Matt Pelton, assistant professor of physics, has received the prominent CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to advance his research on vibrating nanoparticles. His award totals approximately $650,000 over five years, and his research will focus on how nanoparticles act in various liquids, to understand the unique ways in which mechanical energy flows at the nanometer scale.

“We congratulate Dr. Pelton on his NSF CAREER Award, a recognition of his work and dedication to impacting other scientific fields through his research,” said Karl V. Steiner, vice president for research. “This recognition of Dr. Pelton adds to our growing list of outstanding young faculty who are receiving this high level of peer-based recognition from NSF and other sources.”

Scientists understand how conventional liquids, like water, behave on ordinary time and length scales, and how individual molecules make up liquids, but there is less understanding about liquids on intermediate scales. Pelton has developed a method based on ultrafast laser spectroscopy of vibrating metal nanoparticles suspended in liquids to understand the complex properties and molecular interactions of ordinary liquids.

“It’s like ringing a bell, but on a much smaller scale,” Pelton says of his work. When a bell is rung, it vibrates many times, and if the bell was rung and then submerged in water, it would ring fewer times than when it was not in water, he explains. And if the same bell was rung and then submerged in honey, a viscous liquid, the bell would only ring once or twice.

The nanoparticles in liquids that Pelton studies vibrate a few billion times per second, and can be manipulated with laser pulses. These pulses cause the nanoparticles to expand and vibrate, but like a bell, they react differently depending on the liquid that they are in. Pelton is working to understand how long the nanoparticles vibrate when hit with laser pulses, and where the energy goes as the particle moves.

It is known that particles on fast time scales and short length scales do not act the way that the particles on ordinary scales behave. Pelton explains that sometimes liquids act like a solid, giving the example of cornstarch mixed with water. The mixture acts like a liquid if somebody pushes slowly on it with their finger, but someone presses quickly enough, the particles in the mixture cannot move out of the way and the mixture appears to behave like a solid. Pelton’s research shows that this happens even for an ordinary liquid, such as water, if you push on it quickly enough — such as with a vibrating nanoparticle.

By contributing new knowledge about the complex properties of liquids, Pelton’s work will expand understanding of the function of biological molecules, which live in a liquid environment, and of potential new molecular sensors based on vibrating nanoparticles.

Beyond the research methodologies and findings, Pelton shares that UMBC has allowed him to create his own, independent research group and train the “next generation of scientists in an environment that emphasizes inclusive excellence.”

“I’m particularly happy to receive the CAREER award because it recognizes both of these goals: effective teaching and innovative research,” Pelton says. “It allows me to pursue a research project that will form a cornerstone of my longer-term scientific program as a researcher and educator: to understand the unique ways in which energy flows at the nanometer scale.”

In the last two decades, UMBC faculty have received 30 NSF CAREER awards. Helena Mentis, assistant professor of information systems, is the most recent previous recipient of a CAREER award for over half a million dollars to advance her research on gesture-based tools that can be used by remote surgeons to share expert knowledge in the operating room.

Image: Matt Pelton works with a student in his lab. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC. 

I started with UMBC over 8 years ago as a Business Specialist with the GEST and JCET Centers, promoted to Business Manager 3 years later.  I now manage all of GPHI and some of the JCET faculty members.  I, truly, love my job and enjoy working with everyone in GPHI and JCET.  I am honored that 4 of my faculty members took the time to nominate me for the award.

Our very own INDS student, Alyson Stetyick, whose concentration is in Organizational Development, has recently been accepted into UNC Charlotte's Organizational Science PhD Program as a fully-funded doctoral student!

Organizational Science is an interdisciplinary field of inquiry focusing on employee and organizational health, well-being, and effectiveness. Organizational Science is both a science and a practice, founded on the notion that enhanced understanding leads to applications and interventions that benefit the individual, work groups, the organization, the customer, the community, and the larger society in which the organization operates. Doctoral students are involved in field work, research, applied internships, and charity consulting operations through the program's self-run Organizational Science Center, which focuses on providing aid to local non-profits. 

The discipline stems from (in alphabetical order): Human Resources Management, Industrial/Organizational Psychology, Organizational Behavior, Organizational Communication, Organizational Sociology and Social Psychology. The program itself spans four departments within UNC Charlotte - the Departments of Psychological Sciences, Communications Studies, Sociology, and the Belk School of Business. Doctoral students are encouraged to co-enroll within Master's programs aligned with these departments within the school; as such, I will also be earning a Master's Degree in Industrial/Organizational Psychology. Graduates currently have a 100% employment rate. 

The American Council on Education (ACE), has announced that Anne Brodsky has been named an ACE fellow for academic year 2016-17. Brodsky, an associate dean of the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences and professor of psychology, is one of just 33 fellows selected nationwide following a rigorous nomination and application process.

Established in 1965, the ACE Fellows Program is designed to strengthen institutions and leadership in American higher education by identifying and preparing faculty and staff for senior positions in college and university administration.

Nearly 2,000 higher education leaders have participated in the ACE Fellows Program over the past five decades, with more than 80 percent of fellows having served as senior leaders of colleges and universities.

“The ACE Fellows Program cultivates leaders prepared to meet the constantly evolving challenges of today’s higher education landscape,” said ACE President Molly Corbett Broad in a press release announcing this year’s class. “The diverse and talented 2016-17 fellows class demonstrates why the program has been such a vital contributor for more than a half-century to expanding the leadership pipeline for our colleges and universities.”

“I am excited to follow in the footsteps of the UMBC faculty who have participated in this fellowship before me and the ACE fellows who have visited and been hosted by UMBC over the years,” shares Brodsky.

Dr. Brodsky is a community/clinical psychologist and her teaching, research, and practice focus is on resilience, psychological sense of community, and the role of communities in creating and resisting societal risks and oppressions, including violence, poverty, racism, and sexism. Her research was featured in the fall 2014 edition of UMBC Magazine, and she was the recipient of the 2014 Society for Community Research and Action (SCRA) Award for Distinguished Contributions to Theory and Research in Community Psychology.

“This fellowship provides me with an excellent opportunity to expand on what I’ve learned during my four years as an associate dean in CAHSS and previous years as associate chair of psychology and director of gender and women’s studies. I look forward to gaining new insights from my placement site, ACE training activities, and my ACE fellowship colleagues and bringing that knowledge back to UMBC,” Brodsky explains, adding, “I am particularly interested in issues of access, inclusion, participation, and retention at all levels of the university, as well as initiatives to promote the co-equal synergy of STEM, the social sciences, and all the liberal arts – a synergy that is necessary to contribute to changes in the real world that serve to enhance the university’s value to the community.”

The ACE Fellows Program combines retreats, interactive learning opportunities, campus visits, and placement at another higher education institution to condense years of on-the-job experience and skills development into a single semester or year. Fellows will focus on an issue of concern to their institution while spending the next academic year working with a college or university president and other senior officers at a host institution.

Throughout their placement, ACE fellows will develop a network of higher education leaders from across the country and abroad through the program’s three retreats on higher education issues organized by ACE. Fellows will also read extensively in the field and engage in interactive learning opportunities to increase their understanding of higher education challenges and opportunities. Read more about the ACE Fellows Program.

Image: Anne Brodsky. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.