1. K-State home
  2. »About K-State
  3. »Stats and Strengths
  4. »K-State achievements
  5. »2012
  6. »2012 Arts and Sciences Achievements

About K-State

2012 Arts and Sciences Achievements

* Geraldine Craig, head of the department of art, was invited to be the 2012-2013 Dorothy Liskey Wampler eminent professor at the School of Art, Design and Art History at James Madison University, Harrisonburg, Va. Previous Wampler professors make up a select list of distinguished artists and scholars, and include Bill Viola, Peter Plagens, Lucy Lippard, Xu Bing, Clarence Morgan, James Wines, Donald Kuspit, Suzi Gablik and the Women’s Studio Workshop. December 2012

* Kimetris Baltrip, assistant professor in journalism, was selected a 2013 fellow to the Scripps Howard Journalism Entrepreneurship Institute Jan. 2-6, 2013, at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication in Phoenix, Ariz. November 2012

* Artem Rudenko, assistant professor of physics at Kansas State University, was one of the principal investigators in an international physics collaboration that used the world's most powerful X-ray laser to supercharge an atom for the first time. By stripping a record number of electrons from a xenon atom, researchers were able to covert the atom to an intense positive energy state thought to be unobtainable. The findings will help scientists create and study extreme new states of matter, such as highly charged plasma, and record better atomic images and data. November 2012

* Martin "Tucker" Wilson, senior in English, was awarded a Phi Kappa Phi Study Abroad Grant to fund a trip he took to Spain as part of the university's modern languages study abroad program. The honor society awards 50 $1,000 grants each year to help support undergraduates as they seek knowledge and experience in their academic fields by studying abroad. October 2012

* Vern Wirka, journalism and mass communications instructor and KSDB-FM chief operator and faculty adviser, now serves as the vice chair for Kansas Chapter 3 of the Society of Broadcast Engineers. The chapter members elected Wirka at the Kansas Association of Broadcasters convention. October 2012

* James R. Hamilton, professor of philosophy, was elected to the board of trustees of the American Society for Aesthetics. October 2012

* Peter Dorhout, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, was appointed to the American Association for the Advancement of Science steering committee of the science and human rights coalition as a representative of the American Chemical Society board of directors. As part of his responsibilities, Dorhout serves as one of six members, plus a staff member, responsible for directing implementation of policies developed to address scientific freedom and human rights challenges and abuses. October 2012

* Matthias Kling, assistant professor of physics, has received the Early Career Research Program Award from the U.S. Department of Energy. Kling will receive $750,000 to support his research titled "Electron Dynamics in Nanostructures in Strong Laser Fields." Aug. 2012

* Kristin Michel, assistant professor of biology, has been appointed to a one-year term on the Department of Health and Human Services' Vector Biology Study Section, Center for Scientific Review. Study section members are selected on their demonstrated competence and achievement in their scientific discipline as evidenced by the quality of research accomplishments, publications in scientific journals and other significant activities, achievements and honors. July 2012

* Katherine Karlin, assistant professor of English, won the 2011 Balcones Fiction Prize from Austin Community College Creative Writing for her book "Send Me Work," which is also a 2012 Kansas Notable Book. Published by TriQuarterly, "Send Me Work" is a collection of fictional stories about working American women. July 2012

* Lisa Tatonetti, associate professor of English, received a silver medal in the 2012 Independent Publisher Book Awards in the anthologies category for the book "Sovereign Erotics: A Collection of Two-Spirit Literature." Published by the University of Arizona Press, Tatonetti is co-editor of the collection and co-author of the book's introduction. July 2012

* Saad Alsubaie, doctoral student in security studies, has been offered a position as a distinguished international security studies fellow at the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations. June 2012

* Cameron Hunter, plant pathology-based doctoral student in the interdisciplinary genetics graduate program, won a Eukaryotic Cell Outstanding Young Investigator award in recognition of a stellar research presentation at the 2012 Gordon Research Conference on Cellular and Molecular Fungal Biology. The award is sponsored by the American Society for Microbiology. Hunter presented work characterizing multiple nuclear localization signals that direct a key transcription factor of nutrient metabolic genes to the nucleus of cells in the genetic model eukaryote Aspergillus nidulans. June 2012

* A Fulbright award will help Joe Sutliff Sanders, assistant professor of English, further his research on one of the world's most famous cartoonists, Belgium's Hergé, the author of the "Tintin" series. Sanders will spend the spring 2013 semester teaching at the University of Luxembourg and spending some of his time at the Royal Library of Belgium in Brussels, home to an exclusive microfilm collection of comics by Hergé. June 2012

* Saad Alsubaie, doctoral student in security studies, has been offered a position as a distinguished international security studies fellow at the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations. June 2012

