Faculty Grant Profiles

Swarthmore faculty write grant proposals to support their research, their teaching and other academic projects. When funded by external grants these activities are sponsored programs: activities faculty often engage in during their sabbatical. Some faculty members, especially in the natural sciences and engineering, also receive on-going research grants that span multiple years.

Each year, more than forty faculty members are eligible for a one-year sabbatical leave. The first semester is paid for by the College. Internal resources are available to fund a second semester of leave for a limited number of faculty. Individuals are only eligible to apply for an internal second semester leave grant if they have already applied for external support.

Faculty grants often include support of summer stipends for Swarthmore student researchers, postdoctoral researchers, and indirect funds to support the administrative infrastructure necessary for research.

Below you will find profiles of sponsored programs that are in progress at Swarthmore this fiscal year (July 1 through June 30) or that are noteworthy for a number of reasons. They tell the story of faculty innovation and pursuit of new knowledge and expression, across the liberal arts, sciences and engineering.

View the archived list of sponsored programs that ended prior to the current fiscal year.

Luciano Martínez, Spanish

Radical Desires: Homosexuality and Revolution in Latin America

Donor: U.S. Department of Education

Award Date: 3/29/2018

This library travel research grant, administered by the University of Florida and funded through the Department of Education Title VI National Resource Center program, will support travel for Dr. Martínez to explore the vast holdings of the university’s Latin American and Caribbean Collection (LACC). This research project focuses on sexual liberation and political revolution movements in Latin America. Working at the intersection of literary criticism, cultural studies, and gender studies, the resulting book will map and analyze cultural and literary representations of Latin American homosexuality in relation to the political agendas of the revolutionary left and the sexual liberation movement of the 1970s.

Project Period: 4/1/2018 – 7/31/2018

Eva-Maria Collins, Biology

CAREER: Emergence of Population Diversity from Stem Cell Decision Making in Asexual Planarians

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 3/28/2018

Diversity of individuals is indispensable for population survival and evolution. This project examines how phenotypic diversity can emerge from decision making of individual stem cells in a multicellular regenerative organism. Asexual freshwater planarians are famous for the regenerative capabilities that are based on a large number of adult pluripotent stem cells (ASCs). These ASCs allow them to reproduce by binary fission, thus creating a clonal population and raising the question of how this species is able to create sufficient diversity to survive on evolutionary time scales. Using tools from statistical physics, we recently demonstrated that reproduction is largely stochastic, but that reproductive patterns exist whose molecular and physical determinants remain to be investigated. This proposal aims to test the hypothesis that population diversity arises from a joint effect of the specifics of planarian reproduction mechanics and epigenetic diversity of ASCs in individual worms.

Project Period: 3/1/2018 – 6/30/2021

Steve Wang, Mathematics & Statistics

RUI: Comparing age selectivity in modern extinctions and the fossil record

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 3/2/2018

This project will study the relationship between taxon age and extinction risk for modern taxa, and compare it to relationships in the fossil record. Steve and his team will use fossil data from the Paleobiology Database, and modern extinction threat assessments from the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List. Preliminary analyses have found no relationship between taxon age and extinction risk - a pattern similar to what has previously been seen in past mass extinctions, and dissimilar from that seen in background extinctions. However, these preliminary analyses are not directly comparable to previous analyses on fossil data due to differences in methodology. The team will work to adapt the methodology for modern species to fossil data, and to investigate how potential biases in methodology and fossil and modern databases affect these results.

Project Period: 4/15/2018 – 3/31/2019

Eva-Maria Collins, Biology

Unraveling the Role of Mechanics for Tissue Self-organization in Vivo

Donor: Research Corporation for Science Advancement

Award Date: 2/6/2018

This project addresses fundamental questions regarding the role of mechanical interactions for pattern formation in development. It has two aims: (1) to determine the role of mechanical properties for cell behaviors during tissue organization and body axis formation and (2) to obtain in vivo measurements of the forces individual cells experience and their connection to cell signaling during these patterning processes. Using a multiscale approach from the molecular to the organismal level, this study will provide insight into how macroscopic organism-level patterning emerges from physicochemical interactions on the microscopic scale.

Project Period: 1/1/2018 – 6/30/2020

Jennifer Peck, Economics

Exploring Fixed Costs in Female Hiring: The Role of Adjustment Costs and Cultural Barriers to Women’s Employment

Donor: Harvard Kennedy School

Award Date: 08/22/2017

Saudi Arabia’s Nitaqat program has sharply increased female employment in the private sector. However, hiring was not spread evenly across firms. Some have shown rapid growth in female employment; others have continued to employ only male workers. This study will begin studying if this may be due to fixed costs. While hiring female workers may be attractive to firms trying to meet nationalization quotas, firms must first invest in the capacity to hire women. Workplace adjustments may also be needed to comply with cultural norms. This pilot will gather information on firms’ assessments of these constraints through a combination of administrative data analysis, interviews, and a firm survey. While the focus will be on fixed costs, the evidence gathered as part of this study will likely shed light on the perceived barriers to hiring women, providing crucial evidence for future work on female labor force participation in the region.

