Dr. Guangwei Ding, associate professor of chemistry, collaborated on four articles in 2017: “Quantitative Assessment of Aeolian Desertification Dynamics: A Case Study in North Shanxi of China (1975 to 2015),” co-authored with Zhanjin Xue, Zuodong Qin, Fangqin Cheng and Hongjian Li, was published in Scientific Reports; “Hyperspectral Estimation of Soil Organic Matter Based on Different Spectral Pre-processing Methods,” co-authored with Xing-Xing Qiao, Chao Wang, Mei-Chen Feng, Wu-De Yang, Hui Sun, Zhuo-Ya Liang and Chao-Chao Shi, was published in Spectroscopy Letters; “Long-term Dynamic Characterization of Aeolian Desertification in Northwest Shanxi, China,” co-authored with Zhanjin Xue, Zuodong Qin, Fangqin Cheng and Hongjian Li, was published in Environmental Science and Pollution Research; and “Extraction of Sensitive Bands for Monitoring the Winter Wheat (Triticum aestivum) Growth Status and Yields Based on the Spectral Character,” co-authored with Chao Wang, Mei-chen Feng, Wu-de Yang, Lu-jie Xiao, Guang-xin Li and Ting-ting Liu, was published in PLOS One.

Dr. Erin Fouberg, professor of geography, co-edited the Atlas of the 2016 Elections, published by Rowman & Littlefield. In addition to co-editing the volume, Dr. Fouberg collaborated on writing one of the chapters, and contributed two entries.

Dr. Joshua Hagen, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, published a chapter titled “The Meaning of National History and Borderlands for Identity and Border Education” in the edited volume Border, Memory and Transculturality. He also contributed a foreword for the same volume titled “Border Studies, Memory Studies, and Teacher Education.” These publications stemmed from Dr. Hagen’s keynote address to the conference Borders, Memory and Migration in Educational Contexts held in 2016 at the European Academy of Otzenhausen, Germany. This conference and volume are part of a larger project funded by the Erasmus+ program of the European Union that brings together scholars of education policy from six European countries.

Dr. Alyssa Kiesow, associate professor of biology, and student Anika Van Oosbree published an article titled “Phenotypic Effects of Probiotics on Xenopus laevis Development” in the Journal of Student Research. Dr. Kiesow also collaborated on two presentations in the Association for Women in Science: ADVANCE/GSE Program Workshop in Washington, D.C.: “Salaries in High Education Systems: A System-wide Perspective on Career Advancement and Gender (Sex) Equity” and “A Good Departmental Citizen: A Qualitative Analysis of Faculty Annual Reviews about Professional and General Service”; in the same venue, Dr. Kiesow also participated in the symposium titled “Six Universities, Six Sets of Data, One Process of System Change: SD-WISE Work in the South Dakota Board of Regents System.”  

Dr. Andrew Russell, assistant professor of biology, was featured on the South Dakota Public Radio program "In the Moment" to discuss the science of fermentation and brewing beer. He was also an invited speaker at the South Dakota Agricultural Heritage Museum to give a lecture on the biology of brewing as part of their exhibit "Barley to Barrel: Science and History of Brewing in South Dakota."

Dr. Steven Usitalo, professor of history, received a grant to attend a Hess Seminar at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., in January 2018. The seminar was titled "Silenced Voices and Marginalized Histories: Roma and Sinti in the Holocaust." At the seminar Dr. Usitalo was asked to help organize and participated in an educational forum at the University of Nebraska Omaha at the end of March, titled: “Vectors of Violence: Persecution and Complacency in Nazi Germany and the Great Plains.” This forum (along with travel and related costs) will be funded by the Holocaust Museum in D.C. The workshop proceedings will be distributed through the Holocaust Museum's online educational website.

Dr. Patrick Whiteley, professor of English, published an article titled “Remembering and Forgetting:  William Trevor's Ethics of Memory" in the summer 2017 issue of New Hibernia Review:  A Quarterly Record of Irish Studies.

Photo courtesy of South Dakota Ag Heritage Museum