Virtual reality (VR) uses advanced display and immersive audio technologies to create an interactive, three-dimensional image or environment. Augmented reality (AR) uses digital technology to overlay video and audio onto the physical world to provide information and embellish our experiences. This is the first in a series of articles showing how University researchers cross disciplines to collaborate on VR/AR innovations that will revolutionize how we learn, discover, heal, and create.

Research shows that action-based video games can enhance visual attention. So might VR games do the same — to even a greater degree because of the increased level of immersion?

Duje Tadin, associate professor of brain and cognitive sciences; Jeffrey Bazarian, professor of emergency medicine; and Feng (Vankee) Lin, assistant professor in the School of Nursing, hope to answer that question.

They have secured grant funding from Arts, Sciences & Engineering, the Medical Center, and the School of Nursing to study the effects of VR brain training on three groups:

• Healthy individuals, whose results would provide a baseline measure.
• People with mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) resulting from concussions.
• Older adults with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), a group at high risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease, but still with the possibility of recovering normal function.

“Much of the existing research on brain plasticity in adults has focused on healthy adults,” says Tadin, who studies the neural mechanisms of visual perception. However, Tadin’s own recent research has shown that brain-training video games can improve the peripheral vision of children with poor eyesight. So, “the people who might benefit the most from this work are those who have decrements in their attention or cognitive abilities,” he says.

Lin, a leading researcher on cognitive aging in older adults, studies the use of computerized cognitive training to help slow cognitive decline. Bazarian studies concussions and other traumatic brain injuries with an eye toward preventing, diagnosing, and treating them.

“All three of us are studying the brain, but in different disciplines,” Tadin says. “And I think the biggest scientific advancements come not from within a discipline, but from branching out.”

Wearing an Oculus headset and using the NeuroTrainer software, the study participants must keep track of specified objects—basketballs on a court, for example—in their visual field. As the difficulty level increases, there is more visual sensory input presented across a broader area, along with the introduction of surprising or unexpected elements.

“We’re basically taking the key components of video games, using them in an immersive VR setting, and then collecting the data with eye-tracking technology,” says Tadin.

Ideally, by the time the researchers complete their study roughly a year from now, the next generation of VR equipment will be more user-friendly and affordable. “Right now, you need special hardware that’s tethered to a computer, one that requires a high-performance video card,” Tadin says. Meanwhile, the mobile or cardboard box-style headsets often have problems with flickering.

But the future is near—and the Rochester researchers are poised to bring therapeutic interventions harnessing VR technology to their patients. “Oculus has a stand-alone model, Oculus Go, coming out sometime this year,” notes Tadin. “If we have our intervention worked out by the time the next generation of hardware comes out, we’ll be ahead of the curve.”

Read more here including how this collaboration came about.

The University has launched a national search for a new director of its Goergen Institute for Data Science.

The University has made a $100 million commitment to data science, which it has identified as its top research priority.

“We’re not bringing in someone to build a program, but to bring it to the next level,” says Wendi Heinzelman, dean of the Hajim School of Engineering & Applied Sciences. Heinzelman and Gloria Culver, dean of the School of Arts & Sciences, will serve as co-chairs of a University search committee comprised primarily of faculty members.

Henry Kautz, the current Robin and Tim Wentworth Director of the Goergen Institute for Data Science, is stepping down after leading the institute since its founding in 2014.

Ehsan Hoque, the Asaro-Biggar ’92 Family Fellow in Data Science and assistant professor of computer science, will serve as interim director while the search is conducted.

“We are very grateful for Henry’s commitment and tireless efforts that have brought the Institute to where it is today,” Culver says.