Project Period: 6/1/2017 – 5/31/2018

Dawn Carone, Biology

Locus-Specific regulation of pericentric satellite sequences

Donor: The Charles E. Kaufman Foundation

Award Date: 7/26/2017

The development of sustainable and benign catalytic systems around new aluminium complexes is limited by the lack of readily available multi-electron states for aluminium, which prevents conventional complexes from undergoing important redox-based processes. In order to increase the utility of aluminium as a catalytic metal, new complexes capable of multi-electron redox processes must be developed. The goals of this proposed research are to synthesize aluminium complexes of redox-active nitroxide ligands that exhibit reversible, multi-electron electrochemical- and chemical transformations. This novel redox chemistry will expand the reaction portfolio of aluminium complexes and enable new catalyst systems based around this abundant element.

Project Period: 9/1/2017 - 8/31/2019

Linda Chen, Mathematics

Equivariant and Combinatorial Algebraic Geometry

Donor: The Simons Foundation

Award Date: 1/30/2017

The Simons Foundation has awarded a grant to Dr. Chen to support her research on combinatorial and enumerative problems in algebraic geometry, and fruitful interactions between modern methods in algebraic geometry and new developments in combinatorics, representation theory, symplectic geometry, and other fields. Fundamentally linked to these problems are the study of moduli and parameter spaces and their cohomology theories, and the study of objects that are combinatorially rich in structure. Her work discusses recent and ongoing work on equivariant and quantam Schubert calculus of homogeneous spaces, brill-Noether theory of curves, K-theory of degeneracy loci, affine Grassmannians, Hessenberg varieties, and generalizations of the moduli space of curves.

Project Period: 9/1/2017 - 8/31/2022

Catherine Crouch, Physics & Astronomy

Do connections persist? A pilot study investigating the lasting impact of a physics course designed to facilitate connections with biology

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 6/13/2017

This early-stage, exploratory research study is designed to lay the groundwork for future large-scale research studies. The study addresses two central research questions: (1) Do IPLS students demonstrate a greater ability to leverage physics later biology coursework, compared to their peers with no physics or traditional introductory physics?; and (2) Do IPLS students view physics as more connected to biology and chemistry, compared to their peers? The research team will work with biology faculty to develop a set of tasks administered to upper division biology students and conduct longitudinal case studies with life science students.

Project Period: 8/15/2017 - 7/31/2020

Aaron Grocholski, Physics & Astronomy

Calibrating the Luminosity of Carbon Stars: An Archival Study of Galaxies in the Nearby Universe

Donor: National Aeronautics & Space Administration (NASA)

Award Date: 7/28/2017

Studies have shown that the uncertainty in the contribution of carbon stars to integrated galaxy light can cause galactic mass and age estimates to change by a factor of 2. We propose to significantly improve this calibration by performing an archival HST study of the resolved carbon star populations within ~4 Mpc. We use a sample of 40 galaxies with deep HST photometry to determine accurate star formation histories and compare the properties of the carbon stars to those of underlying populations. Our study will design a more effective empirical calibration of carbon stars and improve understandings of galaxy evolution.

Project Period: 7/1/2017 - 6/30/2020

K. Ann Renninger, Education

Collaborative Research: Hybrid Professional Development to Enhance Teachers’ Use of Bootstrap

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 8/23/2017

Bootstrap's current professional development (PD) program for math teachers is a 3-day in-person event which assumes that teachers are somewhat facile with algebraic functions. This project studies how to develop teachers' understanding of CS and strengthens their math proficiency. A total of 270 middle-school math teachers—a majority from rural areas or serving Native American or Hispanic students—will participate in Bootstrap PD under this project. Assuming typical adoption rates, these teachers should reach 6,000 students within the project period alone. Building Bootstrap content into the Math Forum exposes thousands of NCTM's teachers to the potential of integrated math/CS curricula.

Project Period: 9/1/2017 - 8/31/2020

Amanda Bayer, Economics

Using Research to Promote Diversity, Inclusion, and Innovation in Economics

Donor: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System

Award Date: 8/6/2015

The economics profession includes disproportionately few women and members of historically underrepresented racial and ethnic minority groups, relative both to the overall population and to other academic disciplines. The lack of diversity negatively affects the discipline, constraining both the range of issues addressed and the capacity to understand familiar issues from new and innovative perspectives. This project employs state-of-the-art research to enhance diversity, inclusion, and innovation in the practices, programs, and research at the Federal Reserve and in the economics profession more broadly.

Project Period: 9/1/2015 - 6/1/2017

Christopher Graves, Chemistry & Biochemistry

RUI: Redox Active Aluminum Nitroxide Complexes for the anti-Markovnikov Hydrofunctionalization of Alkenes

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 6/16/2017

Dr. Graves’ research addresses the important chemical challenge of limitation in the advance of new aluminum complexes around which sustainable and benign catalytic systems can be developed. The goals of this proposed research are to synthesize aluminum complexes of redox-active nitroxide ligands that exhibit reversible, multi-electron electrochemical and chemical transformations. This novel redox chemistry will be exploited to expand the reaction portfolio of aluminum complexes and will enable new catalyst systems based around this abundant element.

