Author: Anna Gotskind Page 2 of 3

Artificial Intelligence Innovation in Taiwan

On February 26, 2020

In Computers/Technology, Data, Engineering

Taiwan is a small island off the coast of China that is roughly one fourth the size of North Carolina. Despite its size, Taiwan has made significant waves in the fields of science and technology. In the 2019 Global Talent Competitiveness Index Taiwan (labeled as Chinese Taipei) ranked number 1 in Asia and 15th globally.

However, despite being ahead of many countries in terms of technological innovation, Taiwan was still looking for further ways to improve and support research within the country. Therefore, in 2017 the Taiwan Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), initiated an AI innovation research program in order to promote the development of AI technologies and attract top AI professionals to work in Taiwan.

Tsung-Yi Ho, a professor at the Department of Computer Science of National Tsing Hua University in Hsinchu, Taiwan came to Duke to present on the four AI centers that have been launched since then: the MOST Joint Research Center for AI Technology, All Vista Healthcare (AINTU), the AI for Intelligent Manufacturing Systems Research Center (AIMS), the Pervasive AI Research (PAIR) Labs, and the MOST AI Biomedical Research Center (AIBMRC) at National Taiwan University, National Tsing Hua University, National Chiao Tung University, and National Cheng Kung University, respectively.

Within the four research centers, there are 79 research teams with more than 600 professors, experts, and researchers. The centers are focused on smart agriculture, smart factories, AI biomedical research, and AI manufacturing.

The research centers have many different AI-focused programs. Tsung-Yi Ho first discussed the AI cloud service program. In the last two years since the program has been launched, they have created the Taiwania 2 supercomputer that has a computing capacity of 9 quadrillion floating-point operations per second. The supercomputer is ranked 20th in computing power and 10th in energy efficiency.

Next, Tsung-Yi Ho introduced the AI semiconductor Moonshot Program. They have been working on cognitive computing and AI chips, next-generation memory design, IoT System and Security for Intelligent edge, innovative sensing devices, circuits, and systems, emerging semiconductor processes, materials, and device technology, and component circuit and system design for unmanned vehicle system and AR/VR application.

One of the things Taiwan is known for is manufacturing. The research centers are also looking to incorporate AI into manufacturing through motion generation, production line, and process optimization.

Keeping up with the biggest technological trends, the MOST research centers are all doing work to develop human-robot interactions, autonomous drones, and embedded AI on for self-driving cars.

Lastly, some of the research groups are focused on medical technological innovation including the advancement of brain image segmentation, homecare robots, and precision medicine.

Beyond this, the MOST has sponsored several programming, robotic and other contests to support tech growth and young innovators.

Tsung-Yi Ho’s goal in presenting at Duke was to showcase the research highlights among four centers and bring research opportunities to attendees of Duke.

If interested, Duke students can reach out to Dina Khalilova to connect with Tsung-Yi Ho and get involved with the incredible AI innovation in Taiwan.

Post by Anna Gotskind

Contaminated Drinking Water in Our Backyard

By Anna Gotskind

On February 5, 2020

In Environment/Sustainability, Faculty, Field Research, Policy, Science Communication & Education

About 70% of the human body is made up of water. Water is something we consume on a daily basis. Therefore, when a community’s water source is threatened or contaminated it can be extremely detrimental.

In 2017, it became apparent that there was water contamination in eastern North Carolina. Specifically, PFAS or per- and polyfluoroalkyl Alkyl chemicals were found in the water supply. As a result, several legislative mandates were issued in 2018 establishing a PFAS Testing Network to investigate the contamination.

Lee Ferguson, an Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Duke and Kathleen Gray, a professor at UNC’s Institute for the Environment, are testing PFAS water contamination and communicating any risks to the public.

Gray is part of the network’s risk communication team. She explained that PFASs are hard to address because the health effects are unknown and they have yet to determine a standard or guideline for these substances. However, because this water contamination affects the lives of everyone connected to the water supply it is extremely important to communicate risk to the affected community but without eliciting panic.

Gray explained that people often ask, “Are my family and I safe?” “What can I do to protect myself and my family?” “Why did this happen?” and “Why wasn’t it prevented?”

