Science: Exploring our world and ourselves

Tucson and the University of Arizona have a long history of significant scientific accomplishments.

Modern ecology was invented on Tumamoc Hill about 100 years ago as the result of a partnership between the Carnegie Institution and the city's Chamber of Commerce. The science of dendrochronology - using the annual rings of trees to answer questions about the natural world - was invented here.

It's no accident that these and other scientific disciplines had their start in the then-tiny town of Tucson. The rich history of science and technology in our community is driven and supported by a strong science tradition at the UA.

Today discoveries flow from the Large Binocular Telescope, which as the largest telescope in the world will be fabulous at looking for other habitable planets in our universe. North of Tucson is Biosphere 2, which has unrivaled capabilities for research about the effects of global climate change on our planet.

The cluster of high-technology companies focusing on optics stems from the UA's great strength in optical sciences. In addition, the depth of our region's scientific expertise now is drawing companies that focus on green technologies and biotechnology.

These strengths bring great minds and inspired people together in our community to create knowledge and put it to work. Never has this been more true than now, and this gives our community the edge in the tough competition of the global economy.

Top scientists from around the world are here exercising their imaginations and talents and are contributing to our city, our state and our country in profound ways. From their new ideas new businesses will grow and new and better ways of tackling society's problems will emerge.

I want to share with you the exciting range of scientific discoveries being made in the UA College of Science. This special section describes just a small number of science investigations happening at the UA.

Some of the research has obvious implications for the treatment of diseases or addresses ecological concerns with implications for our standard of living and the overall health of our planet. Some research simply seeks answers about the world we live in - from the bottom of the ocean to the most distant galaxies.

The key is discovery. What drives scientists is the fleeting moment of realizing that she or he has just learned something that nobody else knows. Our hope and desire at the UA College of Science is that we not only create significant amounts of knowledge - but that we also transmit this knowledge to our students, our community and to the world at large.

As you read through our stories, you will learn about the amazing science conducted in the UA College of Science and about our many programs that share science with our community.

These are extraordinary times for science. We are learning about our world and ourselves faster than any other time in the history of mankind. Our standard of living has improved dramatically because of what we know about our bodies and because of how we can manipulate matter and energy.

I hope you enjoy this small sample of the world's best science and that you feel as proud as I do of being part of this community.

About the dean

Joaquin Ruiz is the executive dean of the UA Colleges of Letters, Arts and Science and the dean of the College of Science, which comprises four schools, 15 departments and nine programs and centers and has more than 6,500 undergraduate and graduate students and about 1,500 faculty and staff.

Ruiz was honored in 2010 by Mexico's president as an outstanding Mexican researcher; one of the first Mexican scholars living abroad to be so recognized. He is also a member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences. Also this year, Ruiz was elected president of the Geological Society of America. Ruiz joined the geosciences department in 1983, was named department head in 1995, dean of the College of Science in 2000 and exexcutive dean in 2008.

Ruiz's lab discovered in 2002 that more than 40 percent of the world's gold is 3 billion years old.

Chat with the dean

Join Joaquin Ruiz at azstarnet.com/sciencechat Tuesday at 10 a.m. to talk about world-class science and discoveries at UA.

E-mail Joaquin Ruiz at uasci@email.arizona.edu

Stay informed

Go to cos.arizona.edu to subscribe to the UA Science e-newsletter. Sign up at the bottom right-hand side of the web page under "Stay Informed."

Seeking a way to connect community members with the UA College of Science, Dean Joaquin Ruiz and his Board of Advisors created the Galileo Circle, a society of committed individuals who support the college's students and faculty members in their educational and research pursuits.

Since 2001, Galileo Circle members have provided scholarships to more than 450 of the college's best and brightest undergraduate and graduate students. These students will be at the forefront of the world's future scientific innovations.

The Galileo Circle also recognizes the college's most distinguished faculty members as Galileo Circle Fellows. These scientists are academic scholars who demonstrate a deep understanding over a broad range of science, a willingness to think in a truly interdisciplinary way, and an ability to inspire colleagues and students alike.

This recognition and a $5,000 award create possibilities for Galileo Circle Fellows to pursue novel research or launch ground-breaking projects to take their science to the next level.

"Through their annual contributions, Galileo Circle members are taking part in the excitement of fostering scientific discoveries that will profoundly affect our community and our world. We welcome new members who want to share in this exciting opportunity," says Lesley G. Goldfarb, chair of the Galileo Circle and member of the Dean's Board of Advisors.

Dean's Board of Advisors

Arthur Lee Herbst (board chair), Lesley G. Goldfarb (Galileo Circle chair), Lawrence J. Aldrich, Susan B. Butler, Ronald D. Carsten, Carlotta B. Chernoff, Robert L. Davis, Sally S. Drachman Salvatore (emerita), Robert A. Esperti , Kenneth R. Evans, Kirtland C. Gardner, James M. Gentile, Thomas M. Grogan, Agnese Nelms Haury (emerita), Nils Hasselmo, Gary Jones, Lee B. Jones, Michael J. Kaiserman, I. Michael Kasser, Philip Lacovara, Sid Leach, Frank L. Lederman, Linda K. Lohse (emerita), James R. Patton Jr., David F. Peachin, Kathleen Perkins, James S. Pignatelli, Henry N. Pollack, John P. Schaefer, Sarah B. Smallhouse, Nick P. Soloway, Daniel B. Stephens, John F. Sutter, Janos Wilder, Raymond L. Woosley, Ruth H. Zollinger.

About the Directors

Bob Logan is senior director of development for UA Science and an MBA grad from the Eller College of Management. He has been at the UA for more than 23 years: first as a football coach under Larry Smith; then as UA associate director of athletics for development for 10 years; and finally in his current capacity in the College of Science since 2000. Under his leadership, the College of Science has grown into one of the largest development efforts on the UA campus. He has been responsible for many of the largest gifts to the UA including the $30 million gift from Philecology Foundation to manage Biosphere 2 and the $9 million gift from Agnese Haury to build the Bryant Bannister Tree-Ring Archive Building.

Cheryl K. Tomoeda, M.S., is associate director of development for UA Science, a speech-language pathologist and UA Science alumna. She came to UA Science in 2006 after a 22-year research career in the UA Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences.

More information about the Galileo Circle is at cos.arizona.edu Contact Logan at 621-4015, rlogan@u.arizona.edu; or Tomoeda at 621-1787, cherylt@email.arizona.edu

Gasping at the thin air, two men stagger onto a previously unclimbed summit in southwestern Tibet, 20,000 feet above sea level. Although relieved to be at the top and stunned by the spectacular views of surrounding Himalayan peaks, the real prize is the collection of rock samples the two University of Arizona geologists will gather on their way down the near-vertical slope.

The pair will take the rocks back to Tucson, where they will be studied to find out when they formed and how they moved through the Earth's crust. The elevation and climate histories of that region of the Himalayan mountain range also will be studied.

