Deb Aronson's RSS feed. http://www.debaronson.com/ http://www.debaronson.com/features/physician_educate_thyself/ 2010-06-22 The words “librarian” and “celebrity” are not often used in the same sentence, but in the case of Nancy Pearl, it happens often. Not only has Pearl, a librarian by training, written three books, she is a regular guest on National Public Radio and hosts a Seattle television show. To top it all off, she was the inspiration for a librarian action figure and is quoted on one of the Starbucks coffee cups.* “That’s certainly something you don’t expect that when you are 10 and think ‘I want to be a librarian,’” she says, chuckling. Ever since she learned to read at the age of three or four, Pearl has loved books. She discovered libraries as an oasis in a “not particularly happy home environment.” From the time she was 10, Pearl knew she would be a librarian, “just like Miss Whitehead,” the children’s librarian her Detroit neighborhood. And for most of her career that is just what Pearl has been, first in Detroit, then Tulsa and most recently Seattle. In 2002 Pearl’s life hit warp drive when a Seattle book publisher approached her about writing a book, titled Book Lust, about good books arranged by 300 somewhat random categories — everything from “Aging” or “Art Appreciation” to “Zen Buddhism” and “Zero” (books about nothing) with entries of 250 words each. “The thing I do best, my one talent, is that I can talk about books,” says Pearl. “I remember authors and frequently come up with plot details. “ The librarian action figure came out almost simultaneously, “but just by chance,” as Book Lust. “They played off each other,” says Pearl. “There was controversy over the librarian action figure. Did the shushing action reinforce negative stereotypes? About 20 librarians decided they didn’t like it, because they had no sense of humor — it’s meant to be ironic! So every time they talked to the press another 2,000 librarian action figures would sell.” And they’d identify Pearl as the author of Book Lust, which was great for book sales. As for the success of the book, Pearl says, “They ended up feeling they could trust me because I wasn’t a snob about reading.” Today, in addition to having written three books in the Book Lust collection (Book Lust, More Book Lust and Book Crush), with a fourth (Book Lust To Go) due out next year, Pearl also does hour-long call-in radio shows both for the Seattle NPR station and with Wisconsin Public Radio, a television show (Seattlechannel.org) in which she interviews authors — and sometimes readers — and a blog at nancypearlbooks.wordpress.com where she posts a new review weekly. But before she was an author, a radio host or the inspiration for an action figure, Pearl was first, and at heart still is, a librarian. In 1998 she developed the program, “If All Seattle Read the Same Book.” The goal of the program was to build new audiences for literature. Pearl wanted to center the program on book clubs. “I believe very strongly in book groups as a way to transcend our superficial differences,” says Pearl. “Talking about hard issues in a book is much easier than talking about them on a personal level without a book.” This “one city one book” idea has since been adopted by communities and schools across the nation and is, says Pearl, the achievement she is most proud of. Hand in hand with Pearl’s efforts to share her passion for reading is the mystery Pearl has spent her life pondering: why people like the books they like. “This is something librarians have been trying for decades to understand,” she says. “What is it in a particular book that has or has not drawn you in?” Pearl pictures books as having four doors by which to enter: story, characters (whether hobbit, dragon or human), setting (in time or location) and language. Every book has all four of those doorways. What’s different between books is the size of the doorways. Books by Dan Brown, for example, are all about story, and that is the largest door, says Pearl. People who read for language may not enjoy Brown as much as someone for whom story is key. Setting is another door, but although every book has a setting, setting is not always the biggest door. For example, although Ann Tyler’s books are all set in Baltimore, they could really be set anywhere. Her books are more about character. In Laura Lippman’s books, on the other hand, Pearl says Baltimore is integral part of her books, especially the mystery series. “People always thinks a book they love has all four equal doorways but they really don’t,” she says. The beauty of the four doors analogy, says Pearl, is it is not judgmental; there is not a hierarchy or an implication that one door is better than another. They just represent “descriptive ways to meet people where they are. The way people talk about books is a clue to what door is most important to them,” she adds. Pearl suggests that English teachers could think of these doors as they choose books to assign their students. She argues that, “assigning stories in school is wasted unless the door size