In the last year Ferguson and his research team have tested 409 sites in North Carolina for PFAS compounds.

He explained that PFAS substances are particularly dangerous because they are non-degradable, potentially toxic and constantly changing. Long-chain PFASs are being replaced by fluorinated alternatives.

Ferguson described this phenomenon as “playing environmental ‘whack-a-mole’ with different substances.”

Ferguson and his testing team have found two contaminated water supply sites in North Carolina. Dangerous contamination is based on the EPA health advisory level of 70ng/Liter. The exceedances were found in Maysville and Orange Water and Sewer Authority. Maysville was able to switch to the Jones County water source once the problem was identified.

New data that came in within the last couple weeks found high month-to-month variability in PFAS in the Haw River near Pittsboro. Ferguson and his team predict that it is coming downstream from a waste treatment plant.

Brunswick County is shown having the worst PFAS concentrations. However, Dr. Ferguson and his team have recently found that the contamination in Haw River is even worse.

While all of this information may seem very alarming, Gray and Ferguson both reiterated that it is not necessary to panic. Instead, people should make sure they are drinking filtered water or invest in a water filter.

Ferguson added, “The best choice is reverse osmosis.”

Gray and Ferguson presented their work at a SciComm Lunch-and-Learn, a monthly event sponsored by Duke Science & Society Initiative that explores interesting and innovative aspects of science communication. The event is free and open to anyone in the Duke community.

First-Year Students Designing Real-World Solutions

By Anna Gotskind

On January 21, 2020

In Biomedical Engineering, Computers/Technology, Engineering, Genetics/Genomics, Science Communication & Education, Students

In the first week of fall semester, four first-year engineering students, Sean Burrell, Teya Evans, Adam Kramer, and Eloise Sinwell, had a brainstorming session to determine how to create a set of physical therapy stairs designed for children with disabilities. Their goal was to construct something that provided motivation through reward, had variable step height, and could physically support the students.

Evans explained, “The one they were using before did not have handrails and the kids were feeling really unstable.”

,
Teya Evans is pictured stepping on the staircase her team designed and built. With each step, the lightbox displays different colors.

The team was extremely successful and the staircase they designed met all of the goals set out by their client, physical therapists. It provided motivation through the multi-colored lightbox, included an additional smaller step that could be pulled out to adjust step height, had a handrail to physically support the students and could even be taken apart for easy transportation.

This is a part of the Engineering 101 course all Pratt students are required to take. Teams are paired with a real client and work together throughout the semester to design and create a deliverable solution to the problem they are presented with. At the end of the semester, they present their products at a poster presentation that I attended. It was pretty incredible to see what first-year undergraduates were able to create in just a few months.

The next poster I visited focused on designing a device to stabilize hand tremors. The team’s client, Kate, has Ataxia, a neurological disorder that causes her to have uncontrollable tremors in her arms and hands. She wanted a device that would enable her to use her iPad independently, because she currently needs a caregiver to stabilize her arm to use it. This team, Mohanapriya Cumaran, Richard Sheng, Jolie Mason, and Tess Foote, needed to design something that would allow Kate to access the entire screen while stabilizing tremors, being comfortable, easy to set up and durable.

The team was able to accomplish its task by developing a device that allowed Kate to stabilize her tremors by gripping a 3D printed handlebar. The handlebar was then attached to two rods that rested on springs allowing for vertical motion and a drawer slide allowing for horizontal motion.

“We had her [Kate] touch apps in all areas of the iPad and she could do it.” Foote said. “Future plans are to make it comfier.”

The team plans to improve the product by adding a foam grip to the handlebar, attaching a ball and socket joint for index finger support, and adding a waterproof layer to the wooden pieces in their design.

The last project I visited created a “Fly Flipping Device.” The team, C. Fischer, E. Song, L. Tarman, and S. Gorbaly, were paired with the Mohamed Noor Lab in the Duke Biology Department as their client.

Tarman explained, “We were asked to design a device that would expedite the process of transferring fruit flies from one vial to another.”

The Noor lab frequently uses fruit flies to study genetics and currently fly flipping has to be done by hand, which can take a lot of time. The goal was to increase the efficiency of lab experiments by creating a device that would last for more than a year, avoid damaging the vials or flies, was portable and fit within a desk space.

