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Daniel Dunaief

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Jin Koda and Amanda Lee at the recent 243rd annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society in New Orleans. Photo by Jenny Zhang

By Daniel Dunaief

Hollywood is not the only place fascinated with the birth of stars. Indeed, researchers at Stony Brook University, among many other academic institutions, have focused considerable time, energy and effort into understanding the processes that lead to the creation of stars.

Astronomers had tried, unsuccessfully, to detect molecular clouds in the galaxy outskirts, which is how stars form in the inner part of galaxies.

About 18 years ago, a NASA satellite called GALEX discovered numerous newly formed stars at the edges of a spiral galaxy M83, which is 15 million light years from Earth. 

Leading an international team of scientists, Jin Koda, Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Stony Brook University, together with his former undergraduate student Amanda Lee, put together data and information from a host of sources to describe how these stars on the outer edge of the galaxy formed.

Their work demonstrated star-forming molecular clouds in this outer area for the first time.

“These molecular clouds at the galaxy edge are forming stars as much as the molecular clouds in normal parts of galaxies” such as molecular clouds around the sun, Koda explained.

Before their discovery, Koda said astronomers had considered that new-born stars at galaxy edges could have formed without molecular clouds.

Koda recently presented this work at the 243rd annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society in New Orleans.

Indeed, partnering with scientists from the United States, Japan, France and Chile, Koda, who is the Principal Investigator on the study, and Lee found evidence of 23 of these molecular clouds on the outskirts of the M83 galaxy.

Combining data from a host of telescopes for this research, Koda and Lee found “higher resolution than before,” Lee said. “We could see a peak of atomic hydrogen in that region, which we didn’t know before.”

While helium also exists in the molecular clouds in the galaxy edges as well as in the atomic gas and in stars, it does not emit light when it’s cold, which makes its signature harder to detect.

Scientists are interested in “why we weren’t able to detect these molecular clouds for such a long time,” Lee said. “We ended up using a different tracer than what is normally used.”

The group came up with a hypothesis for why the molecular clouds were difficult to find. Carbon monoxide, which typically helps in the search for such clouds, is dissociated in the large envelopes at the galaxy edges. Only the cores maintain and emit this gas.

A collaboration begins

When Lee, who grew up in Queens, started at Stony Brook University, she intended to major in physics. In her sophomore year, she took an astronomy class that Koda taught.

“I was very interested in studying galaxies and the evolution of galaxies,” Lee said.

After the course ended, she started working in Koda’s lab.

“Her tireless efforts made her stand out,” Koda explained in an email. Koda appreciates how speaking with students like Lee helps him think about his research results.

Lee is “particularly good at identifying and asking very fundamental questions,” he added.

At one point about two years before she graduated in 2022, Lee recalled how Koda shared a picture of M83 and described the mystery of star formation at the outskirts of galaxies.

Two years later, by delving into the data under Koda’s supervision, she helped solve that mystery.

“I didn’t know my work would end up contributing to this project,” Lee said. “It’s really exciting that I was able to contribute to the big picture of star formation” in distant galaxies.

Since graduating from Stony Brook, Lee has been a PhD student for the last year and a half at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

At this point, Lee is still working towards publishing a paper on some of the work she did in Koda’s lab that explores the formation of stars in the inner disk of M83.

“Broadly,” she said, the two research efforts are “all related to the same picture.”

For her part, Lee was pleased with the opportunity to work with such a geographically diverse team who are all contributing to the goal of understanding star formation.

Future focus

The area they observed is relatively small and they would like to see more regions in M83 and other galaxies, Koda explained.

Finding so many molecular clouds at once in the small region “encourages us to hypothesize that the process is universal,” although scientists need to verify this, Koda said.

The researchers also discovered more atomic gas than they would expect for the amount of molecular clouds. A compelling discovery, this observation raised questions about why this abundant atomic gas wasn’t becoming molecular clouds efficiently.

“We need to solve this mystery in future research,” Koda explained. He is pleased with the level of collaboration among the scientists. “It’s very interesting and stimulating to collaborate with the excellent people of the world,” he said.

A resident of Huntington, Koda grew up in Tokyo, where he earned his bachelor’s, master’s and PhD degrees. When he moved to the United States, Koda conducted post doctoral studies for six years at Cal Tech. 

About 15 years ago, he moved to Stony Brook, where he replaced Professor Phil Solomon, who was one of the pioneers of molecular cloud studies in the Milky Way galaxy.

Science appeals to Koda because he is “interested in how things work, especially how nature works,” he said.

In this work, Koda suggested that the molecular clouds have the same mass distribution as molecular clouds in the Milky Way, indicating that star formation is the same, or at least similar, between the Milky Way and galaxy edges.

Koda made the discovery of the molecular clouds and the hypothesis about the carbon monoxide deficient cloud envelope in 2022. Since then, he and his team have obtained new observations that confirmed that what they found were the “hearts of molecular clouds,” he said.

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By Daniel Dunaief

For the first time since May 2023, Brookhaven National Laboratory required masks on site at its facility starting on Jan. 8, as the rate of hospital admissions for the virus that caused the pandemic climbed.

Following the Safer Federal Workforce Task Force, BNL, which is a Department of Energy-sponsored site, reinstituted the mask policy once Covid admissions climbed above 20 per 100,000 people in the county, as determined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.

The CDC level rose to 24.8 on the evening of Jan. 5 and the lab re-implemented its mask requirement on the following Monday. Area doctors said they’ve seen an increase in illnesses tied to Covid, particularly after people traveled during the December holidays.

“We’ve seen a lot more Covid,” said Dr. Sharon Nachman, chief of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Stony Brook Children’s Hospital. 

Dr. Nachman said people who are talking to friends and neighbors are hearing regularly about those who are sick with Covid.