matches the kids. One of the problems with high school assignments is that we give kids books at the wrong time of their lives.” “The biggest doorway for kids has to be story,” she adds. Pearl is very sympathetic to English teachers and suggests that they and librarians “have a lot to say to one another.” They struggle with somewhat similar issues, such as figuring out ways to help students love to read and understand what they read. Pearl also would argue that parents and teachers could help their readers pace themselves, picking books that match the reader’s own emotional maturity level. “One of the saddest things is you’re getting seven and eight year olds reading all of the Harry Potter books. The early Harry Potter books were written for seven and eight year olds, they were all action all the time. But as the books progress, those kids that were seven when the first one came out were growing up, so by the time the seventh Harry Potter came out those kids were able to handle the story, which is much more interior and much less obvious to story readers.” Although she agrees she’d probably start a riot if she really suggested this, she would like to see parents and teachers making kids wait to read certain books until they are at a proper age. It’s not, definitely not book banning, she says, more like book pacing. Since 2004, when Pearl left the Seattle public library, she has been leading workshops, teaching as an adjunct professor at the University of Washington Information School, and talking about the “doorways theory.” Despite the age of the Internet and Google, where information is so much easier to access, Pearl continues to believe in the importance of libraries and librarians. “You can sit at home and find out almost anything so what is the library to do? To me it is what the library has always done. It’s been a haven for readers and a place you can come to find people who love reading as much as you do. It’s a place to find your next good book with the help of a trained librarian and it’s a place where programs take place: book discussions, poetry reading, open mikes.” *Oh, and that Starbucks quote, cup #169? “Life’s too short to read a book you don’t love. At age 50 or younger, give a book 50 pages to see if you like it. Over 50, subtract your age from 100 and that’s the number of pages to read before you bail on a book you’re not enjoying. And when you turn 100, you get to judge a book by its cover!” http://www.debaronson.com/profiles/nancy_pearl_uber_librarian/ 2010-03-15 Janice Harrington’s recent success as a poet, author and college professor is deeply rooted in her more than two decades as children’s librarian and storyteller, where her work fostered a powerful ear for vivid rhythm and imagery. You could say Harrington’s latest incarnation as a professor in the University’s creative writing program started more than a decade ago when she invited Michael Madonick to give a poetry-writing workshop at the Champaign Public Library. When Madonick asked the children to write a poem about something important to them he urged Harrington, head of the children’s department, to participate as well. “Then he did a very bad thing,” joked Harrington. “He looked at my poem and said it was good.” Harrington went home, started writing and didn’t stop. “I had a full-time job but luckily I also had insomnia,” she says. “I could sit for four hours moving words around. It felt like playing. I love how you move one word and it’s exactly RIGHT.” The resulting poetry collection, “Even the Hollow My Body Made is Gone (2007),” won the A. Poulin, Jr., Poetry contest, designated for a first book of poetry. Most recently, Harrington was one of six writers to win the 2009 Rona Jaffe award, one of the only literary honors in the country devoted exclusively to women. Each recipient receives $25,000. Harrington will use that award to complete Nightshift, a collection of poems about her experiences working in nursing homes, during both high school and college. “I need to do something with all those lives, and people and faces that have stayed with me all those years,” she says. Harrington, who grew up in rural Alabama and Nebraska, weaves her life experiences into not just her poetry but also her picture books. Her first such project, “Going North” was based on her own family’s journey and started, not surprisingly, as a poem. She showed it to her friend and colleague, Janice Del Negro,a children’s author and former director of the Center for Children’s Books at Illinois, who liked it so much she asked permission to show it to her editor. That book subsequently won, among other awards, the 2004 Ezra Jack Keats Award from the New York Public Library. Since then Harrington has published “The Chicken-Chasing Queen of Lamar County” and “Roberto Walks Home.” Her next children’s book is based on an African folktale about a procrastinating chicken. Though Harrington was hired a mere two years ago, she is, by many accounts, an inspired and inspiring teacher. “[Harrington] is so passionate and knows so much about her subject,” says