With the approval of 29 new positions, representing eight proposals, the 100 interdisciplinary junior faculty positions President Mary Sue Coleman called for in 2007 now are approved, though not all have been hired.
The new clusters are in the areas of sustainability, health care technology, climate change, urban studies, adolescent substance use and abuse, children in poverty and biological networks.
“We have attracted exceptional scholars from around the world to expand collaborative teaching and research throughout the university. This has been a major undertaking by our deans and department chairs to advance new areas of scholarship,” Coleman says. “The range of proposals we have funded holds great promise.”
Coleman announced in 2007 a five-year, $30 million initiative to hire 100 tenure-track junior faculty members to increase the university’s focus on teaching and research across disciplines.
The goal is to recruit scholars whose work crosses boundaries or for cluster hires that bring experts from different fields together to explore significant questions or address complex problems.
To date, the initiative has funded a total of 101 positions in 25 clusters; 34 faculty members have been hired, 26 now are on campus and another eight will begin their positions here by January 2012. Searches are under way or will be in the near future for the remaining positions.
This year’s proposals include departments within the College of Engineering, Medical School, School of Dentistry, LSA, the School of Natural Resources and Environment, School of Public Health, Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Stephen M. Ross School of Business, Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, School of Social Work and School of Education.
“In approving these new positions, we’re strengthening the university’s commitment to innovative teaching and interdisciplinary research on complex problems,” Provost Phil Hanlon says. “We look forward to the contributions new faculty members will make in both areas.”
An urban studies cluster proposed by Angela Dillard, professor and director of the Center for Afroamerican & African Studies, will focus on social inequality and the prospects for equity and sustainability. The research would focus on Detroit and southeast Michigan, both urban and metropolitan.
“We want to not only examine what’s going on here, but also how to develop models and strategies to export to other post-industrial cities in similar circumstances,” Dillard says. She envisions creation of a “Detroit School” of urban studies, similar to earlier research programs that led the “Chicago School” and later the “Los Angeles” schools of urban studies. One trend Dillard hopes to investigate is mass incarceration in Detroit.
“Why are so many people in prison? What does it do to our communities?” she asks. “This is the issue of the moment for our society. The numbers for Detroit are dramatic and devastating.”
Dillard says her cluster will work with students from the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program and Project Community, as well as graduate students, to do research, conduct interviews and administer surveys.
Another proposal, Distributed Health Technologies, suggests an idea that will design, develop and test technologies that are compatible with large-scale distribution to the general community, says coordinator Sunitha Nagrath, assistant professor of chemical engineering.
This research will give students a unique “opportunity to work at the crossroads of engineering, medicine and biology,” Nagrath says.
“The students will be exposed to the challenges of developing technologies that can go from bench side to bed side,” she says. “They will have this creative environment where they can interact with multidisciplinary team of experts and develop multifaceted skills to face the real world challenges when it comes to implementing the innovative technologies into patient care.”
Conducting post-doctoral work on the blood of cancer patients made Nagrath realize “the importance of interdisciplinary teamwork to make outstanding contributions to patient care.”
“If we develop the technology from the design stage itself with the idea of taking to bed side, then the translation of research to patient care is much faster and easier,” she says.
“The cluster hire will accelerate the process of integrating engineering solutions into clinical medicine from the conception stage, which is the thrust of next generation of life sciences technologies. This will uniquely position U-M at the cutting edge of the future of clinical medicine and soon U-M can take a lead in this emerging globewide health care scenario.”
One cluster will examine the path toward a sustainable and equitable food system, spanning the natural and social sciences. Sustainable Food Systems is led by John Vandermeer, Asa Gray Distinguished University Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Arthur F. Thurnau Professor, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, LSA, and professor of natural resources and environment, School of Natural Resources and Environment.
Three of the clusters from previous years now are complete.
• Social Science Aspects of Energy — lead faculty member is Carl Simon at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy. New faculty hired are Shaun McRae (economics), Brian Min (political science) and Ashley Langer (Ford School).
• Microbial Ecology: Relationships to Human and Environmental Health — lead faculty member is Deborah Goldberg in ecology and evolutionary biology. New faculty hired are Vincent Denef (ecology and evolutionary biology), Rickard Alexander (epidemiology), Patrick Schloss (microbiology and immunology) and Blaise Boles (molecular, cellular and developmental biology).
