Richard Hughes
Associate Professor,
Petroleum Engineering
Associate Professor,
Petroleum Engineering
LSU'S Biweekly Newsletter for Faculty & Staff
November 3, 2006 |
VOL. 23, NO. 6 |
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Richard Hughes
Associate Professor, Petroleum Engineering |
What is your research interest?
I have a fairly broad set of interests, but most recently I have been working on carbon dioxide injection into the subsurface both for enhanced oil recovery and the mitigation of greenhouse gas effects on the environment – sequestration.
What do you hope to accomplish at LSU?
I would like to see both LSU and the state take advantage of the unique position we are in with regard to the utilization and storage of carbon dioxide. If we can make it work right, Louisiana has the right combination of CO2 producers, transporters and potential storage locations to make the economics of sequestration work. That should translate into research and development opportunities for a variety of disciplines here at LSU.
What do you enjoy most about LSU?
I really appreciated how Baton Rouge in general and LSU in particular came together to fill needs last year. [My family] had only been here about a month and were amazed at the way that family and friends helped each other survive the storms and regroup in their aftermaths. I was also impressed with the resiliency of the students to continue to work through their classes despite the uncertainties their families faced.
LSU is among six colleges and universities that received top recognition for extraordinary community service as the first-ever President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll was announced at Campus Compact’s 20th Anniversary Gala in Chicago on Oct. 17.
LSU joined Jackson State University and Tulane University in receiving the President’s Award for Hurricane Relief. Elon University of North Carolina; California State University, Monterey Bay; and Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis received the President’s Award for outstanding community service.
“It is an honor for LSU to receive the President’s Award for Hurricane Relief,” said LSU Chancellor Sean O’Keefe. “Service is central to LSU’s mission, and the strong spirit of volunteerism was needed in full-force during last year’s hurricanes. Our faculty, staff, students and administration stepped up to help those affected by the storms, and this award is accepted on their behalf.”
More than 500 colleges applied for the Honor Roll in its inaugural year, and monetary awards of $5,000 were presented to the six top schools to support further service on their campuses.
Stephen Goldsmith, chairman of the Corporation for National and Community Service, presented the awards at the Campus Compact 20th Anniversary. In addition to the top honorees, nine schools received Katrina Compassion Awards for helping Gulf Coast communities recover, 10 others were named finalists for general community service, and 141 colleges, universities and professional schools were recognized for distinguished community service. In total, 492 schools were recognized on the first President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll. A full list is available at http://www.nationalservice.gov/honorroll.
The Honor Roll is co-sponsored by the Corporation for National and Community Service, the Department of Education, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, USA Freedom Corps and the President’s Council on Service and Civic Participation. The President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll has been generously supported by the Case Foundation. The recognition is presented in cooperation with Campus Compact, a national coalition of nearly 1,000 college and university presidents, and supported by all the major national higher education associations.
The awards were presented a day after the Corporation for National and Community Service released a comprehensive report, “College Students Helping America,” which shows college student civic engagement rising significantly in recent years.
The study, which used data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, showed that student volunteering increased approximately 20 percent from 2002 to 2005, and that 3.3 million college students serve their communities and nation. The study showed that college students between ages 16 to 24 are more likely to volunteer than cohorts in that age group who are not enrolled.
Observers have attributed the growth in student service to several causes: the proliferation of high-school and college service-learning classes; an increase in the number of campus offices linking students to volunteer opportunities, and the lingering impact of the September 11 and Hurricane Katrina disasters.
The President’s Honor Roll provides more new evidence that the nation is beginning to move toward that level of student civic engagement. More than 1.1 million students from Honor Roll schools participated in local community service activities, and more than 219,000 students provided hurricane relief.
LSU will induct 16 new members into its military Hall of Honor on Saturday, Nov. 11, as part of “LSU Salutes,” an annual celebration of the contributions of U.S. veterans sponsored by LSU and Cadets of the Ole War Skule.
The induction ceremony will take place at 9 a.m. at the LSU War Memorial on the LSU Parade Ground. This event is free and open to the public.
The inductees will also be recognized during pre-game activities for the LSU-Alabama football game at Tiger Stadium, and the half-time show will have a patriotic theme.
This year’s list of inductees includes one of Cadets of the Ole War Skule’s founding members and Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee, among others.
The Saturday morning event will include the induction ceremony, a military parade, static displays, a wreath-laying and a 21-gun salute. Also participating will be LSU’s Cadet Corps and Southern University’s Navy ROTC program. The LSU Cadet Corps consists of LSU Army and Air Force ROTC students, and the Southern Navy ROTC consists of LSU and Southern students.
The LSU Army and Air Force ROTC programs, along with Southern’s Navy ROTC program, helped plan and organize of the events. Opportunities like this involving the ROTC programs represent one of the largest leadership training activities on campus.
The Hall of Honor inductees, all of whom must have attended LSU and served in the military, were selected based on their involvement with the university, as well as military and community service.