Jeremiah Childers, a creative writing major who settled on poetry after taking a class with her. “She has a compassion and genuine interest in people in that community of poets. And as an aspiring poet you are immediately thrust into that community.” “I’m not in the class by myself; I’ve got my crew with me,” she demurs, meaning fellow poets Williams Butler Yeats, Emily Dickinson, Langston Hughes and Gwendolyn Brooks, to name a few. Harrington includes her students in that crew, as well. The students “are fascinating to me,” she says. “I admire their enthusiasm, their bravery and daring. We face the same difficulties getting what we want to say on the page. I feel as if I’m among peers.” Meanwhile Madonick and other faculty members in the creative writing program who had been wooing Harrington for years, are ecstatic that she has joined them. “For us, the biggest problem was that [Harrington] is ridiculously humble and self-effacing about her abilities as a writer,” he says. “We had to convince her that she not only belonged but would probably outshine most of us.” http://www.debaronson.com/profiles/a_community_of_poets/ 2010-01-20 If Michael B. Johnson ‘88 ENG were a Pixar movie character he would be Sully, the large, furry, green-with-blue-spots star of Monsters, Inc. Like Sully (voiced by actor John Goodman), Johnson’s voice is deep and resonant; he is a hail-fellow-well-met; modest in an “aw-shucks-just-doing-my-job” way; and he is all about giving credit to others. For 16 years, the Chicago native has worked at Pixar Animation Studios, an entity synonymous with exquisitely rendered computer animation combined with heart-warming characters and imaginative stories. Since its first movie, Toy Story, hit the screen in 1995, Pixar has subsequently released A Bug’s Life, Toy Story 2, Monsters,Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, Wall-E, and Up. The first six Pixar movies alone have generated $3.2 billion worldwide and won numerous Academy Awards. At Pixar computer software is critical, not just in making movies but also in managing the workflow. This is where Johnson comes in. As head of the studio’s acclaimed Moving Pictures Group, he writes computer software (or code) that helps make the jobs of the writers, artists, animators and other “Pixarians” easier and more productive. As such Johnson functions like the best of wedding planners — unobtrusive but essential to a successful enterprise. Want to make sure Editorial knows what Animation is doing? Johnson can write software code for that. How about being able to mark up drawings and then refer back to and manipulate those markings? Johnson has written code for that. Or, boy, wouldn’t it be great to see your drawings as a movie much sooner, rather than just a pinned-up collection of sketches? Johnson and his team have solved that with custom computer software that enables artists to make storyboards on the computer. Johnson’s adult career path began at the University of Illinois, which he chose over Princeton, and in electrical engineering, which he chose over theater. The National Merit Scholar packed numerous experiences into his college career, including working for IBM as part of the engineering co-op program; studying in Swansea, Wales; and learning from Nancy St. John, who had been hired from the Los Angeles computer graphics business world to start the Scientific Visualization Program at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) on campus. “The NCSA experience was the first chance I had to work on campus with faculty and staff and see them as humans,” says Johnson. “Otherwise [for me], as an undergraduate, professors and TAs and the like were very mysterious.” (Perhaps to demystify himself, Johnson made a point of replying first to questions from numerous pre-teens who helped fill the Wohlers Hall auditorium at a talk he gave on campus last fall.) By the time he was a junior, Johnson realized his passion and skill lay in writing computer code, and switched to computer science engineering. After graduating, he studied at the MIT and its Media Lab, and joined Pixar as an intern via Ed Catmull, a member of his dissertation committee and a co-founder of Pixar. In the intense, creative and occasionally chaotic atmosphere of Pixar, Johnson has found a perfect fit for what he loves to do. “Our craft is coding,” Johnson says of his team, “And we have to code fast.” Part of that quick coding reflects the point of creating custom software — to overcome a frustration by improving a particular problem. For example, sometimes in the midst of a review, a person will have an idea that is most easily communicated by scribbling something on the existing image. “Lots of creative people finish their sentences with a drawing,” explains Johnson.) Thus “Review Sketch” came into being. The software records those drawings (done on a computer screen or tablet), which users can later edit or simply review. Creating “Review Sketch” meant “a lot of tension went out of the room,” says Johnson. “Beautiful, well-crafted user interfaces and work flows