SEAS program manager Williams-Hudson elected to police panel
Jazmin Williams-Hudson, DEI program manager in the School for Environment and Sustainability, was elected to represent non-union staff on the U-M Police Department Oversight Committee for a two-year term that began this month. The oversight committee receives and makes recommendations regarding grievances against any police officer deputized by the university. The committee includes two students, two faculty members (one Senate and one non-Senate faculty), and two staff members (one union and one non-union) who are elected by their peers. More information on the committee is available at hr.umich.edu/pdoc.
SPH renames department to reflect commitment to health equity
The School of Public Health’s Department of Health Behavior and Health Education has been renamed the Department of Health Behavior and Health Equity, effective Aug. 15. The new name reflects the department’s increasing focus on issues of health equity in research, teaching and service. “Health equity is at the core of our mission and actions in public health,” said SPH Dean F. DuBois Bowman. With more than 40 faculty members, 135 students, 75 staff members and 1,700 alumni working across the globe, the Department of Health Behavior and Health Equity is committed to advancing health, reducing preventable illness and promoting health equity through the application of research, teaching, service and practice that promotes health and quality of life across diverse populations. Established in 1975, the department houses eight interdisciplinary research centers and initiatives, and offers a Master of Public Health and doctoral degree programs, as well as many dual-degree options for students. Read more about the name change.
UM-Flint part of $1.7M study on the impact of native plant lawns
The U.S. National Science Foundation and the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation have announced a $1.76 million grant to Rebecca Tonietto, associate professor of biology at UM-Flint, and her collaborators, to study the effects of converting turfgrass lawns into native plant species. The project, titled “Conservation potential of converting urban turf lawns to native plants,” will advance knowledge of how the identity of species within ecological communities is shaped and insights can be applied to public and residential areas. This is expected to bolster urban ecosystem services like pollinator support, water filtration, cooling, and carbon sequestration. Tonietto is a co-principal investigator on the project alongside Rebecca Barak, conservation scientist with the Chicago Botanic Garden; Liz Anna Kozik, a postdoctoral researcher at the Chicago Botanic Garden; and Lauren Umek, project manager for the Chicago Parks District. The research will be conducted during a five-year period on the UM-Flint campus in addition to seven park locations throughout Chicago and the Chicago Botanic Garden. Read more about the project.
Research forecasts warmer, rainier winter storms for Great Lakes region
Anyone who’s spent their winter months around the Great Lakes has probably experienced living through three seasons in a single weekend. According to new research from U-M, these wild weather swings are poised to become even more common in the future. Behind this forecast is an analysis spanning decades of data about large storm systems known as midlatitude cyclones or extratropical cyclones. These are important drivers of winter weather in the Great Lakes region, but the extent of their connection to the region’s mercurial climate patterns has been underexplored, said Ayumi Fujisaki-Manome, associate research scientist in the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research. On one hand, the new analysis of historical weather data underscored what researchers knew about the cyclones — the storms are highly variable. But within that inconsistency, the researchers resolved a significant trend. On average, the air masses carried by these storms are warming at a faster clip than the background climate warming level in the Great Lakes region. The storms are also carrying more moisture. Read more about this research.
Human-wildlife overlap to affect more than half of Earth’s land by 2070
As the human population grows, more than half of Earth’s land will experience an increasing overlap between humans and animals by 2070, according to a U-M study. Greater human-wildlife overlap could lead to more conflict between people and animals, say the U-M researchers. But understanding where the overlap is likely to occur — and which animals are likely to interact with humans in specific areas — will be crucial information for urban planners, conservationists and countries that have pledged international conservation commitments. “We found that the overlap between populations of humans and wildlife will increase across about 57% of the global lands, but it will decrease across only about 12% of the global lands. We also found that agricultural and forest areas will experience substantial increases of overlap in the future,” said Deqiang Ma, lead author of the study and a postdoctoral research fellow at the U-M Institute for Global Change Biology in the School for Environment and Sustainability. The study showed that the human-wildlife overlap will be driven by human population growth rather than climate change. Read more about this study.
— Compiled by James Iseler, The University Record