Project Period: 7/1/2017 – 6/30/2020

Michael Brown, Physics & Astronomy

Collaborative Research: Analysis of wave mode content in fully turbulent, moderately collisional plasma through laboratory experiment and kinetic simulation

Donors: National Science Foundation and Department of Energy

Award Date: 9/15/2017

This project, a joint venture with researchers at Bryn Mawr College and the University of Maryland, College Park, aims to explore and understand the turbulent characteristics of hot, magnetically dynamic, moderately collisional laboratory plasma generated by a plasma gun launched into a flux-conserving plasma wind tunnel. Experiments of this nature will be conducted on two different plasma machines: the Swarthmore Spheromak Experiment (SSX) and a new experiment in development at Bryn Mawr College. The measurements will then be compared to kinetic simulations of the experiments using Gkeyll and Eurus developed at the University of Maryland and University of Iowa, respectively. Comparisons will focus on metrics geared to investigate the wave mode content of these plasmas, including correlation of magnetic field and density, variance anisotropy, and wavenumber spectra.

Project Dates: 8/15/2017 - 8/14/2020

Daniela Fera, Chemistry & Biochemistry

Structural analysis of antibody virus complexes to guide immunogen design

Donor: amFAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research

Award Date: 8/21/2017

Previous structural efforts of a bnAb has revealed how it binds to the HIV envelope, but it is still unclear how its germline antibody binds. Thus, the goal of the proposed research is to determine a high-resolution structure of an early intermediate from this lineage in complex with the envelope to see how the two bind. Because the early intermediate is closely related to the germline antibody, this information will allow us to deduce how the germline antibody binds to the virus envelope and thus develop a peptide immunogen that can mimic the antibody epitope on the envelope trimer.

Project Period: 8/1/2017 - 7/31/2018

Jennifer Peck, Economics

Childcare as a potential barrier to women’s employment in Saudi Arabia

Donor: Harvard Kennedy School

Award Date: 7/27/2017

Some firms have continued to employ only male workers even after the Nitaquat program. We hypothesize that this may be due to fixed costs: while hiring female workers may be attractive to firms trying to meet nationalization quotas, firms must first invest in the capacity to hire women. This pilot will gather information on firms’ assessments of these constraints through administrative data analysis, interviews, and a firm survey. The goal of this pilot is to lay the groundwork for a full-scale RCT in close collaboration with MLSD partners to test policies, alleviate these constraints, and increase female employment.

Project Period: 7/1/2017 - 6/30/2018

Liliya Yatsunyk, Chemistry & Biochemistry

Deciphering the structure and dynamics of quadruplex DNA and DNA-ligand complexes

Donor: National Institutes of Health

Award Date: 3/24/2017

The proposed research will improve the selectivity and efficacy of anticancer therapies by contributing new knowledge about non-canonical G-quadruplex (GQ) DNA structure, and the interactions of GQs with small molecule ligands. GQ DNA has been firmly established as an important therapeutic target for cancer. Unfortunately, DNA-centered drug discovery programs suffer from limited structural information available for GQs, especially in the presence of ligands. To address these challenges, this research will perform comprehensive crystallographic investigations focused on telomeric and oncogene promoter G-quadruplexes. This work will be accompanied by spectroscopic and calorimetric studies of the thermodynamic parameters of ligand binding to GQ DNA (e.g., stoichiometry, affinity, selectivity, driving forces). Kinetic information can help identify the timescale of G-quadruplex formation and thus biological processes that can be affected by the presence of these structures. Collectively, the proposed work will enhance our understanding of GQ structural plasticity, supply coordinates for drug discovery platforms, shed light on the origin of ligand selectivity for a specific DNA target, and guide the design of novel highly selective anticancer therapies while providing transformative training to Swarthmore undergraduate students.

Project Period: 6/1/2017 - 5/31/2020

Brad Davidson, Biology

RUI: The role of mitotic trafficking in cell fate specification

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 5/12/2017

Brad Davidson’s research focuses on understanding how cell division impacts inductive signal processing to increase understanding of how cell fate induction is impacted by intracellular trafficking of signaling components. This grant will seek to characterize mitotic trafficking of FGFR enriched signaling domains, delineate the role of specific endocytic pathways in signaling domain redistribution, and delineate how mitotic kinases impact endocytic trafficking of FGFR enriched domains. This research will provide fundamental insights regarding the interplay between division and signaling in both embryonic and stem cells.

Project Period: 5/15/2017 - 4/30/2021

Cat Norris, Psychology

Ambivalence as a Catalyst for Changing Health Behaviors

Donor: Pennsylvania Department of Health, Commonwealth Universal Research Enhancement (C.U.R.E.) program

Award Date: 9/9/2016

This project examines the impact that ambivalence can have on healthy decision making. Ambivalence—the simultaneous experience of both positive and negative feelings—may be a necessary catalyst for changing addictive behaviors; it may also prevent healthy decisions if it distracts attention away from the decision at hand. Both potential impacts of ambivalence, as well as an intervention that may diminish the deleterious effects of ambivalence on attention, will be researched in this project which will examine the neural signatures of these processes and study how individual differences (e.g., personality) affect the experience of ambivalence. The data collected may also shed light on the positive role ambivalence can play in adopting healthy behaviors.