Cadets of the Ole War Skule originally included former students who served as cadets when the campus was located at its downtown site. In 1994, LSU reorganized the group to include anyone who has ever served as a cadet at LSU, whether or not they received a commission. If a former cadet is deceased, the cadet’s spouse may join the organization. LSU Salutes recognizes all U.S. veterans and, in particular, those who attended LSU and served in ROTC.
The event acknowledges LSU’s military tradition, and the university’s identity as the Ole War Skule. In 1998, the LSU Board of Supervisors passed a resolution establishing the celebration of the university’s military history as an official annual university event.
Cadets of the Ole War Skule has been instrumental in preserving LSU’s military traditions. Last year, as a revival of one of those traditions, they have helped facilitate having LSU ROTC officials fire a cannon in Tiger Stadium as the football team takes the field.
Registration, reunion groups and a luncheon will take place on Thursday and Friday, followed by the main events on Saturday, which includes the assembly and induction ceremony, followed by the annual meeting and brunch. The events will conclude at the football game on Saturday night.
Information about membership in Cadets of the Ole War Skule or attending LSU Salutes is available by calling 578-0420.
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| Finalist companies of the “New Venture Business Plan,” or NVBP, competition were recognized at the BizTech Expo’s Top 100 Private Companies Luncheon on Oct. 11. Pictured from left to right: Marc Levitan, Joey Coco and Sam Amoroso are the management team of Engensus, the winning hurricane-engineering firm in the NVBP competition. |
Engensus, the first private comprehensive hurricane-engineering firm in America, was named winner of the “New Venture Business Plan” competition on Oct. 11, at the annual BizTech Expo’s Top 100 Private Companies Luncheon. LSU’s E. J. Ourso College of Business and the Baton Rouge Business Report sponsored the competition.
Using similar principles as the established field of earthquake engineering, Engensus will offer a unique combination of interdisciplinary services, including civil, structural, wind and forensic engineering, as well as consulting for coastal processes, vulnerability analysis and hurricane risk-mitigation. The company is targeting those vulnerable to hurricanes – in business, industry, insurance, architecture, government and emergency planning.
Highlighting the venture’s timeliness, the National Science Board recently released a draft report calling for major national investments in hurricane science and engineering.
The Engensus management team, composed of Joey Coco, Sam Amoroso and Marc Levitan, credit LSU for the company’s foundation.
“Many of the ideas leading to the establishment of the firm have their origins in research and academic programs at the LSU Hurricane Center and the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at LSU. These organizations developed the concepts and established curricula in hurricane engineering,” according to an Engensus news release.
Coco is a licensed engineer with a degree in civil engineering and an MBA from LSU. Amoroso, a licensed engineer with a degree in civil engineering from LSU, is pursuing his doctoral degree from LSU on the topic of wind effects on petrochemical structures. Levitan holds a doctorate and has more than 20 years’ experience in research, education
and consulting in wind, hurricane and structural engineering. He is the LSU Hurricane Center director and an endowed civil and environmental engineering associate professor at LSU.
“We are establishing and branding an entirely new field of engineering. Engensus is committed to Baton Rouge and will work closely with LSU to retain graduates trained in the latest applications of hurricane engineering,” the team members said in their presentation for the judges.
The competition was open to all entrepreneurs in the 10-parish capital region. A panel of judges evaluated each team based on a written business plan, a 30-minute oral and PowerPoint presentation and a question-and-answer session. The winning company must launch within six months. Two other companies were named finalists.
NanoMat Technologies was founded by Challa Kumar of LSU’s CAMD and Carola Leuschner of the Pennington Center. They are joined with Craig Stevens, CAMD assistant director, to target cancer hospitals and diagnostic companies that provide MRI scans to breast and prostate cancer patients. This nanotechnology company plans to market its patent-pending contrast agent for MRI, LHRH-SPION, a non-toxic chemical product that specifically attaches to cancer cells when injected in the body, making cancer cells highly visible in MRI scans. This will provide earlier detection with the exact location of primary and metastasized cancer, which may revolutionize treatments and reduce the number of cancer deaths.
RigIt Safe, founded by brothers Justin and Josh Langlois, will target companies in the material-handling industry to offer on-site personnel safety training, as well as inspection, testing and certification of the material-handling equipment. RigIt Safe’s services may help companies to obtain a safer work environment with potentially reduced injuries and insurance premiums. In conjunction with its safety services, the company sells material-handling equipment, including rigging products, hydraulic and industrial hoses and hydraulic adapters.
The winner becomes a complimentary tenant of the E. J. Ourso College’s Louisiana Business and Technology Center, or LBTC, along with business supplies, furniture and equipment. Local business sponsors will provide free professional services including accounting, legal and graphic-design consultation. The total expected benefits are $25,000. The LBTC is nationally recognized as a top-performing business incubator.
After taking a first-hand look at the needs of New Orleans, officials with investment banking firm Goldman Sachs decided to lend some helping hands and cash to the recovery effort.
The company originally contacted Amanda Hardesty, the recovery volunteer coordinator with the LSU AgCenter and Louisiana Sea Grant program, during the summer concerning what they could do to help in the city’s recovery from Hurricane Katrina.
