ODU Office of Research Announces New Seed Grants

Five research teams involving 18 faculty members at Old Dominion University and three collaborators from Eastern Virginia Medical School will share nearly $375,000 in multidisciplinary seed funding awarded Tuesday, Dec. 2, by the ODU Office of Research.

The grants were announced by Mohammad Karim, vice president for research. This is round four of a program Karim initiated in 2005 to promote multidisciplinary research projects. The goal is to nurture projects to the point that they can attract external funding.

Projects selected for funding by the research office's panel of experts are (unless otherwise noted, the investigators are from ODU and are identified by the departments and/or centers they represent):

• "Quantifying Cancer-Causing Human Papilloma Virus Strains in Hampton Roads Women." Lisa Horth, assistant professor of biological sciences; Mark Dorrepaal, chair and professor of mathematics and statistics; Jim Swanson, professor of biological sciences; and Dawn Curran, instructor of medical laboratory and radiation science. $64,721

• "Hybrid Texture Imaging and Molecular Biomarker Classification of Prostate Cancer Tumor Cells." Jiang Li, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering and researcher at the Virginia Modeling, Analysis and Simulation Center (VMASC); Frederic McKenzie, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering; Rao Chaganty, professor of mathematics and statistics; and Julius Nyalwidke of EVMS. John Semmes of EVMS serves as a consultant. $80,000

• "Do Marine Aggregates Facilitate Gene Transfer of Antibiotic Resistance in Nature?" Fred Dobbs, professor of ocean, earth and atmospheric sciences, and Gary Schafran, professor of civil and environmental engineering. Holly Gaff, assistant professor of community and environmental health; Wayne Hynes, professor and acting chair of biological sciences; and Jin Wang, assistant professor of mathematics and statistics, serve as consultants. $81,782

• "Impaired Insulin Delivery During Continuous Insulin Infusion." Ayodeji Demuren, professor of mechanical engineering; Dr. Eric Gyuricsko of EVMS; and Norou Diawara, assistant professor of mathematics and statistics. Shizhi Qian, assistant professor of aerospace engineering, serves as a consultant. $77,650

• "Novel Nanoporous Electro-osmotic Micropump: Basic Technology Development and Its Lab-on-a-Chip Applications." Shizhi Qian, assistant professor of aerospace engineering, and Helmut Baumgart, Virginia Microelectronics Consortium Professor of electrical and computer engineering. Ali Beskok, Batten Endowed Chair in computational engineering, serves as a consultant. $70,000

The funding is for work extending through the first half of next year. Each team is required to provide a written report, make an oral presentation and follow up with an aggressive plan to attract external grants, Karim said.