University of Miami: Miami Magazine » STEM

Studying Creepy Crawlers to Save Lives

Sau Choi — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 18:49:57 +0000

Citizen ’Cane

Studying Creepy Crawlers to Save Lives

Insects will always be one spindly-legged step ahead of us, says Adriana Troyo Rodríguez, Ph.D. ’07, who’s been a fanatic follower of arthropods for as long as she can recall.

As a bug-obsessed child, she collected beetles, spiders, grasshoppers—whatever she could get her hands on in her native Costa Rica. “I even learned I had to give caterpillars the same plant they were feeding on when I collected them or they would not eat,” says Troyo Rodríguez, an associate professor of microbiology at the Universidad de Costa Rica in San Jose.

In 2010, at age 33, she was the first woman to be named Most Distinguished Scientist of the Year by Costa Rica’s Ministry of Science and Technology. The prize recognizes her achievements in researching Chagas disease, dengue fever, and other insect-borne tropical diseases.

After training with professors John C. Beier and Douglas O. Fuller in the College of Arts and Sciences’ interdisciplinary Ph.D. program, Troyo Rodríguez was involved in one of the world’s first efforts to study dengue epidemiology and Aedes aegypti ecology using high-resolution satellite imagery—a method that’s helping to predict outbreak times and locations.

“My latest scientific research is oriented toward understanding the epidemiology of rickettsial diseases such as typhus or spotted fevers, many of which are emerging tick-or flea-borne infections that can be fatal,” she says.

In addition to teaching, publishing research, and training health officials, Troyo Rodríguez’s days still revolve around collecting bugs. She travels door to door with her research team, taking blood, flea, and tick samples from dogs and other domestic pets. Her team also treks through forests to catch ectoparasites found on wild rodents and opossums.

“We begin the day with our rubber boots on at 7 a.m. and finish when the sun goes down, looking like we rolled in the mud with the animals—which we probably did,” she says.

The work is hard, sometimes dangerous, and ultimately lifesaving. “One of the most fulfilling aspects of my job,” says Troyo Rodríguez, “is knowing I can make a difference in my own country on topics where scientific research is very limited, but where we have much to give.”

—Robin Shear

The post Studying Creepy Crawlers to Save Lives appeared first on University of Miami: Miami Magazine.

Rocking the Red Planet

Sau Choi — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 18:19:22 +0000

Citizen ’Cane

Rocking the Red Planet

Photo by NASA / JPL Caltech

From her undergraduate days studying mechanical and aerospace engineering in Miami through her master’s degree projects at M.I.T., Missouri-raised Erisa K. Hines, B.S.M.E. ’02, dreamed of exploring space.

That opportunity arose in 2006, when she was hired by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory at Caltech. Just five years later she was working on the agency’s largest Mars rover yet, Curiosity.

Hines, an attitude control systems engineer, was on the team tasked with keeping the spacecraft on target—aligned with Earth for communications and the sun for solar power. She developed commands to communicate with the spacecraft during its eight-and-a-half month, 354-million-mile cruise towards Mars.

Hines shared the spotlight with hundreds of other “blue shirts” in JPL’s Pasadena control room as they famously erupted in cheers and tears when the rover’s 13,000-mile-per-hour entry, descent, and landing phase (dubbed “seven minutes of terror”) ended seamlessly in the wee hours of August 5, 2012.

The surprise, Hines notes, was how smooth the landing was: “We did a few dress rehearsals and, each time, something went wrong. When the time came for the actual landing, it was flawless. The rover hit within 1.5 miles of the landing target, well within the success parameters.”

As keynote speaker at the 2012 College of Engineering Homecoming Breakfast, Hines said her own trajectory was guided by supportive family and mentors. “There are probably at least three professors in this room who remember me crying in their office during my first two years, while I was trying to figure out how engineering works,” she shared. By junior year, though, her advisor insisted that she apply to graduate school at M.I.T. “That’s how much he believed in me.”

Another mentor was her grandfather Robert H. Colledge, ’53, who died two weeks before the landing. “He was always proud of Erisa’s many accomplishments,” notes his widow, Barbara Colledge, B.Ed. ’59.

Now, with her cosmic career launched, Hines is on the surface mobility team, which includes simulated Martian terrain testing intended to help Curiosity scour the Red Planet for answers to vast questions. “Dream big,” urges Hines. “These moments are why we do what we do.”

—Annette Gallagher, B.S.C. ’94

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