Project Period: 1/1/2016 – 12/31/2017

Christopher Graves, Chemistry and Biochemistry

Aluminum-Nitroxide Complexes: Redox-Active Aluminum Complexes for Applications in C–H Activation

Donor: Research Corporation for Scientific Advancement

Award Transfer Date: 9/1/2016

The objective of this research is to synthesize aluminum complexes of redox-active nitroxide ligands that are capable of multi-electron redox processes. The rationale for this work is that by showing novel redox activity the aluminum complexes will establish new functional groups and catalytic systems, namely for C–H activation chemistry, based on this abundant and inexpensive element. Dr. Graves will synthesize a series of Al-nitroxide complexes and then the redox behavior of the ligand will be used to install multiply-bound function groups (Al=E, E = CR2, NR, O) at the aluminum cation. He will probe the solution electrochemical behavior of the complexes and correlate their behavior with reactivity. The aluminum complexes will be used as reagents for the C–H activation of hydrocarbons and the synthesis of functionalized organic compounds. Ultimately Graves expects that by exploiting the redox behavior of the Al-nitroxide complexes he will create a new catalytic manifold for C–H activation. The results will expand the utility of aluminum reagents in synthesis while offering novel catalysts for a synthetically useful reaction.

Swarthmore Project Period: 9/1/2016 - 8/31/2018

Catherine Crouch and Benjamin Geller, Physics & Astronomy

Collaborative Research: Community Sourcing Introductory Physics for the Life Sciences

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 8/31/2016

The Introductory Physics for Life Science (IPLS) Portal will enhance the education of hundreds of thousands of life science students each year by providing engaging and effective IPLS instructional materials and helping IPLS instructors use these materials. This collaborative effort of the American Association of Physics Teachers and eight colleges and universities, including a community college and a Hispanic-serving institution, will create an open-source, peer-reviewed, and innovatively structured environment for IPLS content. Initially containing materials from multiple NSF-funded research and development projects, the Portal will become a development platform for IPLS curricula. The site will serve as both an archive and a dissemination tool, including a course-building interface for faculty. Instructors will be supported in creating innovative and individualized courses, mixing and matching from multiple sources tuned to their needs, offering a flexible and low-cost alternative to traditional textbooks.

Project Period: 9/1/2016 - 8/31/2020

Kelly McConville, Mathematics

Support Vector Machines and Support Vector Regression for Imputation in Bureau of Labor Statistics Surveys

Donor: American Statistical Association

Award Date: 8/29/2016

Item nonresponse is a common issue for many surveys. One solution to item nonresponse is to impute the missing values, which provides the end user with a complete dataset. The integrity of that partially imputed dataset relies on the ability of the imputation method utilized to decrease nonresponse bias while still maintaining the true structure of the survey variables and the true relationships between these variables. During the fellowship, Dr. McConville will develop imputation methods based on support vector machines (SVM) and support vector regression (SVR). This work would require adapting these statistical learning techniques to handle data collected using a complex sampling design. Using the SVM/SVR imputation model, McConville will study the properties of the imputed estimator under different missing data mechanisms and various sampling designs. In particular, she would construct SVM/SVR imputation models for the asset and liability variables in the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey (CE) and would draw comparisons between this statistical learning tool and the existing methods of imputation currently used for CE.

Project Period: 9/1/2016 - 1/25/2017

Liliya Yatsunyk, Chemistry & Biochemistry

Deciphering the structure and dynamics of quadruplex DNA and DNA-ligand complexes

Donor: The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation

Award Date: 7/29/2016

The Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award is provided to support faculty who are engaged in both outstanding research and teaching. Research supported by this project will support the development of new and promising highly selective therapies to battle cancer. Unusual DNA structures called G-quaduplexes (GQ) are involved in a significant number of cancer-related biological processes. Finding ligands that bind these structures may open new insights into the development of individualized therapies against cancer. Studying GQ DNA structures of telomeres and oncogene promoters and uncovering their interactions with small molecule ligands will provide a better understanding of cancer while also paving the way for more efficient and selective therapies. The interdisciplinary nature of the research design and its potential to advance the quadruplex field will provide transformative training for Swarthmore undergraduates.

Project Period: 9/1/2016 – 8/31/2021

Erin Bronchetti, Economics

Pay to Plan or Pay to Act?

Donor: Russell Sage Foundation

Award Date: 5/16/2016

This research investigates how individuals respond to incentives that encourage planning (“Pay to Plan”) versus incentives that reward action (“Pay to Act”). Erin Bronchetti, along with Judd Kessler (UPenn), Ellen Magenheim (Swarthmore College), Dmitry Taubinsky (UC Berkley), and Eric Zwick (U Chicago) study this question by conducting a field experiment, in which subjects are invited to participate in an online course in computer code writing. Subjects are randomly assigned to groups that face different levels of financial incentives for task completion (completing three weekly coding modules) and plan-making (creating three calendar events specifying when during the week they will complete the coding tasks). The results will provide new evidence on plan-making, follow-through, and incentives.