Some 35 professors and students in the UA Department of Geosciences are collaborating in a global study of major mountain ranges. Besides answering how, when and why major mountains form, the research is fundamentally changing the way scientists think about how mountains interact with the entire planetary system, from the Earth's core to the clouds above.

The work is difficult and sometimes dangerous, but UA geoscientists revel at the challenges of leading the scientific community toward new understandings of the world's mountains.

The Earth's crust is divided into about a dozen huge plates that bump and grind against one another as they move slowly around the Earth's surface.

Think slow-motion train wreck, with trains the size of continents. Where the plates collide, big mountains grow. The ongoing collision between the Indian plate and the Asian plate has uplifted the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau - an area equivalent to the entire western U.S.- to an average elevation of 15,500 feet, higher than the highest mountain in the lower 48 states.

Similarly, the collision of the Pacific and American plates has created the vast mountain chains called the Western Cordillera of the Americas, which stretches from the southern tip of South America to Alaska.

Each year, UA geoscientists spend months mapping and sampling rocks in remote areas in the world's highest mountains to understand the dynamics and causes of mountain-building.

The researchers deploy instruments so sensitive they can detect plate motions of only a few tenths of an inch per year. The instruments also measure the energy released in earthquakes so the researchers can create images of the Earth's mantle, hundreds of miles beneath mountain ranges.

The researchers study the structure and composition of the Earth's crust where it deforms at unimaginably large scales and also measure the nuclear properties of elements and crystal defects at the smallest scales.

Why such intense effort in far-flung places? For one thing, mountains create both resources and hazards critical to humans. We depend upon the water that the great mountain ranges wring from the atmosphere.

Erosion in mountains not only creates dramatic landscapes but also produces huge amounts of sediment that accumulate in topographic lows such as the Tucson basin.

In addition to the soil we farm for food, these basins hold groundwater, oil, gas and other resources. Volcanic eruptions and great earthquakes associated with mountain-building can kill thousands of people in minutes.

The UA geoscientists are finding that the long-term processes of mountain uplift and erosion dramatically influence weather patterns, global climate and the composition of the oceans.

The researchers' discoveries have far-reaching implications for climate change, global energy policy, land use and resource management.

Experience science

Studying the world's mountain ranges:

www.geo.arizona.edu/~reiners/cosa.htm

10 facts about UA Geosciences: www.geo.arizona.edu/pdf/factsheet_10.pdf

About the scientists

Peter DeCelles is a UA professor of geoscience whose research focuses on reconstructing the structural histories of mountain ranges and the sedimentary basins that form near them. He works in Nepal, Tibet, western North America, Bolivia, Argentina and the central Mediterranean region and is a fellow of The Explorers Club.

Peter Reiners is a UA professor of geoscience. His research focuses on geochemical approaches such as thermo-chronology to understand mountain-building and other Earth processes.

Medical imaging methods have revolutionized health care during the last 20 years. Yet pictures of a patient's anatomy often show diseased tissues that have reached stages that are too late for treatment.

Now, researchers in the University of Arizona's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry are developing the next revolution in medical imaging: molecular imaging methods that detect molecules that cause the earliest stages of diseases.

My colleagues and I are creating ways to use imaging to measure enzymes, the workhorse molecules responsible for most of the biological functions in the human body. Our research will lead to more personalized medical treatments by improving medical decisions for treating cancers and other diseases.

Just as students at the UA are graded on their performance on exams and essays rather than attendance, medical decisions should be made on the basis of the body's performance. Many inactive enzymes may not pose a threat, whereas just a few very active enzymes could.

However, we don't yet have good tools that allow doctors to make life-and-death decisions based on how well an enzyme is performing. Right now we can only look at the enzyme's attendance - how many molecules of a particular enzyme are present.

To solve that problem, Michelle Benson, a UA chemical engineering senior from Phoenix, is working on a method that uses MRI, magnetic resonance imaging, to measure the performance and the function of an enzyme molecule commonly known as PSA. The amount of PSA, prostate-specific antigen, is used to diagnose prostate cancer.

However, recent medical studies show that simply having a lot of the PSA molecules does not mean the man has a dangerous prostate cancer. Benson's research will create medical pictures that show where high-performing PSA is chopping normal tissues into tiny pieces, clearing a path for prostate cancer to grow and spread.

I served as Benson's instructor for her chemistry quantum mechanics course. It has been a great experience to see how she uses her chemistry coursework in her medical research. Another member of my research team, Tony Ward, is creating a chemical test that measures the performance of a similar enzyme called KLK6, which is involved in colon cancer.

KLK6's connection to colon cancer was discovered by researchers in the Arizona Cancer Center. Other researchers in the cancer center have built an endoscope that can scan the colon wall.

Working with researchers from many science backgrounds has been essential for combining Ward's chemical test with the endoscope to diagnose colon cancer. Ward earned his chemistry degree from the UA in 2009 and plans to enroll in the Cancer Biology Graduate Interdisciplinary Program next year.

In addition to identifying cancer, our molecular imaging tests help physicians predict what type of drug should be used to treat a specific cancer patient. That will allow a physician to tailor the drug treatment to the enzyme performance of each individual patient's tumor, providing personalized medicine for the patient.

Experience science

Biomedical engineering:

bme.engr.arizona.edu

Arizona Cancer Center:

www.azcc.arizona.edu

About the Scientist

Mark "Marty" Pagel is a UA associate professor of biomedical engineering and of chemistry and biochemistry. He is also a comprehensive member of the Arizona Cancer Center, where he directs the Contrast Agent Molecular Engineering Laboratory (CAMEL). Pagel's interdisciplinary research is also supported by the Advanced Research Institute for Biomedical Imaging, the Arizona Research Laboratories and BIO5 Institute. Pagel moved to the University of Arizona in 1998 and says CAMEL has found an ideal home in the desert.

The ongoing search for life on other planets reveals how fortunate we are to have the right balance of ingredients here on Earth. Our planet has 6.9 billion humans living on the Earth's land surface. This zone of the crust is critical because it provides us with fertile soil for growing food, clean water for drinking and habitat for a diversity of plants, microbes and animals. Precious landscape, indeed.

The "critical zone" stretches from the treetops to the bottom of the groundwater and can be thought of as a permeable, living filter in the larger Earth system. The thin green carpet of plants, microbes and animals directly controls how climate chisels away at the landscape, how it weathers rock to form soil and how it changes the quality of water during its transport.

Although scientists know a lot about the plant communities, soil fertility, geology and hydrology of the critical zone, we don't have a detailed understanding of how all the components interact to shape landscapes and clean and store our water. Therefore, the National Science Foundation and the European Commission recently created a network of 10 Critical Zone Observatories, six in the U.S. and four in Europe, to study this key component of our life-support system.

The University of Arizona is the headquarters of the Jemez River Basin-Santa Catalina Mountains Critical Zone Observatory.

