Elizabeth Herndon, Ph.D., assistant
professor in the Department of Geology,
has been awarded the Farris Family
Innovation Award.

Two Kent State University faculty members, Elizabeth Herndon, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of Geology, and Anthony Tosi, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology, have been awarded the Farris Family Innovation Award to support their research. The Farris Family Innovation Award rewards faculty members who combine scholarship of teaching, discovery and application in new and effective ways.

Todd Diacon, Kent State’s senior vice president for academic affairs and provost, recommended Herndon and Tosi for the award, and was approved by Kent State President Beverly Warren. Applications for the award are reviewed by the University Research Council.

Award recipients receive $8,000 for up to three years while they continue their projects and remain untenured faculty members. The funds from the grant covers expenses in undergraduate research, graduate student stipends, equipment expenses and travel associated with faculty projects.

Herndon received the award for her research project, “Impact of Vegetation on Metal Release from Soils Developed on Coal Mine Waste.”

“I’m honored to be selected for the Farris Family Innovation Award, and I appreciate the support given to early-career faculty such as myself to pursue cutting-edge research,” Herndon says. “These generous funds will enable me to continue research on the geochemistry of human-perturbed landscapes and impacts on water resources.”

Herndon’s research explores the interactions between minerals, water and biota that shape the “Critical Zone,” the thin surface of the Earth’s crust that extends from groundwater to vegetation canopy and supports life. She will study how ecosystems can enhance or mitigate leaching of harmful metals from mine waste into surface water.

“This research is especially pertinent in Ohio, where centuries of mining operations have left a legacy of mine waste that poses an ongoing hazard to ecosystem health and water quality,” she says.

Anthony Tosi, Ph.D., assistant
professor in the Department of
Anthropology, has been awarded the
Farris Family Innovation Award.

Tosi received the award for his research project, “The Molecular Signature of Sperm Competition: A Case Study in Macaque Monkeys.”

“I’m very happy to receive this award,” Tosi says. “It not only provides the funds for a stand-alone project but, more importantly, allows collection of preliminary data for larger NSF and NIH grant applications.”

Tosi will examine the differences in sperm genes between two species of macaque monkey. These monkeys occasionally hybridize, and the Y-chromosome (where many sperm genes are located) of one species has crossed deeply into populations of the other. Female macaques have multiple partners per breeding season, leading to intense sperm competition among the males, he says.

Tosi hopes to discover what genes play the most significant role for “better” sperm and what factors make them better, which could lead to the development of new medical techniques for treating male infertility.

“The answers to these questions become the launchpad for studies in evolution, anthropology and biomedical science,” he says.

Click here for more information about the criteria for the Farris Family Innovation Award.

For more information about Kent State’s Department of Geology, visit www.kent.edu/geology.

For more information about Kent State’s Department of Anthropology, visit www.kent.edu/anthropology.