The team came up with over 50 ideas on how to accomplish this task that they narrowed down to one that they would build. The product they created comprised of two arms made of PVC pipe resting on a wooden base. Attached to the arms were “sleeves” 3D printed to hold the vials containing flies. In order to efficiently flip the flies, one of the arms moves about the axis allowing for multiple vials to be flipped that the time it would normally take to flip one vial. The team was very successful and their creation will contribute to important genetic research.

It was mind-blowing to see what first-year students were able to create in their first few months at Duke and I think it is a great concept to begin student education in engineering through a hands-on design process that allows them to develop a solution to a problem and take it from idea to implementation. I am excited about what else other EGR 101 students will design in the future.

Wellness and the Ritual of Baking Challah

By Anna Gotskind

On November 20, 2019

In Behavior/Psychology

People find lots of different ways to cope with the stress of everyday life. One day Beth Ricanati, an internist at the Cleveland Clinic and the mother of three young children, was particularly overwhelmed. A friend of hers suggested that she make challah for the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashana.

Challah is a traditional braided bread eaten on Shabbat, the Jewish sabbath as well as major Jewish holidays. It is customary to bake a round challah on Rosh Hashanah to symbolizes the year coming to a close and a new one beginning.

Ricanati decided to take her friend’s advice. That Friday, before the sun went down signifying the start of Shabbat, she carved out thirty minutes to bake a loaf of Challah.

Ricanati explained, “It was the most transformative experience because I just stopped.”

The talk was sponsored by Duke’s Forum for Scholars & Publics, a weekly forum where local, national, and global scholars can interact with the Duke community to generate greater exchange between the university and the broader world. It was facilitated by Duke Professor Kelly Alexander who brought the students in her first-year seminar “How ideas about food circulate across cultures and across film.”

Baking challah is a cultural and ritualistic practice. Ricanati explained that the first step of the recipe is to stop and think. When baking challah, it’s important to have an intention, to consider “why am I here and in whose merit am I making this bread?” This intention can be for others or for yourself. After the bread has risen the baker blesses it and takes a small piece off which represents the offerings that used to be made at the temple in Jerusalem.

Ricanati is a women’s health expert and medical professional. She had never really baked before this. “Challah is not necessarily about the end product, about making a perfect challah. It is about the process.”

There are 613 mitzvot or commandments in the Jewish tradition and only three of them are specifically designated for women. Baking Challah is one of them. Challah is special because it is intended to nourish us both physically and spiritually.

Ricanati added, “When I took the challah out of the oven that day my house became a home.”

She enjoyed this experience so much that she decided to continue baking challah every Friday. Not only did it create thirty minutes a week for her to stop and reflect but it brought wellness into her life. As a result, she ended up writing a book titled Braided: a journey of 1000 challahs. The book focused on thinking about food as medicine and how to create wellness in one’s life.

“To be well is more than just physical,” Ricanati said. Wellness is about both the mind and the body; it’s about a holistic treatment of the whole person. “Making challah, for me, is a way to embrace stress management.”

As a medical professional, Ricanati also explained the idea of Neuroplasticity, the ability of the brain to change continuously throughout one’s life. Our behaviors aren’t fixed and new behaviors have to be enjoyable in order to be sustainable.

“The more I made the bread, the easier it became and the easier it became the more I made the bread,” she said.

After publishing her book, Ricanati got to meet others who had been inspired to start the ritual of baking challah in there own homes. Similarly, they too felt that the ritual brought unexpected wellness into their lives. Beyond this, Challah has the ability to strengthen a community — not only does baking lend itself to being a group event but there are people baking challah on Fridays all over the world.

“It is a gift to bake Challah because it feeds both your soul and your tummy.”

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Responding to the Climate Crisis Through Dance

By Anna Gotskind

On November 17, 2019

In Art, Behavior/Psychology, Climate/Global Change, Environment/Sustainability

Kimerer LaMothe began her talk in an unconventional way, by singing a song. As she reached the refrain she repeated the words “everybody dances” and invited the audience to join her.