This observatory, under the leadership of a group of faculty in the UA's School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, focuses on the Santa Catalina Mountains near Tucson and the Jemez Mountains north of Albuquerque. It is the only critical zone observatory that has research sites arrayed along elevation gradients in the semi-arid Southwest.

The mountains of Arizona and New Mexico host a range of rock types and climates. Temperatures and the amount of precipitation vary dramatically with elevation. Because geology and climate exert primary control over critical zone formation, the diversity in rock type and climate makes these mountains natural laboratories for critical zone science.

However, unraveling complex interactions among vegetation, soils, rocks and water requires close collaboration among ecologists, hydrologists, soil scientists and geologists. All of us must bring our state-of-the-art tools to the joint research effort.

Our UA-led team is setting up sensor networks in low, intermediate and high elevation watersheds in the two mountain ranges to measure how climate affects the flows of water and materials through vegetation, soils, groundwater and streams. We collect data on precipitation, soil moisture, plant uptake, aquifer recharge and stream flow during and between both rainfall and snowmelt.

During such events, members of our team of postdoctoral scientists, graduate students and undergraduate researchers rush to the field to collect samples of water, soil and plant tissue and bring them back for laboratory analyses.

We are discovering much about the critical zone. We are finding that soil depth and development strongly influence the partitioning of water in the landscape, the speed that it is delivered to streams and the unique chemical "fingerprint" it obtains during its journey.

Experience science

More about the critical zone:

www.czo.arizona.edu

UA Department of Soil, Water and Environmental Science:

ag.arizona.edu/SWES/

About the scientist

Jon Chorover is a UA professor of soil, water and environmental science. His research investigates the interaction of geochemical and biological processes in the critical zone. He is particularly interested in processes that influence the fate of metal and organic compounds. The research provides a foundation for novel approaches to remediation of impacted natural systems.

About the school

The School of Earth and Environmental Sciences generates knowledge, provides the scientific basis for environmental and climate policy and trains the next generation of earth and environmental scientists. The school comprises the Departments of Atmospheric Sciences, Geosciences, and Hydrology and Water Resources plus the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research and the Department of Soil, Water and Environmental Science.

In my laboratory, we study the biology of nitric oxide, a small two-atom molecule with a checkered past.

Nitric oxide is a reactive free-radical toxic oxidant found in car exhaust, yet is also required by all higher animals. Studies on the biology of nitric oxide can be traced to a 19th century Swedish dynamite factory, where employees of Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, found relief from angina while making nitroglycerin.

Relief for millions more would follow, but the discovery that nitroglycerin releases nitric oxide when consumed would take another 100 years. Like his invention, Nobel was a study in contrasts and used his profits from dynamite production to found the Nobel Prizes, including the Peace Prize.

We now know that nitric oxide is required for regulating blood pressure, tissue development and neuronal activity. We also know that nitric-oxide biology goes awry in heart disease, cancer progression, diabetes and sepsis shock.

Our laboratory examines how certain key proteins can safely interact with nitric oxide. Proteins, the tiny workhorses of the body, span only about 0.004 microns and come in 30,000 varieties. Most drugs either enhance or inhibit a specific protein.

We are particularly interested in the nitric-oxide receptor, soluble guanylyl cyclase, a protein which, when bound to nitric oxide, produces compounds that cause smooth muscle relaxation, inhibit arterial plaque and lower blood pressure.

We figure out the atomic structures of nitric-oxide-binding proteins and study how these proteins behave in live cells. Understanding how a protein works - and designing compounds to turn it on or off - is easier with a picture showing its shape and its atoms. This requires purifying and crystallizing the protein and obtaining a 3-D picture using X-ray diffraction.

We have benefited from an unlikely source: insects that use nitric oxide for smelling and eating. The kissing bug and the bedbug, two blood-sucking insects, have specialized proteins called nitrophorins to transport nitric oxide from saliva to victim, leading to vasodilation and a satisfying blood meal for the bug. We determined the nitrophorin atomic structure and discovered that nitrophorins trap nitric oxide in a deep, non-reactive heme-containing pocket for nitric oxide transport, snapping shut much like a Venus' flytrap. Upon injection, nitrophorin opens and releases nitric oxide into the victim.

Hawk moths produce nitric oxide in their antennae to help detect food and pheromones. We are using soluble guanylyl cyclase from hawk moths to uncover how new compounds, in clinical trial for cardiovascular disease, activate the protein and lower blood pressure. Hawk moth soluble guanylyl cyclase is more stable than the human protein and is a convenient tool for these studies.

We discovered that the new compounds cause nitric oxide to be trapped in a heme pocket, much as happens with nitrophorin. Additionally, using live cells, we discovered that two blood proteins that cause vasoconstriction, angiotensin and thrombospondin 1, function to inhibit soluble guanylyl cyclase. These proteins are more prevalent in disease, and as we age contribute to poor health. Our results provide new targets for drug discovery.

Uncovering the secrets of nitric-oxide biology requires broad expertise. The breadth and collaborative nature of science at the University of Arizona make this possible.

Experience science

Find out more about Montfort:

www.biochem.arizona.edu/faculty_b/profiles/montfort.html

Schedule of the department's seminars and colloquia:

cbc.arizona.edu/seminars/seminar-all.cfm

About the scientist

William R. Montfort is a UA professor of chemistry and biochemistry. His research involves the structure, function and dynamics of protein molecules, particularly those involved with the biology of nitric oxide. His laboratory includes students of biochemistry, chemistry, cell biology, pharmacology and mathematics who hail from around the country and around the world.

Each day in the U.S., and particularly in Arizona, we receive enormous amounts of energy in the form of light from the sun.

Photovoltaic solar cells can capture the sun's energy and convert it into electricity to power homes, schools, businesses and portable electronics.

The newest and most exciting photovoltaic solar cells being developed contain only thin layers of the materials that capture the sun's energy and promise to be extremely inexpensive, light-weight and portable. Thin-film solar cells will provide electricity at a cost that is highly competitive with electricity generated from fossil fuels.

Today the world consumes energy at an average rate of about 15 terawatts, with about 85 percent produced from fossil fuels. The U.S. Department of Energy has set as one of its goals the generation of one terawatt - a million-million watts- of electricity from photovoltaic technologies, at an average cost of less than a dollar per watt, installed. Meeting this goal will require low-cost, easily manufactured solar cells so that up to miles of photovoltaic solar cells could be produced each day. Realizing this vision is critical because the world's energy consumption is rising rapidly.

I published my first paper on the basic science underpinning new solar energy conversion technologies in 1979, shortly after the first oil embargo in the early 1970s made it clear that renewable energy conversion technologies might help secure our nation's energy future. Thirty years later I direct one of the new Energy Frontier Research Centers that will help the U.S. expand its use of solar energy.

The centers are funded by the Department of Energy to support our nation's development of economical energy sources for the 21st century.

The Energy Frontier Research Center at the University of Arizona combines experts at four U.S. universities and DOE's National Renewable Energy Laboratory in a five-year, $15 million program. This center, the Center for Interface Science: Solar Electric Materials, offers outstanding and unique training opportunities for students to become future energy scientists and leaders.

