Grant to lead UNL's technology development
With more than 10 years of technology
commercialization experience,
Kannan Grant is ready to ratchet
UNL's technology development
activities to a new level. Grant
joined UNL this month as associate
vice chancellor for technology
development.
Grant has been associated with the Purdue
Research Foundation
at Purdue University since July 2000, and since
June 2002, directed
its engineering and physical sciences division.
Among his duties
were the management of a portfolio of more than
300 technologies
and negotiation of more than 20 license
agreements. He also assisted
many start-up companies at the Purdue
Research Park, raised venture
capital and educated faculty and
others in intellectual property
matters for Purdue.
At UNL, Grant will oversee activities associated with technology
transfer and economic development, including developing a new
strategic plan for commercialization of research technologies
and
enhancing relationships with the business community and external
constituents. He also will work closely with the UNL Technology
Development Corp. and the Technology Transfer Advisory Board.
He reports to Prem Paul, UNL vice chancellor for research
and
dean of graduate studies.
"We are excited to announce
Kannan's hiring," Paul
said. "His experience and energy
will help our Office of
Technology Development better serve faculty
and the local business
community."
Grant's
career also includes stints in technology commercialization
offices
at the University of Georgia Research Foundation, the
University of
Florida Research Foundation and Iowa State University.
From 1987 to
1991, he worked in Iceland, where he was a telecommunications
engineer for the Posts and Telecommunications of Iceland/NATO.
He
developed fiber optic infrastructure in Iceland.
Grant
received his bachelor of science degree in electrical
engineering
in 1986 from the University of North Dakota and a
master of
business administration in telecommunications and technology
management in 1993 from Texas A&M University.
The
office has had two interim directors in the past year.
Stephen
Frayser resigned the position to assume the presidency
of the
University of Nebraska Technology Park in April 2003.
Celika
Caldwell, a technology transfer associate, has served
as interim
director since April.
Kuzila
is director of Natural Resources
By Steve Ress, UNL Water
Center
Mark Kuzila has been named director of the UNL
School of Natural
Resources.
Kuzila's appointment was
effective Aug. 19, said John Owens,
Harlan vice chancellor of the
University of Nebraska Institute
of Agriculture and Natural
Resources.
Kuzila has been head of the university's
Conservation and
Survey Division since 1998, where he has been a
soil scientist
for more than 20 years. He also is Nebraska's state
geologist.
"Dr. Kuzila is a proven leader and
facilitator who is
intimately familiar with Nebraska's natural
resources,"
Owens said.
Earlier this year, Owens
announced the School of Natural Resource
Sciences, the Conservation
and Survey Division and the Water
Center were merging into the
School of Natural Resources. A subsequent
UNL search for the
founding director of the school resulted in
Kuzila's selection for
a three-year appointment.
Kuzila joined the Conservation
and Survey Division's faculty
in 1975. A Kansas City, Kan., native,
he holds bachelor's and
master's degrees in soil science from
Kansas State University
and a doctorate in soil science from UNL.
He is a past president
of the Nebraska Society of Professional Soil
Scientists and member
of the Geological Society of America, Soil
and Water Conservation
Society and Soil Science Society of
America.
Kuzila's professional focus and areas of expertise
are in
soil origins and development, soil survey and mapping the
state's
lands and wetland soils.
Bergt named director
Eileen Bergt has been named
director of Landscape Services
and campus landscape architect at
UNL.
Bergt came to UNL in 1999 from Clark Enersen Partners,
where
she had been a landscape architect working on many projects
in
Lincoln and throughout Nebraska.
She earned her
bachelor of science degree in architecture
from UNL and a master's
degree in landscape architecture from
Kansas State University. She
is a registered landscape architect
and is active in the Nebraska
Statewide Arboretum, the Garden
Club of Lincoln and the
Preservation Association of Lincoln.
Her previous
appointments at UNL were as campus landscape
architect and interim
director of Landscape Services.
"It is an honor and
privilege to guide our department
through the changes that have
occurred, while maintaining an
aesthetically pleasing and safe
campus," Bergt said.
Robert Hensarling previously
served as director of Landscape
Services.
Lutgen to lead development center
A UNL agricultural economist has been appointed executive
director of the Nebraska Cooperative Development Center.
Lynn Lutgen, an associate professor of agricultural economics
at
NU's Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources, assumed
his
new duties in July. He has worked with the NCDC during the
past few
years, helping cooperative groups get started.
The NCDC
helps agricultural enterprises add value to products
such as meat,
grain and vegetables.
As executive director, Lutgen is
responsible for helping new
agribusiness groups develop business
plans, conduct feasibility
studies and obtain special training.