She then posed an intriguing question: How can dance be a response to the climate crisis? In the western world, dance is usually seen as a recreational activity and here LaMothe was asking how it could be used as a tool or even as the solution to one of the largest issues of our time. I was definitely a little skeptical.

The talk was a part of Duke’s Ruby Fridays organized by the staff of Duke Arts and the Rubenstein Arts Center. LaMothe was invited to contribute to the series which features casual art talks with the intention of connecting art across a multitude of disciplines.

Her response to the climate crisis began with a discussion about the body. LaMothe explained that for three and a half billion years after the planet was formed, there were no complex bodies on the planet, just microbes. She said they developed multicellular bodies because they needed to move.

“We build our knowledge of the world through the bodily movements we make,” she said.

The idea is that a body’s ability to move and interact with the world around it is a form of dance. This is especially demonstrated by how human babies interact with their caregivers. Human babies, unlike many other animals, are extremely reliant on their caregivers and must find a way to communicate with them. Thus, they use movement to garner attention. They have an impulse to connect and use patterns of movement like a smile or a snuggle to make sure they are taken care of. What results is something like a dance.

LaMothe described it as, “A vital human expression of kinectivity.”

Using movement and dance as a way to connect or interact, however, is important to human life past infancy. Many different cultures around the world use dance as the primary ritual of their community.

One example LaMothe gave was the healing dance practiced by the Bushmen of the African Kalahari. They use dance to “stir energy” and understand any pain. As the dancing intensifies the energy grows.

LaMothe explained that this allows them to “enter what they call first creation, a perception of reality where everything is changed and everything is changing.”

Through this, the healer can see the capacity of that pain to change and help the members release the pain. The idea is that to dance is to heal both themselves and the earth.

Still, the question remains: How does dance heal the earth? The earth that is facing ecosystem collapse, species extinction, and overexploitation. The past five hundred years have exponentially brought us to the brink of the climate crisis. These are the same centuries that Europeans traveled around the world colonializing and overtaking native lands. One of the main ways colonists tried to make native people civilized was by stopping them from dancing.

LaMothe stated, “Native communities were told to stop dancing and instead make “progress towards civilization.”

In many places, it actually became a crime to dance. In fact, until 1932 it was against the law for native people to engage in ceremonial dances in the United States. Furthermore, in efforts to “civilize” people, a focus was placed on learning through reading and forsaking movement as a way to gain knowledge. This “civilized” culture also abandoned the awareness and respect native communities showed towards the environment around them. Dance not only allowed them to connect with each other but with the earth. This connection was reflected in the other parts of their life resulting in sustainable living and caring for the earth.

In LaMothe’s words, “dance can catalyze a sensory awareness of our own movement making.”

An Image from LaMothe’s Presentation Featuring People Participating in
Climate Conscious Dance

She explained that through climate-conscious dance we can reconnect ourselves with the environment and help restore the earth.

One example she gave of how to do this is through events like Global Water Dances where people can participate in events all over the world to dance and raise consciousnesses about how to protect water.

In 2005 after teaching at both Brown and Harvard, LaMothe moved to a farm with her family so she could write and dance in an environment closer to nature. She has written six books, created several dance concerts and even a full-length musical titled “Happy If Happy When.” She spends her time writing, singing, dancing, and tending to the farm alongside her family.

Post by Anna Gotskind

Malaria Hides In People Without Symptoms

By Anna Gotskind

On November 11, 2019

In Biology, Field Research, Genetics/Genomics, Global Health, Science Communication & Education, Students

It seems like the never-ending battle against Malaria just keeps getting tougher. In regions where Malaria is hyper-prevalent, anti-mosquito measures can only work so well due to the reservoir that has built up of infected humans who do not even know they carry the infection.

In high-transmission areas, asymptomatic malaria is more prevalent than symptomatic malaria. Twenty-four percent of the people in sub-Saharan Africa are estimated to harbor an asymptomatic infection, including 38 to 50 percent of the school-aged children in western Kenya. Out of the 219 million malaria cases in 2017 worldwide, over 90% were in sub-Saharan Africa.

