People and Events

Departments, Centers, Branch Stations, other units and individuals may submit items to Amalie Holland, AGCS, AGRI 110 (ahollan@uark.edu). Eligible items include recent unit events, coming events, invited presentations, awards, foreign trips, election to leadership positions, new faculty and staff, retirements, etc. Include jpg photos @72 dpi.

Agricultural Economics & Agribusiness

Eric Wailes gave an invited address and paper, “Implications of the WTO Doha Round for the Rice Sector,” at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations 2004 International Year of Rice Conference in Rome, Feb. 12, and presented another invited address and paper, “Prospects and Challenges: Supply and Demand of World Rice,” at the Korea Rural Economic Institute International Academic Symposium in Seoul on May 28. Dr. Wailes was elected chair of the S-1016 Multistate Research Project “Impacts of Trade and Domestic Policies on the Competitiveness and Performance of Southern Agriculture” in New Orleans April 19-21.

Diana Danforth and Dr. Wailes made presentations at the Southern Agricultural Economics Association meeting in an organized symposium, “Issues Surrounding the Acceptability of Agricultural Biotechnology: Results from Focus Group Meetings and Mail Questionnaire Surveys,” in Tulsa Feb. 16.

Alvaro Durand-Morat was awarded a Walton Graduate Fellowship to study agricultural policy in the Public Policy Ph.D. program at the University of Arkansas.

Andrew McKenzie hosted a grain merchandising seminar April 6 presented by White Commercial Corporation representatives John Werner, Scott Hardy and Sherry Lorton and by Roger Gatis of Central Louisiana Grain Co-op, Brian King of E. Ritter Seed Co., and Don Wiseman of Wiseman and Associates consulting firm.

Agricultural & Extension Education

An article by Jefferson Miller, Mamane Annou and Eric Wailes, “Communicating Biotechnology: Relationships between Tone, Issues and Terminology in U.S. Print Media Coverage” (v. 87, issue 3) was selected as the Journal of Applied Communications journal article of the year for 2003. The award will be presented at the Association for Communication Excellence in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Life and Human Sciences (ACE) meeting June 22 at Lake Tahoe.

Awards to be presented to Agricultural Communication Services staff at the ACE meeting in Lake Tahoe June 22 include a first place and a second place in two categories for a Louisiana Purchase Bicentennial exhibit, “The Evolution of Arkansas Agriculture,” by Judy Howard, Howell Medders and Fred Miller, with assistance from the CES communications unit; third place for writing for an Arkansas Land and Life article by Fred Miller; and second place for the 2002 Division annual report produced by the CES communications unit with assistance from the AGCS staff.

Elizabeth “Betty” Maeda, of Tanzania, received the Margaret McNamara Memorial Fund grant for 2004-05. The purpose of the grant is to support the education of women from developing countries. Maeda is a Ph.D. student in public policy with an emphasis in rural development. George Wardlow is her advisor.

Isaac Melin, representing the UA Collegiate Farm Bureau, won first place in the State Collegiate Discussion Meet April 8 in Little Rock. Arkansas Farm Bureau sponsors the competition to promote critical thinking about important issues in Arkansas agriculture.

Animal Science

Charles Maxwell received the Medal of Excellence in Bioscience for the Feed Industry from Alltech. He will present an invited paper on “Re-inventing feeds and feeding: Positioning food animal production for future success” at Alltech’s annual symposium.

Jason Apple won the national Pork Board Award for Innovation at the American Society of Animal Science meeting in Tulsa in February.

The All-East Livestock Evaluation Contest was hosted by the U of A April 16-18. Eight teams competed, and the UA team placed fourth overall and third in Selection and Judging. Individual awards went to Jason Corey, high point in beef cattle judging, and Dana Stewart, second high point in sheep judging. The judging team will assist Bryan Kutz and Steve Jones in conducting the Fifth Annual UA Animal Science Youth Livestock Judging Camp June 7-9.

A retirement reception was held April 30 for Lilly Rakes and John Sligar. Lilly has been with the department for 35 years, most recently as a research specialist. John has been with the department 34 years, with most of that time at the beef farm and most recently at the Pauline Whitaker Animal Science Center.

Amy Hedges, administrative office supervisor, won the Jane Osborne Memorial Award given by the Arkansas Association of Cooperative Extension Service Specialists.

Biological & Agricultural Engineering

Indrajeet Chaubey presented an invited seminar titled “Uncertainty Analyses in Hydrologic/Water Quality Models” during the Environmental Dynamics Colloquium at the U of A Jan. 26. Dr. Chaubey also gave an invited presentation, “Decision Support System research activities within the Ecological Engineering program,” at the Public Policy Colloquium Jan. 22 and presented “Development of a decision support system for the Beaver Lake watershed management” to the West Fork–White River technical advisory group Feb. 24 in Fayetteville. He served on the National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship panel with Marty Matlock in Washington, D.C., in February.

Kati White and T.A. Costello, along with Dr. Chaubey, conducted a field day demonstrating the use of periphytometers for water quality assessment in Lincoln on March 30. Kati White also presented her “Moores Creek watershed project summary” to the beef cattle producers meeting Feb. 23 in Fayetteville.

M. Kavdia and A.S. Popel presented “Microvascular smooth muscle NO bioavailability: Role of neuronal and endothelial NO sources” at Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) in Washington, D.C., held April 17-21. Kavdia also gave the presentation “Model for Prediction of nitric oxide, superoxide and peroxynitrite profiles from activated immune cells in an encapsulated cell matrix.”

