Cogswell Receives UC Reseaerch Fellowship
Thomas Cogswell, professor of history and the chair of the UCR Academic Senate, has been selected as one of 15 people in the UC system to receive a President’s Research Fellowship in the Humanities.

The honor means up to $25,000 in funding and time to pursue a scholarly project.

Cogswell, who came to UCR in 1999, has won many previous awards, including fellowships from the National Humanities Center, the Fulbright Commission, the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Folger Shakespeare Library, the Huntington Library, the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, and Wadham College, Oxford.

Before coming to UCR, he taught at the University of Kentucky and Harvard University.

Entomologists Recognize Federici
Brian A. Federici, a distinguished professor of entomology, has been named the recipient of the Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America C. W. Woodworth Award, the highest award offered annually by the branch to recognize the outstanding achievements of its members.

Federici will receive the award for 2008 on April 1 in Napa, Calif.
Federici’s research focuses on understanding the basic microbiology of pathogens that attack insects, and the use of this knowledge to develop pathogens or their products to control insect pests.

The recipient of numerous awards, Federici has also been honored by the U.S. Department of Agriculture with an Individual Honor Award for Superior Service and by the ESA with a National Distinguished Teaching Award. In 2005, he received the Academic Senate Faculty Research Lecturer Award.

Other UCR entomologists honored this year by the ESA’s Pacific Branch are John Klotz, associate extension specialist, ESA Recognition Award in Urban Entomology; Jocelyn Millar, professor of entomology, Award for Excellence in Integrated Pest Management; Richard Redak, vice chair and professor of entomology, ESA Distinguished Achievement Award in Horticultural Entomology; Michael Rust, professor of entomology, ESA Recognition Award in Entomology; and Richard Stouthamer, professor of entomology, ESA Recognition Award in Insect Physiology, Biochemistry and Toxicology.

Research on Display
Research accomplishments by Thomas A. Miller, a professor of entomology who researches the tobacco budworm, Pierce’s Disease and the pink bollworm, will be permanently displayed at the “Uljin Insect Tour,” an insect museum and visitor center being built in Uljin, South Korea, by that country’s Insect Ecology Research Center.

The exhibit centers around Miller receiving in 2003 the prestigious Gregor Mendel Award for Research in the Biological Sciences from the Czech Academy of Sciences. Also being celebrated is the annual Verrall Lecture that Miller gave to the Royal Entomological Society, London, in 2005 – an honor given only to distinguished foreign scientists.

The opening of the Uljin Insect Tour will coincide with the 2009 Uljin EXPO (July 24 through Aug. 16). Thereafter, the center will be available to entomologists worldwide for doing collaborative studies.

Jury Distinguished Alumni
The Department of Physics at the University of Wisconsin has awarded William A. Jury the Distinguished Alumni Fellow Award. The award is intended to recognize a graduate of the department “who has earned the respect and admiration of the physics community.”

Jury, a distinguished professor of soil physics in the Department of Environmental Sciences, will received the award at the University of Wisconsin Department of Physics Honors and Awards Banquet in Madison, Wis., on May 2.

Jury’s research involves the measurement and modeling of chemical movement in field soils, chemical screening models and volatilization processes. He has published more than 200 professional papers and written four books.

Straight Honored
A short story by creative writing professor Susan Straight has been nominated for a 2008 Edgar Allan Poe Award. “The Golden Gopher” is one of five works nominated in the category of Best Short Story.

Winners will be announced at a banquet May 1 in New York City.

The Edgar Allan Poe Awards, presented by Mystery Writers of America, recognize the best in mystery fiction, nonfiction, television and film published or produced every year.

Straight also has been named the Riverside Community College Alumnus of the Year. She will be recognized at a banquet April 3 at the Mission Inn.

CAREER Award
Chun Ning (Jeanie) Lau, who joined UCR in 2004 as an assistant professor of physics, has been awarded a CAREER award, the National Science Foundation’s prestigious honor for new faculty researchers. Lau’s research focuses on novel electrical properties that arise from the quantum confinement of atoms and charges to nanoscale systems.

Her research helps physicists gain fundamental understanding of how atoms and electrons behave when they are ruled by quantum mechanics. The 5-year, $500,000 CAREER award will support Lau’s study of the electrical properties of graphene, which is a single layer of graphite.