Using a special vacuum-like tool, Kelsey Sumner, a former Duke undergraduate now completing her Ph.D. at UNC-Chapel Hill, collected mosquitoes in households located in rural western Kenya. These weekly mosquito collections were a part of her pre-dissertation study on asymptomatic, or invisible, malaria. She visited Duke in September to catch us up on her work in Data Dialogue event sponsored by the mathematics department.

Sumner and colleague Verona Liao, in front of a sticky trap for mosquitoes

People with asymptomatic malaria carry the infection but have no idea they do because they do not have any indicators. This is incredibly dangerous because without symptoms, they will not get treated and can then infect countless others with the disease. As a result, people with an asymptomatic infection or infections have become a reservoir for malaria — a place for it to hide. Reservoirs are a group that is contributing to transmission at a higher rate or proportion than others.

Sumner’s study focused on examining the effect of asymptomatic malaria on malaria transmission as well as whether asymptomatic malaria infections would protect a person against future symptomatic infections from the same or different malaria infections. They were particularly looking into Plasmodium falciparum malaria. In Kenya, more than 70% of the population lives in an area with a high transmission of this potentially lethal parasite.

“P. falciparum malaria is very diverse in the region,” she said. “It’s constantly mutating, which is why it’s so hard to treat. But because of that, we’re able to actually measure how many infections people have at once.”

The researchers discovered that many study participants were infected with multiple, genetically-distinct malaria infections. Some carried up to fourteen strains of the parasite.

Participants in the study began by filling out an enrollment questionnaire followed by monthly questionnaires and dried blood spot collections. The project has collected over nearly 3,000 dried blood spots from participants. These blood spots were then sent to a lab where DNA was extracted and tested for P. falciparum malaria using qPCR.

“We used the fact that we have this really diverse falciparum species in the area and sequenced the DNA from falciparum to actually determine how many infections people have,” Sumner said. “And then, if there’s a shared infection between humans and mosquitoes.”

Sumner and her team also visited symptomatic participants who would fill out a behavioral questionnaire and undergo a rapid diagnostic test. Infected participants were able to receive treatment.

While people in the region have tried to prevent infection through means like sleeping under insecticide-treated nets, malaria has persisted.

One of the Kenyan staff members hanging a CDC light trap for mosquitoes

Sumner is continuing to analyze the collected DNA to better understand asymptomatic malaria, malarial reservoirs and how to best intervene to help stop this epidemic.

“We’re basically looking at how the number of shared infections differ between those that have asymptomatic malaria versus those that have symptomatic malaria.”

She and her team hypothesize that there are more asymptomatic infections that would result in and explain the rapid transmission of malaria in the region.

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Vulci 3000: Technology in Archaeology

By Anna Gotskind

On July 2, 2019

In Computers/Technology, Faculty, Field Research, Science Communication & Education, Students

This is Anna’s second post from a dig site in Italy this summer. Read the first one here.

Duke PhD Candidate Antonio LoPiano on Site

Once home to Etruscan and Roman cities, the ruins found at Vulci date to earlier than the 8th century B.C.E.

As archaeologists dig up the remains of these ancient civilizations, they are better able to understand how humans from the past lived their daily lives. The problem is, they can only excavate each site once.

No matter how careful the diggers are, artifacts and pieces of history can be destroyed in the process. Furthermore, excavations take a large amount of time, money and strenuous labor to complete. As a result, it’s important to carefully choose the location.

Map of the Vulci Landscape Created Using GIS Technology

In response to these challenges Dr. Maurizio Forte decided to supplement the excavation of ancient Vulci sites by using innovative non-invasive technologies.

Considering that it once housed entire cities, Vulci is an extremely large site. To optimize excavation time, money, and resources, Dr. Forte used technologies to predict the most important urban areas of the site. Forte and his team also used remote sensing which allowed them to interpret the site prior to digging.

Duke Post Doc Nevio Danelon Gathering Data for Photogrammetry

Having decided where on the site to look, the team was then able to digitally recreate both the landscape as well as the excavation trench in 3D. This allowed them to preserve the site in its entirety and uncover the history that lay below. Maps of the landscape are created using Web-GIS (Geographic Information Systems). These are then combined with 3D models created using photogrammetry to develop a realistic model of the site.

