Dateline staff
The swagÍâÁ÷ Hellman Fellowship Program, now in its fourth year, has given grants totaling almost $244,000 to 13 assistant professors.
Vice Provost Barbara Horwitz of Academic Affairs described the program as an âextraordinary opportunityâ for junior faculty who have promising research plans but lack the stable funding of more established faculty.
Funding comes from the San Francisco-based Hellman Family Foundation, which committed to providing $1.25 million to the campus over five years to support career advancement activities of promising assistant professors.
Under the guidelines, each grant recipient must have completed at least two years as an assistant professor and submitted a compelling research proposal.
All the foundation asks in return is that the grant recipients meet for lunch in the spring with Warren and Chris Hellman, the philanthropists behind the foundation. Warren Hellman is an investment banker and UC Berkeley alumnus.
The 2011-12 Hellman Fellows, their academic units and their research topics:
- Keith Baar, neurobiology, physiology and behavior â âMaking Bigger Muscles with Mighty and mTORâ
- Christian Baldini, music â âCD Recording: Vocal and Chamber Worksâ
- Marusa Bradac, physics â âDark Matter, Dark Energy and First Galaxies Light Upâ
- Siobhan Brady, plant biology â âThe Arabidopsis Root Secondary Cell Wall Gene Regulatoryâ
- Amber Boydstun, political science â âThe Nature and Causes of Media Stormsâ
- Arne Ekstrom, psychology â âRepresentation and Binding of Spatial and Temporal Memories in Human Hippocampusâ
- Zhiliang Fan, biological and agricultural engineering â âConversion of Cellulosic Biomass to Isobutanol: Process Design and Economic Analysisâ
- Robert Faris, sociology â âThe Emergence and Consequences of Scientific Disputesâ
- Cynthia Lin, agricultural and resource economics â âAn Analysis of Ethanol Investment Decisionsâ
- Fu Liu, mathematics â âOn Ehrhart Polynomials of Polytopesâ
- Scott MacKenzie, political science â âFrom Political Pathways to Legislative Folkways: Connecting Institutions, Political Experiences and Legislative Decision-Makingâ
- Stephanie Lee Mudge, sociology â âNeoliberalism and Party Politics in an Age of Crisisâ
- Nina Claire Napawan, environmental design â âProductive Landscapes of the Resilient Cityâ
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Dave Jones, Dateline, 530-752-6556, dljones@ucdavis.edu