The Leahy Clinic patient population consists largely of the working uninsured and those with chronic health diseases. The clinic screens all patients for obesity and hypertension on each visit. All patients with diagnosed and conditions that are preconditions will be referred to the Health Education Clinic. Patients with diabetes will be given a treatment plan and follow in the medical and patient education and monitor blood glucose at home. This clinic is staffed by volunteer registered dietician, nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialist and community health education students from the University of Scranton along with faculty experts in the field of education. The grant includes money for equipment for measuring glucose/blood pressure, office equipment, computers and electronic health record access.

This grant is for an analysis of six countries – Germany, Ireland Czech Republic, South Korea, Netherlands and Columbia – and will survey CAHME-accredited programs to identify individual faculty who are involved internationally while gathering specific details related to these faculty and program activities. The survey will gather information on accreditation programs in business, medicine and/or public health to identify their domains, sponsorship, processes and memberships. It will develop a detailed strategy and plan of action to implement international demonstration site visits in different countries using the newly adopted 2013 CAHME accreditation criteria.

Funded activities:

• Variations: Photographs of Carl Buckland: His primary interests are form, color and pattern as found in urban scenery and decay.
• NEPA Regional Art 2010: 6th biennial exhibition in community and educational venues.
• An Ideal Subject: The art of Jennie Brownscombe: Establishes her role, genre, history as a portrait painter 25th Annual Student Exhibition: Juried student exhibition

Pennsylvania has the largest rural population of any state and has the second largest elderly population. The purpose of the grant is to support the enhancement of advanced nursing education and practice in predominantly rural NEPA. This project will 1) enhance family nurse practitioner curriculum with focus on palliative care and 2) improve access to quality healthcare by preparing FNP graduates who are culturally competent to provide care for vulnerable patients in rural and medically underserved areas. We plan to increase the number of rural and clinical sites in northeast and north central Pennsylvania.

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Advanced Education Nursing Traineeships HRSA (Human Resources and Services Administration) $19,549

The University of Scranton has the only family nurse practitioner program in NEPA. Our clinical nurse specialist program is the only program with a focus on nursing education. This grant will assist with the cost of tuition, books and fees associated with the advanced education nursing program.

Faculty and students will assist scientists and engineers at Schott NA in Duryea in building finite element analysis models to simulate glass annealing and glass blank casing.

The University of Scranton, along with 11 other universities, is participating in a five-year, $598,611 National Science Foundation project to promote the development of female STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) faculty. The goal of the project is to develop an effective, efficient and sustainable network that will lead to expanding communication and collaboration while nurturing career advancement. The grant will develop networks for female STEM faculty by building leadership skills, creating workshops, promoting mentoring to develop an atmosphere that will reduce isolation and encourage professional growth of female STEM faculty.

“Rusting” (oxidation) and sticking together (aggregation) of proteins are common threads among aging-related diseases, in particular neurodegenerative diseases. The aims of the research are (i) to characterize further disulfide bond formation in proteins from the brain, (ii) develop and refine chemical methods to capture, from the brain, proteins that have a high propensity toward destabilization and aggregation, and (iii) to further define the protein aggregation observed in vitro in soluble protein extracts from the brain in response to conditions that would be expected to promote the formation or rearrangement of disulfide bonds.

This is a study of the process of nerve cell regeneration using the chick olfactory system. It will examine how nerve activity shapes the growth and development of olfactory neurons through the “odor imprinting” approach. Odor imprinting is the long-term change in the nervous system which changes the animal’s behavior as a result from exposure to odors in the egg. The results of these experiments will help to determine if single cells possess the ability to completely guide their own differentiation fate.

To investigate the mechanism of the isothermal conversion of syngas to dimethyl ether of alumina supported palladium catalysts employing steady state isotope transient tracing and IR Spectroscopy. The study of this reaction is a step forward in achieving the goal of providing the environmentally safer sustainable and renewable source of energy. As dimethyl ether increasing gains importance as an alternative to petroleum, an improved understanding of the mechanism of the formations of dimenthyl ether from syngas on this catalyst can have far reaching economic impacts.

This grant is a theoretical investigation of the orbital evolution of mass transferring eccentric binary star system. Binary star systems consist of two stars gravitationally bound to each other in orbit very similar to the Earth is around the sun. If the stars are driven close together, it is possible that the gravitational pull of one star on the surface of the other can be so great as to rip a piece off the other star. The piece removed can be accreted onto the first star, be thrown from the system, or stay in the system and orbit one of the stars. The research of these scenarios will help to develop computer models and modifications to existing simulation software to include the occurrence of eccentric mass transfer, an evolutionary process not currently included.

This study will explore the potential complementary effect between the techniques of behavioral targeting and contextual targeting in online advertising. Using the online click-through data of target advertising from advertising intermediary in China, Adchina, the study will explore how consumers’ response to online video advertisements is influenced by their behavioral characteristics and match the advertisement and the page content they view.

This research will explore the experience of losing a child and consider how older adults cope with the loss of an adult child. The results of the study will provide healthcare providers a better understanding of this experience.

This study aims to expand the research on how students who travel and study abroad deal with reverse culture shock.  Identifying what occurs upon returning home will allow for easier transition for study abroad students and improve their rate of success in integrating the experience. The findings will describe and identify the factors returnee students encounter and may serve as a key factor in providing services to help returnee students.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of citrulline (a non-essential amino-acid found in watermelon) and watermelon juice on both aerobic and anaerobic performance, as well as flow-mediated vasodilation (FMD) among healthy, college-aged individuals.

The study will investigate the patterns of nonmedical use of prescriptions drugs in college students ages 18 to 24. The principal investigator hopes to gain information on changes in prescription drug abuse on a population that is undergoing critical life changes. Information may be used later to evaluate a study conducted in a southeastern university for a comparative study.

Delirium is one of the most compelling and complicating problems of a hospital stay for the elderly, often leading to morbidity and mortality. Elders who return home are at a particularly high risk for reoccurrence. Promoting independent living while facilitating early detection of delirium is vital. This grant will be used to develop a prototype of a non-invasive pill-box containing a behavior tracking detection system and an eye-tracker to detect variations in attention for home use. This proposal is designed to validate whether the connex box attached to the pill box would yield data comparable to that obtained by more complex and expensive eye-tracking technology.