InsideIllinois Nov. 29, 2012

Vol. 32, No. 11

F o r F a c u l t y a n d S t a f f , U n i v e r s i t y o f I l l i n o i s a t U r b a n a - C h a m p a i g n • h t t p : / / n e w s . i l l i n o i s . e d u / i i

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Synchronized danceResearchers have

demonstrated that tiny spheres synchronize their movements as they self-assemble into a spinning

mircrotube.

PAGE 8

BOOK CORNER 5

BRIEF NOTES 7

DEATHS 2

ON THE JOB 3

INSIDE ILLINOIS ONLINE: news.illinois.edu/ii/ • TO SUBSCRIBE: go.illinois.edu/iiSubscribe

I N D E XTentative GEO agreement reachedOn Nov. 27, a tentative agreement was reached between UI officials and representatives of the Graduate Employees Organization, the union representing graduate student employees. Before the agreement is finalized, it must be ratified by the GEO and then processed by the university.

Efforts to create, sustain inclusive environment recognizedBy Mike Helenthal

Assistant Editor

On Nov. 9, three university em-ployees were recognized at the 27th annual Celebration of Di-versity for their efforts in “creat-

ing and sustaining an inclusive, respectful and vibrant living, learning and working community.”

Avé Alvarado, the director of Education-al Equity Programs in the Graduate College; Timothy L. Offenstein, the lead information design specialist and campus accessibility liaison for Campus Information Technolo-gies and Educational Services; and Michael Parrish, an undergraduate academic adviser for the College of Education, were awarded the Larine Y. Cowan Make a Difference Award at a breakfast at the I Hotel and Con-ference Center.

The event was sponsored by the Office of Diversity, Equity and Access; Cowan is its former long-serving director. Each re-cipient receives $500.

“This year, the awards were designated for leadership in diversity broadly, and for special areas including LGBT and disabil-ity,” said Chancellor Phyllis M. Wise in an-nouncing the winners. “We are honored, as a campus, to have committed and dedicated faculty, staff and students working daily to advance the cause of equality and justice.”

Associate Chancellor Menah Pratt-Clarke said the university’s focus on diver-sity is being redoubled under Wise’s admin-

istration, and that the program recognizes those who have gone above and beyond normal efforts.

“There is a great deal of positive energy, effort, focus and attention around diversity on our campus,” Pratt-Clarke said. “I’m thrilled to be part of Illinois at this particu-lar time and season to be able to help create a firm foundation and platform upon which Illinois can build on its greatness and excel-lence.”

Alvarado is credited with creating and developing the Summer Pre-Doctoral Insti-tute, the GRE Institute and the Illinois Sum-mer Research Symposium, each of which is designed to prepare students for the rigors of graduate school.

She is an executive committee mem-ber of the Council on Teacher Education,

the current vice chair of the Committee on Race and Ethnicity, and co-coordinator of the Graduate College Illinois Partners for Diversity Summit.

One of the nominators called Alvarado “a very passionate leader and advocate for diversity in her professional life and a pro-moter of social justice in her personal life.”

Offenstein serves as the campus accessi-bility liaison through CITES’ User Experi-ence Design Group. He is a member of the ITaccess Team, serves on the Chancellor’s Committee on Access and Accommoda-tions and is the chair of its media subcom-mittee.

In 1999, he formed the UI Webmasters group, which helps to promote and celebrate accessible design, including workshops and an annual conference that is expected to be- SEE DIVERSITY, PAGE 2

These bots were made for walkingBy Liz Ahlberg

Physical Sciences Editor

They’re soft, biocompatible, about 7 millimeters long – and, incredibly, able to walk by themselves. Min-

iature “bio-bots” developed at the UI are making tracks in synthetic biology.

Designing non-electronic bio-logical machines has been a riddle that scientists at the interface of biology and engineering have struggled to solve. The walking bio-bots demonstrate the Illinois team’s ability to forward-engineer functional machines using only hydrogel, heart cells and a 3-D printer.

With an altered design, the bio-bots could be customized for specific applications in medicine, energy or the environment. The research team, led by UI profes-sor Rashid Bashir, published its results in the journal Scientific Reports.

“The idea is that, by being able to design with biological struc-tures, we can harness the power of cells and nature to address challenges facing society,” said Bashir, an Abel Bliss Professor of Engineering. “As engineers, we’ve always built things with

For example, Bashir envisions the bio-bots being used for drug screening or chemical analysis, since the bots’ motion can indicate how the cells are responding to the environment. By integrating cells that respond to certain stimuli,

such as chemical gradients, the bio-bots could be used as sensors.

“Our goal is to see if we can get this thing to move toward chemi-cal gradients, so we could even-tually design something that can look for a specific toxin and then

try to neutralize it,” said Bashir, who also is a professor of electri-cal and computer engineering and of bioengineering. “Now you can think about a sensor that’s moving and constantly sampling and doing

Making tracks The team that developed the “bio-bots” – from left, Taher Saif, Vincent Chan, Hyun Joon Kong, Rashid Bashir, Kidong Park and Mitchell Collens.

hard materials, materials that are very predictable. Yet there are a lot of applications where nature solves a problem in such an el-egant way. Can we replicate some of that if we can understand how to put things together with cells?”