Project Period: 7/1/2016 - 6/30/2017

K. David Harrison, Linguistics

Collaborative Research: Plant and Fungal Diversity of Tafea Province, Vanuatu, a Threatended Hotspot

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 3/29/2016

Vanuatu is a group of 80 islands located in the South Pacific, situated roughly equidistant from New Caledonia, Fiji, and the Solomon Islands, all of which are globally important biodiversity hotspots. Despite its significance as a treasure trove of biodiversity, Vanuatu’s plants and fungi remain poorly documented, rendering it a “biodiversity black hole” and, thus, leaving a significant gap in our knowledge of biogeographic relationships with neighboring island countries. Along with its rich biological diversity, Vanuatu is also the most linguistically dense country in the world, with 112 languages for a total population of only 253,000; nine of these languages are found only in Tafea Province. The researchers will complete the first comprehensive survey of angiosperms, gymnosperms, ferns, lycophytes, bryophytes, endophytic and macro-fungi, and lichens ever undertaken in Tafea Province. Formal student training will also take place at the University of the South Pacific, California State University–East Bay, Swarthmore College, University of Hawai‘i, and the New York Botanical Garden. Because most land in Vanuatu is held under customary ownership, and local people are the stewards of their environments, the loss of biocultural knowledge is a serious threat to their ability to manage biodiversity resources sustainably.

Project Period: 7/1/2016 - 6/30/2020

David Cohen, Physics & Astronomy

A Probe of the Hybrid Colliding Wind and Cetrifugal-Magnetosperic X-Ray Emission of Plaskett’s Star

Donor: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Award Date: 1/27/2016

Plaskett’s star is an extremely massive, close 0-0 binary system. Recent spectropolarimetric observations have detected a magnetic field of ~ 3 kG on the secondary, as well as a very short rotation period of 1.21 d. The secondary is the first 0 star suspected to harbor a centrifugally supported magnetosphere, and the primary is close enough for its wind to interact with the magnetosphere of the secondary. We propose a 315 ks HETGS observation, with which we will measure variations in the Doppler width and shift of emission lines as a function of both orbital phase and secondary rotation phase. We will also make high precision measurements of f/i line ratios, constraining the spatial distribution of X-ray emitting plasma.

Project Period: 1/19/2016 - 1/18/2018

David Cohen, Physics & Astronomy

Chandra Cycle 17 Archive Theta1: Phase-Resolved Chandra Grating Analysis of the Prototype Magnetic O Star Theta1 Ori C

Donor: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Award Date: 1/27/2016

Overluminous in X-rays by an order of magnitude compared to non-magnetic 0 stars, theta1 Ori C (07V) is the prototype magnetic massive star, and the star that powers the Orion Nebula. We propose to carefully extract and decontaminate the HETGS grating spectra in 14 pointed, archival Chandra observations of this star. We will apply temperature, line-ratio, and line-width diagnostics - all as a function of phase for this star with its rotationally modulated, tilted dipole magnetosphere. The exquisite Chandra grating data, with nearly 100 measurable spectral emission lines spanning a wide range of temperatures, will provide information about the shock physics and the spatial distribution of the hot plasma in this classic magnetically channeled wind shock X-ray source.

Project Period: 1/1/2016 - 2/28/2018

Barbara Milewski, Music

Hidden in Plain View: The Music of Holocaust Survival in Poland's First Postwar Feature Film

Donor: National Endowment for the Humanities, Fellowship Program

Award Date: 12/8/15

Barbara Milewski will illuminate a hidden story of Jewish survival during the Holocaust embedded in the first feature film released in Poland after WWII. Forbidden Songs, a light musical comedy based on satirical street songs that were banned by the Nazis, is replayed annually in Poland as a commemorative symbol of national resilience. Yet within the larger context of this work that celebrates the abiding pluck and wit of Poles lies a subtler message, told through the music, about the experience of the screenwriter, Ludwik Starski, a Polish Jew who survived in hiding during the War. Relying on archival sources and interviews with those who knew the film’s creator, Dr. Milewski will produce the first comprehensive analysis of the film's music. In addition to publishing her research, she will create the first authoritative English translation of the film and its songs, ensuring that both researchers and the general public outside of Poland have access to a significant treasure of heritage cinema.

Project Period: 1/1/2016 - 8/31/2016

Wol A Kang, Chinese

A Language Pedagogy Workshop on Teaching Chinese at Liberal Arts Colleges

Donor: Alliance to Advance Liberal Arts Colleges

Award Date: 10/23/2015

This three-day workshop aims to bring together Chinese Language teachers and scholars in AALAC institutions to share their ideas, perspectives, experiences and innovative pedagogy as well as strategies involving students in research. It will provide a forum for these faculty members to reflect, exchange teaching methods, enhance pedagogical and scholarly presentations, and discuss the challenges and issues they are facing while teaching at their home institutions. It will also provide an opportunity for Chinese language teachers to form connections and identify shared interests that can serve as platforms for collaborative panels or sessions at relevant conferences or other workshops.

Workshop Dates: 10/7/2016 - 10/9/2016

Amanda Bayer, Economics

A Workshop to Enhance Inclusivity in Economics at Liberal Arts Colleges: 2018

Donor: The Alliance to Advance Liberal Arts Colleges

Award Date: 6/24/2017

This workshop continues and expands the collaborative work begun in 2015 to enhance inclusivity in economics at liberal arts colleges. Thanks to support received from AALAC that year, economists from fifteen liberal arts colleges (Barnard College, Furman University, Grinnell College, Haverford College, Middlebury College, Oberlin College, Occidental College, Pomona College, Smith College, Swarthmore College, Vassar College, Washington & Lee University, Wesleyan University, Wellesley College, and Williams College) have been exploring ways to diversify the group of students majoring in economics at liberal arts colleges. Activities include meetings (in February 2016 and January 2017), sharing curricula and strategies, and conducting coordinated, randomized evaluations to generate credible evidence on whether these approaches are effective.