make people happy,” http://www.debaronson.com/profiles/what_lies_beneath/ 2010-01-15 http://www.debaronson.com/features/teacher_advocacy_teachers_speaking_up/ 2010-01-01 IGB faculty members are not only advancing life sciences research and stimulating bio-economic development in the state of Illinois, they also are advancing and stimulating the minds of area residents age 50 and over, as part of the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI). OLLI is a national program with institutes in every state. The University of Illinois program was established three years ago and now has more than 500 members. This past spring, IGB faculty team-taught the New Science of Genomic Biology, which got rave reviews from participants. That class was filled to capacity and had a waiting list, says Kathleen Holden, director of OLLI at the University. The class speakers included Gene Robinson, on neural and behavioral plasticity; Nigel Goldenfeld, on using the genetic code to understand evolution; Brenda Wilson on how the vaginal microbial ecosystem impacts women’s health; and Jay Kesan, on the business of biotechnology. In each session the researchers explained how their work interfaced with genomics and how that was significant. OLLI members enjoyed the variety of both instructors and subject matter. “You learn something new every week,” says one OLLI member, Jean Paley, who took the genomics course and is planning on taking another IGB-taught course this fall. Paley was skeptical about the need for OLLI at first. She felt that there were already so many opportunities for intellectual stimulation on campus there was no need for more. She has changed her tune. The difference, she says, is that OLLI classes are full of adults with life experience and curiosity, all of whom are thrilled to be there. “The people attracted to OLLI are retired and have really active minds, they are fun to be in class with,” says Paley. “They think about things, ask interesting questions and stimulate interesting discussions.” “It was an extraordinary course,” says Ira Lebenson, another OLLI participant. “We have some of the world’s best people giving the courses and it’s the latest information.” OLLI director Holden credits Robinson, Swanlund Chair of entomology and theme leader at the IGB, with the idea of team teaching an OLLI course. Robinson says that he knew many faculty who are very good at explaining their research to the public and he saw this as a chance for them to do that. “It worked beautifully,” he said. “It’s a fantastic group of people,” says Robinson of the OLLI program. “Firstly because they are so hungry, so thirsty for new knowledge and secondly because they have so many sets of life experiences to engage with the material —this makes for some very lively and broad discussions. In other words, it’s a lot of fun.” Jo Ann Cameron, who also taught in the course, is back for more in Spring 2010, coordinating “Spare Parts: The Science of Organ Regeneration.” “I learned about the OLLI program last spring when I was invited to give a lecture on amphibian limb regeneration. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and I found interacting with the most enthusiastic students I’ve seen in a long while very gratifying,” Cameron said. “Public outreach in science is extremely important and I’m pleased to organize a course that showcases some of the timely and seminal research in regeneration biology and medicine here at the University of Illinois.” To learn more about the program, visit http://olli.illinois.edu http://www.debaronson.com/features/education_for_every_generation/ 2009-12-30 Bruce Fouke, a sedimentary geologist, started his academic research journey in a fairly conventional way; integrating sedimentology, stratigraphy, geochemistry and paleontology to reconstruct the Earth’s environment during the deposition and secondary alteration of sedimentary rocks. But since beginning his research at Illinois Fouke has traveled a long and winding road that connects the coral reefs of the Netherlands Antilles, the hot springs in Yellowstone National Park and Tuscany, meteor ejecta in the Yucatan, Roman aqueducts, aquifers and oil fields in rural Illinois, and, ultimately, microbes. Microbes? Why would a geologist be interested in microorganisms? The answer, while not simple, underscores the collegiality and interdisciplinary nature of the University of Illinois and the IGB. It turns out that Fouke, associate professor of geology and one of the founders, along with Carl Woese and Nigel Goldenfeld, of the Biocomplexity theme at IGB, recognized the importance of microbes to his research shortly after arriving at the University of Illinois in 1997. That is when he learned that microbes control the major chemical cycles of the world’s oceans. Since he was investigating sedimentation as a way to understand ancient marine environments, he decided he had to understand microbiology. “How can we do geology without understanding microbes?” asks Fouke, somewhat rhetorically. Fouke apprenticed himself to Abigail Salyers, professor