The key to the bio-bots’ loco-motion is asymmetry. Resembling a tiny springboard, each bot has one long, thin leg resting on a stout supporting leg. The thin leg is covered with rat cardiac cells. When the heart cells beat, the long leg pulses, propelling the bio-bot forward.

The team uses a 3-D printing method common in rapid proto-typing to make the main body of the bot from hydrogel, a soft gel-atin-like polymer. This approach allowed the researchers to explore various conformations and adjust their design for maximum speed. The ease of quickly altering de-sign also will allow them to build and test other configurations with an eye toward potential applica-tions.

ONLINE VIDEO

http://go.illinois.edu/

biobots_video

photo by L. Brian Stauffer

SEE BIO-BOTS, PAGE 7

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Avé Alvarado Timothy L. Offenstein Michael Parrish Menah Pratt-Clarke

come a regional event next year.“Tim has directly helped more than 50

departments and units improve the accessi-bility of their websites,” said one nomina-tor. “Tim has a deep personal and profes-sional commitment to eliminating technical barriers to information and resources so that our students, staff and faculty can equally participate and excel in teaching, learning and research.”

Parrish has facilitated Social Issues Dia-logue courses focusing on exploring sexual orientation and race and ethnicity. She also has worked closely with the LGBT Re-source Center to provide satellite advising and has spoken several times at Quench, the center’s lunch-and-learn program.

“Although not part of her job description

PAGE 2 InsideIllinois Nov. 29, 2012

Judith A. Day, 74, died Nov. 22 at the Kirby Medical Center, Monticello. Day was a technical assistant at the Illinois Sustainable Technology Cen-ter for eight years, retiring in 2004. Cynthia Ann Wall, 50, died Sept. 29. She was an office support specialist in the Office of Corporate Relations and also at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications for 12 years, resigning in 2009. Memorials: SPCA of Wake County, 200 Petfinder Lane, Raleigh, NC 27603.

Inside Illinois is an employee publication of the Urbana-Champaign campus of the University of Illinois. It is published on the first and third Thursday of each month by the News Bureau of the campus Office of Public Affairs, administered by the associate chancellor for public affairs. Distribution is by campus mail.

News is solicited from all areas of the campus and should be sent to the editor at least 10 days before publication. All items may be sent to dkdahl@illinois.edu. The campus mail address is Inside Illinois, 507 E Green St., Room 345, Champaign, MC-428. The fax number is 217-244-0161.

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Editor Doris K. Dahl 217-333-2895, dkdahl@illinois.eduAssistant Editor Mike HelenthalPhotographer L. Brian StaufferStudent Intern Christian GollayanNews Bureau contributors

Liz Ahlberg engineering, physical sciences

Craig Chamberlain media, international programs, social sciences

Phil Ciciora business, labor, lawSharita Forrest education, social workDusty Rhodes arts, information science,

humanities, libraryDiana Yates agriculture, applied health

sciences, life sciences

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Cellphone bans associated with fewer urban accidentsBy Liz Ahlberg

Physical Sciences Editor

Cellphones and driving go togeth-er like knives and juggling. But when cellphone use is banned, are drivers any safer?

It depends on where you’re driving, a study by UI researchers says.

The study found that, long-term, enact-ing a cellphone ban was associated with a relative decrease in the accident rate in urban areas. However, in very rural areas, cellphone bans were associated with higher accident rates than would otherwise be ex-pected.

“The main idea is to use the eye test when it comes to cellphone use,” says study leader Sheldon H. Jacobson, a UI profes-sor of computer science and of mathemat-ics. “If you look around and it’s busy, it’s a good idea to put the cellphone down and not use it when driving.”

The Illinois study, published in the jour-nal Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, is set apart by two factors: the length of time and the method of measuring driver density.

The study examines long-term trends of accident rates and their association with cellphone bans, comparing seven years of driver data in New York – the first state to institute a statewide ban – and neighbor-ing Pennsylvania, which has no ban. Both states have similar weather patterns and wide diversity in size and population den-

sity of counties.“Most other studies focus on a very

short-term analysis,” Jacobson said. “A law is enacted; what’s the impact immediately? We try to take a much longer view and look at the impact not just over six months to a year, but over several years.”

While most studies define driver density by licensed drivers per square mile, the Illi-nois researchers looked at the number of li-censed drivers per mile of roadway to get a better estimate of traffic volume by county. They classified counties as urban, rural or very rural, and performed statistical analy-ses to look for trends in accident rates in each class over time.

Across all three classes, enacting a cell-phone ban was associated with an initial rise in accident rate, followed by a steeper decline than would otherwise be expected, although the magnitude differed in each class of counties. In higher driver density areas, there was a clear, statistically signifi-cant, association between the enacting of a cellphone ban and relative reduction in per-sonal injury accidents after seven years. By contrast, such bans in very rural areas were associated with a relative increase in acci-dent rates over the same period.