Our center involves more than 70 scientists and engineers in Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, New Jersey and Washington. The center's research focuses on understanding and improving what happens in new thin-film photovoltaic solar cells within regions called interfaces to ensure optimum performance of these new solar cells. These interfaces form anywhere that two different materials are brought into contact with each other.

Interfaces are extremely thin, and their thickness is measured on a nanometer scale. To put this in context, one nanometer is about 100,000 times thinner than the width of a human hair.

Thin-film photovoltaic solar cells contain many different materials, such as metals, dyes and polymers (plastics). This leads to many interfaces, each one of which can be critical to solar cell performance. By better understanding these interfaces, energy efficiencies can be raised while manufacturing costs are lowered, improving the way thin-film solar cells transform the sun's energy into electricity.

New thin-film photovoltaic technologies, widely dispersed in Arizona, could help make the state of Arizona an energy exporter to the rest of the U.S.

Experience science

Video: "It's Complicated: Creating Generation Three Solar Cells"

uanews.org/node/26664

About the scientist

Neal R. Armstrong is a UA professor of chemistry and biochemistry and of optical sciences and the director of the Center for Interface Science: Solar Electric Materials. Since 1978 he has produced some 50 doctoral and master's students and interacted with about 100 undergraduate research students. The recipent of numerous awards for teaching and research, he has devoted his career to the exploration of chemical processes at interfaces that control the efficiency of light-emitting and energy-conversion devices.

The largest camera ever sent to another planet is from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE), which is run from the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory on the University of Arizona campus. HiRISE is on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has orbited Mars since 2006.

HiRISE has collected more than 13 terapixels of data at a scale of just about one foot of Mars per pixel. HiRISE images have been used to find a safe landing site for the Phoenix Mars Lander, efficient travel paths for the Mars rover Opportunity and to evaluate candidate landing sites for the 2011 Mars Science Laboratory and the rovers to be launched in 2018.

Findings about Mars from HiRISE measure in the hundreds.

Highlights include:

• Water-worn landscapes from floods triggered by large impact events.

• Altered joints and fractures due to groundwater flow in ancient bedrock.

• Layered deposits from dozens of ancient lakes.

• Thousands of brand-new impact craters less than 10 years old, some of which exposed shallow ice in the middle latitudes.

• Active frost-dust avalanches in the early spring.

• Active gully formation in the late winter.

Currently, HiRISE is the most active project of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory's long history of involvement with missions to Mars, but it won't be the last.

The HiRISE team will also lead the High-resolution Stereo Color Imager (HiSCI) to fly on the Trace Gas Orbiter, expected to launch in January 2016.

About the scientist

Alfred S. McEwen is a UA professor of planetary sciences and of the lunar and planetary laboratory. His research interests are geologic processes on planets and satellites, including volcanism and impact cratering. He has contributed to spacecraft exploration of the outer solar system by the Voyager, Galileo and Cassini missions; to moon exploration by Clementine and the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter; and to Mars exploration by Mars Global Surveyor, Mars Odyssey, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter.

Experience science

The HiRISE images, topographic products and more are available at:

hirise.lpl.arizona.edu

All about the Phoenix Mars Mission:

phoenix.lpl.arizona.edu

After years of preparation, audiences at the Jet Propulsion Lab and the University of Arizona anxiously awaited the touchdown of the Phoenix Mars Mission lander.

Previous failures made this landing the scariest maneuver. For seven minutes, the audiences stilled in terror.

Finally, the spacecraft signaled a successful entry and deployment of the parachute. A dramatic countdown in altitude gave chills to all who watched. With a whoop of joy, we watched as the Phoenix science laboratory landed safely onto the northern, icy plains of Mars. The date was May 25, 2008.

For five months the UA hosted the command center for the spacecraft. Phoenix successfully returned data concerning the geology and climate of the landing site despite the challenges of operating a robotic arm seen only in images from our one-megapixel camera 200 million miles away.

Phoenix is most associated with discovering a large amount of a rare salt called perchlorate in the Martian soil. Microbes on Earth are known to use perchlorate as a food source, and its presence lowers the freezing temperature of water.

Even more exciting is recent research implying that the presence of perchlorate fooled the 1976 Viking scientists into reporting that Mars is free of organic molecules. As organic soil is heated, perchlorate releases oxygen and destroys the organic signatures.

For 35 years, the story has been that there are no organics on Mars - but the addition of perchlorate changes everything. Now we suspect that the building blocks of life are on Mars; this increases our chances of finding life.

We patiently await validation of this new paradigm of an organic soil and the next steps in the search for life when the Mars Science Laboratory lands in 2012.

Experience science

phoenix.lpl.arizona.edu

About the scientists

Peter H. Smith is the Thomas R. Brown Distinguished Chair of Integrated Science in the UA Department of Planetary Sciences. He has participated in numerous space missions throughout his long career and is the principal investigator of the Phoenix Mars mission.

William Boynton is a UA professor of planetary sciences and has participated in many planetary space missions. His Mars research focuses on the planet's geochemistry, and his Gamma-Ray Spectrometer on the Mars Odyssey spacecraft led to the discovery of buried ice in the Mars polar regions.

Astronomers at the Large Binocular Telescope have produced the sharpest image of a star ever seen. They used new equipment called adaptive optics to eliminate the twinkle of stars.

Twinkling stars above may be romantic for lovers, but the twinkle is a severe annoyance for astronomers seeking a clear, crisp view of the heavens. The University of Arizona is a founding partner in the Large Binocular Telescope, the largest operating telescope in the world.

The Large Binocular Telescope on Mount Graham now produces star images that are sharper at their core or center than can be achieved at any other observatory.

The adaptive-optics system, developed at the Arcetri Astrophysical Observatory in Italy, uses a unique secondary mirror developed by astronomers at the UA's Steward Observatory and its Mirror Laboratory. The secondary mirrors sit above the two giant 26.5-foot-diameter primary mirrors of the Large Binocular Telescope.

The secondary mirror rapidly changes its shape to compensate for the bending of starlight produced by the Earth's atmosphere. The atmosphere distorts the image of the star just the way a piece of wavy glass distorts the image of an object behind it. The "active" secondary mirror then bends its shape to remove the distortions.

Air movement in the atmosphere continually changes the distortion, hence the twinkling of stars. The new secondary mirror bends its shape rapidly enough to keep up with the changes in the atmosphere.

The concept is much like noise-canceling headphones, but for light rather than sound. An additional advantage is that the new adaptive-optics system concentrates more light in the central core of the star image than other adaptive-optics systems in use at other telescopes.

The telescope's dual mirror design provides an additional advantage over traditional single-mirror telescopes.

The Large Binocular Telescope's two 26.5-foot-diameter primary mirrors, which gather the starlight and reflect it toward the secondary mirrors, are separated on the same mounting by 50 feet. Currently only one of the secondary mirrors has the new active mirror technology.