of microbiology and a member of IGB’s Host-Microbe Systems theme, who helped him learn techniques, like PCR, for sequencing genes in order to identify which microbes are present and what they are doing metabolically to sustain themselves. After setting up his own lab, complete with a PCR machine, thermocycler, other equipment and a postdoctorate researcher with a Ph.D. in microbiology, Fouke began looking at microbes in all the places he already was working. Fouke’s efforts were consistently buoyed by ongoing close collaborations with the Department of Microbiology, as well as microbiologists and scientists interested in microbiology from across the Illinois campus. And his ability to work with microbes opened up a new window into his understanding of sedimentation. Fouke is on the leading edge of a whole new way of asking and answering geological questions. “I’m one of a small group of people who come at this from the geological side to engage the molecular microbiology, but the field is now rapidly growing,” says Fouke of this marriage of microbiology and geology, or geobiology. Microbial activity can play a key role in modifying water chemistry, thus changing the conditions available for precipitation of minerals such as carbonates. At the same time, precipitates themselves modify the water flow pattern and the transport of microbes, creating a dynamic interplay between the biological activity and the spatial geological structures that emerge at hot springs. It is possible, then, that changes in, for example, calcium carbonate sedimentation rates in the geological record at the hot springs of Yellowstone National Park may have resulted from changes in local microbial biomass concentrations throughout geologic history. “As calcium carbonate minerals are precipitated, it leaves a chemical fingerprint of the animals and environment, the plants and bacteria that were there,” said Fouke. By identifying and then understanding these kinds of microbe-water-mineral interactions, Fouke hopes to be able to distinguish between deposits that are directly precipitated by microorganisms, indirectly precipitated by them or inorganically precipitated. Only when he can distinguish between these deposits will he be able to determine how the organism-environment feedback controls geological preservation and the creation of a fossil record. At this same intersection of microorganisms and geology Fouke also is applying his research to the production and extraction of oil and gas. As a co-principal investigator in the Microbially Enhanced Hydrocarbon Recovery (MEHR) project sponsored by the Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI), a part of IGB funded by BP, Fouke is studying the naturally occurring microorganisms that exist in the subsurface and are associated with the subsurface migration and entrapment of hydrocarbons. This project is taking place in Decatur and is co-sponsored by the Midwest Geological Carbon Sequestration Consortium and the Illinois State Geological Survey (ISGS). Fouke has collaborated with members of ISGS for many years and holds an appointment in their division. Archer Daniels Midland is providing the wells for the study. Fouke and other EBI researchers will study the genetic makeup of microbial communities found in the water and rock samples extracted from the wells. Microbes are thought to interact with oil and other resources, causing them to become more viscous or liquid. If this is the case, and the microbes can be identified and cultured, Fouke hopes the team will be able to use the microbes, or even enhance their ability to break down oil and make it possible to extract more of it. “If we can get even another five percent out of existing oil wells, that represents an enormous amount of oil,” says Fouke. Even more importantly, this project gives researchers an opportunity to study the Earth’s subsurface, which is a vast and mostly unknown ecosystem that is “just as important as any national park,” says Fouke, who sees himself as a steward of the subsurface. “This project could be a major step forward for subsurface ecosystem sustainability and management.” http://www.debaronson.com/profiles/bruce_fouke/ 2009-12-30 Regenerative medicine in the 1990s promised simple and dramatic cures, but these cures remain the stuff of fiction. Over the last 15 years researchers and clinicians alike have begun to realize that, while the promise of regenerative medicine remains, the challenges are far more daunting than they originally imagined. Remember when all of Harry Potter’s arm bones were re-grown by drinking a potion? That is not going to be happening in our world any time soon. “The huge promise of tissue engineering in the ’90s had people thinking we were going to have livers, kidneys, hearts, whole replacement organs we could grow. It set up impossible targets to actually hit,” says Brendan Harley, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and a member of the IGB Regenerative Biology and Tissue Engineering theme (ReBTE). Having said that, researchers in the ReBTE theme are surging