Dr James W. Porter
Dr. James W. Porter, the Josiah Meigs Professor of Ecology at the University of Georgia, is a marine ecologist specializing in the biology and ecology of Floridian and Caribbean coral reefs. He has investigated the effects of naval bombardment on coral reefs on Isla Vieques, Puerto Rico, and has worked with the CDC in Atlanta, GA to investigate the link between Underwater Unexploded Ordinance (UWUXO) and human health on the island
Professor Porter served as the editor of the professional journals Ecology and Ecological Monographs. He is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Society of Naturalists, and the Great Barrier Reef Committee. He has published more than 150 papers, with 14 of these in either Science, Nature, or PNAS.
Dr. Porter has built by far the largest library of antiquarian books on corals and coral reefs in existence. With more than 2,500 books in the collection, its holdings are rich in material from the Seventeenth, Eighteenth, and Nineteenth Centuries.
Faculty website: http://www.ecology.uga.edu/facultyMember.php?Porter-32/
Dr Marshall Shepherd
Dr. J. Marshall Shepherd is a leading international expert in weather and climate. Dr. Shepherd was the 2013 President of American Meteorological Society (AMS), the nation’s largest and oldest professional/science society in the atmospheric and related sciences. Dr. Shepherd is Director of the University of Georgia’s (UGA) Atmospheric Sciences Program and Full Professor in the Department of Geography. He is the Georgia Athletic Association Distinguished Professor of Geography and Atmospheric Sciences. Dr. Shepherd is also the host of The Weather Channel’s Award-Winning Sunday talk show Weather Geeks, a pioneering Sunday talk show on national television dedicated to science and contributor to Forbes Magazine.
Dr. Shepherd currently serves on the Board of Trustees for the Nature Conservancy (Georgia Chapter), Earth Science Subcommittee of the NASA Advisory Council, and the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Visiting Committee. He was a member of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Science Advisory Board, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed’s Hazard Preparedness Advisory Group United Nations World Meteorological Organization steering committee on aerosols and precipitation, 2007 Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) AR4 contributing author team, National Academies of Sciences (NAS) Panels on climate and national security, extreme weather attribution, and urban meteorology. Dr. Shepherd is a past editor for both the Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology and Geography Compass, respectively.
Dr. Shepherd received his B.S., M.S. and PhD in physical meteorology from Florida State University. He was the first African American to receive a PhD from the Florida State University Department of Meteorology, one of the nation’s oldest and respected. He is also the 2nd African American to preside over the American Meteorological Society. He is a member of the AMS, American Geophysical Union, Association of American Geographers (AAG), Sigma Xi Research Honorary, Chi Epsilon Pi Meteorology Honorary, and Omicron Delta Kappa National Honorary. He is also a member of the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. and serves on various National Boards associated with his alma mater. Dr. Shepherd co-authored a children’s book on weather and weather instruments called Dr. Fred’s Weather Watch. Dr. Shepherd is originally from Canton, Georgia. He is married to Ayana Shepherd and has two kids, Anderson and Arissa.
Source of bio and website: http://www.drmarshallshepherd.com/
Previous lecture: https://athenssciencecafe.wordpress.com/past-events/zombies-sports-cola/
Dr Kate Hendricks, MD, MPH&TM, Medical Officer, Special Pathogens Branch, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Dr. Hendricks is board certified in preventive medicine, has a tropical medicine degree, and started her public health career in Mississippi as Epidemic Intelligence Service officer (’87). She currently serves as an anthrax subject matter expert for the CDC. Previously, she was a public health physician for the state of Texas where she directed infectious disease epidemiology, edited the state’s biweekly morbidity report, served as principal investigator for a neural tube defect project, and following a stint in the nonprofit world, served as the chief public health officer for the prison system. She has more than 60 peer-reviewed publications on infectious, developmental, nutritional, and environmental topics. She is particularly interested in the issue of susceptibility to infectious diseases. Recently she directed a project that accessed English – language published case reports of patients with anthrax from 1880-2013.