Project Period: 7/1/2017 – 6/30/2019

Emily Gasser, Linguistics

Lexical and Grammatical Documentation in South Halmahera-West New Guinea (SHWNG)

Donor: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History

Award Date: 10/1/2015

The 1200 languages of the Austronesian family are spoken across the Pacific, from Taiwan and the Philippines to Madagascar, New Zealand, and Hawaii. Some areas of Austronesian are well-documented and thoroughly analyzed, while others are several severely under-studied. The South Halmahera-West New Guinea (SHWNG) languages, spoken on the island of Halmahera and in the Papua region of eastern Indonesia, fall squarely in the latter category. Dr. Gasser will travel to Indonesia this June to collect wordlists and basic grammatical data from roughly ten so-far-undocumented SHWNG languages. The data gathered by this project will be incorporated into a large, publically available online database, the Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database, to be used in comparative studies to reconstruct the linguistic history of the region. While in the field, she will continue her existing collaboration with the Universitas Negeri Papua to train future researchers in language documentation practices.

Project Period: 11/1/2015 - 10/31/2016

Michael Brown, Physics & Astronomy

Plasma Accelerator on the Swarthmore Spheromak Experiment (with Bryn Mawr College)

Donor: U.S. Department of Energy, Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E)

Award Date: 9/23/2015

David Schaffner (Bryn Mawr) and Michael Brown will design, develop, and test two flexible, low-cost, small-scale plasma acceleration modules for the purpose of injecting energy in the form of high velocity non-axisymmetric magnetized plasma into a fusion chamber at high energy efficiency and high repetition rate. This module will be built onto the existing Swarthmore Spheromak Experiment machine. The ultimate goal of this project is to develop plasma acceleration/energy injection technology that can be used in conjunction with a variety of fusion machines. This project aims to prove the ability to provide significant energy to a fusion plasma system on a small scale, with minimum additional infrastructure.

Project Period: 9/28/2015 - 9/27/2018

Jennifer Peck, Economics

The Effects of Nitaqat on Aggregate Saudi and Expatriate Employment and Earnings

Donor: Harvard Kennedy School

Award Date: 9/4/2015

In collaboration with Conrad Miller of the University of California, Berkeley, Jennifer Peck will study the aggregate effects of the Nitaqat program on the labor market, with attention to market-level effects and other spillovers to non-targeted firms. While Nitaqat directly incentivizes firms to meet quotas for Saudi workers, its effects on aggregate Saudi and expatriate employment rates and earnings are theoretically ambiguous. Firms under the quota may increase their Saudi employment by hiring workers away from firms already satisfying the quota; decreases in expatriate employment at some pressured firms may be offset elsewhere; and wages for Saudi workers may or may not adjust in response to the program. To understand the nature of these potential spillovers, the study will first adapt tools from network analysis to partition firms based on prior observed worker movements across firms. Then variation across firms in ex-ante distance from hiring quotas will be used to estimate the overall employment and wage effects of Nitaqat, varying the level of aggregation to estimate spillovers.

Project Period: 5/14/2015 - 5/31/2016

Kathleen Howard, Chemistry & Biochemistry

Conformational Studies of the Region of Influenza A M2 Protein Involved in Viral Budding

Donor: National Institutes of Health

Award Date: 8/25/2015

Influenza A viruses cause recurrent seasonal epidemics and global pandemics. The threat of future pandemics, coupled with the growing resistance to current antivirals, makes the development of new influenza drugs a national healthcare priority. Basic information on the life cycle of influenza is still emerging and could lead to new tactics for inhibiting viral infectivity. In particular, new insight into how influenza buds at the plasma membrane of infected cells has recently been discovered. The influenza M2 protein has been shown to be critical to viral budding and is the focus of this proposal.

Viral fission studies have demonstrated that M2-facilitated budding is cholesterol dependent although the atomic-level details of the interaction between cholesterol and M2 are not known. Capitalizing on the PI’s expertise in both EPR and NMR techniques, both spectroscopic approaches will be used to provide a structural understanding for how the M2 protein facilitates viral budding. M2 localizes to the highly curved neck of budding viruses. Structural information on the conformation of the M2 protein within high curvature regions could inform efforts to inhibit the replication of viruses, offering significant potential for developing a new generation of anti-flu drugs.

Project Period: 9/1/2015 – 8/31/2018

Alan Baker, Philosophy

RUI: STS: Standard Research Grant: Mathematical Explanation in Science

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 8/10/2015

This project will analyze case studies of mathematical explanation in evolutionary biology to inform the philosophical debate about the nature of mathematical explanation in science. It will take place over three consecutive summers, and will make essential use of undergraduate researchers in philosophy, mathematics, and biology; specifically, it will integrate research and education by involving advanced undergraduate students in the project. Doing so will serve to broaden the scope of participation in science by exposing students in mathematics and in philosophy to a collaborative style of research that is often lacking in these disciplines; it will provide a model for institutional interdisciplinarity, fostering intellectual and logistical connections between the natural sciences and the humanities.