“What we found in our research is that the cellphone ban was associated with dif-ferent outcomes in different groups of coun-ties,” said industrial and enterprise systems engineering researcher Douglas King, a co-author of the study. “Based on this research,

Accident rates Illinois professor Sheldon H. Jacobson led a study that found an association between cellphone ban enactment and long-term trends in driver accident rates.

photo by L. Brian Stauffer

it suggests that a blanket cell-phone ban may not always lead to a greater benefit. Based on the seven-year time period that we were able to examine, the out-come in each group of counties after the ban was not uniformly beneficial.”

The cause of the slight in-crease of accidents in very ru-ral areas is unknown, although Jacobson and King hypothesize that lower enforcement or other factors unique to rural driving may contribute.

“The other possible explana-tion is that in lower driver densi-ty areas, the number of accidents is smaller, and as a result the data collected isn’t as rich,” Ja-cobson said “This could be just a statistical anomaly.”

Whatever the reason for the relative increase in rural acci-dents, the relative decline in ur-ban accidents in New York ver-sus Pennsylvania was clear: After the initial ban enactment, accident rates declined and continued to be lower over time.

“This is the kind of research that defi-nitely should encourage densely populat-ed areas to enact these laws,” King said. “There’s sufficient evidence to support it. When you start getting into rural and very rural areas, I think you have to have to take

at the College of Education, Michael has cultivated connections with the Resource Center to create safe spaces for LGBT stu-dents, as well as challenge students, col-leagues and herself to develop allies,” said one of the nominators. “She embodies the dedication and mindfulness of a true advo-cate and ally.”

Pratt-Clarke also was recognized as a “visionary leader of diversity” and pre-

DIVERSITY, CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

it in a case-by-case basis. But for urban ar-eas, the evidence is substantial.”

UI graduate student Kevin Ryan and Air Force Institute of Technology researcher Matthew Robbins were co-authors of the paper. This work was supported by the Simulation and Optimization Laboratory in the department of computer science at the UI.

Initiative to help UI achieve diversity goals

sented an award in honor of her work on diversity on campus during the past years, including her service as the former director of the Office of Diversity, Equity and Ac-cess.

Wise said the recipients exemplify the university’s commitment to diversity, which can be achieved even through simple ways.

“It’s not always big and dramatic,” Wise said. “Sometimes it’s just a nice smile and

a hello to a stranger; sometimes it is being more accommodating when life challenges come into the workplace; and sometimes it is being willing to hire someone who thinks completely different than you, looks dif-ferent and acts different – yet you are will-ing to trust that the difference is valuable and can have an impact on your unit. It all makes a difference.”

deaths

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ON THE WEB

http://illinois.edu/blog/view/1109

By Mike Helenthal

Assistant Editor

Chancellor Phyllis M. Wise on Nov. 15 announced a new Inclusive Il-linois initiative aimed at leading the university toward reaching its

diversity goals more quickly.“We have made some progress,” she said

in a Nov. 12 blog, “but we need to acceler-ate the rate of change and increase the slope of the curve to greater diversity.”

Illinois EDGE (Enhancing Diversity, Guiding Excellence) will be led by the chancellor’s and provost’s Faculty Advi-sory Council on Diversity and Cultural Understanding, with members appointed by the chancellor and led by James D. An-derson, a professor of educational policy, organization and leadership.

Wise also appointed council advisers: Debasish Dutta, the dean of the Graduate College; Steve Zimmerman, a professor of chemistry and former department head; and Sandra Rodriguez-Zas, a professor of ge-netics, genomics and bioinformatics in the department of animal sciences. Wise said

Associate Chancellor Menah Pratt-Clarke would work closely with the council.

The council will work in conjunction with the existing Diversity Administrative Coordinating Team to evaluate diversity initiatives and will initiate a “listening and learning” tour to allow all campus voices to be heard.

“I have asked them to develop an action plan to institutionalize a culture of diversity and excellence on campus through the de-velopment of a structure and culture of re-sponsibility, incentive and accountability,” Wise said in her announcement, adding that any approved programs also will “intercon-nect” with findings in last year’s Visioning Excellence initiative.

Wise said the issue of diversity goes well beyond numbers and statistical benchmarks and to the university’s commitment to en-sure opportunity for all.

“When it comes to meeting complex so-cietal challenges, when the people around the table are more diverse, the conversa-tion is richer and the solutions are better,” she said. “The power of universities comes from our ability to engineer new ways of thinking and to open up new perspectives. If we have a ‘product,’ it must surely be the creation of ideas.”

The Urbana Academic Senate recently adopted a Diversity Values Statement, which Wise said she supports.

That statement says the university should “support diversity of world views, histories and cultural knowledge across a range of social groups including race, eth-nicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, abilities, economic class, religion and their intersections.”

“For us, enhanced diversity is the only viable route to excellence and success in the competitive environments we’re entering,” Wise said. “It isn’t a path, it is the path. These issues of diversity are going to be a point of relentless emphasis and priority in my time at Illinois.”

Nov. 29, 2012 InsideIllinois PAGE 3

On the Job Dale Turner

On the Job features UI staff members. To nominate a civil service employee, email insideil@illinois.edu.

photo by L. Brian Stauffer

By Christian GollayanNews Bureau Intern

In the corner of the lobby of Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, in a well-lit shop, stands a man in a fitted suit, micro-patterned dress shirt with

a gold tie tack, all anchored with a pair of designer wingtips.