Forte decided to make the excavation entirely paperless. All “paperwork” on site is done on tablets. There is also an onsite lab that analyzes all of the archaeological discoveries and archives them into a digital inventory.

This unique combination of archaeology and technology allows Forte and his team to study, interpret and analyze the ancient Etruscan and Roman cities beneath the ground of the site in a way that has never been done before. He is able to create exact models of historic artifacts, chapels and even entire cities that could otherwise be lost for good.

Forte also thinks it is important to share what is uncovered with the public. One way he is doing this is through integrating the excavation with virtual reality applications.

I’m actually on site with Forte and the team now. One of my responsibilities is to take photos with the Insta360x which is compatible with the OculusGo, allowing people to experience what it’s like to be in the trench with virtual reality. The end goal is to create interactive applications that could be used by museums or individuals.

Ultimately, this revolutionary approach to archaeology brings to light new perspectives on historical sites and utilizes innovative technology to better understand discoveries made in excavations.

By: Anna Gotskind ’22

Vulci 3000: A High-Tech Excavation

By Anna Gotskind

On June 26, 2019

In Computers/Technology, Faculty, Field Research, Science Communication & Education, Students

This summer I have the incredible opportunity to work with the Vulci 3000 Bass Connections team. The project focuses on combining archaeology and innovative technology to excavate and understand an ancient Etruscan and Roman site. Over the next several weeks I will be writing a series of articles highlighting the different parts of the excavation. This first installment recounts the history of the project and what we plan to accomplish in Vulci.

Covered in tall grasses and grazing cows it’s hard to imagine that the Vulci Archaeology Park was ever something more than a beautiful countryside. However, in reality, it was home to one of the largest, most important cities of ancient Etruria. In fact, it was one of the biggest cities in the 1st millennium BCE on the entire Italian peninsula. Buried under the ground are the incredible remains of Iron Age, Etruscan, Roman, and Medieval settlements.

Duke’s involvement with the Vulci site began in 2015 when Maurizio Forte, the William and Sue Gross Professor of Classical Studies Art, Art History, and Visual Studies visited the site. What was so unique about the site was that most of it was untouched.

One of the perils of archaeology is that any site can only be physically excavated once and it is inevitable for some parts to be damaged regardless of how careful the team is. Vulci presented a unique opportunity. Because much of the site was still undisturbed, Forte could utilize innovative technology to create digital landscapes that could be viewed in succession as the site was excavated. This would allow him and his team to revisit the site at each stage of excavation. In 2015 he applied for his first permit to begin researching the Vulci site.

In 2016 Forte created a Bass Connections project titled Digital Cities and Polysensing Environments. That summer they ventured to Italy to begin surveying the Vulci site. Because Vulci is a large site it would take too much time and money to excavate the city. Instead, Forte and his team decided to find the most important spots to excavate. They did this by combining remote sensing data and procedural modeling to analyze the various layers underground. They collected data using magnetometry and ground-penetrating radar. They also used drones to capture aerial photography of the site.

These technologies allowed the team to locate the urban areas of the site through the discovery of large buildings and streets revealed by the aerial photographs, radiometrically-calibrated orthomaps, and 3D point cloud/mesh models.

Anne-Lise Baylé Cleaning a Discovered Artifact on Site

The project continued into 2017 and 2018 with a team returning to the site each summer to excavate. Within the trench were archaeologists ranging from undergrads to postdocs digging, scraping and brushing for months to discover what lay beneath the surface. As they began to uncover rooms, pottery, coins, and even a cistern, groups outside the trench continued to advanced technology to collect data and improve the understanding of the site.

One unit focused on drone sensing to digitally create multispectral imagery as well as high-resolution elevation models. This allowed them to use soil and crop marks to better interpretation and classify the archaeological features.

By combining traditional archaeology and innovative technology the team has been able to more efficiently discover important, ancient artifacts and analyze them in order to understand the ancient Etruscan and Roman civilizations that once called Vulci their home.

Photo Taken Using the Insta360 Camera in “Planet” Mode

This year, archaeologists return to the site to continue excavation. As another layer of Vulci is uncovered, students and faculty will use technology like drones, photogrammetry, geophysical prosecutions and GIS to document and interpret the site. We will also be using a 360 camera to capture VR compatible content for the OculusGo in order to allow anybody to visit Vulci virtually.

