SIUC Research

Southern Illinois University

Impact

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Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 2

About this section This special section on research and outreach activities at Southern Illinois University is a collaborative effort with The Southern Illinoisan.

Staff of SIU’s University Communications and Marketing and the SIU School of Medicine’s Public Affairs Office provided all stories and photos.

Research and Service Support Region’s Progress Southern Illinois University is proud to be a partner in the progress of our region. We educate future leaders, conduct research that improves lives, and contribute to the cultural vibrancy of Southern Illinois.

We support the region’s economic development as a major employer. We attract students from all 50 states and more than 100 countries, and we offer cultural and athletics events that attract families, alumni and visitors.

Through our Office of Economic and Regional Development, we collaborate on initiatives that assist small businesses, and we help entrepreneurs attract funding that turns innovative ideas into jobs.

When we say we value service learning and civic engagement, we practice what we preach. Last year,

SIU students, faculty and staff contributed 290,000 hours in outreach and community service benefitting 237,000 residents in central and southern Illinois.

In short, our commitment to Southern Illinois is deep, and our impact is wide.

Rita Cheng In the following pages we highlight just a few examples of our partnership with the region.

You will find, for example, a story about a collaboration to support cancer survivors and caregivers. Another story focuses on cultural contributions through the Southern Illinois Civic Orchestra.

You may read about research that advances our understanding of how we might help individuals diagnosed with autism or dementia. You can explore efforts to introduce children to ecosystems through gardening.

Or you can learn about work that will help doctors relieve pain, non-profit organizations protect data, businesses avoid fraud and communities assess flood risks.

Through these and many other initiatives, SIU faculty, staff and students – whether they are here for four years, 40 or more -- are proud to contribute to the vitality of Southern Illinois.

Rita Cheng is the chancellor of Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

Table of Contents Page 3 Strong Survivors Page 4 Rx for Pain: BOTOX Page 5 Learning from Invertebrates Page 6 IT Security for Non-Profits Page 7 For the Love of Music

Page 8 Designing the Future Page 9 Mitigating Microbes Page 10 ‘Recipe Revolution’ Page 11 Gardening in the Curriculum

Page 12 Climate Change Page 13 Assessing Beliefs Page 14 Detection and Protection Page 15 Crafting a Compromise Page 16 Averting Disaster

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 3

| Health

Participants, students benefit from program

‘This has helped me work through a lot of things.

It has helped me to realize I’m not alone.’

– Roxie Musgrave

Strong Survivors

By Christi Mathis

Roxie Musgrave will never forget the moment her doctor uttered those dreaded words, “You have cancer.”

Thirteen years later, the memory still brings tears to her eyes. A complete hysterectomy removed the cancer and no additional treatment was necessary, but she was changed forever.

“I just fell apart hearing that six-letter word. My dad died of cancer and I thought I was going to die,” she said. “It does something to you to hear that diagnosis. It devastated me.”

She survived. Life went on. But the diagnosis continued to haunt her. Upon hearing Musgrave’s story during a Christian group meeting, an SIU Carbondale faculty member convinced her to check out the Strong Photo by Russell Bailey Survivors Exercise and Strong Survivors – Roxie Musgrave, right, a Strong Survivors participant, balances on a ball as she uses dumbbells during a workout with Matt Jordan, a Nutrition Program for first-year master’s student in exercise science from Bloomington.

Cancer Survivors and Caregivers.

When Musgrave arrived for her first all too well. Having session in spring 2012, no family history of she was quiet and the disease, the Herrin Within the university, the hesitant, thinking that woman was diagnosed since she hadn’t had with breast cancer in College of Education and Human radiation, chemotherapy January 2013 at the age Services ranks first in external funding. or similar follow-up of 34. A few weeks later treatment, she didn’t she began a five-month In the last fiscal year, the college belong. But Phil Anton, chemotherapy regimen received more than associate professor and after discovering of exercise science in that she had the breast $20 million.

SIU’s Department of cancer gene, she opted Kinesiology and Strong for a double mastectomy Survivors program in August. exercise program After hearing her director, told her they get valuable handscomponent and Anton speak at the SIH numerous participants on learning and research oversees the fitness Hope is Home Gala hadn’t had follow-up experience and the portion. about the need for a treatment. program has a Participants can comprehensive cancer “If you survived positive impact on choose either or both center in the region, the words ‘You have their lives. segments, and can Anton invited Lerner to cancer,’ you are a “It’s great working continue participating join Strong Survivors. cancer survivor and this She was immediately with the clients, seeing in the fitness and program is for you,” them progress. They interested. She comes to activity portions as Anton assured her. appreciate the help and long as they want SIU while her children Musgrave jumped it’s a good feeling to to, through the third are in school, working in with both feet and be able to help them out with Melissa “Missy” component, “Survivors says the program has improve their lives,” Forever.” Some people Hagene, a senior had a very positive Matt Jordan, a firstjoin for weeks, some exercise science major impact on her life. The year master’s student for many years; some from Pinckneyville. special exercise and in exercise science were diagnosed years “My body changed nutrition program, a drastically last year. Not ago, some very recently, from Bloomington, joint SIU Department of said. Jordan joined the Anton said. just from surgery but Kinesiology/Southern program in fall 2012 as Each participant gets from being so sedentary Illinois Healthcare an undergraduate and a personal trainer, an nearly the entire year. project, is tailored to Musgrave is one of his SIU student, typically a I saw muscle atrophy meet the needs of each clients. kinesiology department and weight gain. I got participant, enabling “This program has student, who prepares winded very easily. My each to improve an individualized fitness helped me work through troubled knees were according to individual a lot of things. It has plan based on the weak. Getting back capabilities in a helped me to realize client’s medical history, into the gym was very program that enhances I’m not alone. With capabilities and goals. important to me but I mood, reduces Strong Survivors, Anton typically has a don’t know if I would fatigue and increases have had the confidence couple of undergraduate you don’t have to do strength and overall it by yourself. It’s a research assistants and to do it myself. I well-being. strong support system,” sometimes students am very grateful for “The program focuses Musgrave said. She’s serve internships in the the Strong Survivors on small changes over also experienced program, but the vast program and all the a 12-week period, a side benefit: a majority of the student volunteer hours that go helping people adjust 100-pound weight trainers are strictly into it,” Lerner said. their diets and fitness loss, accomplished in volunteers.

Strong Survivors routines so they can a healthy way through The program began with grant stick with it over a exercise and eating expanded in 2009 to funding from the long period of time. right. include caregivers, Lance Armstrong It’s about continued “The weight loss is whom Anton calls “the Foundation in 2005. lifestyle changes for just a fabulous side forgotten soldiers in the When the grant better health,” Tonica benefit. I’ve had old cancer battle. A lot of ended, the program Anderson, a registered friends who didn’t times, caregivers are so continued thanks to nurse and cancer patient the Department of recognize me and it’s so focused on the needs navigator cool. There are things I of the cancer survivors Kinesiology and SIH’s and survivorship that their own needs are want to do in this world Community Benefits coordinator for forgotten. This program and I’m living the life department.

Southern Illinois gets them back on track. I wanted to live. It’s The program has Healthcare, said. just awesome and I And, it’s something three components “During cancer have this program to positive the survivors including a 12-week diagnosis and treatment, nutrition and physical thank for it!” Musgrave and caregivers can do people have so little said. together.” activity class that meets control, so little-sayShe celebrated by More than 380 people twice weekly at John so on what is going going zip lining in have experienced the A. Logan College’s on with them. This the Shawnee Forest life-changing Strong Community Health program gives them with Ricky Crossley, Survivors since it Education Complex, back control and it’s her previous trainer, launched in September and the exercise and control over something in September 2013.

2005. This spring, 31 fitness program at that benefits them,” she Musgrave and Jordan students are donating SIU’s Davies Hall added. their time to help cancer are planning their own Cancer Rehabilitation Leah Lerner knows survivors and caregivers. zip line adventure Laboratory. Anderson that helpless feeling soon.

The students say teaches the nutrition

Worth Knowing

By Christi Mathis

It was a short walk from her car to SIU’s Davies Hall. But, when Fran Benson first attended Strong Survivors Exercise and Nutrition Program for Cancer Survivors and Caregivers sessions in 2006, she needed two canes and help from her husband and a student to get Photo by Russell Bailey there.

Strong Survivors – Cooper The retired Springfield, left, a senior Carbondale CPA had exercise science major from battled lymphoma in Champaign, helps Fran Benson, 1980 and again in a three-time cancer survivor 2002. It left her weak and eight-year participant and badly off-balance. in Strong Survivors, with her Now, despite a third workout. recurrence in 2011, Benson maneuvers quite well only using A typical balance a cane as a safety workout routine may precaution to cross look something like this: busy streets or for • Stand on one foot similar tasks. with eyes open “I’m doing great, • Stand on one foot thanks to Strong Survivors,” Benson with eyes closed said. “I feel like I’m • While standing on standing on a threeone foot, perform another legged stool. One leg activity like raising arms is friends and family, over head or doing bicep another is my doctor curls holding dumbbells and the third is Strong • Balance on a foam Survivors, and those pad or a squishy half-ball. legs have provided the • Play catch with a support that’s gotten trainer while balancing on me this far. I would something soft/unstable. come here with zero energy and leave energized.”

Balance problems are among the many common complications cancer survivors experience, according to Phil Anton, exercise science associate professor in SIU’s Department of Kinesiology and exercise program director for the Strong Survivors program.

Cooper Springfield, a senior exercise science major from Champaign, has worked with Benson for four semesters and the close connection between the two is quickly apparent.

Anton said most of the time when people are falling, at some point all of their body weight is on one foot.

Learning to maintain balance, especially on one foot, helps prevent injurious falls. Likewise, combining elements such as balance exercises with resistance training is an effective use of training time and also helps strengthen the brain and body.

Benson said she and Springfield work “all the time” on balance techniques and “I’ve learned a lot of ways to gain control. I have absolutely come a long way in my recovery to feeling strong and capable and I attribute a lot to this program. It’s also provided me a lot of support and social opportunities. I enjoy meeting the other survivors and every one of the trainers is great.

And Dr. Anton is always here and helpful. When I found out the cancer was back in 2011, he was my first call.”

Springfield enjoyed creating personal fitness routines for friends and family and joined the program to enhance his experience but found the work to be lifechanging for him as well as participants. He said it’s an engaging way to help people and after he completes his master’s degree, he’ll likely pursue a career in a similar program.

“Working with the survivors one on one helps you put what you learn in the classroom to use as you help people improve their lives and well-being. It’s amazing,” Springfield said. “I really care about Fran and my other clients and how they progress. It’s a reflection of how well I teach and learn to think on the fly, adapting to meet their needs.”

Teri Mahome, a junior exercise science major from University Park, said her clients become like family to her and the experience also translates into an improved classroom learning experience.

Anton said the benefits of Strong Survivors are many for all involved. Participants experience positive physical and mental life changes. Students get valuable hands-on learning experience and the correlating research benefits students and patients alike.

Strong Survivors students and faculty are involved in ongoing research regarding many aspects of the program and its participants. They study balance, especially among those dealing with chemotherapy’s side effects, the impacts of the cancer experience and treatment on quality-of-life aspects, the effects of various types of training, dietary counseling and exercise techniques on recall, and simple motor skill performance. They also study how the program benefits cancer caregivers.

An overview of the Strong Survivors Program and detailed, quantitative study of the positive contributions of the program entitled “Rural Community Exercise Program Improves Balance, Activities of Daily Living and Quality of Life in Cancer Survivors” is currently under review for publication. “Supportive Care in Cancer,” a Springer-Verlag cancer support journal, published “Cancer Caregivers’ Perceptions of an Exercise and Nutrition Program,” a research study by Anton, his wife, Julie Partridge, a Department of Kinesiology sport and exercise psychology associate professor, and graduate student Margaret Morrissy.