Stony Brook University Hospital is not requiring masking at all times. The hospital is recommending that people consider wearing masks. Medical staff entering patient rooms are wearing them.

People walking into the hospital will see “more people wearing masks” in general, she added. In addition to Covid, hospitals in the area are also seeing a “huge amount of flu,” Dr. Nachman said.

 

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Pixabay photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

Some historical phrases help shape and define the country the way landmarks like the Grand Canyon, Statue of Liberty, and Mt. Rushmore provide a distinct national identity.

One of those expressions, for me, is “rugged individualism.” The combination of the two words suggest independent thought, an ability to decide for ourselves, and a willingness to eschew tradition in favor of something more personal, practical and self-directed.

We don’t need kings and monarchs to tell us how to behave or to dictate from on high. We favor the stories of Americans whose humble origins offered hope to anyone born in a log cabin, a la Abraham Lincoln, or whose compassion inspired them to build houses for others, Jimmy Carter, perhaps, long after they were no longer the most powerful person on the planet.

We think for ourselves, we live with the view that we have unlimited potential and that we don’t need to have the right name or address to realize our dreams. Our self confidence allows us to imagine that we can become the next “Cinderella Man” or “Working Girl.”

And yet, we the people of the United States sometimes appear to be living lives that are filled with paint-by-the-numbers decisions and that involve following other people’s footprints in the snow.

Why? Have we and our children become so accustomed to group think that we don’t want to separate ourselves from the pack? Are we living in a world where we are desperate to conform?

Part of our collapse in independent thinking comes from corporate America. That faceless, nameless, profit churning machine, with its fake wooden boardrooms and its army of handlers and focus groups, has encouraged us to believe that buying their products, supporting their stores and following the trends is a way of asserting our independence.

It’s a clever ploy, my friends. They convince you that eating what everyone else eats, saying the same words everyone else says and wearing what everyone else wears helps you realize your potential.

The argument is an easy one to make, especially as you drive through Anytown USA. You see the same collection of franchised stores, with their predictable food and products and their well-oiled experiences, where it takes 5.6 minutes from the time you entered the store to get exactly the same soggy french fries in Dubuque, Iowa as it would in Setauket, New York.

We resist risk. Going into a restaurant with an unknown name means we might consume food that doesn’t taste familiar or good to us and that might give us indigestion as we move, like cattle, to the next predictable destination and engage in an echo of the same conversation we had last week, last month and last year.

I get it: it’s hard to decide to go to a unique store or restaurant in a town, particularly when the parking lot in the franchise chain next door is packed with people driving the same model and color cars we see on our roads back home.

Well, it’s 2024, and not 1984. We can and should make our own decisions. I would encourage you, your children and your friends to decide who you are and what that means. Yes, it’s hard and yes, people might hide behind the cloak of conformity to encourage you to do as they and everyone else does. They might even peck at you verbally, uncomfortable with differences and unsure of how to react to “the real you.”

If we fit in too well everywhere we go, we run the risk of disappearing. As Frank Sinatra suggests, it’s time to do things “My Way.” Yes, we might hate tuna fish with peanut butter, but at least we’ll be listening to our own voice and getting off a nonstop conveyor belt of conventional thought in which we follow the same roads, the same thoughts, and the same routines. Different? Different is good and, best of all, it’s up to you to decide what that means.

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James Konopka. Photo by Susan Watanabe

By Daniel Dunaief

Most of the time, the fungus Candida albicans, which is ubiquitous on the skin, inside people’s mouths, throat, and guts, among other places, doesn’t cause problems. It can, however, be an opportunistic infection, particularly in people who are immunocompromised, leading to serious illness and even death.

Antifungal infections work best during the early stage of an infection. Once a severe infection becomes established, it responds less well to drugs, as resistance can become a problem.

James “Jamie” Konopka, Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology in the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University, is working to find the mechanism that enables C. albicans to resist attack by the immune system. His long term goal is to identify ways to make the fungus more vulnerable to immune defenses.

In a paper published recently in the journal mBio, which is published by the American Society of Microbiology, Konopka identified the mechanism by which hypochlorous acid, which is produced by cells in the immune system, attacks C. albicans.

He expanded this by testing forms of the fungus that lack specific genes. These mutants can be more vulnerable to attack by hypochlorous acid, which is produced by neutrophils and is also called “human bleach.” Longer term, Konopka hopes to find ways to sensitize the fungus to this acid, which would bolster the ability of the immune system to respond to an infection.

His study showed that hypochlorous acid disrupts the plasma membrane, which is a layer of lipids that surround the cell. Once this is breached, parts of the cell leak out, while more bleach can damage the fungus.

Hypochlorous acid reacts with proteins, lipids and DNA.

The activated immune system produces several chemicals known as “reactive oxygen species.” In some cells, particularly neutrophils, hydrogen peroxide is converted into hypochlorous acid to strengthen and diversify the attack.

To be sure, the discovery of the mechanism of action of hypochlorous acid won’t lead to an immediate alternative therapeutic option, as researchers need to build on this study.

Future studies will examine how some genes promote resistance, and which are likely to be the most promising targets for drug development, Konopka explained.

Increase sensitivity

These are C. albicans cells growing invasively into tissue in a mouse model of an oral infection. The candida hyphae are stained black, and the tissue is stained a blue/green. Image from James Konopka

Konopka suggested that increasing the sensitivity of the fungus to hypochlorous acid would likely prove more effective and less potentially toxic than increasing the amount of the acid, which could also damage surrounding tissue.

“Our idea is to sensitize fungal pathogens” to hypochlorous acid “rather than upping the dose of bleach, which could lead to negative consequences,” Konopka said. Ideally, he’d like to “take the normal level and make it more effective” in eradicating the fungus.

Other scientists funded by the National Institutes of Health created a set of about 1,000 different strains of the fungus, which provides a valuable resource for Konopka and others in the scientific community.