forward on various fronts in their efforts to make tissue engineering a reality. The theme brings together scientists in nanotechnology, bioengineering, cell biology, genomics, biomaterials, and computer sciences, as well as linking with clinical programs at both Carle Hospital and the School of Medicine. These researchers are looking both at creating material that has direct clinical applications and using biomaterials and engineering approaches to understand the basic science behind regenerative medicine. Some of the research questions being investigated include: • How can micro- and nano-environments be created to optimize tissue development and engineering? • How can new therapies for chronic conditions or tissue and organ replacement be developed from understanding healthy tissue regeneration? • How can design rules for simple cell-based systems and devices be applied to more complex biological systems and devices? • How can cost-effective clinical treatments be derived from the manipulation of stem cells to treat chronic conditions? In most cases tissue regeneration work involves creating a kind of scaffold, either of a hard material mimicking bone, or a soft material, in the case of hydrogels. In both cases the scaffold enables and, ideally, encourages the body to re-grow tissues along that framework, eventually degrading it and replacing it with new tissue. Harley, for example, is working on developing a material to repair damaged tendon, whether the damage occurs in the middle of the tendon or where the tendon attaches to bone, as is the case in a torn rotator cuff. Tendons in the shoulder and elsewhere suffer a lot of both acute and chronic damage. Harley’s group is trying to create materials and approaches for both kinds of damages, while also keeping in mind regulatory and intellectual property aspects of the project “before we get very far along, in order to shorten translation to commercial applications,” he says. In some cases, rotator cuff surgery currently has a failure rate of 90%. Harley says this is because in essence, the tendon is getting reattached back to bone, without addressing the needs specific to such a heterogeneous site. In order to help improve these kinds of surgeries, Harley’s group is looking to understand tendon material, the bone and the interface between the tendon and the bone. This project builds on what Harley did before coming to the University of Illinois, in which he and a fellow graduate student developed a material that mimics the interface between cartilage and bone. Although there are several differences, that experience helped Harley as he set out to learn about tendons and tendon injuries. By themselves, tendons have a complex and heterogeneous microstructure. In the proper environment, which also is heterogeneous, they grow structures of aligned collagen material, which is perfectly suited to their function. Ina more uniform environment, however, tendons don’t grow that way. Harley would like to understand what factors in the environment are most crucial to proper growth patterns and how to create those factors at the wound site. In addition, he is working to understand the tendon and bone interface in the hopes of helping the body re-grow that region as well, much as he did with the cartilage project. Matt Wheeler, another member of the ReBTE theme, also is working to repair damaged bone, but he is focused on helping soldiers who have sustained extensive injuries, particularly craniofacial ones. Wheeler’s lab is approaching the project from the stem cell direction. Like stem cells, fat cells can be programmed to make bone, cartilage, muscle, fat and connective tissues. Wheeler has been building a biodegradable scaffold of polymers that fit precisely into the damaged region. The scaffold is seeded with fat cells, which, in the proper environment, will grow into bone cells. Alternatively, the scaffold can be seeded with molecular instructions that will tell the body’s own fat cells to migrate to the wound site and begin to make bone. “So if you have an injury anywhere in the body, and if it’s the right kind of injury, these cells can be mobilized,” says Wheeler. Wheeler, Harley and other colleagues are looking for ways to encourage more rapid bone growth in the hopes that any patient with craniofacial injuries would not have to endure 50-60 surgeries to repair bone damage. Of course there is a catch: researchers need to figure out how to not only signal the bone to grow but also to turn off that signal. “You want to regenerate tissue but then you want it to stop,” notes Wheeler. “The question is whether the body’s natural signal to stop will work so you don’t end up with a two-foot-long jaw.” In other cases within the theme, researchers are trying to create a biomimetic environment to support soft tissue repair. Hyun Joon Kong, for example, is working to promote re-vascularization, an important process in repairing both bone and soft tissue injuries. He is developing hydrogels, which are formed from the cross-linking of water-soluble polymers, that serve as