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GIAR Newsletter—August, 2012
In this issue, GIAR Committee Member Sue Ann Miller discusses the importance of references in grant applications, we begin our Centennial Series focusing on GIAR recipients of the past ninety years, and we catch up with grant recipient Priyanka Bhattacharya who was recently awarded a prestigious Linus Pauling Fellowship at PNNL.
Please share this information with potential applicants, mentors, grant recipients and supporters of the program.
Emma S. Creaser
Chair, Grants-in-Aid of Research Committee
March 2012 Awards Announced
Successful grant applicants for the March 15, 2012 cycle have been announced. Of the 1048 applications received, 178 were funded. Winners can be viewed on the Sigma Xi website. Applications for the October 15, 2012 cycle are now being accepted.
Application tip: Effective recommendations supplement an application
Anyone who reads letters of recommendation knows that only some letters are useful. GIAR posts the committee expectations on the society web page, so the following examples serve as reminders of common problems that diminish effectiveness of a recommendation letter submitted to our program.
Letters to GIAR should be customized for the Grants-in-Aid program. Letters that are written to other granting programs may not provide information that GIAR needs. Uploading boilerplate or a letter written for another program suggests the recommender is not really involved in the student's work.
Useful recommendations provide information about an applicant that is not already documented. Good letters help a committee project how a student can perform by sharing examples of work habits and assessment of an applicant’s ability to conduct the proposed project. A recommender can supplement what an applicant says about a proposed project, but a useful recommendation provides more about the applicant being recommended than it does about the recommender or the recommender's lab.
In summary, tell the committee about the young scientist you are recommending. Discuss initiation of the idea, taking initiative, work habits and context of the work, but do not re-write the proposal in your letter. The Sigma Xi GIAR program is competitive. A student's proposal will be less competitive, if letters of recommendation are not useful.
Sue Ann Miller, Ph.D.
Professor of Biology
Hamilton College - Clinton, NY
Centennial Series—Icie Macy Hoobler
 In 1930, Icie G. Macy (later Hoobler) became the fourth woman to receive a Sigma Xi Grant-in-Aid of Research for her project entitled, An investigation of the calcium and phosphorus metabolism of women in late lactation. The Sigma Xi grant helped encourage her career as a pioneer in the study of infant, child and adolescent growth and nutrition.
Hoobler's research included some of the first studies on mother's milk, helping establish maternal nutritional needs during pregnancy. Hoobler also studied the composition of cow's milk and was instrumental in determining the appropriate amount of Vitamin D to be added to milk to assist in the prevention of childhood rickets. Additional research included studies of amino acids, Vitamin C and the prevention of scurvy.
Hoobler served as a research director at Merrill-Palmer School, Children's Hospital of Michigan and its successor, Children's Fund of Michigan. She co-authored 300 papers in scientific journals, as well as 18 monographs and books, including her autobiography, Boundless Horizons: Portrait of a Pioneer Woman Scientist.
Former Grant Recipient receives prestigious Linus Pauling Fellowship
 Priyanka Bhattacharya (GIAR 2011, SX 2011) has been selected to receive the 2012 Linus Pauling Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellowship presented by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). The fellowship is designed for "the next generation of scientists and engineers who will push the boundaries of science to world-recognized discoveries."
Bhattacharya's 2011 GIAR funded research to advance our understanding of the fundamental interactions of dendritic polymers with common environmental pollutants for their applications towards a sustainable environmental remediation.
Dendrimers are a class of soft polymeric nanomaterials that possess high degree branching and order, low viscosity, monodispersity, ample interior voids, and pH-responsive surface charge and radius of gyration.
Priyanka remarked that "we believe that the knowledge gained from this research has significantly furthered the potential use of dendritic polymers for environmental remediation, and shed light on many fundamental aspects of supramolecular assembly, physical chemistry and nanotechnology."
In 2011, Bhattacharya presented her research at the Sigma Xi Annual conference and the Sustainable Remediation conference at UMASS, Amherst, where she won a 2nd prize at the student poster competition. Priyanka graduates with a Ph.D. in Physics in August 2012, at which time she will join the Energy and Environment Directorate at PNNL.
[Editor's Note: Linus Pauling was a life member of Sigma Xi, elected in 1925 by the California Institute of Technology Chapter. He received the Nobel Prize in 1954 & 1962]
Support the GIAR Centennial Program
 In 2022, the Grants-in-Aid of Research program will celebrate its 100th year. To date, Sigma Xi has extended the hand of companionship to young researchers by awarding more than 30,000 Grants-in-Aid of Research.
Funds for GIAR come from support by Sigma Xi members, endowed funds with the National Academy of Sciences and private donations. Our goal by 2022 our 100th anniversary is to double the GIAR endowment to $20 million dollars.
If you would like to find out how you can create a special Named Fund or join the thousands of other donors who support GIAR, please visit our website at Support GIAR
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