Under Kautz, the Goergen Institute:

• Launched bachelor’s and master’s programs that are growing every year.
• Created a NY Center of Excellence and a Rochester Data Science Consortium to further collaborations with local companies.
• Obtained National Science Foundation funding for a summer research experience for undergraduates (REU) program, and a research traineeship (NRT) program that provides cross-training for PhD students in computer science, brain and cognitive sciences, and data science.
• Hired four faculty through interdisciplinary searches.
• Developed of a number of research initiatives focused on data science in health care and human and machine intelligence.
• Provided seed funding for 12 collaborative research projects by University faculty in those areas.
• Moved into Wegmans Hall, its new home, last summer.

Read more here.

Using new data gathered from sites in southern Africa, University researchers have extended their record of Earth’s magnetic field back thousands of years to the first millennium.

The record provides historical context to help explain recent, ongoing changes in the magnetic field, most prominently in an area in the Southern Hemisphere known as the South Atlantic Anomaly.

“We’ve known for quite some time that the magnetic field has been changing, but we didn’t really know if this was unusual for this region on a longer timescale, or whether it was normal,” says Vincent Hare, who recently completed a postdoctoral associate appointment in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences (EES), and is lead author of a paper published in Geophysical Research Letters.

The magnetic field that surrounds Earth not only dictates whether a compass needle points north or south, but also protects the planet from harmful radiation from space. Nearly 800,000 years ago, the poles were switched: north pointed south and vice versa. The poles have never completely reversed since, but for the past 160 years, the strength of the magnetic field has been decreasing at an alarming rate. The region where it is weakest, and continuing to weaken, is a large area stretching from Chile to Zimbabwe called the South Atlantic Anomaly.

In order to put these relatively recent changes into historical perspective, Rochester researchers—led by John Tarduno, a professor and chair of EES—gathered data from sites in southern Africa, which is within the South Atlantic Anomaly, to compile a record of Earth’s magnetic field strength over many centuries. Data previously collected by Tarduno and Rory Cottrell, an EES research scientist, together with theoretical models developed by Eric Blackman, a professor of physics and astronomy at Rochester, suggest the core region beneath southern Africa may be the birthplace of recent and future pole reversals.

“We were looking for recurrent behavior of anomalies because we think that’s what is happening today and causing the South Atlantic Anomaly,” Tarduno says. “We found evidence that these anomalies have happened in the past, and this helps us contextualize the current changes in the magnetic field.”

The researchers discovered that the magnetic field in the region fluctuated from 400-450 AD, from 700-750 AD, and again from 1225-1550 AD. This South Atlantic Anomaly, therefore, is the most recent display of a recurring phenomenon in Earth’s core beneath Africa that then affects the entire globe.

“We’re getting stronger evidence that there’s something unusual about the core-mantel boundary under Africa that could be having an important impact on the global magnetic field,” Tarduno says.

Read more here.

A decade ago, debilitating back pain led Doug Guiffrida, a professor at the Warner School and a licensed mental health counselor, to explore mindfulness practice for relief. He began seeing results.

Last semester, he used a Bridging Fellowship from the University to get an up-close look at a growing, powerful mind-body approach to healing chronic pain that included integrating an emotionally-focused therapy called “Intensive Short Term Dynamic Psychotherapy” (ISTDP). Guiffrida’s fellowship allowed him to study under and collaborate with William Watson, an associate professor in psychiatry and neurology at the Medical Center, who uses ISTDP to treat people suffering from somatic seizures.

Since 1980 about 80 faculty members have taken advantage of Bridging Fellowships to to step away from their area of expertise to explore work in other disciplines. The collaborations that ensue can be both productive and long lasting. (Read more here.)

Guiffrida’s fellowship allowed him to develop and study, with graduate student Jennifer Farah, a chronic pain group at East Ridge Family Medicine. In addition, the fellowship provided an opportunity for Guiffrida to start a private practice in which he has successfully treated patients suffering from such chronic pain conditions as migraine headaches and fibromyalgia.

The fellowship “opened me up to a whole new world of possibilities for healing chronic pain. We may have limited access to some resources in Rochester, but in my case I got lucky. I was able to work directly with experts at URMC who are on the cutting edge of mind-body medicine,” Guiffrida say in a Q&A at the Warner website. “While I continue to study and teach on my prior research areas of college student retention and clinical supervision, this experience has opened up a whole new professional trajectory for me.”