“They came down in August and looked around at the needs of the area, and they decided to send 30 volunteers,” Hardesty said. “But not only did they send volunteers, they also decided to make a $50,000 donation to our volunteer program for the next year.”
The money will be used to fund Hardesty’s volunteer coordinator position for the next year – ensuring that thousands more volunteer hours can be added to the recovery efforts, since her major tasks are matching willing volunteers with those who need help.
Mark Schexnayder, the LSU AgCenter’s hurricane recovery coordinator headquartered in Metairie, said the Goldman Sachs donation will be helpful to the area’s recovery efforts. Schexnayder and Hardesty work with a network of LSU AgCenter personnel to organize volunteer workers who come into the city and put them in touch with people with the greatest needs.
“The Goldman Sachs volunteers are coming down in four different waves,” Schexnayder explained. “The first group came in early October and worked in the French Quarter and in City Park. The second and third waves involved a team in mid-October that split into two groups and worked with Habitat for Humanity in Musician’s Village and in the Treme area, and the third group will come in November.”
Other groups also have made monetary donations when they came down to work, and Hardesty said such donations validate that the volunteer effort is a worthwhile part of the city’s recovery.
Jennifer Cooper, project manager with Goldman Sachs-New York, said volunteers from the company have wanted to come to the New Orleans area since just after the storm, but they had to wait until it was considered safe.
“Basically we got involved initially when the hurricane hit,” Cooper said. “We took a look at the area and assessed the needs, and we did an immediate contribution to the recovery effort. Last fall we had a lot of volunteers interested in coming down right away, but the area just wasn’t safe.”
Cooper and her coworker, Beth Stellato, a senior analyst with the company, came down together in August and decided that they wanted to do something that would coincide with the one-year anniversary.
“Now that it’s a year later, we decided to check out some Web sites to see how we could use our volunteers to best help out in the rebuilding effort. That’s when we saw Amanda’s we-kare.org Web site,” Stellato said.
This is the first time Goldman Sachs has sent a group of volunteers to serve outside of their general work areas, and officials said they are happy this first project is to help in New Orleans.
“I never saw the pre-Katrina New Orleans, but I think it’s just amazing how dedicated the people are to this city in trying to get back and to get the city going again,” Stellato said. “Every person we meet here is so happy and jovial and just happy to be alive, so I’m very grateful.
“There are so many things about this city, like the food and the music, but I think it’s the people that I’m most impressed with,” she added.
Stellato said there has always been a spirit of volunteerism in the company’s culture but that they really found out how strong it was when all of the volunteer positions for the New Orleans trips were filled within 15 minutes of the program’s announcement.
“You know we really had a lot of help after September 11, and this is just a way for us to give back,” she said.
Hardesty said more calls also are coming in already from officials with colleges and universities who want to send volunteers to work during the winter break.
“My job is to make sure that we have areas laid out for them to work in when they come,” Hardesty said.
Since Hardesty came to New Orleans with a group of Ohio State University students last December to volunteer, she says she has seen a lot of improvements in the city, but there still is a lot more to be done.
“There’s a lot more human activity than when we first came,” Hardesty said. “It’s also a lot harder now to find watermarks on houses, and a lot of the houses are being gutted and cleaned up.”
Other projects that Hardesty has scheduled for the fall include a group of realtors who will be in town in November to do a large planting project in New Orleans City Park.
In recent years, the general overuse of antibiotics in medicine and agriculture has led to the increase of resistant bacteria. Now, many scientists say that we’re on the cusp of what could rapidly become a very acute problem.
“It’s not a question of if, but when bacteria become resistant to antibiotics,” said Grover Waldrop, associate professor of biological sciences at Louisiana State University. “Currently, more than 60 percent of Staphylococcus aureus, or staph, infections are resistant to all but one type of antibiotic. We are witnessing evolution in real time.”
Waldrop is currently waging war against these virulent bacteria with the help of LSU’s Center for Advanced Microstructures and Devices, or CAMD. In collaboration with pharmaceuticals company Pfizer, Inc., Waldrop uses the intense X-rays available at CAMD to design molecules that will help solve the problem.
Basically, antibiotics target essential enzymes in bacteria. Waldrop’s research focuses on discovering molecules that inhibit the enzyme acetyl-CoA carboxylase, or ACC, which is required to support bacterial growth. Ultimately, these molecules may be developed clinically for use as antibiotics not susceptible to bacterial resistance.
The ability to find molecules that will bind to ACC depends on a thorough understanding of the three-dimensional structure of the enzyme. This approach, known as structure-based drug design, is best understood through the use of a simple analogy. “If the structure of the inside of a lock was understood in detail, then a key could be designed and manufactured to fit the lock. In the case of enzymes, once the enzyme structure is known, a molecule that binds to it and prevents the enzyme from functioning can be designed and synthesized,” Waldrop said.
To date, Waldrop and his associates have already determined the structure of ACC from several pathogenic bacteria, including staph, using CAMD’s advanced X-ray capabilities. “It is not an exaggeration to say that we could not have succeeded to this point without CAMD,” he said. “CAMD is playing a vital role in battling one of the most pressing health-care problems currently facing our society.”