Crop, Soil, & Environmental Sciences

Larry Purcell gave an invited presentation at the World Soybean Research Conference on March 2. The conference was held at Iguassu Falls, Brazil, and the title of his presentation was “Biotechnology and the Challenge to increase Crop Yields.”

Chuck West won the 2003 Researcher of the Year Award given by the Arkansas Association of Cooperative Extension Specialists. The award was presented at their annual Galaxy Conference in Eureka Springs Feb. 22. Dr. West was cited for his research on beneficial endophytes in tall fescue.

Mary Savin was invited to present at the 2004 Arkansas Water Resources Center Conference held April 21 in Fayetteville. Her talk was entitled “Antibiotic Resistance of Bacteria Isolated from Run-Off and Soils Receiving Poultry Litter.”

Derrick Oosterhuis, Distinguished Professor, gave an invited keynote talk at the Mid-South Consultant meeting in Las Vegas Feb. 19 titled “Imposing Cotton
Tolerance to Stress with trimax.” Dr. Oosterhuis also gave a presentation, “Effect of Trimax on the growth and yield of cotton,” at the Bayer Cropscience Research meeting in Pensacola on March 25.

Food Science

Six food science students made a clean sweep of awards at the 2004 Ozark Food Processors Association student poster competition. In the undergraduate competition Brad Cheatham received first place with his poster titled “Prediction of the texture of cooked poultry pectoralis major muscles by near-infrared reflectance analysis of raw meat.” Brittany Adams received second place, and third place went to Scott Walnofer. In the graduate competition Xiong Rui received first place with his poster, “A novel approach to preference mapping of likings from JAR data using dummy variables.” Bwalya Lungu received second place, and Ashlee Davis took third.

Horticulture

Peggy “P.J.” Hirschey, a junior horticulture major from Fayetteville, was awarded the E. Ted Sims scholarship award from the American Society for Horticultural Science. This is the highest award given to an undergraduate horticulture student in the United States.

The American Pomological Society awarded the Wilder Silver Medal for 2003 to John R. Clark for his outstanding contributions to pomology. Dr. Clark received the award at the American Pomological Society meeting held in Providence, R.I. Dr. Clark was the chair of a review panel conducting a five-year review of the USDA-ARS Fruit Laboratory in Beltsville, Md., April 13-16. He gave an invited presentation titled “Challenges in Fruit Breeding” as part of the Horticulture Seminar Series at Michigan State University in March and taught a workshop to graduate students on intellectual property rights in plant breeding.

Mike Richardson was named editor of Applied Turfgrass Science, a new electronic journal being published by the Crop Science Society of America and the Plant Management Network.

Scott Renfro placed first in the M.S. student Oral Presentation Competition of the Gamma Sigma Delta Student Research Presentations Competition held in March.

Human Environmental Sciences

On April 21 Marjorie Fitch-Hilgenberg presented a poster at the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) in Washington, D.C. The poster, “The effect of smoking on plasma level of carotenoids in 18-25 year old males and females,” was coauthored by Dongmei Wang and Brad Murphy of the Department of Horticulture.

Jerald C. Foote gave an invited presentation to The Ozark Institute of Food Technologists on Feb. 19 titled “Dietary Supplements: A Golden Opportunity for Product Development of the Clinician’s Bane?” Dr. Foote also received a grant of $2,000 from the Arkansas Occupational Wellness Associates for Nutrition Research.

M. Jean Turner was recently elected secretary of the Southern Gerontological Society at the annual meeting in Atlanta April 1-3.

Betty S. Loewer, Interior Design, presented her selected paper, “Faculty and Student Experience in the University of Arkansas Economic Development SEED Program: Student Efforts in Economic Development,” at the 2004 Conference for Industry and Education Collaboration, Sponsored by the American Society of Engineering Education in Biloxi, Feb. 3-6.

A poster presentation titled “Recycled Carpets — Are They Competitive?” was given by Stephanie A. Watson of the University of Minnesota and Mary M. Warnock. The conference, The Interior Design Educators International Conference, was held in Pittsburg March 23-28.

Susan K. Takigiku presented her poster, “Methamphetamine and Rural Substance Abuse in Arkansas,” in Little Rock at the 21st Families Conference: Emerging Issues, on April 21.

Sue Martin was named the Early Childhood Professional of the Year during the Provider Recognition Awards Ceremony April 27 at the Jones Family Center in Springdale. The ceremony was sponsored by the Northwest Arkansas Child Care Resource and Referral Center, the NWA Family Child Care Home Association, the NWA Early Childhood Association and the Center for Effective Parenting.

Plant Pathology

Faculty members Craig Rothrock, Pat Fenn and John Rupe and graduate students Gary Bates, Eric Jackson and Silvina Giammaria attended the VII World Soybean Conference in Foz do Iguassu, Brazil, Feb. 29-March 5. Before the meeting Dr. Rupe consulted with EMBRAPA soybean scientists in Londrina, Brazil, about soybean rust and other diseases. After the meeting Dr. Rupe and Giammaria visited the Universidad Nacional de Rosario and Universidad Nacional de Cordoba where Dr. Rupe gave invited seminars.

Poultry Science

Student Beth Hill of Charleston became Miss National Park and qualified to compete in the Miss Arkansas pageant in Hot Springs June 26.