Nina Cleveland, MPH
Nina Cleveland is the Practice Coordinator for UGA’s College of Public Health, where she is responsible for the coordination of the MPH and DrPH field experiences. During the year she plans Field placement and Career networking events along with information sessions. She also provides career services for graduating students. Cleveland has a practice background in nursing, mental health, and emergency preparedness and response, and she holds degrees in Nursing, Social work and Public Health. She is the Co-Director of the UGA Medical Reserve Corps Unit and on the Board of Directors of the Athens Nurses Clinic. Currently, Cleveland is working toward her PhD in Health Promotion and Behavior with a research focus in public health emergency preparedness.
Source of bio: https://www.publichealth.uga.edu/node/3330
Dr Patricia Marsteller
Dr. Pat Marsteller is a faculty member in the department of Biology at Emory University. She studied evolution of animal behavior for her M.S. degree at University of South Carolina and evolution and quantitative genetics for her Ph.D. at the University of Florida. She worked with alligators for her M.S. thesis, investigating whether they could use the sun, the moon and the stars to navigate. Her dissertation research focused on a quantitative genetic analysis, using fruit flies as a model system, to investigate genetic and environmental influence on life history patterns and traits such as longevity and quantity and timing of reproduction. She has taught courses on Darwin, evolution and many other courses over her 30 years of college teaching. She also works with college and pre-college faculty on developing curriculum materials and on using active learning strategies in the teaching of science and mathematics.
Source of bio and faculty website: http://cse.emory.edu/home/people/staff/Marsteller.html
Article about Dr Marsteller: http://membercentral.aaas.org/blogs/member-spotlight/pat-marsteller-takes-hands-stem-mentoring-new-heights
Jordan Rose
From his bio, "Mr. Jordan Rose is executive director of the Georgia BioEd Institute, managing GaBioEd’s workforce, entrepreneurship and education initiatives, ensuring that they align with industry needs. Mr. Rose is responsible for strategic and operational direction of GaBioEd to fulfill the organization’s mission to grow Georgia’s leadership in life science innovation...As co-founder and co-director of the Atlanta Science Festival, a 501c3 nonprofit organization, he leads a citywide collaboration of more than 100 educational institutions, museums, corporations, and community groups to celebrate our region’s achievements in science and technology. Since 2014 the Atlanta Science Festival has reached over 110,000 curious children and adults at over 300 events at venues across the metro area."
Atlanta Science Festival: http://atlantasciencefestival.org/
Ted Bazemore
Ted Bazemore is the contracted Electronic Resources Librarian at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Stephen B. Thacker Library. He serves as team member/trainer of the Altmetric @ CDC Pilot implementation, facilitating instruction on metrics and qualitative data enhancing traditional research resources. Ted has been in the library profession for 18 years and has worked in a variety of capacities in public, academic and special libraries. He holds a BA in Business Administration from LaGrange College and an MLIS from Florida State University. Born and raised in Atlanta, Ted live in Conyers, is married to a librarian, and spends his spare time working on his backyard garden.
Julie Gaines
Julie K. Gaines is the Head of the AU/UGA Medical Partnership Campus Library. As one of the core educators for the medical students, she is fully integrated in the curriculum by teaching Evidence-Based Medicine topics, and as a small group faculty facilitator in the community health component of the curriculum...
Before joining the faculty at the Partnership, Julie was the Community and Technology Liaison Librarian at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio, Texas. While at the UT Health Science Center, she coordinated and managed the Libraries’ Outreach programs, which included managing several subcontracts provided by the National Network of Libraries of Medicine. Before moving to Texas, she was a National Library of Medicine Associate Fellow after her graduate work where she spent a year in Bethesda, Maryland at the National Library of Medicine on the NIH campus.