Turner’s sartorial tastes complement his position as Promenade gift shop’s buyer/manager, a venue known for its Mezzo Mugs (refills at Intermezzo, the venue’s café, are 88 cents), luxurious scarves, elegant jewelry, classic toys and a selection of many items that would be at home on an old Hollywood set.

“My entire philosophy in retail is showbiz,” Turner said. “In my first job in retail, I tried to bring as much showbiz into it as I could, and here I ended up in a showbiz atmosphere, so it all kind of worked very well for me.”

Promenade is known for its “bright and cheery” atmosphere, Turner said. Originally an art gallery, the long space was converted in 1982 into a gift shop. Its “Wall of Windows,” a glass shelf of featured items, receives a lot of atten-tion. Turner said that the shop’s greeting cards, gear clocks, jewelry and wind-up toys are some of its best sellers, especial-ly during the holiday season.

“Promenade is just a neat place to shop,” he said. “It’s unique to the area also in that all the proceeds from the shop go back right into Krannert Center. When you shop with us you support the arts.”

As the buyer/manager, Turner makes

sure that patrons enter and leave the store happy.

“Even today we’re making change for people to feed the parking meters,” Turner says, “So we’re really a customer-oriented service.”

He remembers regular customers by their first name and asks them how they’re doing, always with a jovial manner.

“Working with customers,” Turner said, “I’ve learned over all these years in retail that I’m a people person, and I enjoy the banter I have with customers and getting to know them.”

A UI graduate who grew up in Cham-paign, Turner never found a reason to leave. He still keeps in contact with childhood friends from his scouting days.

When Turner is not at work, he pursues his strong interests in dance and theater. He says he developed this interest about 30 years ago through a friend who worked at the National Academy of Arts. Since then, he has been a regular patron at Krannert Center.

“I guess that interest is what I do at work and away from work,” Turner said.

Turner has always worked in retail. His first long-term job lasted for 24 years before the company folded. As a regular Krannert Center patron, Turner found an opening at Promenade and now, 17 years later, Turner said the best part of his job is working closely with Krannert Center em-ployees.

“There’s an incredible amount of cre-ativity going on here,” Turner said. “Work-ing with the marketing team, that entire

group is just a hotbed of creativity.”Turner’s day varies depending on

Krannert Center’s events. Store traffic surg-es during theater performances (usually Tuesdays through Saturdays, with a few Sundays thrown in) and the free Krannert Uncorked wine tastings on Thursday nights. Recently, Turner was involved with Corporate Circuit Night, an event that hon-ors Krannert Center sponsors.

“There is no typical day,” Turner said. “It changes all the time, which is the beauty of working here.”

Regardless of how busy he is, Turner will always make time for his customers.

“Thank you, ma’am!” he says and waves like a showman to a patron leav-ing the shop. “Appreciate you shop-ping with us! You did a good job!” u

Mother-son duo release new CD, ‘Dialogues en Français’ By Madeline LeyNews Bureau Intern

Parents and their children often have special relationships that demonstrate a type of closeness unlike any other. UI French horn

professor Bernhard Scully is quite familiar with that concept. He and his mother, pia-nist Joanne Minnetti, have formed a unique musical partnership over the years.

Recently, the mother-son duo collabo-rated on a new CD, “Dialogues en Fran-çais” (2012). The project highlights cham-ber music for the French horn composed by French composers, such as Charles Gounod and Camille Saint-Saens, among others. For Scully, the CD holds special meaning, as it showcases the musical relationship be-tween him and his mother. “It is an album to celebrate our mother-son collaboration and our love of this particular French repertoire for horn and piano,” he said.

The unique musical partnership between Scully and Minnetti began many years ago. “My mother has been accompanying me, first on violin when I was little, and then

musicbox

eventually on horn, for 30 years,” Scully said. “She used to play for all my competi-tions when I was young and we would of-ten just sit down and read through music at home for hours. She is an extremely sensi-tive and exquisite musician and I learned a great deal about music and music making through performing with her.”

Being able to collaborate with his moth-er on musical projects has been beneficial for Scully, because he is able to experi-ence a closeness that, for other musicians, is sometimes difficult to achieve. “When I am playing with her, it is like we can read each other’s minds,” he said. “That certain-

ly does not happen with most everyday music collaborations in my experience.”

The artistic harmony that Scully ex-periences when playing music with his mother creates passion that is highlight-ed in “Dialogues en Français.” Music is a powerful emotional force for Scully. “The Six Melodies by Gounod on the CD are the most enjoyable for me to play. They are conversations between the piano and horn and are heart-wrench-ingly beautiful. I feel like every time we play them they truly become different pieces, because of the inherent musical flexibility and communicative qualities they embody,” Scully said.

The success in collaborating with his mother has given Scully the confidence to pursue many new projects, including col-laboration with UI faculty members. “I am hoping to release many more CDs, encom-passing repertoire from the past and music of the present,” Scully said. “I am currently working on a chamber music project that will combine a number of classic works and also an exciting new composition. The

composer of the new work will produce the album and UI music faculty members will be participating.”