Anton also collaborated with Dr. Laura Rogers, formerly of the SIU School of Medicine in Springfield and currently at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, for two published scientific studies. One was regarding exercise adherence in breast cancer survivors and the other examined muscle strength maintenance in head and neck cancer patients.

Research continues as faculty and students seek the most effective ways of helping cancer survivors and caregivers experience the best quality of life possible.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 4

| Medicine

‘Hope is an incredible gift, and this discovery offers great hope to those who are suffering.’

– Christina Tribbett

®

Rx for Pain: BOTOX

By Rebecca Budde

BOTOX® entered the national consciousness as a beauty treatment to banish wrinkles, but now medical science is discovering its effectiveness to help people with chronic pain.

From clinical trials to life-changing surgery, SIU’s Institute for Plastic Surgery, part of the School of Medicine in Springfield, is leading the way.

For some, the cold winter months mean the welcome possibility of a dusting of snow on the lawn and icicles hanging from rooftops.

For others, like Robin Brinkmeier, 58, the cold can exacerbate an already painful, incurable condition.

Diagnosed with Raynaud’s disease seven years ago, Brinkmeier takes precautions in the cold months. She must wear gloves, and her toes get so cold and lose blood so quickly that she wraps her toes individually in an attempt to keep them warm. She buys her shoes one size larger to accommodate her extra layers.

Raynaud’s disease is a spastic disorder of the blood vessels. Brought on by cold, vibration or stress, the blood vessels constrict, decreasing the blood flow to the extremities. Raynaud’s typically affects the fingers, though it can also affect the toes. The decreased blood flow leads to pallor, cold and painful extremities.

Eventually painful ulcers can form and may lead to amputation.

In January 2004, Dr. Michael Neumeister, SIU’s chair of the Department of Surgery and the Institute for Plastic Surgery and the Elvin G. Zook, MD Endowed Chair in Plastic Surgery, injected his first patient with BOTOX® in an attempt to help his pain.

His fingers were white with no blood supply and he had some ulcers and exposed bone,» Neumeister says. «The first time he came to me, he said, ‘Doc, cut my fingers off!’ This man had been admitted to the hospital, had intravenous morphine and even surgeries to attempt to open up the blood vessels.»

One injection and the patient was pain-free in minutes. Since that first injection, BOTOX® has started to become a more widely known option. The FDA has not given on-label approval for using BOTOX® for Raynaud’s, but Neumeister is conducting a stage 2 clinical trial. Brinkmeier has enrolled in the trial and hopes that her pain is eliminated from the BOTOX®.

The side effects are minimal, but the reduction of the patient’s pain is almost immediate.

Worth Knowing Beyond providing extensive clinical and education services, School of Medicine faculty and staff travel to more than 171 outreach sites in nearly 90 Illinois communities.

Programs include a growing Tele-health network, numerous continuing medical education programs, SIU medical library, and the Rural Health Initiative.

Patients may experience temporary (a couple of months) weakness in the muscles that control the spreading of the fingers.

In addition to patients with Raynaud’s, Neumeister has used BOTOX® to treat neuromas, painful scars, chronic back pain, carpal tunnel, tennis elbow, diabetic foot pain and reflex sympathetic dystrophy syndrome.

Seventy percent of patients have pain relief, according to Neumeister.

Muting migraines Botox is also being used by plastic surgeons as a powerful weapon against migraine headaches.

Christina Tribbett, 37, of Creve Coeur, Ill., began experiencing severe migraine headaches in 2002. The debilitating pain for the single mom of two boys landed her in OSF St. Francis Medical Center’s emergency room in Peoria an average of three days a week. The illness caused her to quit her job. “It was horrible to watch and not be able to do anything to help her,” says Tribbett’s mother, Rebecca Burroughs.

After trying multiple medications and therapies, her neurologist, Dr. Dennis Q. McManus, an ’87 SIU internal medicine resident alumnus, told her about the use of BOTOX® to help fight the pain of migraines. By injecting the offending muscle with BOTOX®, the muscle becomes paralyzed and unable to compress the nerves causing the headaches.

The FDA has approved the use of BOTOX® to help those who suffer from the pain of certain migraine headaches, but it is reserved for those with severe cases.

To qualify for BOTOX® injections for migraines, patients must suffer from debilitating migraines at least 15 days a month, keep a diary of all symptoms and have them documented by their physician.

Tribbett received the BOTOX® injections three

BOTOX – Dr. Michael Neumeister injects a patient's hands with BOTOX®.

SIU School of Medicine

SIU School of Medicine

MIGRAINE PAIN – Dr. Nicole Sommer (right) discusses Christina Tribbett's headaches. Sommer is the only local surgeon offering surgery to banish migraine headaches.

times, in approximately three-month intervals.

Though the BOTOX® worked for the pain, she says that when the last round wore off, the headaches were back and more aggressive than before. The good news was that because the BOTOX® worked for Tribbett, surgery to permanently eliminate the headaches was an option. «Surgeons can use BOTOX® as a diagnostic tool,” Dr. Nicole Sommer, SIU associate professor of plastic surgery, says.

«If it works well for the

migraine pain, in the specific area that’s a problem, there’s an 8090 percent chance that nerve decompression surgery will successfully eliminate the migraines.”

Sommer is the only surgeon in Springfield offering this lifechanging surgery.

Once the surgeon determines the specific trigger point of the pain, migraine surgery is usually performed on an outpatient basis with the patient under sedation and/or general anesthesia. The surgical

technique varies depending on the trigger point. A nerve may be removed or in other cases, a small portion of muscle pinching a cranial nerve may be removed.

Because Tribbett’s headaches were triggered in multiple locations and were so severe, she had to have two surgeries.

Tribbett says she occasionally has minor headaches now, but she knows when they’re coming on. «I can treat them with just an Advil® now,” she says.

Burroughs says it’s great to see her daughter back to being herself again. «The surgery validated that there really was a physical problem. That was such a blessing.” Another side effect of BOTOX® is optimism. «I’m so excited for those who will follow me,” says Tribbett. «Hope is an incredible gift, and this discovery offers great hope to those who are suffering.” The many talents of BOTOX® will continue to be evaluated to help those who battle chronic pain.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 5

| Rehabilitation

‘The objective is for students to realize that behavior is behavior ...’

– Professor Mark Dixon

Photo by Russell Bailey

Cockroach Lab – Mark Dixon, left, professor, behavioral psychologist and coordinator of the behavioral analysis and therapy program, and Carl Flowers, director of the Rehabilitation Institute, examine the Madagascar cockroaches students work with in the labs.

Learning from Invertebrates

By Christi Mathis

Invertebrates have quite miniscule “brains.”

Yet, SIU Carbondale students taught the creatures to accomplish such tasks as kicking a miniature soccer ball through a goal, paddling a surfboard across the water and turning opposite directions in response to different colored lights.

Working with cockroaches and crustaceans in the SIU Rehabilitation Institute’s labs is an eye-opening experience with some very practical implications, according to Mark Dixon, professor, behavioral psychologist and coordinator of the behavioral analysis and therapy program.

Students discover just how much they can teach these simple creatures to do and then realize that humans may not be as limited in abilities as they sometimes are perceived to be.

“If you can get a cockroach to kick a ball through a net, you can teach a child with autism to read or help someone with Alzheimer’s disease retain quality of life longer,” Dixon said.

“Some of the data obtained here is the first of its kind,” he said. “We are generating new research findings not published before.

We’ve taken phenomena studied previously just in humans and found that we can take it down to primary organisms like cockroaches. For instance, they can demonstrate a preference for a certain type of food and will show this by working harder to obtain it.

“Students take the information they get developing techniques to work with the critters and use it to develop protocols and methods to help people,” Dixon added.

“The objective is for students to realize that behavior is behavior, whether you’re a lobster or a cockroach or a human. Knowing this empowers students to make a difference in the

Top 10 things it’s hard to believe they taught invertebrates to do: 10. Differentiate between hard and soft textures of sandpaper (cockroach) 9. Increase memory capabilities through daily mental exercises (lobster) 8. Detect feeding and shelter locations (lobster) 7. Use their antennae to trigger a laser beam to obtain food (cockroach) 6. Weave between pillars and run obstacle courses (cockroach) 5. Turn right when they see a red light and left when they see a green light (lobster) 4. Travel through mazes without errors (crayfish) 3. Tackle toy army men and knock down tiny bowling pins (cockroach) 2. Paddle a tiny ‘surfboard’ across the water to get to dry land (cockroach) 1. Kick a miniature soccer ball through the goal (cockroach) Photo by Russell Bailey

lives of people with what they learn in the labs.”

The students will someday be working with people with a variety of needs, from a child with autism, to an older adult with dementia or other form of memory impairment, to someone with a physical or mental disability. They may also be treating people with addictions and other such issues.

The College of Education and Human Services established the cockroach lab, led by Jacob Daar, a third-year doctoral candidate in behavioral analysis and therapy from Melbourne, Fla., in 2012. The crustacean lab, directed by first-year doctoral behavioral analysis and therapy candidate Mary “Rachel” Enoch of Manhattan, Kan., opened last year.

More than 100 students have participated in the lab work, exploring in person or through remote connections the use of cockroaches and crustaceans as animal models for human behavior.

Enoch said working in the lab is a “phenomenal experience” that has “fueled creativity, pushing it to the limits of the imagination,” as students imagine and test what skills they can teach the animals. As they test,

implement procedures and work, students are understanding much about the way creatures learn and expand their skill sets.

Students explore whether an animal learns better in a natural or novel environment, how they respond to different stimuli, and other behavioral traits and modifications. Enoch said students recently taught tiny crayfish to navigate through a four-point maze using prompting and positive reinforcement and within a week, the animals were running the maze error-free. The animals also taught students that rehearsing a skill every day postpones memory loss but if there is no practice, memory abilities fade.

“The students are all so excited about the work, they even come in on weekends or when they have spare time.

They are learning skills in the lab that they can translate to work with people in the field,” she said. She said students often name the Madagascar cockroaches, crayfish (freshwater lobsters), and giant Maine lobsters they work with.

Dixon also notes that the distance learning component is unique and fits well with SIU’s mission of reaching and

Crustacean Lab – Left to right, Carl Flowers, director of the Rehabilitation Institute; doctoral student Mary “Rachel” Enoch of Manhattan, Kan.; and Mark Dixon, professor, behavioral psychologist and coordinator of the behavioral analysis and therapy program observe as a crayfish moves toward a light in the crustacean lab.

Worth Knowing The Rehabilitation Institute’s Rehabilitation Counseling program, ranked fourth in the country by U.S. News and World Report, also is among the nation’s leaders for research productivity. SIU’s program ranks third among all such programs for scholarly productivity over the past 10 years, according to Rehabilitation Counseling Bulletin. Rehabilitation counselors assist people with disabilities to help them achieve maximum psychological, social, vocational, and economic independence, and quality of life to their fullest capacity. involving off-campus students in innovative learning opportunities.

The class pairs oncampus students with those in an SIU distance education program in Chicago through Skype or Facetime, enabling students hundreds of miles away to be involved in the experiments and research.

Although animal labs were once the norm at research universities, changing times and budgets have had a negative impact in many places. Daar said SIU is fortunate to have the unique learning labs that give students first-hand experience in behavioral analysis and clinical research.

“It helps us learn the processes in a much

more controlled and effective way and gives us the confidence that we can produce desired behaviors in people with disabilities. We learn how to solve problems,” Daar said.

Dixon said James Garvey, interim vice chancellor for research, and Carl Flowers, director of the Rehabilitation Institute, were instrumental in the development of the invertebrate labs, giving support to the program that demonstrates, “We think outside the box as to how we train the next generation of clinicians.”