Since 1976, Lutgen has served as a marketing and international
programs specialist in the agricultural economics department.
His
involvement in cooperative development led him to Russia
and
Ukraine, where he participated in the U.S. Department of
Agriculture's Commercial Agriculture Development Project.
Employee wins national award
Lola Young, residence life services supervisor for university
housing/residence life, has received the 2003 Olive T. Ritchie
Educational Office Professional of the Year award from the National
Association of Educational Office Professionals.
Young's
nominator wrote, "From her work experience to
her personal
activities to association involvement, Lola exemplifies
what a true
professional is in every sense of the word."
Young is
responsible for hiring and overseeing front desk
workers for
Cather, Pound and Neihardt residence halls. She received
the award
in July at a ceremony in Boise, Idaho.
Luthans receives honorary doctorate
Fred Luthans,
University Professor and George Holmes Distinguished
Professor of
Management at UNL, received an honorary doctorate
of humane letters
in June at the commencement at DePaul University.
Luthans has spent his entire 36-year academic career at the
University of Nebraska, where he has won awards for distinguished
teaching and excellence in graduate education. For the past five
years, he has been a senior research scientist with the Gallup
organization.
NET earns grant for
projects
Nebraska Educational Telecommunications recently
received
a $30,000 grant from the Woods Charitable Fund in Lincoln
to
support broadcast and outreach activities in partnership with
human service agencies on dating violence and new immigrants
to
Nebraska.
Both projects are part of NET's "Nebraska
Connects"
series of community service programs. The funding
will enable
NET to enhance live, call-in broadcasts with videotaped
segments.
The video segments will be compiled for later use by
NET's partner
organizations.
In the first project,
NET will partner with the Nebraska Domestic
Violence Sexual Assault
Coalition and the Family Violence Council
to address dating
violence as it relates to youth culture and
media. The dating
violence program is projected to air in January.
The
"Nebraska Connects: New Nebraskans" project
involves a
partnership with the New Americans Task Force, an
organization of
more than 50 agencies in the Lincoln area. The
goal of the
broadcast will be to give Nebraskans the opportunity
to discuss how
communities can assist new residents, attitudes
toward new
immigrants and their roles in the community. The program
will air
in the spring 2004 with a national PBS series, "The
New
Americans."
Health,
safety department wins grant
The Department of
Environmental Health and Safety was awarded
a grant for $22,178
from the Nebraska Department of Environmental
Quality's Waste
Reduction and Recycling Incentive Grants Program.
The funds
awarded to EHS will be used to buy an aerosol can
crusher.
Generally, aerosol cans are considered hazardous waste
because they
may explode if subject to an igniting source or
heated. But if an
aerosol can is punctured and empty and recycled
for scrap metal,
the aerosol can may be excluded from hazardous
waste regulations.
Aerosol-can puncturing devices can be used
to empty the aerosol can
and make them non-reactive.
UNL can generate as many as
seven 55-gallon drums of aerosol
cans every month, about 1,400
cans. The cans will be recycled
as scrap metal rather than being
shipped as a hazardous waste.
'Statewide' wins national award
"Statewide,"
the Nebraska ETV Network's weekly news
journal, received the 2003
Electronic Media Award from the National
Council on Compulsive
Gambling.
The award honored a segment by
"Statewide" producer/reporter
Mike Tobias that examined
how older people in Nebraska are gambling
away their "golden
years." Older adults make up an
unknown number of the 87,000
Nebraskans with degrees of gambling
problems. The segment, edited
by Ralph Hammack, aired in May
2002.
Obituary
Kenneth Orton
Kenneth Orton, professor emeritus and
former chairman of the
educational psychology department, died Aug.
25 after heart surgery.
He was 76.
Orton was chairman
of the department from 1972 to 1983. He
was instrumental in
bringing the Buros Institute of Mental Measurements,
a
consumer-advocacy organization that works to improve tests
and
testing products, to UNL, said Barbara Plake, director of
the
institute and a professor of educational psychology.
Orton
worked with Cecil Reynolds, another faculty member in
the
educational psychology department, and negotiated agreements
with
the Board of Regents, the vice chancellor for academic affairs
and
the University of Nebraska Press to acquire the institute
in 1979,
Plake said.
"We remain indebted to Ken for his hard
work in the late
1970s, and the continuing success of the Buros
Institute is a
testament to his vision," she said.
Orton is survived by his wife, two children and one grandson.
A memorial service was held Aug. 28 in Lincoln. Memorials
may be
made to the Orton Memorial Educational Psychology scholarship
fund
through the University of Nebraska Foundation in lieu of
flowers.
Call the Foundation at 472-2151.
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