In a preliminary screen of plasma membrane proteins, Konopka and his team found that most of the mutants had at least a small increase in sensitivity. Some, however, had stronger effects, which will guide future experiments.

One of the challenges in working with a fungus over pathogens like bacteria or viruses is that fungi are more closely related biologically to humans. That means that an approach that might weaken a fungus could have unintended and problematic consequences for a patient.

“Although they may look very different on the outside, the inner workings of fungi and humans are remarkably similar,” Konopka explained in an email. This has made it difficult to find antifungal drugs that are not toxic to humans.

An ‘overlooked’ ally

Konopka suggested that scientists have been studying hydrogen peroxide, which is also made by immune system combatants like macrophages and neutrophils.

“It seemed to us that somehow bleach had been overlooked,” Konopka said. “It hadn’t been studied in the fungal world, so we launched” their research.

Konopka also believes the plasma membrane represents an effective place to focus his efforts on developing new drugs or for making current drugs more effective. 

Hydrochlorous acid “fell into our wheel house,” he said. In initial tests, Konopka discovered that human bleach caused damage to the membrane within minutes if not sooner, allowing outside molecules to enter freely, which could kill the potentially dangerous infection.

Considering the ubiquitous presence of the fungus, immunocompromised people who might conquer an infection at any given time could still be vulnerable to a future attack, even after an effective treatment. Even people with a healthy immune system could be reinfected amid a large enough fungal load from a biofilm on a medical device or catheter.

Providing vulnerable people with a prophylactic treatment could lower the risk of infection. When and if those patients develop an ongoing and health-threatening infection, doctors could use another set of drugs, although such options don’t currently exist.

In other work, Konopka has identified proteins in C. albicans that help CoQ, or ubiquinone, protect the plasma membrane from oxidation by agents such as hydrogen peroxide and hypochlorous acid.

People can purchase ubiquinone at local stores, although Konopka urges residents to check with their doctors before taking any supplement.

Fish and beer

An organizer of a department wide Oktoberfest, Konopka was pleased that faculty, post doctoral researchers and students were able to decompress and enjoy the fall festival together for the first time since 2019.

In addition to a range of beer, attendees at the event, which occurred half way between the start of the semester and final exams, were able to partake in German food from Schnitzels in Stony Brook Village, which was a big hit.

An avid fly fisherman who catches and releases fish, Konopka said he caught some bigger striped bass this year than in previous years.

When he’s fishing, Konopka appreciates the way the natural world is interconnected. He pays attention to variables like the weather, water temperature, bait fish and the phases of the moon.

He particularly enjoys the wind and fresh air. This year, Konopka marveled at the sight of a bald eagle.

As for his work, Konopka said basic research may have an immediate effect or may contribute longer term to helping others in the scientific community build on his results, which could lead to the next breakthrough.

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Graphic showing the number of pertussis cases from 2019 to 2023 in Suffolk County. Photo courtesy Suffolk County Department of Health

Cases of whooping cough, which is caused by the Bordatella pertussis bacteria, have spiked in Suffolk County this year, raising concerns for the health of newborn babies who don’t have the kind of immunological tools to fight off the infection and its potential consequences.

The Suffolk County Department of Health reported that 113 people had whooping cough, which is dramatically higher than the four people suspected of contracting this bacteria last year.

Whooping cough is “highly contagious,” explained Dr. Gregson Pigott, Suffolk County Health Commissioner in an email. “It is a cyclical disease with outbreaks occurring every three to five years.”

A large majority of people who have pertussis – 105 of the 113 – reported contracting the illness after November 28th, according to Dr. Pigott. Most of those who are sick are school aged children and their families, he added. 

The surge in infections this year may be because immunity from the routine vaccination series, which is given between ages two months to six years, wanes over time.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that people receive the TDaP booster, which offers immunological protection from diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis, every 10 years.

Vaccination rates are “fairly high in Suffolk County, but we do know that some residents fell behind in their vaccinations during the height of the Covid pandemic,” Dr. Pigott added. 

A preventable problem

Doctors urged residents, particularly those who might be interacting with young children or whose health is compromised, to check with their doctors on their vaccination status.

“Pertussis is a completely preventable disease,” said Dr. Adrian Popp, Chair of Infection Control at Huntington Hospital.

Indeed, doctors suggested that some of the people who aren’t receiving the vaccine may have pulled back from their normal inoculations amid the political discussion about the Covid vaccine.

“Covid has polarized our society in terms of vaccinations,” said Dr. Popp. Pertussis has “fallen prey” to this kind of thinking.

The pertussis shot has been around for over 50 years and can prevent bacterial infection, doctors said.

The vaccine is “completely safe and efficacious,” said Dr. Galinkin, infectious disease specialist at Port Jefferson-based St. Charles Hospital.

Dr. Galinkin, who has been practicing medicine in Suffolk County since 2004, said this is the highest level of whooping cough he’s seen in the county.

Indeed, even before the pandemic, the number of people infected with pertussis was 64 in 2019, according to the Department of Health.

The pertussis vaccine doesn’t completely prevent infection, but it does create a much milder case than it would for those who have no immunity, doctors said.

The incidence of pertussis can wax and wane, said Dr. Sharon Nachman, chief of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Stony Brook Children’s Hospital. The increase in cases this year likely means that “it won’t happen next year” as people do what they can to protect themselves, their family and their community when the numbers rise, as they have this year.

Indistinct early symptoms

Like other respiratory illnesses that are actively circulating among the Suffolk County population, whooping cough starts out as a cough and can include a runny nose and a low grade fever.

 A whooping cough, however, often transitions into a more distinctive sound, as people who have it struggle to catch their breath after they cough.