Source: AU/UGA Medical Partnership Faculty Page for Julie Gaines
Recent Publications
Deutsch K, Gaines JK, Hill JR, Nuss MA. iPad experience during clinical
rotations from seven medical schools in the United States: Lessons learned. Med
Teach. 2016 Apr 27:1-5.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27117525
Cervero RM, Gaines JK. The impact of CME on physician performance and patient
health outcomes: an updated synthesis of systematic reviews. J Contin Educ Health
Prof. 2015 Spring;35(2):131-8.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26115113
Sollenberger JF, Holloway RG Jr. The evolving role and value of libraries and
librarians in health care. JAMA. 2013 Sep 25;310(12):1231-2.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24065006
Barbara Kahn-Aitken
Barbara Kahn-Aitken is a Senior Research Analyst within Coca-Cola's Competitive Research team. Prior to this role, Barbara worked as an Information Processional at Cadence Group, an information/records management consultant, and as a Business Applications Consultant at LexisNexis. She received her MLIS from Simmons College and a BA in History and French from Smith College. Barbara is active in the Georgia Special Libraries Association
GA-SLA Member Profile: http://georgia.sla.org/2015/09/member-profile-in-her-own-words-barbara-kahn-aiken/
Dr. Jay Brandes
Dr. Brandes is the Director of the Skidaway Island Scientific Stable Isotope Lab (SISSIL), a state-of-the-art facility which analyzes a wide range of environmental samples for researchers throughout the Southeast. He has been a member of the faculty at the Skidaway Institute since 2005 and became a full professor in 2011. His research interests include using Stable isotopes to determine sources and diagenesis of organic compounds and nutrients in ecosystems and the development of high resolution X-ray spectromicroscopic techniques for examining nutrient cycling and sequestration and organic matter diagenesis.
Source: Skidaway Institute of Oceanography Faculty Page for Dr. Jay Brandes
Select Publications
Huang, W. -J., W. -J. Cai, Y. Wang, X. Hu, B. Chen, S. E. Lohrenz, S. Chakraborty, R. He, J. Brandes, and C. S. Hopkinson. 2015. The response of inorganic carbon distributions and dynamics to upwelling-favorable winds on the northern Gulf of Mexico during summer. Continental Shelf Research 111:211-222. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.csr.2015.08.020
Leal, M. C., C. Ferrier-Pagès, R. Calado, J. A. Brandes, M. E. Frischer, and J. C. Nejstgaard. 2014. Trophic ecology of the facultative symbiotic coral Oculina arbuscula. Marine Ecology Progress Series 504:171-179. doi: 10.3354/meps10750
Dr. Jenna Jambeck
Jenna Jambeck is an Associate Professor in the College of Engineering at the University of Georgia. Dr. Jambeck conducts research and teaches environmental engineering with a focus on solid waste. Her work often interweaves social context and sciences with technical aspects. She has conducted numerous research projects including those related to contaminant fate and transport during waste beneficial use, chemical fate and biological processes within disposal systems, sustainable and innovative waste management practices, marine debris and plastic pollution. As we continue to evolve from waste management to materials management, a new paradigm is being created and the Jambeck Research Group strives to be at the forefront of this transformation.
Source: Jambeck Research Group Homepage
Select Publications
Browne, M., Chapman, M., Thompson, R., Amaral-Zettler, L., Jambeck, J., Mallos, N. (2015). Spatial and temporal patterns of stranded intertidal marine debris: is there a picture of global change? Environmental Science and Technology, 10.1021/es5060572.
Jambeck, J.R., Johnsen, K. (2015). Marine Debris Tracker: Citizen-based Litter and Marine Debris Data Collection and Mapping, Computing in Science and Engineering, 10.1109/MCSE.2015.67.
Dr. Samantha Joye
Dr. Samantha Joye is the Athletic Association Professor in Arts and Sciences in the Department of Marine Sciences in the University of Georgia's Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. She is an expert in biogeochemistry and microbial ecology and works in open ocean and coastal ecosystems. Her work is interdisciplinary, bridging the fields of chemistry, microbiology, and geology.
Dr. Joye's research has been widely published in leading scientific journals, and she is regularly called upon by national and international scientific and policy agencies for expert commentary. Her work has been funded by substantial, multi-year grants from the National Science Foundation, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Gulf of Mexico Research Institute, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, among others.
Source: Joye Research Group Homepage
Select Publications
Joye, S. B., Boetius, A., Orcutt, B. N., Montoya, J. P., Schulz, H. N., Erickson, M. J., & Lugo, S. K. (2004). The anaerobic oxidation of methane and sulfate reduction in sediments from Gulf of Mexico cold seeps. Chemical Geology, 205(3), 219-238.
Joye, S. B., & Hollibaugh, J. T. (1995). Influence of sulfide inhibition of nitrification on nitrogen regeneration in sediments. Science, 270(5236), 623.