When both secondary mirrors are so equipped, the images will achieve the same sharpness as a telescope that is 75 feet in diameter. Since the sharpness of the image is proportional to the diameter of the telescope, this gives a tremendous gain over other telescopes that are limited to the diameter of their single mirror. Both active secondary mirrors are expected to be in place by the end of next year.

The adaptive-optics process works best in light with longer (redder) wavelengths than our eyes can see: infrared light. Infrared light is particularly good for seeing very distant objects and stars in the process of formation.

When the adaptive-optics system is coupled with the Large Binocular Telescope's new infrared camera and spectrometer early next year, it will give this telescope a view of the heavens deeper and sharper than any other telescope on Earth.

Experience science

Department of Astronomy / Steward Observatory:

www.as.arizona.edu/index.html

About the scientist

Rodger Thompson is a professor in the UA Department of Astronomy and an astronomer at the University of Arizona's Steward Observatory. He is also on the board of directors of the Large Binocular Telescope Corp. His research has mainly centered on infrared spectroscopy and imaging, but recently he has been investigating the values of the fundamental constants of physics in the early universe. Thompson also led the UA team that produced the infrared camera and spectrometer for the Hubble Space Telescope.

Michael Worobey's lab has circled the globe for clues to how killer viruses jump into humans and then spread worldwide. Think "CSI" for HIV: Researchers have collected traces of viral DNA from chimpanzees in the Congo Basin, medical samples from forgotten archives and monkey meat in markets. The scientists have then used powerful computational techniques to connect the dots and determine how AIDS viruses or the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus emerged - and how to combat them now.

About the scientist

Michael Worobey is an associate professor in the UA Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. He investigates the origin and evolution of medically important viruses. The findings have pinpointed when and where HIV/AIDS began and have illuminated the earliest days of the 2009 swine flu pandemic. The findings also are helping to understand how pandemics take hold by addressing changes in viral genes and in human populations that facilitate pandemics.

Experience science

More on Michael Worobey:

www.eebweb.arizona.edu/Faculty/Bios/worobey.html

www.podcasting.arizona.edu/evolution

www.bigthink.com/michaelworobey

Ed Beshore, principal investigator for the NASA-sponsored Catalina Sky Survey, sees his job as "one-third scientist, one-third engineer and one-third night watchman." For 24 nights each month, members of his team stand vigil at two telescopes near Mount Bigelow and one in Australia, looking for asteroids that might collide with the Earth. "So far so good," says Beshore. "We've nearly eliminated concern for the largest objects, but we haven't stopped looking."

About the scientist

Ed Beshore is a senior staff scientist at the UA Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and the UA Steward Observatory and directs the Catalina Sky Survey. Beshore has worked on the Pioneer mission to Saturn, developed software for Boeing and Hewlett-Packard and was a partner in a successful technical marketing company. Shortly after building his own observatory in Colorado, he opted for a mid-life career change, joining the Catalina Sky Survey in 2002.

Experience science

Catalina Sky Survey:

www.lpl.arizona.edu/css

NASA/JPL Near Earth Object Program:

neo.jpl.nasa.gov/neo

Steward Observatory:

www.as.arizona.edu

Getting your degree … underground? That's just a small overstatement for some UA geosciences students. Since 2001, Julia Cole's research group has worked in caves to develop regional climate histories. Cave formations grow from minerals in water that originated as precipitation at the surface. From the chemistry of the formations, Cole's research group deciphers past changes in wet-dry conditions outside. The findings help understand past climate changes to better anticipate the future.

About the scientist

Julia Cole is a UA professor of geosciences and of atmospheric sciences. Her work uses paleoclimate methods to characterize the patterns and mechanisms of past climate change on societally important time scales. Her research focuses on past drought in the Southwest and recent changes in the El Niño system of the tropical Pacific. She is happy to be working with students who love caving and wishes she could spend more time underground herself.

Experience science

Julia Cole's lab:

www.geo.arizona.edu/ClimateChange/index.html

The Large Hadron Collider, the largest and most powerful particle accelerator ever built, is up and running outside Geneva, Switzerland. UA scientists and students built parts of the collider's ATLAS detector, the largest-volume particle physics detector ever. ATLAS produces high-resolution "images" of the smallest building blocks of the subatomic world. Now physicists are analyzing the images to find things, such as dark matter and the Higgs particle, that are predicted by theory but not yet found.

About the scientist

John Rutherfoord is a professor of physics at the University of Arizona. His group, which joined the ATLAS collaboration in 1994, has developed instrumentation to look ever deeper into the smallest objects in nature. Fundamental research of this type often produces new technologies that dramatically improve our quality of life.

Experience science

ATLAS public website:

atlas.ch

Physics Department:

www.physics.arizona.edu

Humans arrived in North America 13,500 years ago, when large mammals, including mammoths, mastodons and sabertooth cats roamed. A few hundred years later, most giant mammals were extinct. What happened? Human hunting? Rapidly changing environments? Perhaps a comet? Along with archaeologists in Mexico, Vance Holliday and his students are excavating a site in Sonora. We have little evidence for a comet but discovered a new prey animal - a rare mammoth cousin known as a gomphothere.

About the scientist

Vance Holliday is a UA professor of anthropology and of geosciences. He directs the Argonaut Archaeological Research Fund, which focuses on the time around the close of the last Ice Age, when the first humans arrived in the North American Southwest about 15,000 to 8,000 years ago. These first Americans faced a landscape undergoing dramatic environmental changes, including the extinction of many large mammals.

Experience science

Vance Holliday's research:

www.argonaut.arizona.edu

More Paleoindian websites:

www.argonaut.arizona.edu/links.htm

Arizona Stadium is an icon of the University of Arizona. Students, sports, and science - all encompassed in one grand structure.

Obviously, the stadium is home to Wildcat football, the ZonaZoo student section and Navajo-Pinal Hall dormitories. But what is this about "science"?

Two of the most distinctive and distinguished science programs at the UA - telescopes and tree rings - are also housed within Arizona Stadium. The Steward Observatory builds the world's largest telescope mirrors in workshops on the east side, and the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research studies the world's oldest and largest trees and is housed on the west side of the stadium.

Both of these world-renowned institutions were founded by one of the UA's most illustrious professors of the past century: Andrew Ellicott Douglass. Douglass, an astronomer by training, was interested in how the sun might affect Earth's climate. He began studying tree rings because he realized their variations in thickness might provide a centuries-long estimate of annual rainfall variations to compare with counts of sunspots extending back to the 17th century.

Douglass' sun-climate studies were pioneering, but his greatest breakthrough was his use of tree-ring-dating techniques to determine when the mysterious cliff dwellings of the Southwest were constructed and then abandoned (more than 700 years ago).

When he reported this discovery in 1929, the news spread around the world about this marvelous new science, dendro-chronology, invented at the University of Arizona.