Threat to infants

Health care providers suggested that pregnant mothers receive a booster for pertussis between the 27th and 36th week of pregnancy, which can not only reduce the risk of infection for the mom but can also provide some immunological benefit to the unborn child.

Doctors urged who are expecting a newborn to encourage anyone who has regular contact with the child in the first few months after birth to have updated immunizations, including for pertussis.

“The household of a newborn should consider being vaccinated,” said Dr. Popp. Infants who contract pertussis and who don’t have protection can develop complications such as encephalitis.

Pertussis is “an incredibly big problem for infants in the first year of life,” said Dr. Nachman.

Adults who contract pertussis can receive antibiotics, which generally eradicates the illness within five days. Untreated, however, pertussis symptoms and contagiousness can persist for weeks or even months.

Untreated pertussis can also lead to secondary pneumonia, added Dr. Nachman.

Respiratory illnesses climb

The combination of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), flu, and Covid continues to keep emergency rooms busy during the start of the new year.

Doctors urged adults who are immunocompromised or who are vulnerable to follow the same habits that reduced their risk during the worst of the pandemic, which includes washing their hands, keeping a safe distance from anyone who is sick, and wearing masks when they are in densely-populated indoor areas with less ventilation.

“You don’t necessarily want to isolate yourself to an extreme, but there are certain ways to decrease the chance of getting exposed to illnesses in general,” said Dr. Popp. People who are riding on crowded trains to and from work might want to search for cars that have fewer people when that’s an option, he suggested.

Hospitals are taking precautions to limit the likelihood of passing along infections. The staff in the emergency room at Stony Brook is wearing masks on rounds, said Dr. Nachman.

At this point, people who come to the hospital are offered masks, but are not required to wear them.

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Pixabay photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

The reality of aging is that we sometimes wake up feeling like we’ve got less than a full tank of gas, or, for those of you driving electric vehicles, a fully charged battery, with which to maneuver through the day.

Maybe our ankles are sore from the moment we imagined we could still dive across the grass to catch a foul ball. Perhaps, less ambitiously, we twisted our ankle when we took a bad step on a sidewalk as we did something much less heroic, like texting an old friend or playing a mindless video game. Or it hurts because it, like our jobs, our cars, and our homes, inexplicably needs attention.

What’s the antidote to the numerous headwinds that slow us down and make us feel exhausted earlier each day?

The start of a new year can provide that energy and inspiration. We get to write 2024 on our checks, if we’re still writing them, we can imagine a blank canvas on which we can reinvent ourselves, find new friends, get new jobs, travel to new places, live our values and contribute meaningfully to the world.

We can start jotting activities into that new calendar, smiling as we imagine seeing friends we haven’t seen in years or decades or fulfilling long-held desires to shape our lives, our bodies or both into what we’ve always imagined.

On a more immediate scale, we have other ways to boost our energy. We can grab a steaming hot cup of hot chocolate or coffee, loading our nervous system up with caffeine, which can wake us up and help us power through the next few hours.

We can also grab a donut, a cookie, or some other food loaded with sugar, knowing, of course, that we run the risk of emptying that short-energy tank quickly after the sugar rush ends.

I have discovered plenty of places I can go, literally and figuratively, to feel energized and inspired. My list includes:

Our children: Yes, they are draining and can be demanding and needy, but their youth and energy can be restorative. They take us to places we hadn’t been before, give us an opportunity to share books we might have missed in our own education and offer insights about themselves and their world that amaze us. Their different interests and thoughts keep us on our toes, focused and, yes, young, as we try to meet them where they live. As we relate to them, we can also imagine our own lives at that age.

Our pets: Watching a dog chase a ball, its tail or a frisbee, or observing a cat push a ball of string across the floor can be invigorating. If we threw that ball or tossed that string, we become a human partner in their games, giving us a role to play even as they expend considerably more effort in this entertaining exchange.

Nature: Energy surrounds us. Water lapping on the shores of Long Island at any time of year, small leaf buds responding to the cues of spring, and birds calling to each other through the trees can inspire us and help us feel alert, alive and aware of the symphony of life that serenades us and that invites us to participate in the evolving narrative around us.

Science: I have the incredible privilege of speaking with scientists almost every day. Listening to them discuss their work, when they don’t travel down a jargon rabbit hole filled with uncommon acronyms, is inspirational. The insatiable curiosity of scientists at any age  and any stage of their careers makes each discovery a new beginning. Each of their answers raises new questions. Scientists are always on the verge of the next hypothesis, the next great idea and the next adventure. Their energy, dedication and unquenchable thirst for knowledge invites listeners to participate in the next chapter in the evolving knowledge story.

Sunrises: Okay, if you’ve read this column often enough, you know I’m a morning person. I try to be quiet in the morning, for my family and for anyone else who stayed up late into the night. Sunrises, however, bring a welcome introduction to something new and original.

History: reading about or studying history puts our world into perspective. We not only can contrast previous time periods with today, but we also can enjoy and appreciate that we have the opportunity to share in and shape this moment.

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Bruce Stillman. Photo from CSHL

The toxic talk and policies towards immigrants in the United States is hurting American science and could threaten the country’s ability to compete in technology, an important economic driver.

That’s one of several messages Bruce Stillman, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory President and Chief Executive Officer, shared in an exclusive interview.

The attitude of some Americans towards immigrants, particularly amid the southern border issue, is “scaring a lot of people off, thinking about working in the United States,” said Stillman. Some of these talented immigrants are wondering why they would come to America. “The perception is that the US is not as welcoming as it used to be,” even for the immigration of highly skilled people, he added.

This hostility could have a detrimental top-down effect on science.

Indeed, immigrants have distinguished themselves, earning top prizes in science and accounting for 38 percent of the Nobel Prizes in physics, 34 percent in medicine and 37 percent in chemistry since 1901, according to Forbes.