a “nano- or microporous scaffold,” and mimic — and further improve — the physical properties and permeability of the provisional matrix naturally formed at the injury. “We are interested in designing and characterizing hydrogels and determining how cells interact with those hydrogels so together they can ultimately develop a nicely interconnected vascular system,” says Kong, also a faculty member in chemical and biomolecular engineering. His approach has been to create a provisional matrix, “a kind of factory to stimulate cells to make new tissue.” Varying the percentage of each ingredient within a hydrogel gives different results. Different recipes result in differing mechanical properties like stiffness, toughness and degradability, as well as differing abilities to deliver chemical cues and perform other transport functions. These properties influence how well cells will function in the hydrogel. That, ultimately, is the challenge: to make hydrogels sturdy and yet hospitable to regenerative cells. Joon’s other goal is to move his hydrogel from in vitro to in vivo, which embodies another set of challenges, such as delivering the hydrogel to the proper location, making sure it stays there, designing the hydrogel so it is not attacked by the body and encouraging the cells to make new vascular networks. A big requirement for much of tissue regeneration work, and one Harley is particularly cognizant of, is to develop useful tools that can be applied to a clinical product as quickly as possible. The material he developed that mimics the cartilage bone interface is currently being tested in clinical trials with 15 patients. This experience helped Harley appreciate the steps involved with the regulatory and commercial side of his work and has already helped guide his work with tendon repair. Some of the issues Harley and his colleagues keep in mind are: • Designing material systems that can be quickly translated to clinical applications and get approved by the FDA in as short amount of time as possible. • Figuring out how to scale up this product as quickly as possible. • Designing the material so that is can be implanted easily and accurately by every surgeon. Now that he is in academia, Harley says he also has the luxury to answer some broader questions, such as how to best design material for orthopedic uses, how do you get bone to grow more rapidly (hint: it involves changing calcium chemistry proportions and balancing porosity with strength). He would also like to better understand degradation kinetics and pore structure and behavior, all things that will impact biomaterials and tissue regeneration. The goal within regenerative medicine as a whole has shifted from growing whole organs outside the body to inserting biomaterials that can stave off the need for massive intervention by preserving the function of the given organ. In order to develop biomaterials, however, researchers need to better understand disease progression and the disease state. That is because tissue regeneration is going to be far more difficult in a patient with a chronic injury or one with other illnesses than someone with an acute injury surrounded by otherwise healthy and vital tissue. “You can’t re-grow cartilage of a 15-year-old in the knee of someone who is 80 and has had osteoarthritis for 20 years,” Harley points out. Whether and when regenerative medicine will keep its promise is uncertain. But the researchers at IGB are doing their part to further that work. “We ‘re may never be able to do ‘kazam’ or whatever they do in Star Trek and you’re all healed, but can we put in material to stave off massive intervention?” says Harley. “That’s one of the big goals, to preserve function and some normalcy.” http://www.debaronson.com/features/regenerative_biology/ 2009-12-30 http://www.debaronson.com/features/online_writing_instruction_no_longer_a_novelty/ 2009-11-01 The way Laurie Halse (rhymes with waltz) Anderson sees it, her main job is to tell stories that young people will read. “More than anything that’s my job, to tell stories so that kids will keep reading and developing their literacy skills. If I can do that then I can sleep well at night.” Anderson’s first book, Ndito Runs, was published in 1996, but she had been writing stories for many years before that. “I believe human beings need stories,” says Anderson. “Stories give kids insight into themselves or into somebody who’s different from them. Stories become our common language when we don’t have much in common.” Anderson is perhaps best known for her book Speak, which was published 10 years ago and has received numerous awards. But in addition to YA novels, including Twisted, and her latest, Wintergirls, Anderson also writes historical fiction (Fever 1793 and Chains) and picture books, as well as a very popular series called Vet Volunteers (formerly Wild At Heart), about a group of middle school students who volunteer at a veterinary clinic. Anderson describes it as “Babysitters Club meets Animal ER.” Now that Wintergirls is published, Anderson is working on Forge, an