Project Period: 8/15/2015 - 7/31/2018

Kevin Webb, Computer Science

Collaborative Research: Infrastructure and Development of a Computer Science Concept Inventory for CS2

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 6/26/2015

This collaborative project involving four institutions (University of California-San Diego; University of Illinois, Chicago; University of California-Berkeley; and Swarthmore College) will develop a Concept Inventory (CI) for the second introductory programming course (CS2) in computer science. CIs are validated assessments of course content knowledge, and can be used to compare teaching approaches, identify student misconceptions, and quantify learning gains. In physics, the Force Concept Inventory was responsible for a widespread shift in the ways that physics students are taught. The development of a CI for CS2 will have a similar impact on the way computer science will be taught across the country.

Project Period: 7/1/2015 – 6/30/2018

Amanda Bayer, Economics

Enhancing Inclusivity in Economics at Liberal Arts Colleges

Co-PI: Fernando Lozano, Pomona College

Donor: Alliance to Advance Liberal Arts Colleges

Award Date: 6/25/2015

The importance of diversity and inclusiveness in economics education and policymaking is unquestionable, yet only 30% of economics Bachelor’s degrees are awarded to women and 11% to US citizen black, Native American, or Hispanic or Latino students (National Center for Education Statistics, IPEDS 2011). These workshops convene economists from liberal arts colleges to acknowledge and explore how we fall short in creating an environment of inclusivity for our students and unintentionally deter women, students of color, or low-income students. After learning about inclusive, innovative, and evidence-based teaching practices, workshop participants can join in coordinated, randomized interventions designed to diversify the group of students studying economics at liberal arts colleges.

Workshop Dates: 2/5/2016, 1/5/2017

Allen Kuharski (Theater) & Barbara Milewski (Music)

Allan Kuharski Barbara Milewski

Chopin Without Piano

Donor: The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage

Award Date: 6/15/2015

Swarthmore College’s Performing Arts is partnering with the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, FringeArts, and the Centrala theater company in Warsaw, Poland, for the North American debut of Chopin Without Piano. This theatrical and musical piece will give audiences insights into Chopin, the historic figure, and a rare opportunity to focus on the mastery of his orchestral writing of two concerti. A dramatic spoken text, constructed from primary and secondary sources, “sounds” in place of the virtuosic piano and includes a contemplation of how the arts provide refuge and solace for life in turbulent times. This endeavor is spearheaded by Swarthmore’s two American experts on Polish theater and music: Allen Kuharski, Stephen Lang Professor of the Performing Arts and Chair of the Theater Department; and Barbara Milewski, Associate Professor of Music in the Department of Music and Dance. Dr. Kuharski has brought Polish theater to Philadelphia venues to wide critical acclaim; Dr. Milewski's research on Chopin has won prestigious awards in the U.S. This performance of Chopin Without Piano is arguably the most evocative contribution of Polish contemporary work to Philadelphia's cultural ecology to date.

Project Period: 7/1/2015 - 11/2/2015

Liliya Yatsunyk, Chemistry & Biochemistry

Understanding of Interactions Between Porphyrin Ligands and G-Quadruplex DNA

Donor: Pennsylvania Department of Health, Commonwealth Universal Research Enhancement (C.U.R.E.) program

Award Date: 4/28/2015

Unusual tetrastranded DNA structures, called quadruplexes, play important roles in a variety of biological processes and are linked directly to cancer and aging. The proposed project will contribute to our fundamental understanding of drug molecules interactions with quadruplexes; shed light on the origin of drug selectivity for a specific DNA target, and provide guidance in preparation of novel cancer drugs that act via stabilization of quadruplex DNA. In a broader sense the project will contribute to our understanding of cancer and aging, areas that have a major impact on human health and wellbeing. Importantly, it will serve as a teaching tool to inspire, excite, and motivate Swarthmore undergraduates to choose careers in sciences.

Project Period: 1/1/2015 -12/31/2017

David Cohen, Physics & Astronomy

Probing the Extreme Wind Confinement of the Most Magnetic O Star with COS Spectroscopy

Donor: NASA Space Telescope Science Institute

Award Date: 2/25/2015

In collaboration with Florida Institute of Technology, we are obtaining phase-resolved UV spectroscopy of the recently discovered magnetic O star NGC 1624-2, which has the strongest magnetic field ever detected in an O-star by an order of magnitude. We will use the strength and variability of the UV resonance line profiles to diagnose the density, velocity, and ionization structure of NGC 1624-2’s enormous magnetosphere that results from entrapment of its stellar wind by its strong, nearly dipolar magnetic field. With this gigantic magnetosphere, NGC 1624-2 represents a new regime of extreme wind confinement that will constrain models of magnetized winds and their surface mass flux properties. A detailed understanding of such winds is necessary to study the rotational braking history of magnetic O-stars, which can shed new light on the fundamental origin of magnetism in massive, hot stars.