“The skills our students are learning will work with any species. And the experience they are gaining enables them to feel empowered to make a positive difference in

the lives of people,” Dixon said.

A gambling documentary set to air nationally on PBS in the fall features work in the lobster lab, highlighting study of how lobsters gamble in selecting paths through a maze and how that correlates to the way humans handle risk-taking and choicemaking.

Program expansion is in the works, as well. Plans call for collaborative crossdisciplinary research with the Center for Fisheries, Aquaculture and Aquatic Science. In addition, SIU will begin offering an undergraduate behavioral analysis and therapy program in fall 2015, bringing a larger group of undergraduate students into the labs.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 6

| technology IT Security for Non-Profits

‘They have data that could potentially be of use to a bad guy — if they process or store credit card information; if they have Social Security numbers. Anything you can use for identify theft.’

– Assistant Professor Thomas Imboden

By Pete Rosenbery

Cyber attacks and security breaches are not limited to large corporations and government institutions.

Ongoing research

by SIU Carbondale faculty and students suggests that nonprofit Tom Imboden organizations also need to be more vigilant to avoid the theft of valuable data from their files.

“I think many times the employees and volunteers in these organizations don’t understand what all the risks are,” researcher Thomas Imboden, an assistant professor in the Department of Information Systems Technologies, said. “We hope that by identifying where there is a need for improvement we can come up with a way to help nonprofit organizations address these risks.”

The study started as members of “Tech Dawgs,” a registered student organization at SIU Carbondale, began assisting local nonprofit organizations with network security, setting up secure wireless networks and performing risk assessments. While there is research focusing on information security risks within the private and government sectors, that isn’t the case with nonprofit groups, Imboden said. Often times these organizations and others, such as youth athletic leagues and charity groups with interactive applications, will collect and store the same type of information — names, addresses, Social Security and credit card information, and health records — as large companies.

System break-ins can result in liability issues, along with a loss of confidence and reduced donations to the organization, Imboden said.

“Potentially they can be managing and storing sensitive data just like a business. They are susceptible to the same types of scams as businesses and government employees,” he said. “They have data that could potentially be of use to a bad guy -- if they process or store credit card information; if they have Social Security numbers. Anything you can use for identify theft. There are any number of ways people can use that.”

The research began in spring 2013 and Imboden, along with researchers from Murray State University and West Chester University in Pennsylvania, have written two papers on their initial findings. The group used a mixed method approach with online surveys, interviews and visits to identify attitudes and practices involving 78 nonprofit groups in the Chicago, Metro East area and Southern Illinois. The researchers are working on a new survey they hope to begin within a few months that includes nonprofit groups from throughout the country.

The average yearly budget of the organizations completing the survey was $1.3 million. They had about 20 employees and only 46.8 percent of those organizations had someone dedicated to

Photo Provided

Photo Provided

information security. Just over one-half, 56.4 percent, have an information security policy and approximately two-thirds experienced at least one information security issue -- such as viruses, spyware, malware data theft or loss, or hardware or software failure. Imboden said roughly 10 percent of the organizations did not recognize risks associated with their information and technology assets.

It is important nonprofit organizations have a formal information security policy that outlines proper security procedures. That includes the proper use of social media on organization-based computers, and flash drive usage, which Imboden said represents a large risk due to the potential for transferring viruses. Of the organizations with security policies, 84 percent required employees to acknowledge the policies in a group or individual training session, through paper or electronic distribution, or an employee

Worth Knowing The “Security Dawgs,” a registered student organization, won the Illinois Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition earlier this year for its second consecutive title. This is the third time since 2006 the team has earned a state title, with second-place finishes in 2007, 2008, 2010 and 2011.

handbook.

A formal information security policy is vital because it is wrong to believe that antivirus software and firewalls solely protect an organization. Imboden said research indicated nonprofit organizations with large budgets typically had stronger information security policies in place. Sample policy templates are available online and 44 percent of the organizations with policies used two or more sources in developing them, Imboden said.

Security training also depends on organization

size; many depend upon staff and volunteers who might not be there a long time due to turnover. The average information technology and security budget was $23,408.

“The issue of training is difficult with security because it’s typically something that isn’t viewed as central to their mission even though they might be dealing with any number of sensitive types of information,” Imboden said.

The research indicated “for the most part” there typically wasn’t a person with an information technology or security background, and

organizations relied on office personnel or volunteers to help install programs and make routine maintenance checks. The use of an outside contractor for assistance did not lead to an ongoing relationship for regular help and maintenance.

Imboden believes in many instances it’s a case of not knowing who to go to, although in Southern Illinois for example, there are several businesses that can help.

“If there was a security incident, not knowing who they can reach out to pay or receive volunteer help could exacerbate the incident,” he said. “The longer a computer infection goes, hackers could be stealing data for months and months before something finally gives and people reach for help.”

Imboden said it is important to have a “go-to person” within each organization.

Even if the person doesn’t have a technical background, they will know who to reach out to for assistance.

The goal of the research goal is to find a way to help nonprofit organizations become more security conscious. Additional research will focus on funding, employee training, and whether funding agencies require organizations to have information security practices and policies in place, Imboden said.

He emphasized that online transactions are a now a way of life. And while there are risks to making purchases, banking and communicating online, in general, individuals and organizations believe the convenience and benefits outweigh the risks.

Imboden said “Tech Dawgs” plan on doing more security audits for nonprofit organizations again this summer and he hopes that also helps expand the research.

For more information contact Imboden by email at timboden@siu.edu.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 7

| community

‘Being in an orchestra makes me part of a community. It makes the world smaller to be part of something bigger.’

– Lea Matschke

Musical terminology These musical and instrumental terms are mostly Italian, but are used by musicians all over the world to signify changes in music speed, to indicate the mood the music is meant to set, or to give other direction. See how many you recognize!

Photo by Kenwin Jones

Civic Orchestra – Jacob Tews, instructor of viola in the School of Music, is in his first year of conducting the Southern Illinois Civic Orchestra. His goal is to push his musicians to challenge themselves and learn, but also to create a fun and supportive atmosphere that preserves and promotes a mutual love of music and music performance.

For the Love of Music

By Andrea Hahn

There’s a debate raging in the second violin section pertaining to a particularly difficult entrance to a section of a symphony. Jacob Tews, conductor, settles it. “Twelve notes, and then play.”

The Southern Illinois Civic Orchestra (SICO) at SIU Carbondale is fun by design. It’s also serious.

And it is important to those who participate in it – from the high school students who want an accessible-yetprofessional experience, to the retired professor who finally has time to play in an ensemble, to the SIU students who don’t want to pursue a music performance career but don’t want to give up playing in a formal ensemble.

Tews, lecturer of viola in the School of Music, is in his first year of conducting the ensemble. He is also responsible for the fledgling Southern Illinois Junior Orchestra (SIJO), which recruits students as young as second grade to its ranks.

The orchestra offers something school concert bands cannot -opportunities for strings players. Tews hopes the civic and junior orchestras will in fact become the logical next step for young musicians who’ve been introduced to stringed instruments.

“We have eight to 10 violins in two sections, so even those with less experience can play,” Tews said. “They learn that one of the hallmarks of a great orchestral player is the ability to play in sync with the others in their section. They lean on the leadership of their principal player to achieve that perfect synchronization, and gain valuable experience and confidence that way.”

It’s partly for that reason he chose violinist Ben Bollero, a music business major from

Worth Knowing SIU’s 10th annual Southern Illinois Music Festival, June 12-30, will feature more than three dozen performances on campus and in venues from Sesser to Cairo and Murphysboro to Marion. In addition to members of the New Chicago Chamber Orchestra, musicians from throughout North and South America, Europe and Asia will perform orchestral and choral music, chamber music, opera, ballet and jazz.

The festival also will include Klassics for Kids and Jive with Jazz events throughout the region.

“Mostly Mozart in the Midwest” is the theme of this year’s festival, and the majority of performances are free. Schedule updates will be available at www.SIFest.com.

Chicago, to serve as concertmaster, a position he describes as an anchor for the orchestra.

The concertmaster is, by tradition, the first chair violin, who serves as anchor for the string sections and for the orchestra as a whole.

Bollero also plays in the more formal Southern Illinois Symphony Orchestra. With the civic orchestra, he said, he has the opportunity to grow as a musician.

His position requires him to understand the whole, not just his own part, and to lead the orchestra in formal gestures on stage.

Of course the orchestra is not just for strings.

A typical orchestra also includes woodwinds (flutes, clarinets, oboes, bassoons), brass (trumpets, horns, trombones, tuba), and percussion as well. That is, a typical orchestra includes those things – sometimes Southern Illinois Civic Orchestra does not.

“There are times we simply don’t have enough players on the instruments we need to play the pieces we would like to play.

To do some of the repertoire we perform, I do some modifications to the scores and rearrange the parts to accommodate the available instruments,” Tews said.

While orchestra

performance is one of the most obvious ensemble options for strings players, musicians in woodwinds, brass and percussion can choose concert band. Tews seeks to raise visibility of the civic orchestra partly to encourage more young musicians to try it. Orchestras focus on symphonic music, which is longer overall than compositions intended for a band.

Young musicians often find the symphonies both challenging and rewarding – and a change of pace from the band music they might more encounter through school programs.

The orchestra presents a concert once every semester, minimum.

Recently, the orchestra appeared as part of the traditional Halloween Pops performance, and has recently offered performances at other local venues, including University Mall in Carbondale.

Participation in the Southern Illinois Civic Orchestra requires an audition, but Tews does his best to welcome all those who want to play and have at least some experience doing so.

“There is intrinsic value to participation in an orchestra,” he said.

“There is something to be said for preserving that part of our culture.”

Civic orchestra

musicians have plenty of additional reasons for participating in orchestra.

“Being in an orchestra makes me part of a community,” Lea Matschke, a biological sciences major from Rockford, said. “It makes the world smaller to be part of something bigger.”

“I fell in love with the violin in about third grade with the Thomas Strings program,” Carbondale Community High School junior Mahir Morshed said.

“This is something I intend to carry on with me as long as I can, as far as I can.”

Cameron Taylor, an SIU student from Canton, is a music education major. His first instrument is the euphonium – one more typical of bands than orchestras. That’s ok with him; he wanted to play the oboe anyway.

He’s learning oboe as part of his music education curriculum -he’ll learn several other instruments as well. The civic orchestra gives him a chance to play a new instrument in an ensemble.

Felicia Kruse Alexander retired from Xavier University in Cincinnati, where she was a philosophy professor. She moved to Carbondale to join her husband, also a philosophy professor. “I started out as a music major when I was an undergraduate student,” she said. “I didn’t finish up that way, but I always loved music and wanted an outlet for it.”

She became comfortable on the viola before auditioning for the civic orchestra, and she’s been a member now for two years.

“Performing music makes us feel alive,” Tews said.

To learn more about the Southern Illinois Civic Orchestra and the Southern Illinois Junior Orchestra, contact the School of Music at SIU at music@siu.edu or 618536-8742.

Adagio – at ease (slowly) Allegro – joyful (fast) Andante – walking speed Arco – played with the bow Brio – with vigor Crescendo – getting louder Diminuendo – getting quieter Dolce – sweetly Doloroso – sorrowfully, plaintively Forte – loud Fortissimo – very loud Grace note – an extra note added as an embellishment Largo – very slow Legato – bound together (long notes) Lento – sad (slow) Lentissimo – very slowly Medley – a piece composed from parts of other pieces, typically three, played one after another Mezzo – half Piano – quiet Pianissimo – very quiet Pizzicato – plucked with fingers Poco a poco – little by little Prelude – a musical introduction Presto – very fast Reprise – repeat a phrase or verse, then return to the original theme Segue – to carry on to the next section without a pause Sempre – always Sonata – a piece played as opposed to sung Staccato – torn out (short notes) Tempo – time (speed of the music) Tremolo - shaking Tutti – all together Vibrato – vibrating Virtuoso – performing with exceptional ability, technique or artistry Vivace – very lively, up-tempo

What is the difference between a band and an orchestra?

