August 11, 2020

Hello, everyone,

You know the “good news-bad news” scenario, in which someone asks you to decide which kind of news you want to hear first? Well, I’m pleased to reassure you that this is a “good news-good news” message, and so you don’t even have to decide!

As I hope many of you already saw in SOURCE last week, Colorado State University’s research enterprise was just recognized on an extraordinary list of 10 research universities that are engaged in fighting COVID by working on vaccines, treatment, testing, contagion mapping, contact tracing, data analysis, and education. We’re at #4, after Harvard, Oxford, and a joint Harvard-MIT Institute. More to the point,  as the story associated with this recognition notes, we currently have more than 125 investigators engaged in more than 170 COVID related research projects.

This recognition is exciting, and richly deserved. But we don’t do what we do at CSU for recognition. On the contrary, like all the research, scholarship, and creative work our faculty, staff and students do, our COVID research is something we are committed to because we want to improve our world, save lives, and create brighter future.

I am so proud of this commitment, and of the incredible work ethic that drives our CSU researchers. And I respect how humble and hard-working all of you are.  But sometimes you just need to be celebrated, and I am delighted to take this opportunity to do that.

So in addition to our recent appearance on a national “Ten Best” list for our COVID research, here are just a few other amazing achievements by researchers at CSU:

• Jan Leach, an international authority on how plants resist disease-causing microbes has received the Award of Distinction from the American Phytopathological Society (APS). This award has only been bestowed 16 times in 112 years.
• Brad Reisfeld, a professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, has been selected as a Fellow of the Academy of Toxicology Sciences – one of the highest honors awarded by his peers for an exemplary record of professional accomplishment.
• James Hurrell, Scott Presidential Chair in Environmental Science and Engineering in the Department of Atmospheric Science, has earned three American Meteorological Society honors.
• Nikki Seymour, who received a doctoral degree in geosciences from CSU earlier this year, has received a postdoctoral fellowship from the National Science Foundation.
• Civil engineer Susan DeLong and microbiologist Carol Wilusz have teamed up with researchers at GT Molecular to expand Colorado’s capacity to test wastewater for coronavirus. They were featured in KUNC last week.
• Kristy Pabilonia, Director of Clinical Diagnostics, has partnered with researchers Nicole Ehrhart and Greg Ebel on a statewide study of asymptomatic employees of skilled nursing facilities.

Congratulations to all these wonderful researchers from across the university—and to the countless others who are also doing powerfully transformative work in a variety of fields!

If you enjoyed this taste of our research story, mark your calendar for the upcoming release of the annual CSU Research Magazine. The 2020 issue will be available in late September and will feature CSU COVID research and innovation. And I urge you to take a moment this week or next and reach out to a colleague, a mentor, or a student whose work in the lab, in the field, or in a creative space inspires you. If this pandemic and the enforced distancing it has imposed on us all has taught us anything, surely it’s taught us how much we all need human connection.

I know that you are all gearing up for the fall semester. I thank you for your energy and commitment, and I truly hope to see you on campus soon!

Warmly,

Joyce