• Global Change: Cryosphere and Sea-level Impacts — lead faculty members are Chris Poulsen (geological sciences and atmospheric, oceanic and space sciences) and Todd Ehlers (geological sciences). New faculty hired are Jeremy Bassis (AOSS), Sarah Aciego (geological sciences) and Brian Arbic (geological sciences).
Latest interdisciplinary junior faculty topics
Descriptions based on approved proposals
Adolescent Substance Use and Abuse
Medical School, School of Public Health and School of Social Work
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: John Traynor
Addiction is a chronic brain disorder with both genetic and environmental risk factors. In teenagers and young adults, drug and substance use is associated with failure in school, social alienation and stigmatization, depression, and risky sexual activity. Adolescents particularly are disposed to trying legal and illegal substances as their brains still are developing in the areas that govern decision-making, judgment and self-control. This also means that it is easier for drugs to cause changes in brain chemistry, plasticity and function, which can critically affect adult behavior. To increase our understanding in this area, this faculty cluster will explore questions such as: Why are adolescents so susceptible? What does drug exposure do to the adolescent brain and are these effects permanent? How can we improve education and policy towards adolescent drug abuse? What interventions and or treatments are most appropriate for the adolescent brain?
Children in Poverty
School of Education, Ford School and SSW
Three faculty positions
Faculty leads: Sandra Danziger, Susan Dynarski and Sheldon Danziger
As of 2010, about one-fifth of all children in the United States live in poverty. Compared to their peers, these children are at a substantial disadvantage in their social, physical and emotional development. They progress through school at a slower rate, have lower educational achievement, face greater physical and mental health challenges, and mature into adults who are less likely to go to college and achieve economic security. The group of faculty hired for this cluster will focus on developing an integrated understanding of the effects of child poverty and effective ways to address this societal concern.
Distributed Health Technologies
College of Engineering, School of Dentistry and Medical School
Three faculty positions
Faculty lead: Sunitha Nagrath
In the era of “targeted therapies” and “personalized medicine,” not only it is essential to develop the technologies that are point-of-care but it is equally important to bring these advanced health technologies out of academic institutions to the patient’s bedside and/or into homes. Hence, the idea of “Distributed Health Technologies” (DHT) that will design, develop and test technologies that are compatible with large-scale distribution to the general community. DHT not only will enable the delivery of personalized medicine but also will help to discover the therapeutic biomarkers for targeted therapies. The cluster will accelerate the process of integrating engineering solutions into clinical medicine from the conception stage, which is the thrust of next generation of life sciences technologies.
Diversity and Complexity of Biological Networks
LSA, Medical School and SPH
Five faculty positions
Faculty lead: Mercedes Pascual
With advances in the quantity and quality of biological data has come the realization that biological function cannot be understood by isolating a small subset of components. Understanding how large biological systems are structured and how this structure relates to function, dynamics and development, is one of the central scientific challenges of the 21st century. This cluster will bring together scientists to (1) address the structure and function of biological networks at different levels of organization, (2) better understand how the diversity and complexity of networks affect their robustness to environmental change and variability, and (3) develop new computational and statistical approaches for analyzing networks.
Sustainable Energy and Climate Change Impacts: Integrated Assessment and Modeling
CoE and School of Natural Resources and Environment
Two faculty positions
Faculty lead: Joyce Penner
Sustainable development in the face of environmental and climate change is one of the highest-stake societal issues currently on policy and research agendas, domestically and internationally. The climate and environmental change issues are extreme in their requirements for an integrated view of multiple processes and knowledge from multiple domains to understand key processes and assess the potential effects of future technological advances, and political and economical decisions. Policy choices dealing with climate change are of major importance to the economic health of the Great Lakes region and the nation. It is the goal of this cluster to integrate and extend the university’s contributions to Integrated Assessment modeling of climate change.