The CD project was, for Scully, a labor of love that highlighted the passion of music. “I hope anyone who listens to the CD will be able to recognize the joy we had in making it,” he said. “It was a wonderful pleasure to create this album with my mother.” u

Dramatic retailing  Dale Turner, buyer/manager for Promenade, the gift shop at Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, also is a longtime supporter of the center’s dance and theater programs. A self-described “people person,” Turner said he enjoys selling the hard-to-find items available in the gift shop and working alongside the many talented people at Krannert. “There’s an incredible amount of creativity going on here,” he said.

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PAGE 4 InsideIllinois Nov. 29, 2012

Study tracks brain gene response to territorial aggressionBy Diana YatesLife Sciences Editor

With a mate and a nest to protect, the male threespined stickle-back is a fierce fish,

chasing and biting other males un-til they go away.

Now researchers are mapping the genetic underpinnings of the stickleback’s aggressive behavior. Armed with tools that allow them to see which genes are activated or deactivated in response to social encounters, a UI team has identi-fied broad patterns of gene activ-ity that correspond to aggression in this fish.

A paper describing their work appears in the Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Sci-ences.

“The molecular mechanisms underlying complex behaviors such as aggression are a challenge to study because hundreds of genes are involved, and in order to study them, we have to delve into arguably the most complex tissue:

photo by L. Brian Stauffer

Tracking aggressive behavior  UI animal biology professor Alison Bell and her colleagues tracked changes in the activity of hundreds of genes in the brains of stickleback fish in response to a territorial threat.

Fierce fish  The male threespined stickleback defends its nest against invaders. Researchers tracked changes in gene activity in its brain after it encountered another male near its nest. 

photo by Katie McGhee

the brain,” said animal biology professor Alison Bell, who led the study.

The researchers looked at brain gene expression – the pattern of genes that were activated or deacti-vated – across four brain regions in the nesting stickleback fish shortly after it encountered an intruder. They compared the brains of nest-ing stickleback males that did and did not encounter an intruder, to identify how the experience of fending off a challenger changed gene expression in the brain.

“Territorial aggression and other behaviors in sticklebacks have been well-studied by astute observers of animal behavior for almost a century, but complex be-haviors in wild animals require the use of powerful tools to un-derstand them,” Bell said. “Until recently we have not had sophis-ticated computational and genom-ics tools to delve into the causes of aggression in real organisms in natural populations.”

The analysis revealed that hun-dreds of genes were upregulated (activated at higher levels than normal) or downregulated in dif-ferent regions of the stickleback brain after it encountered an in-truder. The upregulated genes were being transcribed and trans-lated into proteins at higher levels to perform specific tasks within the brain.

An analysis of the types of genes that responded when a stickleback male faced an intruder revealed that many molecular and cellular processes were affected. Genes involved in immunity, me-tabolism and regulation of normal

body states were recruited or put to bed. Many of these genes had never before been implicated in studies of aggression or territorial defense, Bell said.

Some of the genes that were downregulated are associated with metabolism and sexual behavior.

“For ages we’ve known that there are costs of aggression for things like immunity, and con-flicts between aggression and other functions such as courtship behavior,” Bell said. “This study begins to identify some of the mo-lecular mechanisms that mediate these tradeoffs.”

The greatest changes in gene expression were seen in the di-encephalon (a region deep in the brain that is involved in relaying sensory information, emotions and motor signals to other brain regions and helps regulate con-sciousness, sleep, alertness and circadian rhythm, among other things) and the cerebellum (which receives sensory signals and plays a role in motor coordination). A significant number of these genes were regulated in opposite direc-tions in these two brain regions (up in one and down in the other), the researchers report.

One gene, which codes for a protein hormone known as CGA, was the most highly upregulated in the diencephalon and the most highly downregulated in the cer-ebellum. CGA is known to play a role in reproductive changes and is associated with aging in males and females.

“That the same gene was ex-pressed in opposite directions in different brain regions suggests

that there are complex patterns of gene regulation,” Bell said.

The researchers also found evi-dence that some proteins, called transcription factors, which regu-late the expression of networks of genes, are regulated differently in different brain regions in response to a territorial threat.

“This suggests that complex transcription regulatory networks are involved in the behavioral re-sponse of territorial animals to an intrusion,” Bell said.

The new study offers a glimpse into the regulatory mechanisms that govern brain responses to per-ceived threats, Bell said.

“It lays the stepping-stones to the ultimate characterization of

the neurogenomic states under-lying complex decision-making in response to social challeng-es,” said postdoctoral researcher Yibayiri Osee Sanogo, the lead author on the paper.

“This study shows how com-putational approaches can help solve complex problems of mo-lecular biology,” said computer science professor Saurabh Sinha, a co-author on the study. “Only powerful computational tools – in combination with new approaches in genomics – can begin to ad-dress the complexity of the brain and behavior.”

Bell and Sinha are affili-ates of the Institute for Genomic Biology. u

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Nov. 29, 2012 InsideIllinois PAGE 5

The selling of wartime needs sold the U.S. on advertisingBy Craig ChamberlainSocial Sciences Editor

While it might be hard to imag-ine in the midst of the ad-soaked holiday season, there was a time – in the 1930s –

when advertising faced fierce opposition from the public.

Then came World War II, and everything changed, says Inger Stole.