“This is a very important economic and competitiveness issue,” said Stillman, who grew up in Australia.

It is increasingly difficult to recruit people from certain countries, particularly amid challenges getting visas, Stillman said.

Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory has an offer out to a “very talented scientist” who has been waiting for almost a year to receive a visa, he said.

Many people have an opinion on the way things ought to be, Stillman explained, including issues related to diversity, equity and inclusion.

“The dialog in the US is no longer civil, but now people are emboldened to attack those in leadership positions,” he explained in an email. “It is part of the wider adversarial dialog going on in America.”

Policies in some states like Florida create the impression, even to accomplished and dedicated workers, that the country does not want them to work here.

CSHL embraces “talented scientists who want to work in the US to come to CSHL,” he explained.

Major scientific recession

Apart from immigration policies that exclude a broad swath of people who might otherwise ensure American technological competitiveness, Stillman is also worried about how political logjams in Washington could limit future funding for science.

“The moderates on both sides of Congress need to come together to override those on the left wing of the Democratic party and those on the right wing in the Republican party,” he explained.

Stillman does not understand why most members of Congress don’t vote out the extremes. If everyone in the middle stood up, “they would be lauded by the general public,” Stillman wrote in an email.

Listening to the fringes of science on both sides who attack science raises the risk of maintaining a leadership position.

Still, he maintains that he is optimistic that the general public and the moderate majority will prevail.

Learning from history

As the leader of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory for 29 years, Stillman recognizes his institution’s role in a dubious chapter in American history.

Indeed, a century ago, the United States passed the Johnson-Reed Act, or the Immigration Act of 1924, which provided a quota that limited the number of immigrants to two percent of the people of each nationality in the country as of the 1890 census. The law excluded immigrants from Asia.

After that law, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory played a role in this policy by creating a eugenics record office.

CSHL put up a web site 18 years ago to chronicle the lab’s involvement in a period when science was used to justify discriminatory policies.

“We have highlighted on our web site about the eugenics movement so as to educate children and adults about how misunderstanding science, in this case genetics, can lead to dangerous public policy,” he explained in an email.

This year, on the 100th anniversary of the immigration law, the lab plans to highlight the 1924 Immigration Act as something that led to policies that are “not compatible with what the US is about,” he said.

Building for the future

Like other labs, CSHL is competing to earn federal grants from the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

The lab needs to raise “considerable amounts of money each year to eep cutting edge science moving forward,” he wrote.

Indeed, CSHL recently started a major expansion on seven acres of land at the top of the campus to build four research buildings. The lab plans to hire about 14 to 16 new faculty to join the current staff of 56 investigators.

These buildings will expand on programs that explore brain-body physiology, which describes how organs such as the stomach and others interact with the brain.

Many diseases, including cancer, upset the normal brain body interactions, he added. Intervening in these circuits can lead to new therapeutics for cancer and for many neurological disorders.

Researchers at CSHL will publish several discoveries in the next few years in this field that represent “important breakthroughs,” Stillman said.

At the end of May and early June, CSHL will host an annual symposium on brain body physiology, which will include a lecture for the general public.

CSHL is pursuing the most ambitious capital campaign in the lab’s history, raising funds to support the construction of new research and education buildings and to increase the endowment to support the science.

The lab is also building another center called NeuroAI that integrates neuroscience, artificial intelligence and computer science. The computational AI effort has “taken on a life of its own,” he explained. “We plan a major effort to understand how our brain does normal computation and then use this knowledge to improve computer programs.”

In the realm of artificial intelligence, CSHL has used a program called alpha fold, which a unit of Google called Deep Mind developed.

This program predicts protein-protein interactions and protein-drug interactions, which helps “transform the way biology is done,” he said.

While the work “accelerates” the science, it doesn’t “replace doing real experiments,” he added.

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JoAnne Hewett leads her first staff meeting as the new lab director at Brookhaven National Laboratory Tuesday, Aug. 8. File photo from BNL

By Daniel Dunaief

JoAnne Hewett hit the ground running when she arrived at Brookhaven National Laboratory.

She had no choice.

On her first day, Hewett, who is the first woman to lead the Department of Energy lab in its 76-year history, had to decide how to handle a technical problem at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider, a machine that collides heavy beams of ions traveling around a 2.4-mile track.

Hewett, who is a theoretical physicist and had worked as associate lab director for fundamental physics and chief research at SLAC at Stanford University, was “able to grasp everything very quickly,” said Haiyan Gao, associate lab director for Nuclear and Particle Physics at BNL.

BNL decided to end its run of experiments on Aug. 4, earlier than the original plan for the end of September. It took some time to determine the root cause of the problem, which, fortunately, turned out to be a singular event and not a failure of the system.

Gao found it “quite refreshing in the sense that [Hewett] was very interested in the experimental, technical part” of the decision and called it “the right call.”

After arriving at BNL in August, Hewett has impressed many of the staff at BNL and is developing plans for the lab that extend into the next decade and beyond.

TBR News Media is pleased to name Hewett, who is a leader, an inspirational role model and a “people person,” as a 2023 Person of the Year.

In an interview, Hewett described an active first few days on the job.

“There’s nothing like a good initiation,” Hewett said. “Because I do have a collider and accelerator background, it was an easy decision to make.”

RHIC is planning to restart in March, which is about a month behind the normal schedule. Hewett expects the ion collider to get a full run for fiscal year 2024.

‘A breath of fresh air’

Having a new leader at the lab who does things differently “gets noticed,” said John Hill, the deputy director for science and technology. “She’s a breath of fresh air.”

Indeed, one of Hewett’s priorities has been to meet with all the technicians at the lab. She schedules group interactions where she talks with about 10 people at a time.

In addition to listening to the perspective of other BNL staff, Hewett wants “people to be enthusiastic here,” said Luisella Lari, project manager for the Electron-Ion Collider and senior scientist at BNL. “She takes time to explain the vision.”