• Orchestras include stringed instruments; bands do not. (Some bands may include an upright bass, which is a stringed instrument.)

• Orchestras rarely-to-never utilize a saxophone. It’s a standard instrument in a band.

• Orchestras not only include strings, they include many – often more than 30. However, a typical orchestra will include only two to four of each instrument type in woodwinds and brass, and those instruments will each have separate parts – unlike strings, which may see several instruments playing the same part.

• Orchestras specialize in symphonies, which, played in their entirety, may last 30 minutes or even longer. Band music typically is no longer than 10-15 minutes per piece.

• Orchestras have a larger repertoire of music from which to choose, partly because symphonic music is older than band music.

SIU School of Music Orchestras Civic Orchestra – Designed for high school-age and collegiate musicians who want an ensemble outlet, the Civic Orchestra is both an educational and social experience. Open to musicians from the Southern Illinois region, the orchestra is an important part of music education, particularly in the communities nearest to it. Now under the direction of Jacob Tews, the civic orchestra was for years under the direction of Eric Lenz and Jennifer Presar.

Junior Orchestra – A new program, this orchestra is for grade school-age musicians. Meant to complement the strings programs in particular in the Carbondale Elementary School District, the orchestra is open to Southern Illinois musicians who need a starting ensemble with which to learn.

Southern Illinois Symphony Orchestra – Our most advanced orchestra, this one is for advanced performance students and faculty. SISO, as it is known, performs several concerts throughout the year, covers a wide array of music doing so, and is an integral part of the annual Southern Illinois Music Festival.

Other performance opportunities for musicians in the community: Southern Illinois Children’s Choir Klassics for Kids performances Band Camps: High School Band, Junior High Band, Jazz Improvisation, Drum Major, Marching Percussion, Color Guard, Guitar, and Piano Visit the SIU School of Music for more information. Call 618-536-8742.

Email music@siu.edu.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 8

| technology

‘More and more, our world is driven by electronics and electronic control systems.’

– Professor Spyros Tragoudas

Photo by Steve Buhman

Embedded systems – Spyros Tragoudas, professor and chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Luke Pierce, a doctoral student in electrical and computer engineering from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, examine a control unit featuring embedded systems that helps a mini submarine operate.

Designing the Future

By Tim Crosby

Before you get to work in the morning, chances are very good that an embedded system has paved your way.

Embedded systems, environments that use embedded microprocessors to control systems and provide feedback in real time, are everywhere.

They control car emissions, cell phone networks, environmental controls systems, manufacturing, airliners and defense systems.

They are like the nervous system of technological and advanced mechanical systems -- seeing, hearing, feeling, communicating, thinking and adjusting operations for maximum efficiency.

SIU Carbondale is one of the leading institutions in this area, and its researchers are designing, testing and dreaming of the embedded systems of tomorrow.

SIU is home to the Center for Embedded Systems, a national consortium of electronics research funded by the National Science Foundation.

The Center for Embedded Systems is a joint effort among SIU’s College of Engineering, the Fulton School of Engineering at Arizona State University and private industry, said Spyros Tragoudas, professor and chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and leader of the effort at SIU. Created in 2009, the center remains the only one of its kind funded

by NSF in the nation.

Other universities that wish to conduct research

Worth Knowing Researchers from the colleges of engineering and science will participate in the recently announced, $70 million, federally supported initiative to assist the manufacturing sector. SIU Carbondale’s role will be coordinated through the university's Materials Technology Center and Center for Embedded Systems..

in this area can join the center if they meet the requirements to do so.

The center is aimed at finding new algorithms, applications and designs for new levels of sophistication, and sharing those advances with commercial vendors and others.

Researchers in the center look at issues ranging from finding ways to achieve and maintain access to the microprocessors, to testing and verifying their reliability. They also work on the design, size and weight of such microprocessors, which may be critical based on their intended applications.

Like all technology, the field is rapidly evolving and SIU is on the cutting edge as new applications and designs emerge.

“More and more, our world is driven by electronics and electronic control systems,” Tragoudas said.

Industry partners pay an annual fee for membership in the consortium and their representatives sit on its advisory board. The members of the board select proposed research projects for funding.

The consortium provides industry partners with an array of experts in the fields of electrical and

computer engineering and science.

Since its beginning, the center has worked with scores of industry partners, such as Caterpillar, Intel, Johnson Controls and many others. Center researchers work together with companies to identify emerging applications for embedded systems.

Researchers then work with industry to develop research proposals based on those needs.

The center’s researchers are known for their ability to test the reliability and speed of microprocessors, as well as their power consumption, among other things, Tragoudas said.

“Their needs have to match our expertise,” he said.

Student researchers also play an important role in the center.

Last year, the center spent $350,000 on research efforts, funded by industry partners, the NSF and the university.

Industry partners also give some money to develop specified courses of study for students, while NSF also funds some fundamental research related to embedded systems technology.

Tragoudas said the center is the midst of

Photo by Steve Buhman

Embedded systems – Students crowd around a mini submarine controlled by embedded systems technology. Pictured here (from left) are Luke Pierce, a doctoral student in electrical and computer engineering from Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Chase Cooley, a master's student in electrical and computer engineering from Paris, Ill.; Nick Turner, a senior in computer engineering from Dawson; and Steven Blair, a junior in electrical engineering from Makanda.

applying for additional “stage II” funding from the NSF, which would add another five years to the original funding.

“With that we will be trying to get additional and larger corporate partners; those that have sustainable research efforts in their structure, to work with,” he said.

The center also may play a large role in a recently announced federally funded initiative aimed at assisting the manufacturing sector.

The Center for Embedded Systems, along with SIU’s Materials Technology Center, will coordinate the effort announced Feb. 25 by President Obama.

Under this effort, a multi-partner team led by UI LABS in Chicago will receive a $70 million award

from the Department of Defense for the Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute. The long-term goal of the institute is to make American manufacturing more competitive on the global stage.

Along with the DoD funding, the industry, university and the government will supply another $250 million to UI LABS to form the $320 million digital lab. SIU, a partner in the collaborative, could have opportunities to conduct applied research in the areas of advanced materials, digital manufacturing and embedded systems Tragoudas said the specifics of SIU’s role are still being worked out. Researchers at both

the Carbondale and Edwardsville campuses could be involved, however.

“Digital manufacturing is very related to what we do here, and we have the technical experts who could be involved in certain aspects,” Tragoudas said. “We will be involved, but the roles have not yet been defined and the magnitude of our involvement or the amount of money we might receive is not yet known.”

Tragoudas said the center is another way SIU serves the community and the larger world around it.

“At the end of the day, the center is helps make SIU more visible,” Tragoudas said. “It really puts us on the map.”

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 9

| Environment Mitigating Microbes

By Tim Crosby

When you go to the butcher, you don’t ask for the whole cow. Instead, you want a choice cut or juicy, well-blended hamburger.

The same can be said for natural microbes that turn pollutants into more benign substances.

Researchers at SIU Carbondale recently proved that concept en route to helping clean up the water at a polluted site in Southern Illinois.

The idea, supported by more than a year’s worth of research, helped state officials design better methods to mitigate the pollution.

The work centers on a concept called a “bioreactor.” A bioreactor uses living organisms and natural substances such as bacteria and organic material to break down or stabilize harmful substances. The various substances used inside the reactor – the substrates – determine how well it works, based on whatever hazards one is trying to mitigate.

Former graduate student Evan Walters, of Wheaton, found that herbaceous material, such as grass clippings and leaves, help the microbes thrive and subsequently improved the bioreactor’s performance at the abandoned Tab-Simco mine site on Carbondale’s east side.

The mine, which operated on and off since the late 1800s, contains leftover coal deposits that send pollutants into the nearby Cypress Creek. When the Illinois Department of Natural Resources recently refurbished the bioreactor at the site, it incorporated Walters’ research into its design.

Working under the supervision of Liliana Lefticariu, associate professor of geology, Walters’ experiments were aimed at improving the efficiency of a bioreactor the state originally put in place at the site.

Coal deposits at this particular site contain large amounts of iron oxide and pyrite, which, when exposed to water, release additional inorganic elements such as nickel, cadmium, cobalt and arsenic, among others. The high acidity of the water tends to keep those elements in solution, which allows them to move off the site with water.

IDNR, working through the Office of Surface Mines, originally constructed a bioreactor at the site in 2007. That reactor consisted of a small pond with a liner containing layers of limestone, woodchips and manure.

As water from the area drained into the pond, the limestone lowered the acidity of the water, causing the other substances to leave solution. At the same

time, microbes from the manure and wood chips changed iron sulfate into sulfite, taking it back toward its original, less harmful state of pyrite.

Lefticariu’s previous graduate student, Yosief Segid, worked on that reactor for three years, publishing his results in scientific journals as well.

The bioreactor worked well, but after several years, its effectiveness began to wane.

“The first bioreactor was wearing out. It just wasn’t big enough for the volume of water it needed to process,” Lefticiairu said. “Every site like this is unique, and so the bioreactor you devise for it has to be customized. And so Evan had to try to find what materials would work best, improving on the first design if possible.”

So Walters set out to determine the optimal mixture. To do this, he built five small test reactors, filled with various materials, including limestone and several different types of organic materials such as grass clippings, leaves, woodchips, spent brewing grains and others. He also had one control reactor containing only limestone.

Eventually, running the experiment would mean spending thousands of hours in the field, which ended up being a major challenge, Walters said.

But it also meant more reliable results.

“Since the study lasted over a year the variations in weather made it difficult to organize sampling events and maintain operating integrity of the reactors,” Walters said. “Not to mention each sampling day typically meant spending 14 plus hours of non-stop work.

“To tell you the truth every asset of this study would have been much easier if it had been performed in a laboratory setting. But our results depicted the responses of the reactors to environmental conditions that cannot be replicated properly in the lab.

This made it possible to obtain genuine data that is representative of an actual abandoned mine land in the Midwestern United States.”

Walters said the goal of his experiment was finding the best mixture of organic material to act as a food source that would enhance microbial activity, which in turn would increase the bioreactor’s effectiveness.

Herbaceous material such as grass is very malleable compared to wood chips.

This difference, which goes down to the very molecular composition of the materials, makes herbaceous material much more susceptible to degradation by microbes than woody material, meaning herbaceous substrate is a much better food source for these reactors.

“To put it in human

‘We definitely felt committed to finding the best solution to the problem because we knew that our results could impact the local community in such a positive way.’

– Former graduate student Evan Walters

Photo by Russell Bailey

Mine clean-up – Former SIU Carbondale graduate student Evan Walters adjusts some piping used in an experiment he designed aimed at cleaning the water at the abandoned Tab-Simco mine site on Carbondale's east side last year.

Working under the supervision of Liliana Lefticariu, associate professor of geology, Walters' experiments improved the efficiency of a bioreactor the state recently refurbished at the site.

Photo by Russell Bailey

Mine clean-up – Charles Pugh, a research assistant in the Department of Microbiology (left), and former SIU Carbondale graduate student Evan Walters, take samples of water from one of Walters' experimental bioreactors.

