[Chronicle]

April 3, 1997
Vol. 16, No. 14

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    $500,000 in renewal grants awarded to U of C/Argonne collaborators

    Funding for joint University/Argonne projects now totals more than $1 million Scientists exploring problems ranging from photosynthesis to the origin of matter formed in stars have received more than $500,000 in renewal grants through the University of Chicago/Argonne National Laboratory Collaborative Seed Grant Program.

    The projects, all of which received one-year funding last spring, were the first to be awarded through the program, which was created to encourage joint initiatives by researchers at the University and at Argonne. The program provides funding for imaginative proposals that might not fall within the current framework of the standard granting agencies, according to David Schramm, Vice President for Research and Louis Block Distinguished Service Professor in the Physical Sciences.

    The competitive grants are open to all areas of mutual interest to the University and Argonne and require a principal investigator from each institution.

    The proposals were evaluated by a committee chaired by Schramm and Dean Eastman, Director of Argonne, that included the University's Deans and Argonne's Associate Laboratory Directors.

    Earlier this year, researchers at the University and Argonne were awarded $500,000 for new Collaborative Seed Grant projects, with funding provided primarily through the U.S. Department of Energy's performance fees to the University for the management of Argonne and through related institutional funds. With the second-year renewal of nearly all of last year's projects, the total for the entire program this year is more than $1 million.

    Proposals winning renewal grants, and their principal investigators are:

    "Solid-State NMR Conformational Analysis of Apolipoproteins at Lipophilic Interfaces," David Lynn, Professor in Chemistry, Stephen Meredith, Associate Professor in Pathology, and Robert Botto, Chemistry Division at Argonne.

    "The Role of Mycorrhizal Fungal Diversity in Ecosystem Functioning and Plant Community Diversity," Ellen Simms, Assistant Professor in Ecology & Evolution, and Michael Miller, Environmental Research Division at Argonne.

    "Theory of Unusual Metal-Insulator Transitions in Perovskite Manganese Oxides," Kathryn Levin, Professor in Physics, and Michael Norman, Materials Science Division at Argonne.

    "Atom Optics: Applications to Problems in Surface and Synchrotron Based Atomic Physics," Steven Sibener, Professor in Chemistry, and Linda Young, Physics Division at Argonne.

    "Towards Understanding the Origin of Matter Formed in Stars and the Sources of Galactic Cosmic Rays," John Simpson, the Arthur Holly Compton Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus in Physics, and John Schiffer, Physics Division at Argonne.

    "Investigation of the Charge Ordered State in Rare-Earth Manganites," Thomas Rosenbaum, Professor in Physics, and John Mitchell, Materials Science Division at Argonne.

    "Electronic Interactions Through Fluids," Philip Eaton, Professor in Chemistry, and John Miller, Chemistry Division at Argonne.

    "Mechanism of Biophotolysis in the Absence of PSI," Laurens Mets, Associate Professor in Molecular Genetics & Cell Biology, and Marion Thurnauer, Chemistry Division at Argonne.

    Continued funding was also awarded for the ANL/UC Resource Center for Computational Science. Funding for this project was provided through the Energy Department-University management contract performance fee, as well as through alternative University and Argonne sources. The center is headed jointly by Robert Rosner, Professor and Chairman of Astronomy & Astrophysics, and Rick Stevens, Director of the Mathematics and Computer Science Division at Argonne.