By Anna Gotskind

Open Communication is Key to Research in Schools

By Anna Gotskind

On March 28, 2019

In Behavior/Psychology, Field Research, Students

One of the things that excited me most about coming to Duke was the amount of research being done on campus, from theoretical physics to biological field work or cultural anthropology. I recently had the opportunity to attend a panel about conducting research in schools. As someone who has only ever done biological and chemistry-based lab work, I was eager to learn more about how research is conducted in other disciplines.

Doing research in schools is particularly challenging because it includes so many parties. The research goals must align with the school district’s priorities, collaboration must occur with the teachers, administrators and researchers about the design of the study and feasibility of implementations, and there must be cooperation from the students who are often young children unaware of the research going on.

Ultimately, the core role of schools is to educate children. Thus, in order to conduct research, the team needs to find a way to provide a clear benefit to schools for participation and make sure of protecting instruction time, reducing the burden on teachers.

The main purpose of the panel was to help Duke researchers better understand how to effectively interact and conduct research in schools. This was very well reflected in the four panelists Amy Davis, Cherry Johnson, Michele Woodson, and Holle Williams who each gave short, individual presentations.

Essentially, the goal of a school is to provide high-quality education to the students. So to conduct research, researchers must find a way to make their goals applicable to the teachers.

Davis, the coordinator of grants, research, and development in Durham Public Schools explained that because of their large minority population, researchers often want to partner with them. Davis explained that researchers should strive to work collaboratively in a way that will yield what the researcher needs but also benefit the school. The focus of the teachers and administrators is not on research and they are not experts in things like research design.

She urged researchers to first reach out to her because she knows which schools would be a viable fit and can help provide the language to talk directly to them. Furthermore, she addressed that researchers sometimes need to have the flexibility to alter the research design when working in schools.

Johnson, the Director of Research and Grant Development in Johnston County Public Schools began by explaining how her district is driven by principles of relationships, relevance, and innovation.

She added that they are “always interested in collab opportunities between universities and JCPS.”

However, studies that can aid in furthering their priorities, namely innovation, teacher recruitment and social and emotional learning will have a higher likelihood of being conducted successfully.

What makes the county so unique is that they are almost two districts within one.

“We still have notable lines between the haves and have nots,” Johnson added referring to large the socioeconomic differences between the Raleigh commuters and farm families.

To address some of these challenges, JCPS are participating in many partnerships with universities like NC State, UNC and Duke including a study with Dr. Leslie M. Babinski, associate research professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy.

Dr. Babinski conducting research in schools

Ultimately, university research is not a school district’s top priority. However, Woodson added that if the research has the ability to aid the school in accomplishing their goals then it increases the likelihood of success for both parties.

The last speaker was Holle Williams the Director of Main Campus Institutional Review Board at Duke University. Most schools require the approval of Duke’s IRB, which aims to protect the rights and welfare of human research subjects. Williams explained that their goal is to understand the intent of the researcher’s project.

“We want to make sure that what you are doing, what you are contemplating meets the definition of research” Williams stated.

Understanding intent allows then to distinguish research from other kinds of projects where research can help the school but also must contribute to the universal knowledge of a given education based topic.

A big emphasis of the talk was open communication. Both the school representatives and director of IRB highlighted that in order to most efficiently carry out a research project, the researchers should make sure to reach out to both the schools as well as main campus IRB. Through effective communication, strong partnerships can be built between the Duke community and local schools to conduct research that benefits both parties.

Post by Anna Gotskind

Alex Dehgan and The Snow Leopard Project

By Anna Gotskind

On March 28, 2019

In Animals, Environment/Sustainability, Field Research

Traveling through war-torn areas at risk of encountering landmines, militia, and difficult terrain, Alex Dehgan was protected only by a borrowed Toyota Corolla. Dehgan, the Chanler Innovator in Residence at Duke, has spent much of his life overseas addressing conflict in Afghanistan through promoting wildlife conservation.