Worth Knowing

terms, when one goes to the butcher to buy meat for hamburgers, asking for the whole cow SIU is increasingly instead of ground active in the field of beef would be similar to giving technology transfer and microbes woody commercialization. Since material instead 1996, the university has of herbaceous,” Walters said. “Not disclosed 354 inventions, to say that the cow issued 82 licenses/options, or wood could not filed 183 patent applications be used as a food source, it would with a resulting 56 issued just take more time patents, and received $6.5 to break down into million in royalties. utilizable material.”

As a new scientist, Walters said he was careful not to draw “To accomplish this conclusions until all was a feeling that his data were cannot be captured with complete. words,” he sad. “Still, “Having an experiment something else happened last over a year made it to me throughout very tempting to try to this experiment. It speculate at every point turned out that many within the experiment, conclusions brought and trust me I did just about more questions and that,” he said. “But it was possibilities that I had not until all that data not yet considered. I were in that I really had had finally realized that a full picture of what had this study was more occurred within these than an experiment; reactors.” it was what turned me The breakthrough into a living, breathing came, he said, when scientist.” he saw answers to his Walters said he came hypotheses and he grew to see that SIU is a confident that he had committed partner in the found a real solution overall Southern Illinois to making the reactors community. function more efficiently.

“Through my

Photo by Russell Bailey

Mine clean-up – Evan Walters stands near the pond at the abandoned Tab-Simco mine site on Carbondale's east side last year. The orange coloring in the water is from the iron and other pollutants left behind at the site.

experience, I believe SIU and the community are one and the same entity,” he said. “The harsh reality of this project was that it is a site located in Carbondale that threatens the natural ecosystem and water. I could remember going to the site and speaking with the landowners about the contamination and how it had affected the aquatic life in the area. This is when I knew that it was not just an experiment; it was something real that would impact the livelihood of our community. We definitely felt committed to finding the best solution to the problem because we

knew that our results could impact the local community in such a positive way.”

Walters said working in the environmental sector will be an exciting challenge, and he feels well prepared by his experience at SIU. “I feel as though I have both the knowledge and the passion to make a positive impact,” he said. “Water is an essential component of our lives and therefore it is our responsibility to protect our natural water systems. I hope to be at the forefront of ensuring our most precious natural resource is secured for future generations to come.”

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 10

| technology 'Recipe Revolution'

‘This is so revolutionary. It’s a food science and we even want to offer help with niche recipes. We want people to feel comfortable with this app and how it helps them handle their dietary restrictions.’

– Student Alex Hutchinson

By Christi Mathis

Alex Hutchinson can’t just show up at the dining table and dive right in.

Diagnosed with celiac disease at the age of four, he must carefully watch what he consumes so as not to trigger a painful bout of the autoimmune disorder that his father and brother, both named Bob, also suffer from. Eating any gluten, found in flour and many other food staples, can damage the small intestine and create a painful reaction.

Alex isn’t alone. Millions of people must daily contend with the consequences of dietary conditions including celiac disease, food allergies, diabetes or other special medical circumstances or dietary choices.

That’s why Hutchinson decided to make food preparation safer and easier for this big population group.

SIU Carbondale has been instrumental in providing the assistance and support he needed to conceive of a groundbreaking app, the Gluten Free Converter, Hutchinson, said.

Hutchinson, a marketing and finance major from Johnsburg who is set to graduate in May 2015, created the app to offer safe procedures and recipes to assure gluten-free preparation of foods cooked at home. He said he found his inspiration in his mother, Mary Lou Hutchinson.

She responded to learning that the three guys in her household had the medical condition by uncomplainingly adapting her cooking accordingly.

“She did everything in a way that convinced me this glutenfree lifestyle didn’t stink,” Alex said. “People ask me if I miss pizza or other things but I refuse to believe there are things I can’t eat. It’s simply a matter of

Worth Knowing Ben Weinberger – who is a member of the SIU Alumni Association Board -- and Matthew Berry, started a company named Digitalsmiths in 1998 while they were students at SIU. It was announced earlier this year that TiVo is acquiring Digitalsmiths for $135 million.

Students' dietary needs are a priority for dining staff

By Christi Mathis

Photo by Steve Buhman

Award-winning app – Alex Hutchinson (right) a marketing and finance major from Johnsburg, conceived the prize-winning Gluten Free Converter and Alex Glasnovich, left, an information systems technologies major from Galesburg, is assisting with development.

using different ingredients like tapioca or rice flour or doing things a different way.”

Hutchinson said he discovered the same innovative, accommodating, “can-do” spirit at SIU’s University Housing dining. “Chef Jim” Gilmore and the rest of the cooks and chefs not only find ways to prepare safe and tasty meals and snacks for students with celiac disease, but Gilmore has also been quite helpful in the app development process after Hutchinson experienced a “light bulb” moment of inspiration.

“I wished there was a database that would safely convert any recipe to a gluten-free dish.

There wasn’t, so I decided to create one,” Hutchinson said.

“This is so revolutionary. It’s a food science and we even want to offer help with niche recipes. We want people to feel comfortable with this app and how it helps them handle their dietary restrictions.”

Gilmore, who has more than 30 years of food service industry experience, said it is his job but more so, his passion, to help students, whether that means assuring they have appetizing, safe and healthy options to choose from or helping with a project like the one Hutchinson has undertaken.

“Personally, my desire is to make every individual I feed healthier by providing them with a wholesome, healthy diet

Brothers Alex and Bob Hutchinson considered a number of factors in choosing which university they would attend, including academics and something especially important to them: How the university would help them cope with celiac disease, an intolerance to gluten.

“They have taken really good care of us at SIU,” Alex said. Bob graduated in December 2013 and Alex will graduate in 2015 with a double major, and good health, thanks to the care and consideration University Housing staff have provided through the years, Alex said.

“The chefs and cooks are very personable and helpful and they made the transition to college life great. We expected eating to be a struggle every day but here, the dining staff saw it not as a job, but as a challenge, to help us. They prepare food especially for us, stocking special options just to ensure we have safe food to eat. They even created gluten-free kitchen areas for those of us who need it,” Alex said.

University Housing in fact goes to great lengths to accommodate students with all types of dietary needs, according to Peggy Connors, registered dietitian and associate director of University Housing, and Emily Feagans, graduate assistant and master’s program student in community nutrition from Lake Zurich. Feagans also suffers from celiac disease.

Connors said when a student signs a contract to live in campus housing, they are contacted in writing to ascertain any allergies or special dietary needs.

Each year, dozens of students respond affirmatively and the staff begins making adjustments to accommodate their various needs. Dining staff members have addressed celiac disease, diabetes, and allergies to peanuts, turkey, molasses, food dyes, fish, shellfish and a variety of other things including, for the first time this year, nutmeg.

A gluten-free kitchen was built at Trueblood Hall about three years ago and a gluten-free kitchen area added at Brothers | Continued on pg. 11

Gluten-free | Continued on pg. 11

Gluten-Free Converter – This banner and logo are being used to promote the new Gluten Free Converter app and website.

By Christi Mathis The Southern Illinois University Carbondale Student Innovation Incubator:

Where student entrepreneurs and innovators find the facilities, support system and services to take them and their businesses where they envision themselves.

Who can join? Any full-time SIU student in good standing, regardless of major or level in school can join.

Where is it? It is located at the Southern Illinois Research Park, 1740 Innovation Drive, Carbondale, on the second floor of the Dunn-Richmond Economic Development Center.

What facilities and services are available?

The incubator offers a resource room, work space, a collaboration area, hands-on training, consulting services and mentorship within the student component of the region’s leading business incubator.

“Saluki Ventures provides not only consulting and programs for these emerging collegiate entrepreneurs, but also a place of business with 24/7 access,” Kyle L. Harfst, executive director of economic development and the research park, said.

“Students work on their business ideas in-between classes, work and personal commitments and having a location where they can focus on their businesses allows them to work smarter and also to collaborate

Photo provided

Student Innovation Incubator with one another.”

What does it cost? Membership is $25 per

semester for any full-time SIU student with an idea or business. The program is a collaborative effort involving the university as well as the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Delta Regional Authority, thus keeping costs for student participants at a minimum.

How many student members are there? Since the program began in spring 2013, 17 students have participated.

What types of businesses has Saluki Ventures assisted? It’s a diverse group with concepts

including fashion design, marketing and public relations, games, smartphone applications, a lobsterbanding device, non-profit innovation, and the Artificial Intelligence (AI) thermostat that takes the programmable thermostat to the next level, learning the routines of people in the home and adjusting the system accordingly.

“We are excited about the passion and dedication of these entrepreneurs and are constantly amazed at their new ideas to shake thing up in the marketplace,” Lynn Andersen Lindberg, director of business innovation and research, said.

Are there noteworthy success stories? Two SIU student incubator clients have already applied for provisional patents. Others are experiencing success in a number of ways.

“The Saluki Ventures student innovation incubator isn’t the first time that we have worked with students through our incubation programs but this program focuses entirely on them. Recently, Digitalsmiths, one of our previous incubator program graduates, was acquired by TiVo for $135 million,” Harfst said. “It took a decade of hard work and scaled growth for former student entrepreneur Ben Weinberger to reach his goals but it was worth it. We look forward to sharing the successes of our current student members with the region as they grow and make their marks in the world.”

Who oversees the incubator? The incubator has a 15-member advisory board comprised of representatives from Southern Illinois businesses and operates under the umbrella of the SIU Office of Economic and Regional Development.

What else is SIU doing for young entrepreneurs?

In addition to working with full-time SIU students, the office is also working with several high schools to expand entrepreneurship classes at the high school level, serving as a catalyst with public high schools in Jackson and Perry counties to bring intensive entrepreneurship courses to local schools.

How do I find out more? Visit www.researchpark. siu.edu/studentinnovationincubator, call 618/4532083 or email innovation@siu.edu. Hannah Goode, MBA student, is the coordinator of Saluki Ventures.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 11

| Environment

‘Children are never too young to learn good stewardship and respect for their environment.’

– Professor Karen Midden

Gardening in the Curriculum

By Andrea Hahn

Karen Midden was just a young girl when her neighbor in the famous Carbondale dome house, Buckminster Fuller, called her an Earthling.

She was visiting that day with a girls’ club from her grade school.

“I remember how he stood there and he looked at all of us, and he said, ‘Girls, you must remember you are Earthlings; we are all passengers on Space Ship Earth.’”

And that’s one reason why, years later, she wrote, “Gardening with Young Children,” with her co-authors Sara Starbuck and Marla Olthof. Midden is a professor of plant, soil and agricultural systems in SIU Carbondale’s College of Agricultural Sciences. She also serves as assistant dean of the college.

“Even as a child, I always had a sense of wanting to live holistically,” she said.

“And I’ve always had a sense of urgency in wanting people to understand ecosystems, and the natural world, and how it works, and where they fit into it.

Children are never too young to learn good stewardship and respect for their environment.”

The book is meant for teachers and daycare providers, mostly, and it builds on ideas generated in Midden’s first book on the subject with the same co-authors, “Hollyhocks and Honeybees: Garden Projects for Young Children.”

That first book featured projects actively in place at the SIU Child Development Laboratories, SIU’s child development lab and on-

Worth Knowing The US Green Building Council and The Princeton Review have named SIU one of America’s Green Colleges three times.

Among the university’s many sustainability efforts are the green roof and vertical garden, both at the Agriculture Building, and the student-initiated Green Fund. Since the fund, supported by student fees, was established in 2009, more than $1.3 million has been awarded to 85 campus projects proposed by students, faculty and staff. campus daycare.

“Some of the gardens were labor intensive,” Midden said. “Some of them took a lot of involvement from parents. We were fortunate at that time that both the instructors and the parents really wanted to do it, and we had the space, so we were really able to get creative.”

Accordingly, garden plans include themes: a Native American garden, a “pizza” garden and a colorful bird and butterfly garden are just some of the many examples.