Hewett’s approach, which includes a focus on the work and on the people who make the science possible, “makes me feel sure she is on our side” as an advocate, Lari added.

The new BNL lab director appreciates the pride people take in their work and in the effort to make contributions to everything from basic science to applied research that has the potential to contribute to new technology and to provide solutions for various challenges.

“People love their contribution to the big science mission,” said Hewett. “No matter what their role is, they understand that their contribution is important. We can’t get science out the door without them.”

Hewett wasn’t surprised to hear suggestions for ways to improve the lives of people at BNL. At the top of many people’s lists was reopening the cafeteria, which has been closed since the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We’re working very hard to get that open,” said Hewett.

Scientific goals

Top administrators at BNL appreciate Hewett’s long-range focus on improving the science and enhancing the equipment that makes discoveries possible.

Home to the National Synchrotron Lightsource II, which cost about $1 billion to make and was completed in 2015, BNL is focused on opportunities to upgrade a facility that can look at the inner workings of batteries while they are working or explore the interplay between the structure and function of important enzymes.

One of Hewett’s first questions to Hill was “what do you think about an upgrade,” he recalled. Hill said when it was first built, the NSLS-II was the brightest in the world, and now one or two other synchrotrons are brighter. She wanted to upgrade it to “keep its competitive edge.”

Hewett explained that the NSLS-II has the capacity for 60 beamlines. BNL has built 32 and is either constructing or planning another 12 to 15, which leaves room to plan and build 15 additional beamlines.

“Finishing that out is important,” said Hewett.

At the same time, BNL will be holding science workshops to determine which of the accelerator physics options makes sense. Hewett is also focused on enhancing the lab’s computing power.

“All science is data science,” she said. “We work so hard to create the data, we have to make sure we record and process it. If you don’t do that, you might as well not have run the facility.”

BNL just signed a funding request for a series of planned upgrades.

Hill is developing a year-long computational strategy, which includes a focus on the needs for the facility for the next 10 years.

One of the biggest appeals of coming to BNL for Hewett and for other scientists around the country and the world is the Electron-Ion Collider.

BNL won a competition to build the EIC on Long Island, with the help of Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator in Virginia. By colliding electrons and protons, the EIC will reveal how the subunits of protons and neutrons in the nucleus — the quarks and gluons — come together to help generate mass in visible matter.

Hewett is “heavily involved in the EIC, making sure we can deliver on that,” said Hill.

Recently, the Department of Energy passed a critical design landmark, which provides a green light to make long lead procurement items. Specifically, BNL received the authority to spend $100 million on items for construction of the collider that will take years to procure.

This, Hewett explained, is the approval before a funding baseline and schedule for the project.

“These take so long to order,” she said. “It’s not like going into a Target and picking something off the shelf. It takes a long time to keep the schedule on track.”

Hewett said she had no doubt the EIC team would pass this milestone.

She described the procurement project group as a rock star team and she had no doubt that they were going to get it.

BNL won’t get the official approval to spend money until January.

An appreciated first

Choosing Hewett to serve in the top role at BNL has inspired some of her fellow scientists and could serve as encouragement to other underrepresented people in scientific fields.

Her experience makes her “the best person for the job,” said Lari. “This is what I’d put before thinking she’s a woman.”

Lari said she is “extremely proud to be a part of her team because [Hewett] is a really competent scientist, person, and the fact that she’s a woman is a plus.”

Having a female lab director helps with recruitment, added Hill.

In dealing with some human resource issues, Hewett asked questions that reflected some of the challenges she faced, Hill said. “That was eye opening to me and will stick with me,” he added.

Personal inspiration

On the personal side, Hewett, who is a Star Trek fan and makes a quick lunch meal of yogurt and berries in her office on the fly, shared some of her personal struggles and decisions.

In a BNL video, she explained that she is a breast cancer survivor who dealt with the dreaded disease 16 years earlier.

“My main message is to increase awareness and the importance of screenings,” said Hewett. “If one more person gets screened because of the video, then that’s a success.”

Gao applauded Hewett’s message, even as she wasn’t sure she or others would be comfortable sharing personal health issues.

As for her move from California, Hewett, who is an only child, brought her 93-year old father Bob across the country with her.

Her father had moved with the family three times when Hewett was two, seven and 14, which created some symmetry for the latest travels.

The senior Hewett was prepared to travel to Long Island to be with his daughter, whom he calls his “best buddy.”

A dedicated daughter and lab director, Hewett comes to work energized by the achievements and warmth of the staff.

“I knew, of course, about the science before I came,” she said. “What I didn’t know was how wonderful all the people are. Everyone is extremely dedicated to the mission in their role and what they do. It’s like family.”

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Marilyn Simons, left, and Jim Simons, third from left, toast the announcement of a $500 million contribution to Stony Brook University’s endowment with SBU President Maurie McInnis and Simons Foundation President David Spergel. File photo from John Griffin/ Stony Brook University

By Daniel Dunaief

Jim and Marilyn Simons put their money where their mind is.

The power Stony Brook University couple, who were already legends around campus for their intellectual and financial gifts to the university, outdid themselves and everyone else this year with their academic generosity — not to mention their busy travel schedule.

Through the Simons Foundation, the power couple contributed $500 million over seven years to Stony Brook University’s endowment, the largest unrestricted endowment gift to a higher education institution in American history.

The gift, announced in June, followed just a month after the Simons Foundation announced a $100 million contribution to Stony Brook University’s successful bid to develop Governors Island into a climate solutions center.

When the Simons Foundation announced the endowment gift, Lawrence Martin, professor in the Department of Anthropology and director of the Turkana Basin Institute, used a word echoed by many around campus to describe its impact: “transformative.”