Since that time, our tree-ring scientists and students have made many discoveries, bringing distinction to the UA as the premier and global leader in this eclectic science.

We conduct tree-ring studies in archaeology, climatology, hydrology, ecology and geology. From its beginnings to today, the tree-ring lab has been an exemplar of the UA tradition of interdisciplinary teaching and research.

Here are a few examples of our recent findings:

• Tree-ring studies of ancient trees in the headwaters of the Rio Grande, Colorado and Salt rivers have revealed the history of low and high flow levels over the past thousand years. These findings help water managers in their planning by providing useful perspectives about long-term variations in water supplies.

• Forest fire and climate studies by our scientists have identified connections between fire activity in the western U.S. and broad-scale climate variations, such as El Niño, and warming trends. Insights from this work are being applied by forest managers to reduce fire hazards and plan for upcoming fire seasons.

• Our scientists discovered ancient trees in rugged mountain areas of the Middle East and northern Africa. This tree-ring work has led to long drought histories and evidence that recent droughts in northern Africa are among the worst in at least 800 years.

Our tree-ring research has potential applications in radiocarbon and archaeological dating studies in Egypt, Greece and elsewhere in the Mediterranean region.

Great science has been accomplished in the stadium. Now we are looking forward to another century of discovery in a new building designed for us. We hope you will come and visit.

Ready in 2012

Construction on the 26,000-square-foot Bryant Bannister Tree-Ring Building will begin next spring and will be completed in 2012. View the plans online at www.ltrr.arizona.edu

About the scientist

Thomas W. Swetnam is a UA professor of dendrochronology and has been director of the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research since 2000. Swetnam grew up in rural villages in northern New Mexico, where his father was a forest ranger. He began graduate studies in watershed management at the UA in 1980 and joined the faculty in 1988. His specialty is the study of forest fires and climate history in western North America and recently in Siberia, Russia.

About five years ago, a bizarre idea occurred to me. At the time, I was designing complex electronic circuits to mimic a small portion of an insect brain. These circuits would be created on a tiny computer chip, but the prototyping costs would be in the tens of thousands of dollars. Despite having a brain with 10,000 times fewer neurons than our own, insects have remarkable flight capabilities and have a lot to teach people about building flying robots.

I had to wonder: Was it worth all the trouble and expense just to mimic a small slice of an insect brain? Why couldn't I just use a real insect brain? Surely insect brains were cheaper than manufacturing custom integrated circuits!

Since that time, my students and I have been interfacing the living brains of insects to robots.

We started by using a moth because its brain is larger than that of many insects. The focus of my laboratory is on vision, so we tapped into neurons that carry information about objects moving in front of the moth.

In our first insect-robot interfacing experiment (dubbed the "robo-moth"), we had moderate success in making an autonomous robot turn to face objects moving in front of it. The limitation was our ability to continue recording from one particular neuron while the robot moved, which required precise electrode placement.

In the current iteration of this project ("robo-dragonfly?"), we are interfacing the vision system of a dragonfly to a new robot. When hunting small targets, dragonflies move almost faster than our eyes can see.

This time, instead of going into the brain, we are tapping into the "spinal cord" of the insect. Because of this, precise electrode placement is not necessary and we will be able to record for long periods. We are tapping into cells that report the movement of small objects in front of the dragonfly and expect our robot to be able to track small moving targets using the dragonfly's visual system.

Beyond visual sensors, where might this line of research take us? Modern computing systems have their strengths and weaknesses. The average human is completely unable to compete with a common desktop computer in multiplying large numbers, for example. However, the fastest supercomputer on the planet will have trouble matching a human child at face recognition. So you might say that conventional computing and "brain" computing have complementary strengths. So why not engineer a system with the best of both worlds?

In the long term, I imagine hybrid computers that contain both conventional electronics and genetically engineered biological neural networks that work together to make "intelligent" computing systems. Despite decades of improvement in computing and some really remarkable reductions in size, computers today are still pretty dumb.

Might combining computers with biology allow us to extend computing beyond its current limitations, and in combination with robotics, create artificially intelligent beings? I hope so, but only time will tell.

About the scientist

Charles M. Higgins is an associate professor of neuroscience and of electrical engineering at the University of Arizona. The Higgins laboratory studies the visual systems of insects (flies, dragonflies, moths and bees) to enable advanced autonomous robots. This research includes electrical recordings from insect brains, computer modeling, behavioral experiments and the interfacing of living insects to mobile robots.

Experience science

Higgins lab video of dragonfly brain recordings:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYuXJnkgLfs

School of Mind, Brain, and Behavior:

cos.arizona.edu/sci_interdisciplinary/mind_brain_behavior.asp

About the school

The School of Mind, Brain, and Behavior studies subjects ranging from molecules to psychiatric disorders by spanning disciplinary boundaries. The school comprises the Departments of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences and the Program in Cognitive Science and the Graduate Interdisciplinary Program in Neuroscience.

At Biosphere 2 we are creating an unprecedented experimental apparatus to predict how the water cycle responds to climate change.

The biodiversity and dramatic form of our landscapes are controlled by the transformative behavior of water as it moves from mountaintops to aquifers and rivers.

As the climate warms, what will be the fate of arid places that depend on local water sources, seasonal rains and the success of local ecosystems and agriculture for survival?

We do not fully understand how rain distributes across landscapes, into the soil, plants, groundwater reservoirs, rivers and streams, and back to the atmosphere. Understanding the complex coupling of these components of the water cycle requires new tools, new predictive models and new interdisciplinary teams of earth-system scientists. Bio-sphere 2 is tackling this scientific grand challenge.

We are building three, 2- million-pound artificial landscapes, known as the Landscape Evolution Observatory, or LEO, inside Biosphere 2.

These huge artificial hills will allow us to tackle two scientific questions: How does rainwater move through landscapes? How does biological activity change landscapes over time? Both questions require unprecedented cooperation among hydrologists, ecologists, geologists and atmospheric scientists.

This project also involves developing tools that gather detailed measurement of water, life and energy. Before the physical construction of this landscape, we put significant energy into developing computational models that describe Earth-system processes. Those models will let us rapidly evaluate the data emerging from our experiments and modify the experiment as needed.

The Landscape Evolution Observatory will give us a detailed understanding of Earth processes that we could never achieve by conducting an experiment in the field. The 40-by-100-foot landscapes are designed to mimic hills.

The steel structures will reach more than two stories tall and be covered by more than 3 feet of engineered soil. Thousands of sensors will be embedded in the soil to measure water availability, temperature and energy fluxes. Specially designed samplers will provide access to soil water and soil gas from hundreds of locations. We will control precipitation, temperature, humidity and atmospheric composition for precise experimentation.

The Landscape Evolution Observatory's most dramatic capability will be its ability to balance the entire water cycle budget in real time using scales built into the structure. The scales will measure changes in the total weight of the hill as water enters as rain and leaves as soil-water flow, evaporation and transpiration by plants. We will observe how the landscape evolves and introduce plants to see how ecosystems change the physical and chemical system.