However, for the second edition, the authors wanted a broader perspective, and to incorporate new ideas and inspiring stories from their surveys of successful gardening-in-

the-curriculum programs across the country.

Urban gardening is of particular interest for Midden, whose passion for maximizing growing space contributed both to the “Green Roof” and vertical garden at the Agriculture Building on campus. It’s no surprise one of her favorite programs surveyed for the book is from an Upper Manhattan school in New York City.

Children in that project grow herbs along with the vegetables, and get to eat both at lunch.

This has prompted at least some of them to declare their intentions to be chefs and use fresh herbs when they grow up. Those same children also received additional lessons about nature when a bird nested in one of the vertical “gardening pockets” the teacher used for herbs and light soil plants.

“The experience has them considering careers they might not have thought about,” Midden said, “and they had the experience of seeing a nesting bird and how she fed her babies and they learned to fly. And they learned to grow vegetables and herbs.”

Midden said the goal is to incorporate gardening into the curriculum, to make it part of the learning process -- and there are many ways to do it, from counting exercises with seeds or petals to creating botany journals with drawings and written descriptions.

Even a bug infestation can become a cause for curiosity, an opportunity for learning where to find answers.

“Gardening with Children” includes activities even for very small babies. “Just letting a baby hold a flower and look at it, and feel the

Photo provided

Green Roof Kids – The Green Roof at SIU is truly multi-purpose. Besides providing research lab space for students in the Department of Plant, Soil and Agricultural Systems, and playing a role in naturally cooling the building, it also provides an opportunity to teach young children about plants.

Photo provided

Upper Manhattan – A school in Manhattan demonstrated several urban farming techniques similar to those Karen Midden has incorporated at SIU. Here, students tend to herbs in the roof garden, and also enjoy a big city rarity – grass!

petals and pull them off and play with them – all of that is learning,” Midden said.

Overall, the book includes more than 60 hands-on learning adventures for children.

It also features garden creation ideas, incorporating raised garden beds, vertical gardening options,

Gluten-free | Continued from pg. 10 that sustains their mind and body, which ultimately makes them happy and a healthier being,” Gilmore said.

With help and support from family and SIU, Hutchinson began work on the app. He won fourth place and $500 in business start-up funding at the Elevator Pitch competition at the national 2013 annual CEO Conference in Chicago late last fall. He has continued developing the app, which features a large assortment of standardized, adapted recipes along with an option that allows you to plug in other recipes and have them converted.

A website, www.gfconverter. com is being finalized along with another blog-oriented website, www.glutenfreeesociety.com, that will allow crowd sourcing of recipes for the app and other interactions.

Valuable assistance has come in many forms at SIU, Hutchinson said. In addition to receiving technical help from dining staff, he has gotten involved with the Saluki CEO Corps, an entrepreneurial student organization, and has become a tenant at the Student Innovation Incubator within the Research Park at SIU’s Illinois

Small Business Development Center/International Trade Center. Working with Kenneth Stoner, small business specialist, Hutchinson has drafted a business plan, worked on website development and worked on development, networking, fundraising and marketing the app.

“The ball is rolling now,” he said proudly.

Alex Glasnovich, a junior information system technologies major from Galesburg, has begun assisting with the app development. The app is a highly modified adaptation of bar code scanner applications, likewise using optical character recognition.

National celiac organizations have already indicated interest in the Gluten Free Converter app, but the only thing standing in the way of final development and marketing is funding.

Efforts to raise money and gain exposure are ongoing.

The app took two monetary prizes in the 2014 Saluki App Competition: It tied for first place with SI Trails in the Judge’s Choice category, and earned second place in the People’s Choice contest based on online voting. Hutchinson

container gardens and traditional in-ground gardens.

“Gardening does so many things for children,” Midden said.

“It gets them outside.

It helps with physical development in that way, and with small motor skills as they learn to pick up and work with seeds. They learn to

care for and nurture plants. They learn about the cycle of life with composting. It helps them become curious and open about their world, so that a worm or a bug is interesting, not ‘eww.’”

“Gardening with Children” is available from Redleaf Press (www.redleafpress.org).

Brothers | Continued from pg. 10 is also launching a “Kickstarter” crowd-funding database campaign to help raise the necessary funds to compete development of the app and launch it.

Hutchinson plans to offer the app for free, since his whole intention is to help people. It will be available online and for smartphones and will be funded through advertisers and sponsors.

Hutchinson is anxious to launch the app and the websites.

He envisions Gluten Free Converter as a beginning, rather than the conclusion of this long and involved process. If the app is successful, and he has every reason to believe it will be based on feedback he’s receiving, he hopes it will launch a parent company that in turn creates adapted versions of the app for use by vegetarians, people with lactose intolerance or food allergies, diabetics, and those with a host of other special diets.

“There are so many people this app could help, so many lives it could change for the better.

We are excited to see what the future holds and appreciative of all of the help and support SIU is giving us to make it happen,” Hutchinson said.

Thompson Point more recently. They feature separate microwaves, toasters/toaster ovens to avoid any crosscontamination as well as a refrigerator and upright freezer stocked with safe foods.

Numerous SIU dining staff completed the Gluten Free Resource Education Awareness Training created by the National Foundation for Celiac Awareness in 2011 and scored 80 percent or higher on the exam to earn certification. This assures they understand gluten sensitivity and how to handle it, including avoiding cross contamination within food preparation and serving areas.

Plans call for training and re-certifying staff in August, Feagans said.

All chefs and cooks undergo significant training to assure that they prepare food properly for the safety of students with special diets of all kinds, Connors said.

She has worked in campus dining for 23 years and said it seems that more students have unique dietary needs now than in the past, but that fortunately, there are more resources available now as well. University Housing provides support, resources and adaptations to assure that students have foods they can enjoy and safely eat.

Students can view the daily menu for the next day and then email or text staff with requests for specific items to be adapted and ready for them to eat. Feagans said staff prepares adapted foods including gluten-free pancakes, brownies and other treats, and will keep special desserts in the freezer, ready for students to thaw and eat for a snack. She said “Chef Jim Gilmore” even found a way to give her gluten-free nacho chips and shredded cheese.

“We make it our mission to serve all students healthy, tasty foods. Communication is perhaps the number one issue. If they inform us of dietary restrictions, we find a way to accommodate them. We’ve actually had students tell us they came to SIU because we will help them in a way other schools wouldn’t,” Connors said.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 12

| Environment Climate Change

‘It’s difficult to equate what’s happening far away to what’s happening where you live. My focus is on what we need to do here to prepare for possible changes due to climate changes.’

– Associate Professor Justin Schoof

By Andrea Hahn

“It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity.”

It’s both, actually, according to climate research

by Justin Schoof, associate professor and chair Justin Schoof of the Department of Geography and Environmental Resources at SIU Carbondale.

Schoof recently received a $158,254 grant from the National Science Foundation to study how regional and continental factors contribute to variations in temperature and humidity, and how humidity affects other trends that climate scientists are monitoring.

For most of us, the experience of a day high both in temperature and humidity is the most obvious way to appreciate the effects of humidity.

High humidity reduces the body’s ability to cool itself by the evaporation of sweat. Not only does it seem hotter, but also our ability to deal with the heat efficiently is impaired. We feel hotter, and our body is susceptible to heat distress at a lower temperature than it would be with lower humidity.

Schoof’s focus is equivalent temperature, a measurement that accounts for both dry and moist contributions to the total heat of air. Equivalent temperature measures the energy content of dry air (what we typically mean when we talk about temperature), and also the energy associated with water vapor in the air, commonly perceived as humidity. By examining changes in equivalent temperatures in the past, and analyzing the causes of the variations, Schoof can reasonably predict how equivalent temperature and the heat stress associated with it, might change in the future.

Schoof wants to find out why the eastern United States, including our region, has experienced increases in humidity, particularly in light of the fact that we are part of a so-called “warming hole” that seems to exist in defiance of the elevating temperatures seen elsewhere on the planet.

His findings will contribute to climate research focused on forecasting and preparing for climate changes, particularly as related to agriculture and human health.

His preliminary findings are opening new avenues for further research. For example, scientists have determined that a heat wave in 1995 that led to hundreds of deaths in Chicago may have been caused in part by a particularly wet spring that year in Plains states.

Humidity was a significant factor in the heat wave. Moist air from the Plains added

Illustration and text provided by Justin Schoof

Heat wave – The graphic shows data from Springfield, Ill., for the past 50 years (1961-2010). The first panel shows the 90th percentile of summer maximum air temperature. In other words, the maximum temperature shown is only exceeded on 10% of the days for that summer.

The graphic suggests that the warmest days are getting a little bit cooler (or at least are not getting warmer!) on average. The middle panel shows the same information, but for the dew point temperature, which is a measure of humidity. Clearly, the most humid days are getting more humid. The bottom panel shows the equivalent temperature, which depends on both temperature and humidity, and also exhibits a positive trend over time. This graphic demonstrates that the total heat content of air can increase while the temperature stays the same or even decreases.

to the summer heat and contributed to dangerously high equivalent temperatures.

Schoof examines how moist soil contributes to humidity all the time – not just during catastrophic events.

“We can expect that water vapor in the air will increase as temperatures increase globally,” he said.

“And we can examine how air currents that typically bring warm air into the region – from the Gulf of Mexico, for example – might bring moister air and higher humidity.

But I’m also looking at regional causes, such as soil moisture contributing to humidity. For example, irrigation can elevate regional humidity.”

Schoof noted that if climate change trends continue, as the bulk of scientific climate research indicates it will, then it stands to reason that the factors that influence regional humidity will also change, and conditions favorable for high humidity in the eastern United States may become more common.

Of particular interest to Schoof are regions where equivalent temperature is increasing despite cooler temperatures. One of the factors likely responsible for this is an increase in cloud cover.

“Isn’t it interesting we could have global warming leading to cooler temperatures in one area?” he mused during a recent interview.

Schoof will examine his findings in light of atmospheric and climate models already in use by the scientific community.

His research will help

Worth Knowing Students interested in careers pertaining to the environment have a wide variety of options at SIU, including: College of Agricultural Sciences

The Department of Agribusiness Economics offers a specialization in Energy and Environmental Policy. The Department of Forestry offers no fewer than five undergraduate specializations, covering forest hydrology, forest resource management, forest recreation and park management, urban forest management, and wildlife habitat management and conservation. Majors within the Department of Plant, Soil and Agricultural Systems include production horticulture, where students can learn about urban food production; and soil science, which can prepare students for careers in conservation, ecology, and resource management.

College of Applied Sciences and Arts

The School of Architecture teaches students how to create building environments that don't conflict with the natural environment.

Specific courses in environmental design and preservation engage students in projects that seek to make better use of resources.

College of Engineering

SIU offers a degree in civil engineering with a specialization in environmental engineering that calls upon faculty across campus to help students prepare for this growing field.

present a more complex picture of how changes may develop in our region, and therefore, how we can plan and prepare for them.

“The regional level is where things really matter to people,” he said, noting that anecdotal evidence and memory contribute to people’s understanding of how climate change might affect them.

“It’s difficult to equate what’s happening far away to what’s

College of Liberal Arts

The Department of Geography and Natural Resources focuses on the dynamic relationship between nature and society, and offers study from a wide variety of angles. Specializations include environmental sustainability, GIS (geographic information science), and climate and water resources. Other majors, such as political science and economics, offer platforms from which to view the environment through specific academic lenses.

College of Science

Biological sciences offers a specialization in ecology, and chemistry and biochemistry offer an environmental focus. In addition, study in geology, microbiology, plant biology or zoology offers different ways to study environmental issues.