Guiffrida is in the planning stages of creating a new 15-credit advanced certificate at the University that would focus on mind-body approaches to healing and wellness. For people who are already trained and licensed in health care, the new interdisciplinary program, offered in collaboration with the Warner School and Medical Center, would provide a broader exposure to mind-body medicine.

“I also plan to apply for funding to support future research in this area,” Guiffrida says. “Specifically, I am interested studying the potential of mind-body medicine as one step in solving the country’s opioid crisis.  Nearly all of my patients are on large doses of opioids when they begin seeing me, and most have been able to reduce or completely eliminate their use after treatment.”

DEADLINE TODAY TO APPLY FOR BRIDGING FELLOWSHIPS

The Provost’s Office invites applications for Bridging Fellowships for academic year 2018–19.

The program releases members from departmental obligations for one semester to allow them to move to another part of the University for the purpose of learning aspects of another discipline. The distinctive feature of Bridging Fellowships is that they are for study in an area that is peripheral to the fellow’s central professional concern, and they permit the acquisition of knowledge and methods in a different field. These fellowships are thus distinct from academic leaves, so holding a Bridging Fellowship does not affect subsequent consideration for such leaves.

All proposals must contain a clear account of goals for the project and how the project will benefit the academic programs of the University. The dean of the school must approve proposals before forwarding to the Provost’s Office. Direct questions on the fellowship and application process to Marisa Wilson. The application deadline is Friday, March 2.

The Humanities Center has announced two external and four internal fellows for the academic year 2018-19, when the center’s theme will be “Expertise and Evidence,” says Joan Shelley Rubin, the Ani & Mark Gabrellian Director of the Humanities Center.

“The ability to host external fellows distinguishes the best humanities centers from the rest of the pack, and I am delighted that we have been able to sustain our effort to become a ‘destination center,’”  Rubin says. “The applicant pool this year was even stronger than in the past.  All of the applicants for internal fellowships were likewise terrific, and we hope to accommodate in the future those we had to exclude in this round.”

The external fellows are:

• Chris Haufe, associate professor of philosophy at Case Western Reserve University. Haufe’s research concerns how the concept of “fruitfulness” gives “certain ideas their unusual generative capacity.”  His work intersects with both the sciences and the humanities. He will join the center in September and remain until mid-May.
• Meina Yates-Richard, assistant professor of English at Syracuse University. Yates-Richard is a scholar of African-American literature and culture who “investigates sound as a mode of traumatic testimony for African diasporic populations and as a force arbitrating Western affective and political relations.”  She is particularly interested in issues of gender as they pertain to hearing or “disavowing” black maternal figures. She will also join the center for the entire academic year.

The internal fellows are:

• Lihong Liu, assistant professor of art history/visual and cultural studies (Fall 2018). Liu plans to finish writing her book The Real Scene:  On the Matter of Painting, China 1450-1550.  Among other questions, her project explores “why and how Chinese scholar-painters elevated painting as an acclaimed expertise” in light of government-sponsored “orthodox, classical learning.”
• Kathryn Mariner, assistant professor of anthropology (Fall 2018). Mariner will primarily work on her new ethnographic, community-engaged project Disparate Geographies:  Racial Landscapes in Rochester, New York.  She will investigate “how historical conditions of race and class inequality shape the way the very problem of violence is constructed” and how the potential for violence is perceived.
• Anna Rosensweig, assistant professor of modern languages and cultures (Spring 2019). Rosensweig intends to complete her book Tragic Opposition:  Rights of Resistance on the Early Modern Stage. Her project “brings into relief how the conceptual structure of the droit de resistance relies on notions of political expertise and evidence.”  She will analyze how a set of dramas “sustain and rework the ties that bind subjective freedom and collective authority.”
• William Miller, assistant professor of English (Spring 2019). Miller’s project is to finish his book on the concept of enthusiasm and the figure of the enthusiast in the intellectual and literary climate of the seventeenth century.  He will pay special attention to links between enthusiasm and witchcraft, as well as to Mohammed in the discourse of enthusiasm.  He will also extend his focus to include religious enthusiasm in the Rochester area during the eighteenth century.

