TAMIU Annual Report 2022

UNIVERSITY NEWS NSF, DE RESEARCH GRANTS BRING $3.5 MILLION TO TAMIU Grants totaling $3.5 million that target scientific research and increasing the number and quality of well-prepared Hispanic students completing TAMIU undergraduate degrees were awarded this October. The first grant, for $500,902 over three years, is from the National Science Foundation (NSF) as part of its Building Research Capacity of New Faculty in Biology (BRC-BIO) Grant, and is awarded to principal investigator Dr. Ruvini U. Pathirana , TAMIU assistant professor of Microbiology in the College of Arts and Sciences, department of Biology and Chemistry. Dr. Pathirana’s research is focused on select fungi and has the potential to help identify drug targets that control human and plant disease-causing fungal growth. The second grant, for $2.9 million over an anticipated five-year period, is from the U.S. Department of Education’s Developing Hispanic-Serving Institutions Program. It was awarded to principal investigator Dr. Alfredo Ramírez, Jr., interim director and superintendent of TAMIU’s Julieta & Frank Staggs Academy of International and STEM Studies. The grant supports a Title V initiative, the TAMIU Advanced Recovery and Data Analysis (ARDA) program. ARDA targets providing a supportive learning environment that meets students’ holistic needs. TAMIU, UT HEALTH HOUSTON PARTNERSHIP EXPANDS PUBLIC HEALTH STUDY Public Health study opportunities at TAMIU have expanded thanks to an innovative partnership with the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston School of Biomedical Informatics (UTHealth Houston SBMI). The partnership is focused on the delivery of the Development of Informatics Accelerated Learning in Laredo (DIALL) program. DIALL provides TAMIU students the opportunity to complete a 4+1 graduate certificate and accelerated Master’s program with UTHealth Houston. At completion, students graduate with a Bachelor’s degree from TAMIU and a graduate certificate from UTHealth Houston. The program is housed in TAMIU’s College of Nursing and Health Sciences. Biomedical Informatics is a dynamic field with rich employment opportunities, organizers observed. “It’s a growing field that optimizes the use of information in healthcare with employment opportunities in pharmacies, hospitals, insurance companies, and more. The 4+1 program graduates have the opportunity to continue their coursework with UTHealth Houston SBMI and earn their master’s in Biomedical Informatics in just one year,” said TAMIU assistant professor of Public Health Dr. Cindy Lynn Salazar-Collier. The School of Biomedical Informatics is one of six schools within UTHealth Houston, and the only academic Biomedical Informatics program in Texas. It’s also the only free-standing school among 70 related programs in the nation, and one of the largest globally. 9