Susan Davis Allen Set To Lead FSU Research into 21st Century

Vice President for Research Dr. Susan Allen

On July 8, Dr. Susan Davis Allen was named by President Sandy D'Alemberte as FSU's new vice president for research, succeeding Dr. Robert M. Johnson. A Jacksonville native, Allen comes to campus from Tulane University, where she had served as vice president for research and dean of the graduate school since the fall of 1992. At Tulane she also continued her research and teaching as a tenured professor of chemistry and electrical engineering.

Dr. Allen, 52, holds a doctorate in chemical physics from the University of Southern California. She began her undergraduate work in chemistry at Duke University before graduating from Colorado College in Colorado Springs in 1966.

After receiving her doctorate, Allen served in various research and teaching capacities primarily at Southern Cal, including a post as associate director of USC's Center for Laser Studies. In 1987 she left USC for a full professorship in chemistry and electrical and computer engineering at the University of Iowa, where she soon became director of that university's Laser Microfabri-cation Facility.

A specialist in materials research, Allen holds two patents, one on a process for removing minute particles from a surface using lasers, and another for making small, precise fiber optic structures. She also has several other patent applications for techniques related to laser optics and materials research. In recent years, her research has been substantially supported by the U.S. Air Force and by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

"We're extremely pleased that Dr. Allen will be joining Florida State University," said FSU Provost Larry Abele. "Her background and interests will enable her to work with a wide diversity of faculty across campus, and help Florida State to raise its research sights even higher."

At Tulane, Allen managed a budget of $15 million and supervised a staff of 31. At Florida State, she becomes one of five vice presidents reporting directly to FSU's president, and will be the university's senior administrative officer responsible for research policy and the administration of sponsored research. Units reporting to her will include the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, FSU Marine Laboratory, Laboratory Animal Resources, and Institute of Science and Public Affairs.

Allen described Florida State's academic strengths as "formidable" not only in science and engineering but also in the social sciences, humanities and in the arts. "I will inherit a well-functioning research organization developed by (now retired VP) Bob Johnson, and I look forward to using it to enhance FSU's reputation," she said.

Allen's national research connections include her current service on the board of directors and the board of trustees, which she also chairs, of the Oak Ridge Associated Universities. With the National Science Foundation, she has served on several advisory boards for engineering, materials research and fellowship reviews. She also serves on a Naval Studies Board Committee on Technology for Future Naval Forces, charged with recommending to the Navy what technologies it should be using well into the 21st century.

Allen was the first female professor of chemistry at Iowa and the first faculty member hired for Iowa's then-new Center for Laser Science and Engineering. At Iowa and Tulane, she organized a networking system of science faculty to encourage women and minorities in science and engineering.

Born into a military family, Allen has seen much of the U.S. and Central America. She credits a high school geometry teacher she had in Panama with much of her early interest in pursuing a career in science. She also was inspired by a biography of Madame Curie she read as a teenager. But she credits her father with providing the right household environment for fostering her innate scientific interest.

"He wasn't a scientist, but he loved to read about science and nature, and I could always count on him to listen to my questions and help me figure things out," she said.

Allen is keenly aware of national trends in scientific literacy and in support for higher education and research, which show declines across the board. She says she's a strong advocate for finding better ways to communicate the importance of research to the public.

"The current national disenchantment with higher education, in general, and with research and creative activity, in particular, will eventually swing in the other direction, but we must find means to hasten the process by better explaining to the public what 'value added' research universities bring to the state and national economies and quality of life."

Fisk Tapped for National Academy

On April 30th, physicist Dr. Zachary Fisk became the ninth faculty member in FSU history to be elected to one of the most prestigious scientific organizations in this country, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). "It was one of those things that comes out of the blue," he said about the unexpected honor.

Congress created the NAS in 1863 to serve as an advisory body to the federal government. The academy, which comprises many of the finest scientific and technical minds in the nation, is divided into 25 different disciplines and currently has about 1,800 members and 300 foreign associates. Members of the academy, many of whom are Nobel prize winners, elect new members on the basis of their outstanding achievements in original research.

Fisk has excelled in condensed-matter physics, exploring the boundary of materials science and physics for combinations of elements with what he calls "interesting magnetic and electrical properties." This search for the new and unusual brought him to FSU in 1994 as a faculty member of the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (NHMFL).

"Zach Fisk is one of the foremost condensed matter physicists in the country, and I am so pleased to see his numerous scientific contributions recognized by his selection into such a prestigious group," said Provost Larry Abele.

"This award reconfirms my long-term assessment of Zack Fisk," added NHMFL Director Jack Crow.

"It seems somewhat different than other awards," muses Fisk who has won prizes from the American Physical Society, U.S. Department of Energy, and Los Alamos National Laboratory. Anticipating his future appointments to NAS committees, he said "This is sort of like having an award that's with you all the time."

Fisk graduated from Harvard University in 1964 with a bach-elor's degree in physics and completed his doctorate at the University of California-San Diego in 1969. Until he came to FSU, he worked at both UC-SD, where he was tenured in 1991, and at Los Alamos National Laboratory.

The eight previous NAS members from FSU include five retirees: Dr. Michael Kasha of chemistry; Dr. Louis Howard of mathematics; Drs. Herbert Taylor and Lloyd Beidler, both from biological science; Nobel laureate Dr. Paul A.M. Dirac of physics (now deceased) and Dr. Abba Lerner, economics (now deceased). Current NAS faculty members in addition to Fisk are Nobel- laureate physicist Dr. Robert Schreiffer of the NHMFL and Dr. Donald Caspar, who joined the univer-sity's Department of Biological Science in 1994.