For philanthropy that not only makes it possible for academic dreams — particularly among those who are first-generation college students — to become reality, but also that inspires meaningful contributions from other donors, TBR News Media is pleased to recognize the Simonses as 2023 People of the Year.

A significant victory

While the $500 million gift set records and offered financial fuel for an encouraging academic future, the victory in the competition to run a climate center on Governors Island positions Stony Brook to make meaningful contributions to the future of the planet.

Competing against other established universities with a depth of talent and breadth of ideas, including Northeastern University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a group co-led by CUNY and the New School, Stony Brook emerged as the winner for a climate exchange designed to advance research, innovation, sustainability, climate justice and outreach.

The $100 million in support from the Simons Foundation, coupled with $50 million from Bloomberg Philanthropies, “demonstrated the seriousness of Stony Brook’s proposal,” said Kevin Reed, associate provost for climate and sustainability programming and professor at the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences. The partnership “helped us get over the finish line” and was a “game changer for us.”

The initial support from the Simons Center is “opening doors as we continue to fundraise to build the center,” said Reed.

In its history, Stony Brook has helped address and solve challenges in New York as a public institution, Reed suggested. Becoming a flagship university for the state and with the support of the Simons Foundation, Stony Brook has opportunities to demonstrate leadership nationally and internationally, Reed added.

In addition to the climate exchange, Stony Brook will provide students with opportunities for internships that tap into public health, engineering and other interdisciplinary areas, which “came through in our proposal,” Reed added.

Multiplier effect

As for the $500 million donation, Jim and Marilyn Simons have not only stepped in to ensure the current and future academic strength and range of opportunities for faculty, students and the community, but they have also encouraged and inspired other donors.

With support from a program championed by Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) and the Simons gift, donors can triple the effect of their contributions.

Long-term contributors to the university have stepped up this year.

The Simons donation, which has eclipsed what others have done, “encourages the rest of us to keep giving,” said Cary Staller, member of the Board of Trustees of the Stony Brook Foundation and of the SUNY Board of Trustees. “We can see the difference that Jim and Marilyn’s philanthropy has brought about at Stony Brook. It changed the culture.”

Staller has contributed $500,000 this year to the Staller Center Endowment. Staller, whose father donated $1.8 million in 1988 and whose family has contributed over $16 million, said he is talking to other family members about adding to their contributions.

Among the earlier and more noteworthy contributors to the university, the Staller family helped establish a pattern of supporting the Long Island institution.

“When we first gave money to Stony Brook to endow the Staller Center, it really raised a lot of eyebrows among folks,” said Staller. When they made their donation, the Stallers felt “Stony Brook was a preeminent institution that was worthy of support.”

The effect of the Simonses’ support has “eclipsed not only what we’ve done, but really what all of Stony Brook supporters have done,” said Staller.

Staller suggested previous contributions from the Simonses also made it possible to put together the Governors Island proposal.

Jim and Marilyn Simons helped create a Presidential Innovation and Excellence Fund, for which they pledged $25 million. They planned to match another $25 million for that fund, with donor matches that brought the total to $75 million.

“It’s incredible what that money has done,” said Staller, which includes supporting the Governors Island bid. “Those sorts of things cost real money, which is hard to find in a state system,” Staller added. “This allows Stony Brook to really achieve excellence.”

The givers that keep on giving

Stony Brook’s Advancement team recognizes that the couple represents an unusual gift that has kept on giving — to the tune of over $1.2 billion and counting.

“When I talk to my colleagues around the country in similar roles, they are frankly blown away by a philanthropist that has given a gift for the future institution” without any requirements about how the university or future presidents use the funds, said Justin Fincher, vice president for advancement and executive director of the Stony Brook Foundation. The contribution is “something that builds over time” that supports future leadership and demonstrates trust in the institution.

The contribution has “instantaneously raised our profile across the country,” said Fincher. The gift has “made a huge splash” with an instant boost to the school’s reputation.

Jed Shivers, senior vice president for finance and administration, suggested that “a lot of cylinders are starting to fire in synchrony right now.”

Shivers described the $500 million donation as a “seminal” moment for the university, reflecting the confidence the couple has in SBU President Maurie McInnis and the current administration.

This excitement has built throughout the university, with potential high-level recruits showing enthusiasm for a college system on the rise.

In a conversation with Kathleen McGary, the Thomas Muench endowed chair for economics, Shivers said McGary, who joined the university in June, was “extremely excited to come here. At a faculty level, the university has been very successful at recruiting high-quality deans, chairs and faculty.”

Carl Lejuez, provost at SBU, said the university hired seven deans last year, with most of them coming from the Association of American University, or AAU, top public flagship universities.

“Leaders who have strong vision want to come here,” Lejuez said.

These new recruits have helped build the sense of the university providing strong value, with many students who are in the bottom 20% in income when they enter rising to the top 20 percent in the years after graduating.

Hungry minds

Jim and Marilyn Simons do so much more than cutting checks, boosting the profile of the university and supporting its application for marquee projects. The couple is a visible presence wherever the Stony Brook University flag flies.

This year, Jim and Marilyn Simons attended a memorial conference on campus for the late famed paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey. Arriving early and chatting with McInnis and National Geographic Society CEO Jill Tiefenthaler, Jim and Marilyn Simons listened to several lectures, including a well-attended presentation by Louise Leakey, Richard’s daughter and director of public education and outreach for the Turkana Basin Institute and a research professor in the Department of Anthropology at Stony Brook University.

The Simonses “cannot get enough of learning about new things,” said Martin.

Martin highlighted their commitment to learning with an anecdote about a trip Jim and Marilyn made to Kenya earlier this year to honor Leakey.

