New Faculty Highlighted

 

A criminal justice professor studying life after incarceration, a psychologist researching the impact of insulin on the brain, and an independent filmmaker are among the new faculty members who have joined the University at Albany this fall.

Jamie Fader, who has joined UAlbany's School of Criminal Justice, studies youth incarceration, prisoners re-entering society, and the collateral consequences of mass imprisonment. She is concluding a study of young, black men returning to Philadelphia from a juvenile correctional facility designed to address �criminal thinking errors.� Her project has documented the lives of the men for more than three years as they navigated the dual transition from confinement to community and adolescence into young adulthood.

"Imprisonment among poor black men has become so widespread that it has become a standard stage of the transition to adulthood, even more common than completing high school and getting married," said Fader. "Although we are quick to lock offenders up, we must realize that most will return to their communities someday. Incarceration diminishes their opportunities to become productive citizens by weakening their ties to family members and making it even more difficult to find steady employment."

Ewan McNay joined the Department of Psychology this fall as a new faculty member in Behavioral Neuroscience. His lab is housed in the new Life Sciences Research Building. McNay brings with him a $1.4 million NIH grant studying diabetes and memory. The grant runs through 2012, and funds McNay's investigation into how insulin affects the brain. In particular, he is focusing on a role for insulin in modulation of cognitive processes within the hippocampus, a key brain region for learning and memory. His research will also contribute to society's understanding of why patients who have Type 2 diabetes have an increased risk of developing Alzheimer's disease.

"Our work has shown that insulin � long known to be a key regulator of whole-body glucose metabolism � also plays a vital role in regulation of cognitive processes within the brain," said McNay. "Moreover, patients with Type 2 diabetes, which has roughly 200 million patients worldwide right now, a number that's increasing � may also have lowered cognitive ability because of impaired insulin signaling in the brain. Still worse, this also leads directly to the development of Alzheimer's disease." McNay was assistant professor in Neuroendocrinology at Yale before joining  UAlbany.

Sheila Curran Bernard holds a joint appointment as associate director of the Documentary Studies Program, where she is based in the Department of History, and director of media programs at the New York State Writers Institute (NYSWI). Bernard is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning filmmaker and consultant, and the author of two popular texts, Documentary Storytelling and Archival Storytelling (with Kenn Rabin), both for Focal Press/Elsevier. She specializes in nonfiction media storytelling -- from museum installations to Imax films and multi-part PBS series -- and has created and/or overseen the production of media projects for a range of clients

2008-09 New Faculty

At the end of each listing is the faculty member's prior affiliation.

Fall 2008:

� Stephanie Affinito, Staff Associate, Reading, University at Albany
� Sheila Curran Bernard, Documentary Studies Program, Department of History, and NYSWI (joint appointment)/ independent filmmaker, author, and consultant
� Carl Bon Tempo, Assistant Professor, History, Princeton University
� Gregory DiRienzo, Associate Professor, Epidemiology & Biostatistics, Harvard University
� Harry Efstathiadis, Assistant Professor, Nanoscale Science & Engineering, University at Albany
� David Ericson, Service Associate Professor, Political Science, Princeton University
� Jamie Fader, Assistant Professor, Criminal Justice, University of Pennsylvania
� Michael Ford, Assistant Professor, Psychology, George Mason University
� Lisa Fuller, Assistant Professor, Philosophy, University of Toronto
� Adam Gordon, Assistant Professor, Anthropology, George Washington University
� Jeong-Hyon Hwang, Assistant Professor, Computer Science, Brown University
� Loretta Kim, Assistant Professor, History, Harvard University
� Kir Kuiken, Assistant Professor, English, University of Illinois, Chicago
� James Lasdun, Associate Professor, NYSWI, Princeton University
� Siwei Lyu, Assistant Professor, Computer Science, New York University
� Aaron Major, Assistant Professor, Sociology, New York University
� Jolene Malavasic, Staff Associate, Reading, State University College at Cortland
� Ewan McNay, Assistant Professor, Psychology, Yale University
� Barbara Nagler, Service Associate Professor, Educational Administration & Policy Studies, NYS Council of School Superintendents
� Tomas Urayoan Noel, Assistant Professor, English, New York University
� Alandeom Oliveira, Assistant Professor, Educational Theory & Practice, Indiana University, Bloomington
� Huaming Peng, Assistant Professor, Economics, Yale University
� Alex Pieterse, Assistant Professor, Educational & Counseling Psychology, George Mason University
� Unnikrishnan Pillai, Assistant Professor, Nanoscale Science & Engineering, University of Minesota, Twin Cities
� Loretta Pyles, Assistant Professor, Social Welfare, Tulane University
� Alison Redlich, Assistant Professor, Criminal Justice, Policy Research Associates, Delmar
� Ellen Rubin, Assistant Professor, Public Administration & Policy, University of Georgia
� Torrey Shanks, Assistant Professor, Political Science, University of British Columbia
� Donghee Sinn, Assistant Professor, Information Studies, University of Pittsburgh
� Ryan Torn, Assistant Professor, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences, University of Washington
� Ying Wang, Assistant Professor, Finance, Pennsylvania State University
� Stephen Weinberg, Assistant Professor, Public Administration & Policy, Duke
� Meredith Weiss, Assistant Professor, Political Science, East West Center, Washington
� Boris Yoruk, Assistant Professor, Economics, Boston College
� Bin Yu, Assistant Professor, Nanoscale Science & Engineering, University of California, Berkeley

Spring 2008:
� Rosemary Armao, Assistant Professor, Communication/Journalism Center for Investigative Reporting
� Kristie Asaro, Academic Fellow, Educational & Counseling Psychology, University at Albany
� Michael Bloom, Assistant Professor, Environmental Health Sciences, Center for Health and Preventive Medicine
� Pinka Chatterji, Assistant Professor, Economics, Cambridge Health Alliance, Harvard
� John Elter, Professor, Nanoscale Science & Engineering, Plug Power, Inc.
� Samantha Friedman, Associate Professor, Sociology, Northeastern University
� Makoto Hirayama, Research Professor, Nanoscale Science & Engineering, Tokyo Electron
� Norma Tavakoli, Assistant Professor, Biomedical Sciences, New York State Department of Health
� Martin Tenniswood, Empire Innovation Professor, Biomedical Sciences, University of Notre Dame
� Mathias Vuille, Assistant Professor, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
� Wei Wang,  Assistant Professor, Nanoscale Science & Engineering, Indiana University-Purdue University
� Jo Ellen Welsh, Empire Innovation Professor, Environmental Health Sciences, University of Notre Dame
� Mark Wolfe, Senior Assistant Librarian, Libraries, Digital Collections, Albany Medical College
� Recai Yucel, Assistant Professor Epidemiology & Biostatistics, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

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