* Michael Wesch, associate professor of cultural anthropology, recently received an honorary doctorate from the Universidad de San Martin de Porres, Peru's largest university. Wesch was chosen for the honor because many of his ideas have been highly influential to the university and its educational programs. May 2012

* Caleb Wilson, sophomore in geography and natural resources and environmental sciences, is a recipient of the 2012 Ernest F. Hollings Scholarship from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration The scholarship offers a maximum of $8,000 per year for students with two years left of undergraduate study and a summer internship at a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration facility. May 2012

* Matthias Kling, assistant professor of physics, has received the Nernst-Haber-Bodenstein prize from the German Bunsen Society for Physical Chemistry. The award honors outstanding scientific achievements of young scientists in the area of physical chemistry. Kling received the award for his work on the control of electron and nuclear dynamics in molecules, in particular the laser-induced localization of electrons on femtosecond to attosecond timescales. May 2012

* Justin Prelogar, senior in political science and philosophy with a secondary major in international studies, received a 2012 Critical Language Scholarship for intensive summer institutes. It is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. While in China, Prelogar, receives four to five hours of Mandarin Chinese language instruction a day, five days a week. The program covers a year's worth of language study during the 10 weeks of his visit, along with providing cultural enrichment activities and excursions. More than 5,200 students applied for the scholarship, with 631 recipients from 240 educational institutions selected. April 2012

* Nora Johnson, a doctoral student in physics from Dell Rapids, S.D., was selected to attend the 62nd Lindau Meeting of Nobel Laureates dedicated to physics in Lindau, Germany. At the meeting, July 1-6, the laureates lecture on the topic of their choice in the mornings and participate in less formal, small group discussions with the students in the afternoons and some evenings. Johnson was nominated for the honor by Itzik Ben-Itzhak. She is part of his research group in atomic, molecular and optical physics at the J.M. Macdonald Laboratory. She also conducts the same research at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Germany. She was selected to attend by the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science. April 2012

* Radio work by Kansas State University students earned the most honors -- including the most first-place honors -- in the 2012 Kansas Association of Broadcasters' 2012 Student Broadcast Awards competition. Students earned 27 awards overall, including 16 first-place honors, six second-place honors and five honorable mentions. The honors were for work done by students at the university's FM radio station KSDB, the Wildcat 91.9, in the undergraduate and graduate divisions. Students also received honors for work done as radio station interns. April 2012

* The six members of the university's Putnam Mathematical Competition placed highly in the 72nd annual event. The team finished in the top 18 percent among the 572 colleges and universities and nearly 4,500 students participating in the competition. The university team had one member who placed in the top 14 percent of the competition: Hui Cao, senior in mathematics, Beijing, China. Other members finished in the top 18 percent and the top 43 percent. April 2012

* Ben Dietrixhe, junior in geography; Jim Wells, doctoral student in geography; and Tyra Olstad, doctoral student in geography, were on the six-member team Great Plains/Rocky Mountain Region team that won the 2012 World Geography Bowl at the annual meeting of the Association of American Geographers, Feb. 24-28, in New York City. Also on the team were students from the University of Colorado at Boulder, University of Colorado at Denver and the University of Wyoming. It's the second consecutive year that the Great Plains/Rocky Mountain team won the event. The 2011 team also had three K-State members. March 2012

* Lisa M. Butler Harrington, professor of geography, will receive the John Fraser Hart Award for Research Excellence from the Association of American Geographers' Rural Geography Specialty Group for her rural geography research. The award will be presented at the association's 2013 national meeting in Los Angeles, where the specialty group is planning a special session in her honor. The award was established to recognize scholars who have achieved and maintained excellence in the fields of agricultural and/or rural geography research. March 2012

* Donna Potts, associate professor of English, is the author of a new book that examines the poetic traditions of Irish culture by exploring the pastoral genre, a genre in which humans have an intimate connection with the land. In "Contemporary Irish Poetry and the Pastoral Tradition," Potts examines six Irish poets in her book who have written significant collections of pastoral poetry and whose work is in dialogue with both the pastoral tradition and other contemporary pastoral poets. The book is available at local bookstores, online retailers or directly from Chicago Distribution services. March 2012

* Andrew Sweeney,a junior in music and French education, is the recipient of the Pi Delta Phi Joseph W. Yedlicka Award. Sponsored by American University in Paris and Pi Delta Phi French honorary, Sweeney will spend seven weeks this summer studying in Paris. Pi Delta Pi presents four of the nationally competitive awards annually to students in the honorary, but only one of the awards is to Paris. March 2012

* Kendra McLauchlan, assistant professor of geography and director of the university's Paleoenvironmental Laboratory, was named by the Ad Astra Kansas Initiative as one of the top 150 scientists ever to work in Kansas throughout its 150 years of statehood. January 2012.

 

2011 Arts and Sciences

2010 Arts and Sciences

2009 Arts and Sciences

College of Arts and Sciences