The landscape observatory is under construction. In keeping with our mission of being a center for education, research and outreach, the entire process will be highly visible to the public. The research will be an integral part of our overall public engagement activities within the UA College of Science and of our teacher-training efforts at the Arizona Center for STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) Teachers.

Experience science

Biosphere 2:

www.b2science.org

Arizona Center for STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) Teachers:

www.az-stem-teachers.org

About the scientists

Travis E. Huxman is a UA professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and director of Biosphere 2. He studies the ecological dynamics of deserts, with a focus on the evolution of plants and understanding ecosystem response to climate change.

Stephen DeLong is an assistant research professor at Biosphere 2. He is a geologist who focuses on understanding the evolution of landscape structure and the role of vegetation and climate in influencing landscape histories.

The University of Arizona Department of Atmospheric Sciences has launched a Bachelor of Applied Science degree in meteorology, available as a distance-learning program through the Outreach College. This degree program is designed to meet the needs of Air Force weather forecasters, many of whom already hold an associate degree in applied science with a concentration in meteorology. Many need a Bachelor of Science degree to advance in their profession.

The department is working closely with the 25th Operational Weather Squadron at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base and with Tucson's DM-50, a citizen's support group. A number of donors are supporting the program.

Because Air Force personnel frequently move between bases, it is often not possible for them to stay in one place long enough to obtain a four-year degree. The online degree path solves that problem. Already, students from places as far afield as Japan and Korea are enrolled.

This degree program allows students to use credits from their associate degree toward their UA degree so that no credits are lost as they move from base to base. Selected courses are taken at the UA and at Pima Community College.

About the scientist

Eric Betterton is professor and head of the UA Department of Atmospheric Sciences and director of the department's Institute of Atmospheric Physics. He is an atmospheric chemist studying air-quality issues, especially dust and airborne contaminants in Arizona. He serves as honorary squadron commander of the 25th Operational Weather Squadron at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. The squadron has played a pivotal role in developing the Bachelor of Applied Science in Meteorology distance-learning program.

Experience science

Department of Atmospheric Sciences and current weather at the UA: www.atmo.arizona.edu

Bachelor of Applied Science degree in meteorology: www.atmo.arizona.edu/index.php?section=grads&id=bas

ATMO programs:

www.atmo.arizona.edu/index.php?section=grads

For program advising, plan of study and registration, contact the UA Department of Atmospheric Sciences, at 520-621-6831 or atmosci@atmo.arizona.edu

Keeping its promise to the community, the Wildcat Charter School continues to provide a supportive learning environment to underserved students, most of whom come from low-income families.

Under the leadership of the University of Arizona College of Education, the innovative K-8 school in the heart of Tucson features a ground-breaking curriculum, small classes, athletics, after-school activities and cultural development.

The Arizona Department of Education recognizes the school as Performing Plus.

As the College of Education's liaison to the school, I work with various colleges at the UA to bring the talents and abilities of UA students and faculty to Wildcat Charter School students.

As a result of our work, some wonderful programs have blossomed. Through the College of Education's Project SOAR, UA students learn how to mentor middle-school students.

The project now partners with the College of Science to prepare science mentors.

Working with Ekaterina Taralova, then a UA computer science undergraduate, and Kobus Barnard, a UA associate professor of computer science, I helped design and execute an annual computational science camp for middle-school students. The camp, run by computer science students, is funded by the National Science Foundation.

I also launched the College of Education's rigorous Passport to High School Summer Institute.

Eighth-grade students spend half a day meeting and interviewing College of Science researchers, scientists and graduate students.

This helps the recently graduated eighth-graders plan their high school program to best prepare them for both college and their future careers.

About the educator

Sara Chavarria is the director of outreach for the UA College of Education. She developed a summer institute for high school students and designed a mentor-hosting handbook for K-12 schools. She was a key member of the design team for UA for You (uaforyou.arizona.edu), a website that allows community members to easily locate all the outreach programs the UA offers. Her doctorate from the UA is in reading, language and culture.

Experience science

Wildcat Charter School: www.thewildcatschool.com

UA for You portal: uaforyou.arizona.edu

College of Education Outreach: coe.arizona.edu/community/outreach

To encourage K-12 teachers and students to become more science-savvy, we combined the UA College of Science's informal, public activities with our formal K-12 education programs to create an integrated program of outreach.

We incorporated the incredible resources available at Biosphere 2, Flandrau, Tumamoc and Mt. Lemmon SkyCenter to create programs and activities that bring science to the classroom and across the community.

One such program aims to connect every undergraduate in the College of Science with K-12 students, providing mentoring and tutoring. A pilot version of this program includes sponsored trips to College of Science facilities such as Flandrau and Biosphere 2 - places where students engage in fun, educational activities to further understand the role of science in their lives. These trips expose students to our university campus, in the hope of inspiring them to consider college and get involved in science.

We are developing resources to strengthen our community of educators, especially K-12 teachers and UA staff and faculty.

One such resource is a website that K-12 teachers can use to find UA researchers available for activities such as classroom visits and lab tours.

Another new resource, called Teacher Science Cafés, builds upon our successful Science Café program by initiating a series focused on K-12 outreach and teacher resources. At these cafés, scientists discuss their research and answer questions in a small-group situation, often at local restaurants. These events bring exciting content to the K-12 teaching community and strengthen connections between UA and K-12 educators.

Experience science

Biosphere 2

• Public tours, programs, admission costs: www.b2science.org

• Videos, podcasts, webcam: www.b2science.org/b2/inter-video.html

Tumamoc Hill

• Free lecture series, seating is limited and reservations required: www.tumamoc.org

Flandrau

• Programs, admission costs, Family Fun Nights, Laser lecture series: www.flandrau.org

• Science connections, resources for K-12 educators: www.flandrau.org/k12

Mt. Lemmon SkyCenter

• SkyNights, events, image gallery: skycenter.arizona.edu

About the scientist

Elliott Cheu is a professor of physics and the associate dean in the UA College of Science. His research involves understanding the nature of dark matter and its role in the universe. One of his current roles is coordinating the outreach efforts of the College of Science.

Imagine life in a world where voices sound distorted and simple pleasures, like listening to birds sing, are absent. The research and programs at the University of Arizona's Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences are improving the lives of the 38 million Americans affected by hearing loss and their families. This department integrates its innovative research with clinical services available to the public.

Hearing research with babies presents unique challenges. Babies cannot simply tell us what they do and do not hear. Professor Barbara Cone coaxes this information from infants even before they can utter their first words by using a combination of baby-friendly activities and advanced technology.

An infant's response to sound can be measured using sensors that are placed on the infant's head. In Cone's Arizona Human Electrophysiology and Auditory Development Lab, she records the electrical signals of the auditory nerve and of the hearing centers in the baby's brain. By analyzing how the baby's brain responds to speech, Cone and her students can estimate how well the infant detects sound and discriminates between similar speech sounds.