Michele Rucci has joined the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences as a professor. “I’ve always been interested in how light gives rise to subjective experiences and how humans interpret it,” he says. At the University of Florence and later the Scuola Superiore S. Anna in Pisa, Rucci studied biomedical engineering and the ways machines extract information to build an image. He continued this work as a professor at Boston University, focusing on visual perception in humans. Using a combination of head- and eye-tracking tools, virtual reality, and robots, Rucci’s current research brings together aspects of neuroscience, engineering, and computer science to study how we see. “We are interested in how vision works in humans. How do photons of light impinging on the retina get transformed into a world that is meaningful to us? How do we recognize faces? How do we reach for objects? The way we approach these questions is by studying vision together with the motor activities and behaviors we as humans perform,” Rucci explains in a Q&A with Lindsey Valich.

Xiaowen (Cindy) Wang, a Medical Center graduate student, who is the first-place winner of this year’s “America’s Got Regulatory Science Talent” competition. She proposed developing a collaborative drug repurposing database to promote new research directions, novel clinical trial designs, and biomarker identifications. She will present her proposal in person at the FDA in April. Read more here.

The nomination process for the inaugural winner of the College Award for Undergraduate Teaching and Research Mentorship ends today.

The award, funded by Frederic and Susan Rice Lewis, recognizes a tenured faculty member in Arts, Sciences & Engineering who excels as a scholar, teacher, and mentor of undergraduate students. It salutes those tenured faculty members who teach large, introductory classes, as well as advanced seminars, independent study projects, and mentor research experiences, especially those that involve laboratory training in the sciences and engineering.

Detailed instructions can be found here. All nominations must be submitted by today, March 2,  via email to collegedean@ur.rochester.edu. One $20,000 award will be given annually at the Undergraduate Research Exposition in April. Selections will be made by Jeffrey Runner, dean of the College; Gloria Culver, dean of the School of Arts & Sciences; and Wendi Heinzelman, dean of the Hajim School of Engineering & Applied Sciences. Read more here.

An interactive symposium, “Ever Better Teams: A CTSI Team Science Summit,” will feature a keynote presentation by a leading expert on collaborative science and breakout sessions for networking and dialogue on the future of team science at URMC.

The symposium, which will be held from 1 to 5 p.m. May 17, is hosted by the Clinical and Translational Science Institute.

Gaetano “Guy” Lotrecchiano, an associate professor of clinical research and leadership at The George Washington University, will give the keynote presentation. His research focuses on a number of theoretical areas, including transdisciplinary research, threats to teaming, change management, and integration learning.

Contact Oksana Babiy with any questions.

The Center for AIDS Research announces three new pilot opportunities for the spring of 2018, with funding up to $50,000 in direct costs per pilot.  All opportunities require an investigator from each site (University of Rochester and University of Buffalo) and that the submitting investigator hold an appointment at Rochester. Earliest start date is May 1, 2018.  End date must be April 20, 2019.   All applications are due by April 9 at 5 p.m.

See the CFAR Pilot Funding Opportunities page and the specific RFA’s for additional information.

• CFAR 2018 Spring Therapeutic Discovery & Development Pilots RFA 
• CFAR 2018 Spring Junior Faculty HIV/AIDS Pilots RFA 
• CFAR 2018 Spring General HIV/AIDS Pilots RFA

The pilot opportunities are intended to help investigator teams generate preliminary data that will facilitate the submission of subsequent competitive proposals for NIH or other grants.