Sustainable Food Systems
A. Alfred Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Ross School, LSA, SNRE and SPH
Five faculty positions
Faculty lead: John Vandermeer
Today’s global food system produces unprecedented quantities of food. Nevertheless, the World Health Organization estimates that over one billion people lack adequate food to satisfy the minimum standards of nutrition. Even more perplexing is the fact that obesity has become a major health problem for some, even as hunger continues to plague others. Moreover, the modern agricultural system is increasingly recognized as environmentally unsustainable. For consumers, food safety has emerged as a critical issue and for producers — farmers and farm workers — workplace safety and unfair compensation threaten the sustainability of their livelihoods. The complex and multi-dimensional challenges of our food system require an interdisciplinary approach that both engages multiple disciplines and considers systemic effects such as feedbacks and interdependencies.
Sustainability and Behavior
Taubman College, SNRE and Ford School
Three faculty positions
Faculty leads: Arun Agrawal, Jonathan Levine and Carl Simon
An important key to a successful approach to sustainability is the human behavioral response. Consumers routinely eschew environmentally sound, money-saving activities, such as the use of energy-efficient fluorescent bulbs, smart thermostats and low-flow showerheads. Yet if they were widely adopted, currently available technologies could reduce global greenhouse gas emissions to levels within the capacity of earth systems to process sustainably. This cluster will address the fundamental questions of why people behave the way they do in different socio-economic, organizational/institutional, and structural contexts and what can be done to encourage behavioral changes that lead to more sustainable outcomes.
Urban Studies: Social Inequality and the Prospects of Equity and Sustainability in Southeastern Michigan
Taubman College, LSA and SSW
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Angela Dillard
This cluster will bring scholars and researchers together to examine the problems of 21st century urban areas in a region that is perhaps one of the most extreme expressions of the post-industrial condition. The study of southeastern Michigan offers a tremendous opportunity to address a global condition in a local compass and thus to dramatically expand the fields of urban studies. The cluster’s goal is the generation of both knowledge of and proposals for the region that are generalizable to other urban locations, both nationally and internationally. This cluster envisions the creation of a “Detroit School” of urban studies, which will contribute new ways of thinking, especially about equity and sustainability, to the range of fields and interests that urban studies intersects.
Proposals approved for funding in May 2010
Computational Media for Interactive Systems
Taubman College, CoE, School of Art & Design and School of Music, Theatre & Dance
Five faculty positions
Faculty lead: Satinder Singh Baveja
Genes, Environment and Behavior
LSA and Medical School
Five faculty positions
Faculty leads: Dr. Henry L. Paulson and Martin Sarter
The Mediterranean Perspective on Global History and Culture
Taubman College and LSA
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Michele Hannoosh
Rehabilitation Robotics
CoE, Medical School and School of Kinesiology
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Daniel Ferris
Reproductive Sciences
CoE and Medical School
Five faculty positions
Faculty leads: Dr. Timothy Johnson, Dr. Bishr Omary and Dr. Gary D. Smith
Proposals approved for funding in May 2009
Digital Environments
School of Information and LSA
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Gregory Dowd
Environment, Information and Sustainable Development: The Asia-Africa Nexus
School of Information, LSA and SNRE
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Paul N. Edwards
Financial Markets
Ross School, Law School, LSA and Ford School
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Susan Collins
Multiscale Cell Mechanics
CoE and Medical School
Five faculty positions
Faculty lead: Krishna Garikipati
Petascale Computing
CoE and LSA
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Sharon Glotzer
Sustainable Built Environment
Taubman College, CoE and SNRE
Three faculty positions
Faculty lead: Nancy G. Love
Proposals approved for funding in April 2008
Data Mining, Learning and Discovery with Massive Datasets
CoE and LSA
Five faculty positions
Faculty lead: Douglas Richstone
Energy Storage
CoE, LSA and SNRE
Five faculty positions
Faculty lead: Gary Was
Global Change: Cryosphere and Sea-Level Impacts
CoE and LSA
Three faculty positions
Faculty lead: Christopher Poulsen
Global HIV/AIDS
LSA, Medical School and School of Nursing
Five faculty positions
Faculty lead: Valerie Traub
Microbial Ecology: Relationships to Human and Environmental Health
LSA, Medical School and SPH
Four faculty positions
Faculty lead: Deborah Goldberg
Social Science and Energy
LSA and Ford School
Three faculty positions
Faculty lead: Carl Simon
Information about all these proposals is available at www.provost.umich.edu/faculty/faculty_initiative/funded_proposals.html.