In addition to its colleges, SIU is home to a number of centers with an ecological or environmental studies focus. The Center for Ecology supports collaboration among faculty and students in different areas of campus who are undertaking similar research or who are approaching similar problems from different angles. The Center for Fisheries, Aquaculture and Aquatic Sciences will soon expand its facilities to include research aquariums and advanced laboratories. The Cooperative Wildlife Research Laboratory focuses on teaching, research and service, especially for students in wildlife zoology.

happening where you live. My focus is on what we need to do here to prepare for possible changes due to climate changes.”

The impact of his research is global, and the results will be made available to the research community via archives held at SIU and at Indiana University, where research partner Sara Pryor is a professor of atmospheric science.

The work is also

complementary to work that Schoof is conducting for another current NSF-funded research project focused on climate change and led by Christopher L. Lant, SIU professor of geography and environmental resources. That project, launched in 2010 and coming to its close in 2015, focuses on how projected changes in climate may affect the agricultural landscape and water quality in the central United States.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 13

| Communications For the media, the results could give reporters a better understanding of factors that influence people’s beliefs about vaccines. It may suggest that the way the topic is being covered needs to change in some way to help people understand the issue.

By Pete Rosenbery

An upcoming survey by faculty and graduate students at SIU Carbondale will look at factors that influence a person’s healthrelated beliefs, including their Aaron Veenstra views on vaccinations.

The New Media Study Group, a faculty-student collaborative in the College of Mass Communication and Media Arts, will examine the role of such factors as the media, friends and family, medical professionals, the government, religion and other social group relationships.

The survey comes out of the group’s 2011 study that looked at the role partisan affiliations and media play in a person’s political beliefs. Non-political questions, including whether vaccines cause autism, were also a part of that study.

Consistent with various nonrelated survey results on the issue, about one-sixth of the respondents linked vaccines to autism. But the 2011 survey also showed Christian-based television and radio, along with education, appeared to be primary anti-vaccination influencers.

“That popped out at us and we oriented this survey around the one model about vaccines, really expanding it and trying to figure out where there are other sources of influences from both the media and social group affiliations,” Aaron Veenstra, an assistant professor in the School of Journalism, said.

Veenstra said he would also expect that anti-vaccine sentiment might come from people who are affiliated with environmental groups.

Wenjing Xie, an assistant professor in the School of Journalism; Elaine Jurkowski, professor in the School of Social Work; Scott McClurg, a professor with a crossappointment in the School of Journalism and political science, and about 10 doctoral students are involved with the study.

One of the more interesting aspects from the 2011 study is that the belief that “fringe beliefs bubble up and are encouraged” through social

Assessing Beliefs

media is not true for every topic, particularly sciencerelated issues that receive significant political attention, Veenstra said. But for non-political issues, beliefs can have a wider range of influences.

“For an issue like this, once you get past religion and environmental groups there aren’t really obvious social sources of influence. Part of this study will be generating that information out of the data we get,” he said.

Veenstra believes the general population survey of 300 to 500 people from throughout the United States will be ready by the end of the spring 2014 semester.

He hopes the group can analyze the findings this summer and submit a full grant proposal to the National Institutes of Health in early fall. The added funding would provide for two larger surveys of 1,000 to 1,500 people.

Those respondents will take the survey twice, six months to one year apart, to gauge any attitude changes.

Researchers will compare the results to see what changed in a person’s informationgathering habits and media exposure.

“Funding will allow us to test this in a more rigorous way to look at changes over time with a larger sample of people,” Veenstra said.

The survey’s findings can be helpful in a variety of ways.

For the media, the results could give reporters a better understanding of factors that influence people’s beliefs about vaccines. It may suggest that the way the topic is being covered needs to change in some way to help people understand the issue, Veenstra said. And health care providers, particularly primary care physicians who meet with parents skeptical about giving their children vaccines, could also find the survey results useful. It will give them a better idea about how to talk to parents and what kind of information will be helpful in addressing concerns.

This survey will touch not only on beliefs pertaining to vaccines and autism, but overall thoughts about vaccines and health, along with attitudes on science, business, government

Provided Photo

Worth Knowing The College of Mass Communication and Media Arts is home to the best collegiate television magazine news show in the nation. “alt.news 26:46,” which airs on WSIU-TV, has won the College Television Award from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Foundation seven times in the last 15 years, including in 2014. In addition, since 2001, the program has earned 30 regional Emmys -- 28 from the Academy’s Mid-America chapter in St. Louis and two from the Chicago Midwest Chapter.

Vaccinations Some of the pilot survey questions regarding health policy-related beliefs on vaccinations will include: • Vaccinations can cause autism.

• I believe that vaccinations are effective in preventing some diseases.

• Vaccination requirements are profit-driven.

• I worry that vaccines might have unknown long-term side effects.

• Children should only be immunized against serious diseases.

• We don’t really know what’s in vaccines.

• It is better for a child to develop immunity by getting sick than to get a vaccine.

• Healthy children do not need immunizations.

• Immunizations do more harm than good.

• Childhood immunization requirements go against parents’ freedom of choice.

• Parents should not be allowed to send their children to school if they are not vaccinated.

• Government should require, or government should encourage parents to vaccinate children.

— Source: New Media Study Group, SIU Carbondale.

health agencies, doctors and alternative medicine. The survey will also delve into a person’s political and religious identity and attitudes, and how

frequently they watch, read or listen to various types of traditional and social media.

The group plans to present pilot data results at the

American Public Health Association and Midwest Association for Public Opinion Research conferences in November.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 14

| Business

The organization loses money due to the crime and, if the public becomes aware, it loses the trust of stakeholders, society and the government.

Photo by Russell Bailey

Embezzlement research – Reviewing embezzlement data (from left) are Ouadie Akaaboune, a master’s of accounting student from Morocco, Martisia Mitchell, a senior agricultural economics major from Chicago, and Royce Burnett, associate professor of accounting, KPMG Research Fellow for the College of Business and associate dean of University College.

Detection and Prevention

By Christi Mathis

Businesses and organizations lose about five percent of their revenue, more than $700 billion, each year in the United States due to embezzlement and fraud, the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners estimates.

In addition to revenue, experts say embezzlement is particularly costly in terms of negative publicity and the loss of public trust. A group of SIU Carbondale faculty and students is involved in an in-depth research study that they anticipate will not only help them create a profile of an “average” embezzler, but also help businesses and organizations create appropriate and cost-effective safeguards to prevent embezzlement losses.

Faculty members leading the team are Royce Burnett, associate professor of accounting, KPMG Research Fellow for the School of Accountancy and associate dean of University College, and James Cali, adjunct accounting professor and director of internal audit for the Bi-State Development Agency, the operator of the greater St. Louis area’s “Metro” public transportation agency as well as St. Louis Downtown Airport and the Gateway Arch attractions.

Also working on the research are Ouadie Akaaboune, an undeclared graduate student from Morocco who earned his master’s of accounting at SIU and his bachelor’s degree in economics at the University of Hawaii, and Martisia Mitchell, a senior agricultural economics major from Chicago. Master’s in accounting students Cameron Flowers of Carbondale and Rakan Alhuthali of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, are assisting.

The research brings

together Cali’s 30 plus years of auditing, accounting and investigative experience with the research expertise and experience of Burnett and his students. Cali, a longtime law enforcement forensic accountant certified in financial forensics, investigated many embezzlement cases and testified as an expert witness.

A CPA, he earned the United States Department of Justice “Outstanding Law Enforcement Officer of the Year Award” in 2007 for his work on an investigation of a national prescription drug diversion and money laundering case.

Burnett, a CPA, CMA and CGMA, worked for more than 17 years in business before transitioning to academia. His experience includes positions with Ernst and Young, PriceWaterhouse Coopers, Electronic Data Systems, General Motors and BP/ Amoco. He also established and operated a successful CPA practice focusing on nonprofit management. He is also the incoming President of the Government and NonProfit section of the American Accounting Association.

In 2006, Cali began collecting details and statistics about embezzlement cases covering an eight-year period.

The SIU team examined about 400 cases, narrowing the observations down to 346 complete sets of case data that they are presently analyzing. The cases range from a few thousand dollars to as much as $76 million taken by people in a position of trust who are employees or officers of a professional or social organization.

Embezzlement is detrimental to an organization in many ways, as it represents both an internal and an external failure, Burnett said. The organization loses money due to the crime and, if the public becomes aware, it loses the

Worth Knowing The wide array of research and creative opportunities available to undergraduates at SIU – beginning as early as freshman year -- is unusual among public research institutions. Key programs include the Research Enriched Academic Challenge, Saluki Research Rookies, McNair Scholars, Illinois Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation, and undergraduate assistantships.

trust of stakeholders, society and the government. The cost is thus magnified, he said. It’s not uncommon for a business or organization to decline to prosecute the perpetrator to avoid the negative publicity and backlash, but then there’s usually no recovery of funds either.

One of the researchers’ initial goals is to create a profile of a “typical” embezzler. While men and women of all ages and ethnicities have been charged with the crime, Mitchell said it appears it is most common among white women between the ages of 35 and 42 according to preliminary data analysis. Likewise, other patterns seem to be emerging, Akaaboune and Mitchell said.

For instance, there seems to be a “threshold” of about $140,000 as a maximum average embezzlement by minorities, they said.

But, even after they create a “picture” of the typical embezzler, that isn’t nearly enough, Burnett said. Previous studies have suggested the statistical likelihood of certain population groups committing embezzlement but in fact, anyone can commit the crime.

Cali said there are several factors that typically come into play precipitating embezzlement. In the 1950s, criminologist Donald R. Creasy created the “Fraud Triangle” theorizing that when opportunity, motive

and rationalization merge, embezzlement is more likely.

Based on his many years as a CPA in law enforcement, Cali believes there is actually a “Star of Embezzlement” at work and the five elements/ points of the star commonly leading to embezzlement include greed and capacity as well as motive, opportunity and rationalization.

Data suggests to the SIU researchers that there are macro and micro levels of embezzlement and that the profiles of those involved vary according to the level of theft. Burnett said they are also analyzing the data to look for patterns as to why this happens. Are people of different genders or races given more or less access to varying amounts of money, thus affecting how much they may or may not embezzle?

That’s something the team is seeking to learn.

A complete analysis of all of this information and all of the variables is critical and revolutionary, Burnett said, because it will allow the SIU team and other researchers to do what businesses and organizations need most -come up with cost-effective plans to prevent embezzlement at all levels of an organization.

The research will produce an array of embezzlement detection and prevention tools and techniques that can be used to develop methods for enhancing the prosecution of

an embezzler, Cali said.

This project is not only important for businesses and organizations the world over, but it is an excellent example of how an undergraduate McNair Scholar, graduate students and faculty members can all work together on research that matters, research that can make a difference, Burnett said.

“I’ve really learned the fundamentals of research working on this project. I know how to assess and evaluate data and understand the fundamentals of good research,” Mitchell said.

Burnett was so impressed with Mitchell after hearing her speak at the university’s research symposium about her study of the affordability of vegetables and fresh foods for low-income people that he invited her to work on the embezzlement project. She said her research involvement will give her an edge in her career aspirations in the future.

“The research opportunities we have at SIU are among the things that distinguish us from other universities around the country, even around the world. Our faculty are doing high-quality research and involving students at all levels, from undergraduates to doctoral candidates,” Rodrigo Carraminana, director of SIU’s Center for Undergraduate Research and Creative Activities, said.

Akaaboune said he has been involved in a number of other research projects at SIU, primarily with Burnett, leading to presentations at national and regional conferences and he’s already had his work published four times.

The SIU researchers plan to complete their embezzlement research and analysis this summer and submit their study for publication as well. Burnett said the groundbreaking work is sure to receive attention.

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 15

| The Law

‘This process allows us to bring in those constituency groups and have them talk face-to-face with one another and see how they might be able to work it out.’

