on Lyme disease risk.” Her colleagues were Richard Ostfeld of the Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, N.Y.; Kenneth Schmidt of Texas Tech University; and Felicia Keesing of Bard College. The research was done at the Institute of Ecosystem Studies.

The researchers have received a $1.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to expand their work over four years in six states-New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland.

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