Advertisers and the ad-vertising industry helped the federal government sell war bonds and the need for wartime security (“loose lips sink ships”). It promot-ed “victory gardens” and scrap metal drives. It helped recruit men into the military and women into the work-force (“Rosie the Riveter”). There were more than 150 different home-front campaigns in all.

“It was World War II that really consoli-dated advertising in the American economy and psyche,” according to Stole, a UI com-munication professor and the author of “Advertising at War: Business, Consumers and Government in the 1940s,” to be pub-lished in December by the UI Press.

Stole told the story of the pre-war oppo-sition to advertising in her 2006 book “Ad-vertising on Trial.” She described the rise of a consumer movement in the late 1920s and into the 1930s that challenged a com-mercialized environment almost unknown a few decades earlier.

That movement objected to the industry’s reliance on image and emotions to sell prod-ucts, and labeled many industry practices as business propaganda and even undemocrat-ic, Stole said. Consumer advocates demand-ed advertising that provided only legitimate product information and gave consumers

“their money’s worth,” she said.Movement leaders wrote best-selling

books, formed organizations such as Con-sumers’ Research and Con-sumers Union, and lobbied for legislation that would regulate advertising prac-tices.

They ultimately lost that battle, settling for watered-down legislation in 1938, Stole said. And that’s where she thought the story largely ended.

Through further research, however, Stole found that the true victory for the adver-tising industry lay in the war years. During those years,

she writes, “advertisers turned a situation that by all rational accounts should have worked to their disadvantage into a price-less opportunity to cement their place in a postwar society.”

“I’m still in awe at how they managed to pull this off,” Stole said.

In the years leading up to the U.S. entry into the war in 1941, the advertising indus-try was still on the defensive, Stole said.

Two federal government agencies were investigating the role of advertising in fos-tering monopolies and uncompetitive mar-kets. Raw materials were becoming increas-ingly scarce and production was shifting to wartime needs, causing critics to question the need for advertising consumer goods.

Critics also were questioning the busi-ness tax break for advertising at a time when citizens were being asked to sacrifice or risk their lives.

The federal government, however,

quickly saw a need to publicize home-front initiatives, Stole said, “and the advertising in-dustry stepped forward as the knight on the white horse.”

Leading the industry’s effort would be the newly formed War Advertising Council (years later to become the Ad Council), and much of Stole’s book focuses on the council’s challenges in bal-ancing politics, public percep-tion and industry participation.

The council essentially acted as a clearinghouse between the government and the advertising industry, Stole said.

When a government office or agency identified a home-front problem in need of publicity, it would consult with the council – which cooperated closely with the government’s Office of War Information – to see if advertis-ing could play a role. If the proj-ect moved forward, the council would assign the task of creat-ing an advertising campaign to one of many advertising agencies that had volunteered.

Once the campaign was approved, the council would then work to find manufac-turers willing to incorporate the campaign message in their advertising copy or media owners willing to provide space for free.

Sometimes the war-related message might be the central focus of the ad, Stole said. Most commonly, however, an ad com-bined the war-related message with its prod-uct promotion, she said. Quite frequently, an ad’s plea to buy war bonds or salvage scraps was overwhelmed by the advertiser’s quest to sell products.

Getting businesses to participate often required pleading and cajoling by the coun-cil, Stole said, and only about a third of

manufacturers participated, and at different levels.

By the war’s end, however, the council estimated that the advertising industry had contributed more than $1 billion in time, space and talent to the war effort, Stole said.

As a result, within the span of a few years and continuing after the war, the im-age of advertising had been transformed, according to Stole.

“The difference between the stature of the advertising industry in the late 1930s and in the early 1950s was almost night and day,” she writes. “Having positioned itself as a patriotic institution able to sell war and peace, advertising was now comfortably established as an essential and non-contro-versial component of American society.” u

Advertising at war  Advertising was an embattled and unpopular industry in the 1930s, but World War II gave it the opportunity to turn things around and cement its role in American society, says communication professor Inger Stole, in her new book, “Advertising at War.”

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PAGE 6 InsideIllinois Nov. 29, 2012

NEW faces 2012 Among the newcomers to the Urbana campus are faculty members whose appointments began this summer or fall. Inside Illinois continues its tradition of introducing some of the new faculty members on campus and will feature at least two new colleagues in each fall issue.

photo courtesy College of Law

photo by L. Brian Stauffer

Jason Mazzone

the Lynn H. Murray Faculty Scholar in the College of Law

Education: J.S.D. and LL.M., Yale Law School; J.D., Harvard Law School; A.M. (sociology), Stanford University; A.B. (social studies), Harvard University

Research Interests: A nationally recognized expert in the fields of constitutional law and intellectual property law, Mazzone focuses on issues of federalism, separation of powers, state court interpretation of the U.S. Constitution and intellectual property policy.

“Professor Mazzone is a prolific, innovative and highly respected scholar in the fields of constitutional law and

intellectual property,” said Bruce Smith, the dean of the College of Law. “His scholarship on federalism, separation of powers and public constitutionalism – informed by legal-historical and sociological perspectives – has appeared in the nation’s leading law reviews. And his recent book, ‘Copyfraud and Other Abuses of Copyright Law’ (Stanford University Press, 2011) places him in the midst of active debates about the appropriate scope of copyright protection, arguing that companies routinely assert copyright claims that are overly expansive, thus impinging on fair use and the public domain. We

are thrilled to welcome a scholar of this stature and influence to the Urbana campus and the College of Law.”