– Professor Alice Noble-Allgire

Crafting a Compromise

By Pete Rosenbery

A professor at the SIU School of Law is helping research and recommend changes to uniform laws that govern landlords and tenants.

Alice Noble-Allgire is one of the co-reporters for a drafting Alice Noble-Allgire committee working to update the Uniform Law Commission’s Residential Landlord and Tenant Act. The non-partisan commission’s goal is to bring uniformity to the laws among the various states by offering well-conceived and welldrafted legislation for states to enact. First put into place in 1972, the Landlord and Tenant Act has been adopted by 21 states, while other stated have adopted parts of the Act or used it as a model for their own statutes.

States tend to want their own specific statutes, but the commission has been “pretty successful” in getting states to adopt parts, if not all, of the Act. Illinois, which has a number of its own provisions, has not adopted the Act, Noble-Allgire said.

Together with co-reporter Sheldon Kurtz of the University of Iowa, Noble-Allgire has assisting the residential landlord and tenant drafting committee since its inception in 2011. The reporters’ role is to provide background research on trends in state legislation and court decisions on landlord-tenant issues, to participate in the drafting committee’s meetings with various constituency groups, and to draft proposed revisions to the Act. The committee will present the Act for a second reading before the full commission in July. After additional research and review, a final reading and adoption is scheduled for 2015. If adopted, the revised Act will be sent to each state legislature for review and consideration.

In addition to revising existing parts of the Act, there are proposed new provisions in areas that involve protections for domestic violence victims, security deposits, tenants’ abandoned personal property, and what happens to rental property once a tenant dies “There are two very different perspectives between landlords and tenants,” Noble-Allgire said. “The drafting committee and reporters want to make sure the Act represents the best compromise and the best policy decisions we can make that make sense for everyone.”

While landlords and tenants come with different perspectives, in reality, each needs one another. The drafting committee, therefore, encourages representatives from various constituency groups – including national associations that represent landlords and property managers and legal aid organizations that represent tenants – to attend the meetings and provide input on the proposed revisions.

Because these stakeholders actually sit at the table during discussions with the drafting committee, the work allows people and groups more access than they might have with legislators in state government settings, she said.

Photo Provided

Proposed changes for domestic violence victims under the Uniform Law Commission’s Residential Landlord and Tenant Act. • Allow victim-tenants to be released from their lease.

• Allow victim-tenants to change locks.

• Allow the landlord to terminate the portion of the lease involving the perpetrator.

• Protect victim-tenants from eviction for the perpetrator’s actions on the rental property.

— Source: Alice Noble-Allgire

“This process allows us to bring in those constituency groups and have them talk face-to-face with one another and see how they might be able to work it out,” she said.

“It is a challenge at the same time when you have parties who have such different needs and you try to find the common ground between them and find the point where they can both be comfortable with whatever legislation the committee adopts.”

The proposed changes involving domestic violence also affect tenants who have been the victims of sexual assault, dating violence and stalking, Noble-Allgire said.

Victim-tenants don’t feel safe in their homes, particularly if the abuser is also living in the residence or nearby and the victim’s name is on the lease.

The proposed revisions allow victim-tenants to be released from the lease, without penalty, so they can find another place to live. Alternately, the landlord has the option of terminating the perpetrator’s interest in the lease and

allowing the victim-tenant to remain. The Act would also give victim-tenants the right to change the locks on their dwelling unit.

Another area of concern for victim-tenants is the threat of eviction for acts committed by an abuser that disturb neighboring tenants or otherwise violate lease conditions. “That compounds the injury that a domestic violence victim suffers,” NobleAllgire said.

The proposed legislation addresses the issue by prohibiting landlords from taking adverse measures -such as terminating leases, refusing to renew leases, reducing services or imposing different rules – simply because the tenant is a domestic violence victim, the police were called to the residence or a domestic violence act occurred on the premises. Landlords may, however, terminate a lease if the victim invites the perpetrator back onto the property after the landlord has given notice that the person is not to return, or the perpetrator poses an imminent or serious threat to the landlord, employees, or other residents.

Another proposed change involves security deposits and requires landlords to hold the security deposit in a separate account. The deposit would be returned, without interest, if the tenant successfully completes their lease obligations. The change protects both the landlord and tenant from losing the money to secured creditors if the other party declares bankruptcy, Noble-Allgire said. Illinois law requires that security deposits be returned with interest if lease obligations are successfully met.

In the event of eviction or the tenant’s death, landlords will have specific time period

Worth Knowing The SIU School of Law was one of just 60 in the nation recognized by National Jurist magazine as a "Best School for Practical Training" in its March 2014 issue.

Law students gain experience through such programs as semester in practice, clinics, and pro bono projects. In addition, recently released employment data from the American Bar Association for 2013 graduates ranks the School of Law 20th out of 201 law schools nationally in full-time, long-term, bar-pass-required, non-law schoolfunded jobs.

they must keep the tenant’s personal property in storage if it is not removed. NobleAllgire said an important consideration is that landlords want to rent the unit again.

The proposed revisions would allow landlords to move the personal property out of the unit and into storage. The new provisions are particularly helpful when a tenant who was a sole occupant of the home had died.

Landlords will be able to ask tenants at the beginning of a lease the name of a contact person in the event of an emergency, and if the tenant dies, the contact person can take control of the deceased tenant’s property. Alternately, if the landlord is unable to immediately locate a contact person or any relative of the deceased tenant, the landlord can put the property in storage for up to 60 days while the tenant’s estate is set up. The estate is responsible for storage costs, she said, adding that only a few states have addressed this situation.

In the case of eviction or tenants who inadvertently left property behind after terminating a lease, tenants would have 15 days to remove the property after receiving notice from the landlord

unless the notice is extended by mutual agreement. The landlord can then remove the property to storage with the evicted tenant responsible for those costs.

Another proposed change that involves a tenant’s death permits the landlord or tenant representative to terminate the lease, but also allows the deceased tenant’s surviving spouse to assume the lease if they were not party to the original lease.

Additional information on the proposed changes is available at the commission’s website www.uniformlaws. org under the Residential Landlord and Tenant Act Committee section. Comments to the proposed changes are encouraged, Noble-Allgire said.

Noble-Allgire, whose classes include property and trusts and estates, said she is pleased to be involved.

“It’s really exciting to watch a room full of people who have their own interest and expertise in these areas come together.

Initially they put forward their own personal perspective but after talking it through they see where the other side might be coming from and can reach some compromises,” she said. “That has been very gratifying.”

Impact | SIU Sunday, May 11, 2014 | The Southern Illinoisan | Page 16

| Environment Averting Disaster

‘… The greatest concentration of jurisdictions with high flood vulnerability ratings is in the Southern Illinois counties bordering the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers.’

– Flood hazard report

The Southern File Photo

Flood waters in Olive Branch in 2013.

By Tim Crosby

When it rains, it pours.

And when it floods, two SIU Carbondale researchers can tell you who is most at risk.

And not just at risk from the floodwaters, but also their after-effects.

Jonathan Remo, assistant professor in the Department of Geography and Environmental Resources, and Nicholas Pinter, professor in the Department of Geology, recently completed a statewide flood hazard and vulnerability assessment for the Illinois Emergency Management Agency. Remo and Pinter are part of the Natural Hazard Research and Mitigation Group at SIU. Funded with a $155,000 grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the assessment broke new ground in scope by overlapping several databases covering an entire state.

The researchers assessed the flood risk using the FEMA’s HazusMH software, which allowed them to estimate building-related flood exposure and losses.

They also quantified and ranked the flood vulnerabilities of Illinois jurisdictions using flood-loss and socialvulnerability parameters to develop an index.

The assessment is aimed helping state officials understand the risk associated with a “100-year flood” around Illinois waterways. The Illinois floodplain for such a flood encompasses some 7,140 square miles.

Within that area, the researchers identified $190.25 billion in building-related flood exposure, along with the corresponding buildingrelated flood losses estimated at $18.39 billion in 2006 dollars.

The study sought to go beyond just the potential

Worth Knowing SIU faculty, including Professor Nicholas Pinter, led the successful effort to secure a $9 million federal award to acquire and demolish 167 floodprone homes and businesses in Olive Branch. for property losses, however. The researchers also attempted to look at various communities’ ability to recover from a 100-year flood, based on factors such as its socioeconomic resources and the status of its emergency and critical infrastructure.

“We compiled a lot of data for this,” Remo said.

“We believe it’s the first study of this kind in the U.S., the first time data from several different areas were combined to look at an area as large as an entire state to give the true picture of the hazards.”

To make the assessment, Remo and Pinter looked at data showing the state’s flood plains and what was in or near them.

They then overlapped that with a data base showing the condition of levees throughout the state and also with data that showed each threatened jurisdiction’s emergency and critical infrastructure, such a fire and police stations, schools, waste water treatment facilities and such.

The researchers also looked at the socioeconomic status and resources for each jurisdiction, which would be indicative of their ability to recover from such a flood.

In the end, they were able to estimate the financial, social and economic risk in each jurisdiction, and use that to compile a ranking of at-risk communities.

In general, the research indicated communities in the Chicago area, where jurisdictions are perched along many lesser-known rivers and streams, tended to lead the way in terms of the risk of financial loss.

Also at risk, however, are many of the state’s rural communities, where emergency infrastructure is less well fortified and socioeconomic strength is lower. Those included many communities in Southern Illinois along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, among others, as well as upstate communities on the Illinois River and others.

“Unlike flood exposure and losses, which are concentrated in the urban and suburban areas surrounding Chicago, the most floodvulnerable communities in Illinois are the rural jurisdictions located along the state’s larger rivers,” the report stated.

“Flood vulnerability analysis suggests the urban and suburban communities within the Chicago metropolitan region would, in general, be more resilient (because they) possess greater resources for recovery than rural river communities. “… The greatest concentration of jurisdictions with high flood vulnerability ratings is in the Southern Illinois counties bordering the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers,” it stated Other “hot spots” for high risk were in the Metro East along the Mississippi River, East Peoria on the Illinois River and Rock Island, also along the Mississippi River, Remo said.

The report also noted

Flood waters in Olive Branch in 2013.

The Southern File Photo

Top 10 communities most vulnerable to flooding The ten jurisdictions in Illinois most vulnerable to flooding Town/City Rank Total Total Flood

Losses Exposure Vulnerability ($1000) ($1000) Rating Gulf Port East Cape Girardeau Naples Grand Tower Old Shawneetown McClure Liverpool Maunie Gorham Cairo

the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers recently found significant deficiencies in 108 of the 123 participating levee systems in Illinois, rating 34 of those “unacceptable.” “(This) means these levees may not perform as designed during a major flood,” the report stated. “We estimate that the levee systems in Illinois provide flood protection at varying levels to $25.01 billion in building-related infrastructure.”

Pinter said the

1 6,135 23,775 High 2 6,213 43,849 High 3 3,618 15,753 High 4 11,332 56,161 High 5 3,913 22,190 High 6 3,820 27,457 High 7 3,593 21,226 High 8 1,696 11,862 High 9 3,098 20,789 High 10 27,391 243,913 High

collaborative, interdisciplinary approach of the study helped the researchers do a thorough assessment of the flood hazard risk statewide.

“Natural hazards activities at SIU are effective because they are broad-based, involving rigorous research, education and public policy applications.”

Pinter said.

Remo said the partnership between the state and SIU is another example of the university’s commitment

to the community.

“The university has expertise that the state may not have available,” he said.

As part of the study, the research team also was able to provide emergency agencies at the county level with a flood hazard assessment, as well as a flood-risk analysis of state-owned facilities.

“We hope the report will help state officials with a clearer picture of where to spend their flood prevention money,” Remo said.