Monday
Andrew Edelblum – University of Dayton
Does Sex Sell? Not Always
Andrew Edelblum is a University of Dayton assistant professor of management and marketing whose work explores identity, ethics, branding and consumer culture. A member of the American Marketing Association and the Association for Consumer Research, he teaches or has taught courses in buyer behavior, marketing research and social media marketing. His research spans consumer-brand relationships, digital culture, and technology.
Tuesday
Erik Lie – University of Iowa
Catching Cheats
Erik Lie is a professor of finance at the University of Iowa and author of Catching Cheats: Everyday Forensics to Unmask Business Fraud. In 2002, he began researching executive compensation, and using large databases, he documented strong patterns of manipulation of stock option grants. He brought them to the attention of the SEC and Wall Street Journal, which resulted in a massive SEC investigation, numerous lawsuits, congressional hearings, the firings of at least seventy corporate executives, and a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for the Wall Street Journal. In 2007, Time magazine included him in its list of the 100 most influential people in the world.
Wednesday
James Richie-Dunham – University of Texas at Austin
Well-Being is Critical to How a Work Team Performs
James L. Ritchie-Dunham is a clinical associate professor of strategy in The University of Texas at Austin’s McCombs School of Business. The strategic systems-change frameworks he developed have guided thousands of groups through hundreds of initiatives in banking, building renovation, development, education, energy, health, insurance, manufacturing, and the sustainable development goals of the United Nations.
Thursday
Shruti Sharma – Tufts University
Brain Inflammation May Not Always Be a Villain
Shruti Sharma is an assistant professor of immunology at Tufts University School of Medicine. She earned her B.Sc. and M.Sc. from the University of Mumbai in India and a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland, College Park. Dr. Sharma’s research explores how the body senses danger signals from both germs and its own cells—and how those signals help control inflammation and repair damaged tissues. Her lab aims to uncover how these immune defense strategies contribute to a state of health and why these same defense systems sometimes go awry, contributing to diseases linked to aging, autoimmunity, and neurodegeneration.
Friday
Joel Leja – Penn State University
Mysterious ‘Red Dots’ in Early Universe May Be ‘Black Hole Star’ Atmospheres
Joel Leja is the Dr. Keiko Miwa Ross Mid Career Endowed Faculty Chair and an Associate Professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Penn State University. He researches how galaxies like the Milky Way form over cosmic time, using ground-and space-based telescopes, large cosmic surveys, and supercomputers. He specializes in modeling observations of distant galaxies and in data-intensive methodologies applied to astrophysics.