Why Illinois? “Illinois is home to one of the three or four strongest faculties in the United States at work in interdisciplinary research,” Mazzone said. “The College of Law is also at the forefront of developing innovative measures to prepare its students for the challenges of legal practice in the 21st century. Geography also matters. Our modern Constitution is that of Lincoln rather than of Madison and Jefferson. For a constitutional scholar, Illinois is practically an inevitability.” u

Hedda Meadan-Kaplansky

an assistant professor of special education in the College of Education

Education: Ph.D. (special education), UI; M.A. (special education), B.S. (biology), Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Courses teaching: SPED 583, Single-subject Research Design

Research Interests: Social-emotional and communication behavior of children with disabilities and intervention methods to enhance these spheres of functioning.

“Dr. Meadan is passionate about her

work with young children with social communication needs, in particular, children with autism spectrum disorders,” said Michaelene Ostrosky, the head of the department of special education. “Hedda cares deeply about working with the families of children who struggle and helping family members learn strategies to support their children’s development at home and in the community. Her knowledge and skills make her a wonderful addition to the department and the

Champaign-Urbana community.”

Why Illinois? “I completed my Ph.D. here about eight years ago and knew that this was the kind of place I would like to be in the future,” said Meadan-Kaplansky. “I chose to come back to the UI because of the people (that I now) have the privilege to work with every day and the wonderful supportive work environment. I look forward to collaborating on interdisciplinary research projects with students and faculty members across campus.” u

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Nov. 29, 2012 InsideIllinois PAGE 7

brief notesMoms Association

Medallion of Honor nominations soughtThe Moms Association seeks nominations for its most

prestigious award, the bronze Medallion of Honor. Nomi-nations must be submitted by 5 p.m. Dec. 21.

The award was created in 1966 to recognize people who, by example and service, used their talents to enrich the lives of others. Since 1977, this award has been bestowed annu-ally upon a woman affiliated with the UI’s Urbana campus. Nominations are limited to women of current or past affili-ation with the UI.

The recipient will be honored during Moms Weekend 2013, April 12-14, at the organization’s annual meeting.

The Moms Association values the opportunity to hon-or pivotal leaders and to celebrate the achievement of all women affiliated with the UI. This award will be presented to the nominee whose contributions most reflect the stan-dards established by the association.

A valid nomination must include the nominee’s bio-graphical information and two letters of support. All docu-mentation must be submitted to Moms Association, Medal-lion of Honor Committee, 227 Illini Union, MC-384, 1401 W. Green St., Urbana, IL 61801 or uofiparents@illinois.edu. Questions may be submitted to J.B. Bailey, of the Illini Union Parent Programs Office, at jmbail@illinois.edu. u

Free guide makes it easier to find the right books for childrenBy Dusty RhodesArts and Humanities Editor

Holiday shoppers hoping to please the youngsters on their gift lists can turn to the “Guide Book to Gift Books” published by the Center for Chil-

dren’s Books at the UI. The annual guide, compiled by Deborah Stevenson, the editor of The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books – a leading book review journal for school and public librarians – provides one-sentence descriptions of more than 350 of the best re-cently published volumes of youth literature, along with both traditional and e-book prices.

The guide can be downloaded, free of charge, at bccb.lis.illinois.edu/GB2/2012GB2.html, making it conve-nient to consult on a smartphone or tablet while brows-ing at a bookstore.

The guide begins with picture books, including board books for infants and toddlers and books to help little ones prepare for a new sibling or pet, conquer potty training or drift off to sleep. There are books featuring all manner of animals, from the requisite bears, mon-keys, owls, ponies and rabbits, to beavers, seals, sharks, slugs, spiders, worms and walruses. There’s even a book for girls who don’t like the color pink (“Olivia and the Fairy Princesses,” by Ian Falconer) and another book

targeting girls who do (“Pink Me Up,” by Charise Harper).

Stevenson has ar-ranged the guide by age groups, ending with books for seventh grad-ers through high school. This section includes an abundance of myster-ies, horror stories and tales of young love (of the first, unrequited and doomed varieties), and books on substantive topics such as sexual identity, illness (cancer, multiple sclerosis and Asperger’s syndrome) and death. There’s also a plethora of books based on twists of the classics, such as “Little Vampire Women,” by Louisa May Alcott and Lynn Messina; “Jane” (April Lindner’s modern re-telling of “Jane Eyre”); “This Dark Endeavor” (Kenneth Oppel’s prequel to “Frankenstein”); and “The Odyssey” told in graphic novel form by Gareth Hinds. u

ON THE WEB

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something useful, in medicine and the environment. The applications could be many, depending on what cell types we use and where we want to go with it.”

Next, the team will work to en-hance control and function, such as integrating neurons to direct motion or cells that respond to light. They are also working on creating robots of different shapes, different num-bers of legs, and robots that could climb slopes or steps.