Project Period: 2/1/2015 - 1/31/2018

K. David Harrison, Linguistics

REU Site Proposal Building dictionaries to support endangered languages and preserve environmental knowledge in Mexico, Micronesia, and Navajo Nation

Co-PI's: Brook Lillehaugen and Ted Fernald

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 12/5/2014

The project builds bridges between indigenous linguists in the US academic community, Mexico, Micronesia, and the Navajo Nation, with collaborative research that benefits all parties. It helps uncover deep connections between languages and landscapes by documenting the knowledge base about the natural world found in endangered languages. The resulting linguistic materials support local communities' language revitalization efforts. They will also be a resource to the broader scientific community seeking to understand language complexity, diversity and universals. The project begins with a two-week intensive, hands-on training session on current best practice for recording languages (or areas of grammar within languages) that have not yet been adequately documented. Students learn directly from professional linguists and indigenous language experts how endangered languages are being modernized, digitized, and expanded into new technological domains. In weeks three and four, students participate in a two-week field practicum. Working in teams led by indigenous language experts, students help record basic and specialized lexica, folk taxonomies, toponyms, and ethno-biological nomenclature. They explore and help document the rich knowledge base in each language that uniquely encodes the natural environment (flora, fauna, weather, geography, etc.). They also learn current best practices in sustaining indigenous languages and supporting global language diversity.

Project Period: 5/1/2015 - 4/30/2018

David Cohen, Physics & Astronomy

Testing the Wind-Shock Paradigm for B-Type Star X-ray Production with theta Carinae (B0.2V)

Donor: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Award Date: 9/26/2014

This project involves a detailed X-ray spectral analysis of a particular star, theta Carinae, that is already known to have unusual X-ray properties, perhaps due to the low-density of its stellar wind. As Co-Investigator, Dr. Cohen will extract use his expertise in atomic physics, thermal plasma emission, and spectroscopic modeling to help the PI (Prof. Veronique Petit, Florida Institute of Technology) determine the physical properties of the hot plasma in this star’s wind. He will also – along with Swarthmore student Zack Li (’16) – compute numerical simulations of the X-ray production mechanisms in this star’s wind.

Project Period: 9/22/2014 - 9/21/2016

Brad Davidson, Biology

Chordate heart gene network

Donor: National Institutes of Health

Award Date: 8/27/2014

Human heart defects are pervasive and the underlying genetic causes are often poorly understood. In our research we are using sea squirt embryos, simple marine invertebrates with a surprisingly close relationship to humans, to study heart genetics. By studying the simple interconnections between heart genes in sea squirts, we aim to unravel the much more dense and complex networks of genes that control human heart formation.

We will also focus on developing cutting edge technology for comprehensive analysis of the conserved cardiac transcription factor, Ets, and Co-Factor binding patterns during establishment of the heart lineage. These efforts will be tailored to promote intensive training of undergraduate researchers in the formulation and execution of independent research projects.

Project Period: 9/1/2014 - 8/31/2018

Jill Gladstein, English Literature

The Writing Program Administration (WPA) Census Data Project

Donor: The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

Award Date: 8/25/2014

Large-scale, national data have typically not been available to answer comprehensive questions about current practices in post-secondary writing programs. The National Census of Writing (NCW) Data Project addresses this oversight by providing a data-based picture of writing programs at over 900 public and not-for-profit four- and two-year institutions in the fifty states. The Census includes a 200+ survey related to different sites of writing at a given institution including: 1) first-year writing, 2) identifying and supporting diversely-prepared students, 3) Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) and writing beyond the first year, 4) the undergraduate and graduate major/ minor in writing studies, 5) writing centers, 6) administrative structures of writing programs, and 7) the demographics of respondents. The Census Database makes the processed data publicly available and sustainable, by creating interfaces for scholars and administrators nationwide to query the data set and to update their institutions’ profiles at regular intervals.

Project Period: 9/1/2014 – 1/31/2018

Jennifer Peck, Economics

Phase II: Policy Research Engagement, Human Resources Development Fund of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and Evidence for Policy Design, Harvard Kennedy School

Donor: Harvard Kennedy School

Award Date: 7/14/2014

Professor Peck’s expertise is in development and labor issues in resource-rich countries, and some of her recent work focuses on the impact of Saudi labor market policies on the growth of the private sector. Her experience in these areas will help advance the aims of Phase II of this policy/research engagement between the Human Resources Development Fund (HDRF) of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Evidence for Policy Design (EPoD) program at Harvard Kennedy School. Her contributions to this project include organizing and participating in policy research symposia to review research results and policy developments.

Project Period: 11/1/2014 - 10/31/2019

Vince Formica, Biology

Evolvability of Social Networks

Donor: National Science Foundation

Award Date: 1/27/2014

The position an individual occupies in a social network can profoundly affect its resources, risks, and fitness. However, it is unclear whether or how network position has the capacity to evolve through natural selection. This study will determine the biological level of organization most relevant to the evolution of social dynamics by studying 12 wild populations of forked fungus beetles for three consecutive breeding sessions and tracking social networks and pedigrees of populations. Direct (individual) and indirect (social group) contributions to genetic variance will be compared to determine the relative roles of individual traits and social partners' traits in the expression of network position.

The behavioral and genetic data collected during the study will serve as the backbone for a semester long course in Molecular Ecology and Evolution. Research results will also be used to create lab modules for introductory courses and will be used to develop a workshop for Swarthmore College's Science for Kids Program. In addition, the study will provide independent undergraduate research opportunities.

Project Period: 2/15/2014 - 1/31/2019