historical novel set during the American Revolution that is a sequel to Chains. Anderson sees this wide range of audiences and topics as a real advantage. “I have a very short attention span and in children’s literature we’re given this freedom to go where the muse takes us,” says Anderson. “I think it is very good for my writing to have different kinds of projects that pull from different skill sets and keep me fresh.” Anderson had written several books before Speak, but the reception of that book changed the direction of her writing life. That book is about a girl who is raped by a classmate and can’t bring herself to tell anyone. She becomes so depressed she stops speaking. Speak grew from a bad dream Anderson had of a girl sobbing, though she had no idea who the character was or why she was sad. Everybody was surprised at the book’s success: Anderson was surprised it was published; the publisher was surprised when it sold so well. “I really never thought anybody would publish it,” says Anderson. “It was a strange little book about a girl who doesn’t talk.” “Kids write to me about Speak, and say, either ‘I am Melinda because that happened to me’ or ‘that didn’t happen to me and my life is completely different, but I know exactly how she feels,’” says Anderson. “And when you’re a kid and you feel like nobody knows what goes on inside you it is so incredibly affirming to read a story and to see your thoughts on the page and then to see somebody struggle with and ultimately conquer whatever demon it is you are fighting.” Schools over the country teach Speak, though at differing grade levels in different regions. Anderson has several theories for the book’s success, but one of them is that around the time Speak was published there was a new generation of English teachers coming in who “are committed to literacy for their kids and who recognize that the canon, the old traditional books, aren’t reaching all of our children, so they are more open to putting books in kids’ hands that kids will read.” Before she wrote her YA novels, Anderson had written seven books for younger readers and had been visiting schools for many years. With the publication of Speak, her audience changed, but her visits continued. “I love teenagers,” says Anderson, who has four children: Stephanie, 24; Jessica, 23; Meredith, 21; and Christian, 17. “I was in some ways more comfortable in a high school classroom than a gym full of second graders.” On her visits, Anderson talks a little bit about what she was like as a teenager, but says he likes to get quickly to students’ questions “because then I can answer what they really want to know about instead of going on and on and on in my pontificating way.” In the course of her school visits, Anderson began to realize teen boys were a mystery to her. When she visited schools and discussed Speak, for example, boys frequently seemed confused about why the main character would be so upset that it would put her in a depression. Some boys’ perspective was, it wasn’t stranger in the bushes with a gun who raped her, so why was it a big deal? “Their confusion made it clear to me that I didn’t understand teen boys,” says Anderson. That set her to writing Twisted, a book in which the protagonist is a teen boy with a fraught relationship with his father. She researched the book by going to schools, throwing out questions to teen boys and paying attention to the answers. “It both saddened and surprised me how many boys didn’t have a relationship with their dad,” she says. “My theory is that teen boys want to grow up to be good men and they need and are looking for good men to show them the way.” The heroine in Anderson’s latest YA novel, Wintergirls, also has lost her way and struggles with the demon of anorexia. The book, which was published last March, has received much acclaim, including starred reviews in Booklist, Kirkus Reviews and School Library Journal , which wrote, “The intensity of emotion and vivid language here are more reminiscent of Anderson’s Speak than any of her other works.” Many of Anderson’s YA characters confront sticky, complex and emotional issues that resonate deeply with adolescents who are struggling. Her gift is the ability to tell these stories in a deeply authentic voice. Where does that voice come from? Anderson, who sounds bright and cheery on the phone, laughs when she tells of a school visit where a student said, “Ma’am I’m confused. You’re a very happy person, how can you write these depressing books?” She points to her own adolescence, during which her family moved frequently and her father lost his job, for some of her ability to write her so-called “depressing books.” “We were a nuclear family in nuclear meltdown,” she says. Anderson had “packaged up and put away” those difficult memories until her oldest daughter became an adolescent. “Watching my daughter get to that age brought all that up to the surface for me,” she says. “I pull from those feelings of misery for every book.” http://www.debaronson.com/profiles/laurie_halse_andersonhuman_beings_need_stories/ 2009-11-01