'Canes, 'Noles Mix it Up for Research

Florida State and the University of Miami-usually mentioned together in the context of (usually heated) sports contests-agreed in June to play on the same team in the highly competitive game of winning external funding for research.

FSU President Sandy D'Alemberte and UM President Edward T. Foote II signed a collaborative agreement June 4 at a news conference in Tallahassee that strengthens two of Florida's nationally recognized research universities in research efforts in various disciplines.

The new partnership between the private UM and public FSU could lead to broad-based, multidisciplinary educational exchanges, joint course offerings and faculty exchanges, said D'Alemberte.

"The wave of the future for universities is collaboration," he said. "This partnership will make us more efficient, more productive and more competitive for external funding. It's a win-win situation."

UM's Foote said, "Faculty members at our institutions have been working together on research projects for many years. This agreement reaffirms and strengthens our commitment to interdisciplinary research and education of the highest quality by encompassing various disciplines and combining the strengths of both of our institutions."

Initially, FSU and UM will concentrate efforts on three major research projects: Development of a national risk assessment and intervention center to allow medical and scientific faculties at FSU and UM to develop cost- effective and efficient interventions for human risk behaviors; creation of a center for climate prediction research; and applications in magnetic resonance, an imaging and diagnostic technique used in many scientific, medical and engineering fields.

Chancellor Dr. Charles Reed said, "The people of Florida will be the beneficiaries of the partnership between these two great institutions. Working together, the two universities will strengthen their ability to add value, through teaching, research and service, to the lives of Floridians."- from the FSU Office of Media Relations

Environmental Racism?

Does the NIMBY ("not in my backyard") syndrome that plagues government efforts to deal with waste management problems nationwide have racial overtones?

A number of studies have been published alleging that American society is guilty of environmental racism, placing disproportionate numbers of dangerous waste sites and power plants in neighborhoods inhabited by minorities and the poor.

In studying the question, FSU political scientist Dr. Evan Ringquist found the results of the studies to be provocative, but also felt that the research hadn't been done particularly well. So last year he began his own National Science Foundation-funded study, which although incomplete, already presents interesting preliminary findings.

The premise underlying Ringquist's study is that environmental protection is supposed to be a public trust with an evenly distributed component of risk. If, however, policy decisions are being made that distribute that risk unevenly- the result being that some communities are environmentally safer to live in than others-then society needs to scrutinize how we make those decisions.

Three questions guided Ringquist's research: Do inequities exist in the distribution of environmental risk? If so, to what degree are government decisions responsible for creating them? Are policies being made right now that are moving in the direction of equalizing environmental risk?

After identifying the locations of hazardous waste facilities-high-risk ones in particular-and identifying their toxic emissions, Ringquist says: "There's no question in my mind . . . there are inequities in the distribution of environmental risk."

It isn't a conspiracy or bad government policy causing the inequities-just economics, he says.

Moving towards completion of his research, Ringquist has added a forth question. Given that there's an unequal distribution of environmental risk, is it constant across the country or does it vary from state to state? "Run the analysis," he says, "and sure enough, the relationship between race and hazardous waste facilities does vary from state to state."

So far, the data hint that areas with greater minority representation in government and government agencies have greater equity in the distribution of hazardous sites.

But, he cautions, "People naturally assume that because the (federal) government is responsible for environmental protection, that government policy must be responsible for the inequities."

He hopes that his research will help clarify the factors that are responsible for the inequities he's finding, factors that could prove to be more a function of local government or the private sector than of federal policy.

A Sea to See

Tunicates, snails, sea urchins and pails. All the fun of a salt-crusted, FSU Saturday-at-the-Sea (SATS) is being brought to the elementary school classroom this year thanks to a new program called Sea-to-See. A variation on FSU's award-winning education outreach program, Saturday-at-the-Sea- based at the university's marine lab at Turkey Point on the Gulf coast-the new feature brings the sea to children rather than the other way around.

The one-van show transports a collection of local (and hardy) marine organisms to a school where they are transferred to shallow touch tanks, allowing children access to the seemingly exotic creatures. They can tickle a sea cucumber, touch the spines of a sea urchin, stare wide-eyed at the enormous legs and tiny body of a spider crab, and watch an oyster's heart beat. In one hour, these often land-locked kids become aware of the marine environment that dominates our planet and the life that dwells within it.

Sea-to-See began visiting classrooms this past February after receiving funding through the Florida Advisory Council on Environmental Education. The funds, which also support the SATS Summer Camp Program, are a portion of the proceeds from the sale of the Save the Manatee and Florida Panther license plates.

By the end of the 1995-96 school year, Sea-to-See had been presented to nearly 4,700 children in 30 schools in North Florida. That's 700 more than FSU's contract calls for, and there are still two months of programs left to give this fall, says Chuck Bowling, who coordinates Saturday-at-the-Sea and its related programs.

Since 1985, Saturday-at-the-Sea (SATS) has been introducing middle-school children to the aquatic wonders of the Gulf of Mexico. In many cases, the hands-on nature of their investigations have reawakened an interest in scientific inquiry.

This year, the popular coastal classroom, started by Drs. William Herrnkind and Patricia Hayward, caught the eye of Gov. Lawton Chiles' office, winning the Governor's 1996 Environmental Education Award for Public and Private Educational Institutions.

As the end of its first year draws to a successful close, Bowling is optimistic that funding for these programs will continue. Costing little more than a dollar per student, the Sea-to-See program figures to be a whale of a taxpayer's bargain.