The Academic Minute from 9.02 – 9.06
Monday
Kenneth G. Furton – Florida International University
The Scent You Leave Behind
Dr. Kenneth G. Furton is the executive director of the Global Forensic and Justice Center and the chief scientific officer of Florida International University. He is a distinguished university professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and a world-leading scholar in forensic chemistry focused on trace detection and olfaction. From 2007 to 2014, he served as dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, which he reorganized into three mission-based interdisciplinary schools to address some of the biggest issues facing society, raising $50M in philanthropic gifts and doubling research funding to $60M annually. From 2014 to 2022 he served as provost, executive vice president and chief operating officer of FIU where he has led the development and implementation of two FIU strategic plans helping to create a dynamic, results-oriented university with dramatic improvements in student success and research preeminence including simultaneously doubling the four-year graduation rates to over 60%, doubling research expenditures to $250M annually and a 30 fold increase in patents to more than 60 annually achieving a Top 20 patent ranking.
Tuesday
Diana Azzam – Florida International University
Treatments for Children with Relapsed Cancers
Diana Azzam, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at Florida International University. She has a Masters in Biochemistry from the American University of Beirut, Lebanon and a PhD in Biochemistry & Molecular Biology from the University of Miami, Florida. Her lab focuses on implementing functional precision medicine (FPM) approaches in adult and pediatric cancer patients that have run out of treatment options.
Wednesday
Melissa Baralt – Florida International University
Bilingualism Benefits Premature Children
Melissa Baralt’s funded studies explore how bilingualism moderates executive function in children born prematurely. She and her team are working with FIU’s biomedical engineering faculty to use Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS) to explore the neural recruitment of executive functioning in preterm-born children with different language environments. Dr. Baralt’s research also focuses on language-development interventions for young children, with a focus on bilingual language development.
Thursday
Jazmin Locke-Rodriguez – Florida International University
Flowers on Floating Islands Can Help Clean Waterways
Dr. Jazmin Locke-Rodriguez completed her doctoral research in the Fall of 2024 under the supervision of Dr. Krish Jayachandran, as part of both the Agroecology and NSF CREST Aquatic Chemistry programs. Currently, she is a Postdoctoral Research Associate with the FIU Institute of Environment, where she is conducting biofertilizer trials to evaluate the sustainability of recycling algae biomass as fertilizer. This research aims to provide a sustainable solution for clean water while delivering nutrients to farmers at a lower cost.
Friday
Laird Kramer – Florida International University
Creating A Calculus Course Where All Students Succeed
Laird Kramer’s work focuses on facilitating institutional change in STEM instruction through implementation of, and research on, evidence-based educational practices. He led transformation of the undergraduate physics experience at FIU, creating more well-prepared majors through the implementation modeling instruction-based studio physics courses. Recognizing the potential for large-scale transformation, he developed multiple initiatives to establish student-centric educational paradigms across the STEM fields and carry out research on their impact. These efforts grew into the STEM Transformation Institute, a STEM education laboratory for research, development and dissemination of strategies that will transform institutional educational practices to meet the national need for qualified STEM professionals.