“The idea here is that you can do it by forward-engineering,” said Bashir, who is the director of the

Micro and Nanotechnology Labora-tory. “We have the design rules to make these millimeter-scale shapes and different physical architectures, which hasn’t been done with this level of control. What we want to do now is add more functionality to it.”

“I think we are just beginning to scratch the surface in this regard,” said graduate student Vincent Chan, first author of the paper. “That is what’s so exciting about this tech-nology – to be able to exploit some of nature’s unique capabilities and utilize it for other beneficial purpos-es or functions.”

The National Science Founda-tion supported this work through a Science and Technology Center grant (Emergent Behavior of Inte-grated Cellular Systems). Gradu-ate student Mitchell Collens, post-doctoral researcher Kidong Park, chemical and biological engineer-ing professor Hyunjoon Kong, and mechanical science and engineer-ing professor Taher Saif were co-authors of the paper. Bashir also is affiliated with the Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory and the Institute for Genomic Biology at the UI. u

Walk this way  Miniature “bio-bots” developed at the UI are made of hydrogel and heart cells, but can walk on their own.

Illustration by Elise A. Corbin

BIO-BOTS, CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

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PAGE 8 InsideIllinois Nov. 29, 2012

New structures self-assemble in synchronized danceBy Liz Ahlberg

Physical Sciences Editor

With self-assembly guiding the steps and synchroniza-tion providing the rhythm, a new class of materials forms

dynamic, moving structures in an intricate dance.

Researchers from the UI and North-western University have demonstrated tiny spheres that synchronize their movements as they self-assemble into a spinning mi-crotube. Such in-motion structures, a blend-ing of mathematics and materials science, could open a new class of technologies with applications in medicine, chemistry and en-gineering. The results were published in the Nov. 22 edition of the journal Nature.

“The world’s concept of self-assembly has been to think of static structures – something you would see in a still image,” said Steve Granick, a Founder Professor of Engineering at the UI and a co-leader of the study. “We want shape-shifting structures. Structures where a photograph doesn’t tell you what matters. It’s like the difference be-tween a photograph and a movie.”

The researchers used tiny particles called Janus spheres, named after the Roman god with two faces, which Granick’s group de-veloped and previously demonstrated for self-assembly of static structures. In this study, one half of each sphere is coated with a magnetic metal. When dispersed in solution and exposed to a rotating magnetic field, each sphere spins in a gyroscopic mo-tion. They spin at the same frequency but all face a different direction, like a group of dancers in a ballroom dancing to the same beat but performing their own steps.

As two particles approach one another, they synchronize their motions and begin spinning around a shared center, facing op-posite directions, similar to the way a cou-ple dancing together falls in step looking at

one another.“They are both magnetized, which

causes them to attract each other, but be-cause they’re moving, they have to move in sync,” said Erik Luijten, a professor of ma-terials science and engineering and of ap-plied mathematics at Northwestern Univer-sity who co-led the research with Granick.

Soon, the pairs and clusters of dancing spheres assemble themselves into a micro-tube – a long, hollow structure. The entire tube spins, even as each individual sphere continues its motion as well, like dancers in a line dance completing their individual steps as the line moves.

“It’s spontaneous. We don’t force it to

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form,” said UI graduate student Jing Yan, the first author of the paper. “We saw that during the self-assembly process, the syn-chronization also happens. If you look at the spheres, every one is doing a different thing. Only when they come in close con-tact will they do something cooperatively. The two concepts are intricately related in this system.”

Now that the researchers have detailed the delicate choreography of synchroniza-tion and self-assembly, they hope to explore applications for this new class of moving structures. One potential application of a dynamic, self-assembled microtube is to transport and release cargo. A particle or

collection of molecules could be encapsu-lated in the tube and transported to a differ-ent location. Then, the tube can be disinte-grated, releasing the cargo at a target point.

“We’re looking for the new applica-tions that people haven’t dreamt up yet be-cause they didn’t have the capability,” said Granick, a professor of materials science and engineering.

Next, the researchers are working to fur-ther understand the properties governing synchronized self-assembly and ways to guide it for functionality, such as manipu-lating the structures with an electrical or magnetic field. They also plan to explore directing the Janus spheres to synchronized self-assembly of other shapes and struc-tures, allowing even more applications.

“Traditionally in self-assembly, you make a specific building block that will organize into a specific structure,” Luijten said. “If you want a different structure you have to make a different building block. Here now, with one building block, we can control the structure by exploiting the syn-chronization effect.”

The U.S. Army Research Office, the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation supported this work. UI research scientist Sung Chul Bae and Northwestern University graduate student Moses Bloom were co-authors of the paper. Granick also is affiliated with the Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory and with the departments of chemistry, physics, biophysics, and chemical and biomolecular engineering at Illinois. Luijten also is asso-ciated with the department of engineering sciences at Northwestern University.

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Dancing spheres Researchers from the UI and Northwestern University demonstrated tiny spheres that synchronize their movements as they self-assemble into a spinning microtube. From left, Erik Luijten, a professor of materials science and engineering and of applied mathematics at Northwestern University; UI graduate student Jing Yan; Steve Granick, a Founder Professor of Engineering; and Sung Chul Bae, a UI research scientist.

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