Contact the CFAR administrator (Laura_Enders@urmc.rochester.edu) for additional information on eligibility, budgeting guidelines, and required cost sharing forms no later than March 23.

Rebecca Berman, Optics, “Efficient Light Collection in Solar Concentrating Systems.” 9 a.m. March 6, 2018. Douglass Community Room. Advisor: Duncan Moore.

Today: “Critical Medical Ecological Perspectives on Diabetes in the Pacific Islands: Colonialism, Power, and Balance in Human-Environment Interaction over Time,” presented by Timothy Dye, professor of obstetrics and gynecology, pediatrics, public health sciences, and medical informatics. Public Health Grand Rounds. Noon to 1 p.m. Ryan Case Method Room (1-9576), Medical Center.

Today: Deadline to nominate tenured faculty members in AS&E for the College Award for Undergraduate Teaching and Research Mentorship. Detailed instructions can be found here.

Today: Deadline to apply for Bridging Fellowships from the Provost’s Office. Direct questions on the fellowship and application process to Marisa Wilson.

March 5: Applications due for pilot and feasibility awards of up to $50,000 for basic science and translational projects that advance our understanding of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias, through the Rochester Center for Alzheimer’s Disease Research, in conjunction with the Ernest J. Del Monte Institute for Neuroscience. Click here for additional information and RFA.

March 7: “’If a lie may do thee grace’: Shifts of Memory in Shakespeare’s Second Tetralogy.” Presented by Jonathan Baldo, professor of English. Jesse L. Rosenberger Work-in-Progress Seminar Series. Noon. Humanities Center Conference Room D.

March 7: “Helping Babies Breathe” by Nirupam Laroia, professor of pediatrics, who will describe her experiences with the global health initiative for decreasing infant mortality. 18th Annual Anne E. Dyson Memorial Grand Rounds and Child Advocacy Forum. 8 a.m. to 11 a.m., Class of ’62 Auditorium.

March 19: Deadline to submit nominations for the Furth Award, given to junior, tenure track faculty appointed in natural or biological science departments within Arts, Sciences & Engineering or the School of Medicine and Dentistry.  Read more here.

April 9: Deadline to submit proposals for three Center for AIDS Research pilot grants. See the CFAR Pilot Funding Opportunities page and the specific RFA’s for additional information.  Contact the CFAR administrator (Laura_Enders@urmc.rochester.edu) for additional information on eligibility, budgeting guidelines, and required cost sharing forms no later than March 23.

April 12: “The American Health Paradox: What’s Missing?” Presented by Nancy Bennett, professor of medicine and public health sciences, director of the Center for Community Health, and co-director of the Clinical and Translational Science Institute. Phelps Colloquium Series. 4-5:30 p.m., Helen Wood Hall. Click here to register.

April 20-21: UpStat 2018: Better Living Through Statistics conference. A friendly and empowering annual gathering of statisticians, applied mathematicians, computer scientists, engineers, and data scientists from upstate New York and its neighboring regions. We are interested in contributions to statistical methodology as well as to statistical practice, consulting, and education. Read more.

April 28: All In: When Theory Meets Practice in Education Reform. Symposium sponsored by the Warner School Center for Urban Education Success (CUES). 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., East High School. Free and open to the public. Read more.

May 15: Respiratory Pathogens Research Center Scientific Symposium. Featured speakers, lectures by RPRC investigators, poster session. Lunch and refreshments provided. 7:45 a.m. to 6:30 pm., Saunders Research Building. Registration is free, but pre-registration is required by April 27 at RPRCSymposium.urmc.edu

May 17: “Ever Better Teams: A CTSI Team Science Summit.” Interactive symposium featuring keynote presentation by Gaetano “Guy” Lotrecchiano, an associate professor of clinical research and leadership at The George Washington University, and breakout sessions for networking and dialogue on the future of team science at URMC. 1 to 5 p.m. Hosted by the Clinical and Translational Science Institute. Contact Oksana Babiy with any questions.