While they were traveling in the Suguta Valley, which is one of the hottest places on Earth, one of the helicopters needed a spare part. Left in an area with no shade and that can reach over 130 degrees Fahrenheit, Jim and Marilyn Simons “decided to climb a hill to get a better view,” Martin recalled.

Later, while they were waiting for the rest of the group, they had a chance to rest. They had no interest in sitting and waiting, taking a walk with a geologist, where they learned about the geology of the Turkana Basin.

Lejuez suggested that the contributions from the Simons family will “likely have an impact for years to come,” helping to make Stony Brook a first choice university for prospective students.

Stony Brook hopes to reach the same echelon as successful and well-known public universities, such as the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Michigan, and several of the public universities in California, such as UCLA.

Shivers added that the contributions from Jim and Marilyn Simons speak volumes to other donors and investors.

“What better endorsement than to have one of the world’s greatest investors invest in Stony Brook University,” said Shivers.

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Dima Kozakov. Photo from SBU
Michael Zingale. Photo by John Griffin/SBU

By Daniel Dunaief

They have little in common. One studies deep inside cells to understand the difference between diseased and healthy states. The other explores models that represent distant thermonuclear reactions.

What Stony Brook University’s Dima Kozakov, Professor in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics, and Michael Zingale, Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, share, however, is that both led teams that recently won a Department of Energy grant that will allow them to use the fastest publicly available supercomputer in the world, at DOE’s Oak Argonne and Oak Ridge National Laboratories.

Kozakov and Zingale, who are both members of the Institute for Advanced Computational Sciences, are recipients of the DOE’s grants through its Innovative and Novel Computational Impact on Theory and Experiment (INCITE) program.

“It’s a huge recognition of computation” not just at the IACS, but also for Stony Brook in general, said Robert Harrison, Director of the IACS and Professor in the Department of Mathematics & Statistics. Kozakov and Zingale are the “point persons on world-class teams [which] positions Stony Brook at the forefront of the scientific community.”

Harrison suggested that the astrophysics group at Stony Brook was already world class when he arrived a decade ago and the university has been pushing to move Stony Brook to take advantage of all the modern powerful tools for simulation and data driven discovery.

Disease states

Kozakov, who is also an affiliate of the Laufer Center for Physical and Quantitative Biology,  plans to model enormous numbers of molecular interactions to compare how they function in diseased cells with how they work in healthy cells.

He and his team will get the data on important proteins and interactions in disease compared with healthy cells from high throughput but noisy experiments and validate those computationally.

By studying diseases such as cancer, diabetes and Alzheimer’s, Kozakov plans to look for clues about what occurs at the level of the atomic structure of protein interactions, hoping such an analysis points to the creation of new types of therapies.

Kozakov will use a combination of publicly available data and information from some of his experimental collaborators to identify new targets that small molecules may alter amid a diseased state. He feels the tight integration between the theoretical and the experimental nature of the team will enhance its effectiveness.

A supercomputer “allows you to try many approaches in parallel” such as training deep learning models that require trying many options to get the best possible ones, he said.

The pilot work the team has done created the kind of momentum that increased the chance of securing funds and time through the INCITE program.

Kozakov and co-investigators including Assistant Professor Pawel Polak at Stony Brook, Professor Andrew Emili at OHSU, Associate Professor Matthew Torres at Georgia Tech and Julie Mitchell, the Director of Biosciences Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, were “very happy” when they learned they’d won the award. he said. “It’s good to know that people appreciate the [work] we are doing.”

Starry, starry explosion

In the meantime, Zingale’s project, called “Exascale Models of Astrophysical Thermonuclear Explosions,” was renewed for a second year in the INCITE program.

Zingale leads a team that explores two types of astrophysical thermonuclear explosions to understand these physical processes and their broader implications. The computational work is focused mostly on whether a particular model for a thermonuclear explosion is viable.

“We really want to just understand: does it explode or not?” Zingale explained. His work focuses on the explosion mechanism and on the design of algorithms that can efficiently model these explosions.

Graduate students Zhi Chen, Alexander Smith Clark, Eric Johnson, Melissa Rasmussen, and Khanak Bhargava will be working with the supercomputer in the next year, Zingale added.

“Each student is working on separate questions, both on this problem and on related problems (novae and x-ray bursts),” said Zingale. “The goals are the same — in each case, we want to produce a realistic model of the burning that takes place in these events to understand how these explosions unfold.”

Models help connect to the observations astronomers make. While the work doesn’t produce new physics, it allows researchers to gain a greater understanding of supernovae.

Numerous other groups around the world are pursuing similar simulations, which Zingale explained is favorable for the science.

“If we all get the same result using different codes and techniques, then it gives us confidence that we might be understanding what is actually taking place in nature,” he said.

The explosions Zingale is studying differ from those on Earth because they are far larger and can reach higher densities in stars, which produces elements up to iron in explosions. The tools he uses to model these explosions have “similarities to the techniques used to model chemical combustion on Earth,” he said. “We work with applied mathematicians that study terrestrial flames and can use the techniques” in the astrophysical setting.

Zingale explained that he was always interested in astronomy and computers, so this field of work serves as the bridge between the two.

For students interested in the field, Zingale added that it teaches people how to solve complex problems on computers.

“Even if you don’t stay in the field, you build skills that are transferable to industry (which is where many of my graduate students wind up),” he said. He urges people to study something they enjoy. The main code he uses is called Castro and is freely available online, which means that “anyone can look at what we’ve done and run it for themselves,” he explained.

Student opportunities

For Stony Brook graduate students, these INCITE awards offer opportunities for additional learning and career advancement.

“The excitement is infectious,” said Harrison. “The students see not just the possibility to be at the frontier of discovery and the frontier of technology [but also to have] the career opportunities that lie beyond that.”

Students trained to make effective use of these platforms of cutting-edge science are “heavily recruited, going into industry, national labs, working for the likes of Google and so on,” Harrison added.

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