As a result, Dehgan has served in multiple positions within the U.S. Department of State, including the office of the secretary, and the bureau of Near Eastern affairs. There, he aided in addressing foreign policy issues in Iran, Iraq, and Egypt and contributed to the improvement of science diplomacy. Recently, he founded the Office of Science and Technology as the Chief Scientist at the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Dehgan recently gave a talk at Duke on the snow leopard project, an effort he spearheaded focusing on snow leopard (Panthera uncia) and other wildlife conservation in Afghanistan. Because of the conflict, most people are not aware of the incredible wildlife and natural beauty within the country’s borders.

In his conservation efforts, Dehgan visited the Pamir, Karakoram, Hindu Kush, and Tien Shian mountain ranges hoping to learn more about the wildlife that lived there and the best way to promote their conservation. He used camera traps and collected scat to figure out species were in the area.

He began by talking about the Pamir mountains. Despite the fact that this is a very dangerous region to be, Dehgan ventured in ready to work with locals and discover the wildlife there. Once, a member of his team asked if they could forgo checking the camera traps for the day because they were being bombed by the U.S. Army. However, it was worth it because Dehgan had the opportunity to work with locals and collect images as well as data on several unique species.

This included the Marco Polo sheep (Ovis ammon polii), enormous sheep that live in single-sex groups for most of the year. They only come together to mate and when they do, the males clash heads with one another for the ability to procreate. He was also able to find a markhor (Capra falconeri), which he prefers to call a “Twin-horn unicorn.” Markhor means snake eater, but the animal does not actually eat snakes. These animals are so valuable that a hunter once paid $110,000 to shoot one. Dehgan and his team were able to collect hair and genetic samples of musk deer (Moschus), which can be found in very steep areas of the Pamir mountains. These animals derive their name from the musk they produce which is often used in perfumes.

The area is known as Nuristan, the land of the enlightened, and is unique in that each valley has its own tradition, crafts, and even dialect. Dehgan and his team worked with people from the region and trained them to look for the specific animals

One of the most remarkable places Dehgan visited was Band-e Amir, which he described as looking like the grand canyon. The most unique natural aspect is a system of six lakes formed by the same process that creates stalactites and stalagmites. Above the lakes is an incredible mountain range and on top of the mountains are marine fossils because it used to be at the bottom of the sea. Here, Dehgan was able to use camera traps to collect images of ibexes (Capra ibex), Persian leopards (Panthera pardus saxicolor), and poachers. Poaching would eventually become one of Dehgan’s key focuses. Dehgan and his team also discovered Asiatic wild asses and assumed the presence of Asiatic leopards after finding their skins in the nearby villages.

Dehgan discovered that there was a massive trade in wildlife driven by the U.S. military. Skins of snow leopards and Persian leopards could be found all over Afghanistan as a part of illegal wildlife trade and other wildlife like Saker Falcons could be sold for up to $1 million.

As a result, Dehgan started a program around wildlife trafficking. A major part of his effort took place on Chicken Street, a busy shopping area where illegal animal skins could frequently be found. Dehgan worked closely with U.S. Military police, training them on how to identify furs.

Dehgan also worked with Afghani airport employees on how to inspect baggage for illegal furs. This resulted in the shut down of nearly all illegal fur trade, which Dehgan said was one of his biggest successes. In fact, one day while in Afghanistan, Dehgan received word that a fur trader wished to speak with him. Assuming they were angry at him for reducing their business Dehgan said that he actually feared for his life. However, it turned out that the fur trader simply wanted to be trained to identify illegal furs because they too wanted to protect Afghanistan’s wildlife.

Dehgan explained that Afghanistan was one of the easiest places he ever did conservation. This is because 80 percent of the human population is dependent on natural resources and thus when the wildlife fails, they fail. Because of this, they are eager to help aid in promoting conservation efforts.

Additionally, Dehgan was able to create the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Afghanistan Program which resulted in Afghanistan’s first and second national parks. Villages held local elections to set up a committee and to set up rules to govern the national parks.

Ultimately, his conservation work not only helped wildlife, but supported democracy by empowering, working with and training local communities.

To learn more, check out Dehgan’s recently published book, “The Snow Leopard Project” as well as his twitter, @lemurwrangler.

By Anna Gotskind