The results from the lab can not only be used to diagnose speech perception problems, they can also gauge the effectiveness of treatment. The hearing screening that newborns receive today uses methods based in part on Cone's research. As a result, hearing aids and cochlear implants can be customized for each baby.

The department also works with people at the other end of the lifespan - adults who progressively lose their hearing with age. Especially when there is a lot of background noise, the ability to understand speech may become so difficult that their quality of life begins to decline. Without intervention, they suffer increasing isolation, general loss of self, and may withdraw - which affects not just the person with hearing loss, but family and friends.

The department's Adult Hearing Clinic uses rehabilitation science and research on hearing technologies, such as hearing aids, assistive and implantable devices, to develop a comprehensive, individualized approach for each person with hearing loss. The department's Living with Hearing Loss program, created in 2009 and led by Frances P. Harris, offers education and support groups. Participants learn about hearing, hearing loss, available technologies plus strategies to improve communication.

In just the last year, more than 200 people participated in the program. The program also serves as clinical training for graduate students earning the doctor of audiology degree. A similar program is available for young adults, called the Communication, Hearing and Social Enhancement program.

Experience science

Hearing resources:

www.lwhl.arizona.edu

Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences:

slhs.arizona.edu

About the scientists

Barbara Cone is a UA professor of speech, language and hearing sciences. She uses brain- wave recordings and "listening games" to study speech perception, a uniquely human ability. She has 30-plus years experience as a researcher and audiologist and is committed to early diagnosis.

Frances P. Harris is the James S. and Dyan Pignatelli/Unisource Clinical Chair for Audiologic Rehabilitation in Adults in the UA Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences. She works with adults and their communication partners to improve coping, communication and advocacy.

Our world today is filled with amazing technology, from medical devices to interactive games that run on an iPod. Being able to invent such cool stuff requires knowing math.

In the AnimalWatch project, my team at the University of Arizona is helping students master the math skills they need to be ready for algebra. The AnimalWatch software we've developed connects math with environmental science.

Students log on to AnimalWatch, www.animalwatch.org, to solve colorful word problems about endangered species such as the white shark, the Komodo dragon and the snow leopard as they practice key algebra-readiness math skills.

Other problems focus on invasive species such as the Burmese python, many of which have been released illegally in the Florida Everglades by nervous owners who discovered that these snakes grow to be 25 feet long. Facts about unusual creatures from around the world keep students engaged as they practice math problem-solving.

The AnimalWatch website uses technology to let students watch video demonstrations of how to solve math problems. They can slice virtual blocks into pieces to learn how to find common denominators in fractions problems. When they complete a unit, they can enjoy watching a video clip of the animal that they've learned about by solving math problems.

The program we've designed lets teachers have immediate access to detailed information about students' performance.

The teachers can see which problems students solved correctly on their own, which ones they figured out by using the multimedia resources and which ones were just too difficult. That allows the teachers to quickly adjust their teaching to focus on the things that students didn't understand. The results have been impressive: Students show better math skills after working with our program.

AnimalWatch is especially good at helping students who are not doing well with traditional classroom instruction. It's hard for a student who does not understand to keep raising his or her hand while other students in the room roll their eyes.

By comparison, the computer is endlessly patient. The student can review a lesson several times, and if one example doesn't quite work, there is usually a different approach to try.

One teacher e-mailed to tell us about a student who was shy and didn't like to ask questions in class. The teacher had done a class lesson about averages (mean, median and mode) from the textbook, but the student had not done well on the spot quiz. Then he worked with AnimalWatch. The teacher said, "He lit up. He pulled me over and said, 'Mrs. Patty! This is how you do it!' It is all worth it for a moment like that."

Experience science

AnimalWatch is available without charge to schools and districts in Arizona.

www.animalwatch.org

About the scientist

Carole R. Beal is UA professor of cognitive science and research professor in the School of Information: Science, Technology, and Arts (SISTA). She studies how technology can support math and science learning for K-12 students, especially students who are not doing well with traditional approaches to instruction. She studied art history before switching to educational psychology in graduate school. She draws on both her art and psychology training to help the Education Informatics effort in SISTA.

About the school

The School of Information: Science, Technology, and Arts promotes research in computational methods across disciplines and teaches students to understand the computational aspects of any discipline. Computing is rapidly becoming a foundation for research in the sciences, engineering, humanities and arts. SISTA teaches a curriculum that ensures future generations of scholars master the methods of the Information Age. More online at sista.arizona.edu

Thousands of undergraduate science and mathematics students participate in research at U.S. universities, colleges and government laboratories.

With more than 50 percent of its undergraduate students engaged in research, the College of Science at the University of Arizona is a national leader for involving students in cutting-edge research with faculty mentors.

Students become partners with faculty in the process of discovery. It is well-documented that participation in undergraduate research is the purest form of student learning, and the best-recognized preparation for careers in science and technology.

"The skills you acquire by being 'on the front lines' of scientific inquiry are invaluable assets when it comes to applying for Ph.D. programs, fellowships and jobs."

Allison Strom, UA astronomy and physics major

In addition to gaining an in-depth understanding of complex science questions, students develop a collaborative, teamwork approach to problem-solving while simultaneously improving their communication and critical-thinking skills.

"I like to learn and I like a challenge. Research has given me a fantastic way to experience both. Being in a lab is like being part of a team, and learning so many new things I feel that I am contributing a small puzzle piece to the greater goal of curing breast cancer."

Nicole Pereira, UA molecular and cellular biology major

Undergraduate research is an opportunity open to all qualified students who enter the university as a member of the College of Science. Students can tailor a research experience to fit their academic career goals either by participating in research for academic credit, for pay, or by volunteering.

"My research has allowed me to apply what I have learned in the classroom and gain a firsthand look at the research process."

Miranda Sampsel, UA psychology major

Student research is funded by faculty research grants and federal program grants, as well as private and institutional support.

Undergraduate research programs such as the Undergraduate Biology Research Program and the NASA Space Grant Internship Program have been pillars of support for undergraduates for more than 20 years and are some of the keys to the success of undergraduate research within the College of Science.

The UA's undergraduate research students are the leaders of tomorrow for our state, our nation and the world.

For more information about all of the opportunities, log onto the College of Science's Office of Undergraduate Research at www.ur.arizona.edu

"Learning is something that cannot be taught; it must be discovered, revealed, explored, and developed. Research does exactly that."

Kayla Peck, UA biology major

About the scientist

Glenda Gentile is the director of the UA College of Science Office of Undergraduate Research. She has supervised more than 100 undergraduates in research, with many of them presenting their research at professional meetings and co-authoring research papers. A graduate of Illinois State University, Gentile was a research laboratory associate in the department of dermatology at Yale University School of Medicine and laboratory director for genetic toxicology research at Hope College before joining the UA in 2006.

Experience science

UA News video: Student Research Program Creates Opportunity:

uanews.org/node/33230

College of Science Undergraduate Research website:

www.ur.arizona.edu