Notables

Herpetologist Harry Greene, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, was one of two recipients this past year of the E. O. Wilson Naturalist Award, presented at the American Society of Naturalists annual meeting in Bloomington, Ind., in June. Greene has authored numerous publications and wrote the award-winning Snakes, The Evolution of Mystery in Nature (1997).

The Wilson award is given to an active investigator in midcareer who has made significant contributions to the knowledge of a particular ecosystem or group of organisms. The other Wilson Award winner was Richard Shine, from the University of Sidney.

Stephen Zinder, professor and chair of the Department of Microbiology, was elected in December to fellowship in the American Academy of Microbiology. He was honored for a distinguished career in applied and environmental research. Zinder's work uncovered a strain of the bacterium Dehalococcoides ethenogenes that converts cancer-causing solvents found in groundwater into a simple and harmless hydrocarbon, ethylene. Academy fellows are elected by their peers based on their records of outstanding contributions to microbiology, scientific achievement and leadership. ASM is the world's oldest and largest life science organization and has more than 42,000 members worldwide.

The Latino Studies Program has announced the recipients of its second annual LSP research awards for undergraduate and graduate students. The $500 grants are awarded to students to engage in research projects that enhance the understanding and knowledge of the Latino experience in the United States.

The LSP grant winners and the titles of their research projects are as follows: Faye Christine Caronan '01, English: "Filipino and Latino American Theater"; Nicole Guidotti-Hernández, Ph.D. candidate, English: "Writing Race, Writing Experiences of Violation: The Politics of Chicana Literary Representations of Violence in the United States, 1872-1995"; Ernesto Martínez, Ph.D. candidate, English: "Queer Latino/a Literature and Culture"; and Annette Portillo, Ph.D. candidate, English: "Chicana and Native American Women." Grant recipients will present some of their work later this spring during an informal cafe con leche sponsored by LSP at the Latino Living Center.

A multistate research group that includes Ramona Heck, professor of policy analysis and management and the J. Thomas Clark Fellow of Entrepreneurship and Personal Enterprise, has been named the winner of a prestigious award for its research on family businesses. The group's project, Family Business Viability in Economically Vulnerable Communities, a U.S. Department of Agriculture Northeastern Multistate Research Project, has won the Northeastern Regional Agricultural Experimentation Directors Research Award for Excellence. The award was to be presented Jan. 30 at the group's annual meeting at the University of Maryland, College Park, Md.

The research group, composed of 12 land-grant institutions, has collaborated since 1987 and has studied 794 family businesses in great detail.