UD in the News, March 15, 2005

10:53 a.m., March 15, 2005--A roundup of recent news items about UD, its faculty, staff and alumni.

Thomas Beebe, professor of chemistry and biochemistry, was featured in the March 15 News Journal and the March 14 Electronic Engineering Times for research on molecular nanowires that could help in the further miniaturization of electronic devices. "I want to avoid making any fantastic claims," Beebe told the EE Times. "The new thing that we have done, that has not been done before, is use a molecular corral to confine, isolate and to some extent control how long nanowires are grown."

Charles Elson, Edgar S. Woolard Jr. Chair and director of the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance, was quoted in a March 15 New York Times story on signs that corporate boards increasingly are holding chief executive officers accountable. "The question is, Are boards getting too active? Are they pulling the trigger too quickly? I don't think so," Elson told The Times. "They are looking at these terminations over the long term."

Elson was quoted widely concerning the selection of Robert Iger to replace Michael Eisner as chief executive officer of the Walt Disney Co., with comments March 15 in the New York Daily News and March 14 in the Los Angeles Times, Business Week Online and Reuters. "Having gone within the company to someone closely associated with the current CEO, and that the current CEO will be there a bit longer, will only fuel dissent," Elson told Reuters.

Kimmie Meissner, U.S. figure skating bronze medalist and a member of the University of Delaware Figure Skating Club, was featured in a March 15 News Journal story on the state’s high level figure skaters. The story cited Meissner, who hopes to skate for a medal in the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, and Johnny Weir, who formerly trained at UD and is competing in the world figure skating championships this week in Moscow.

McKay Jenkins, Cornelius A. Tilghman Sr. Professor of English, was quoted in a March 13 Los Angeles Times story concerning the National Endowment for the Arts’ Operation Homecoming, through which returning war veterans are encouraged to write about their experiences. "I was encouraging people who aren't writers, who have had a remarkable experience, to see their own experiences as a writer would," Jenkins said of the workshop he conducted at Fort Drum in New York.

Jochen Lauterbach, associate professor of chemical engineering, was featured in a March 12 News Journal story on research he is conducting on automotive catalytic converters.

Ralph Begleiter, Edward and Elizabeth Goodman Rosenberg Professor of Communication and Distinguished Journalist in Residence at UD, was mentioned in a March 12 Toronto Star story concerning the writer’s trip to Antarctica, where he met Begleiter and a UD study abroad class.

Havidan Rodriguez, director of UD’s Disaster Research Center, Tricia Wachtendorf, assistant professor of sociology, and Joseph Trainor, a doctoral student in sociology, were interviewed March 9 on WHYY-TV’s Delaware Tonight program concerning the center’s trip to South Asia to study response to the December 2004 tsunamis. The interview featured their recent field work in India and Sri Lanka as well as their preliminary findings from the tsunami-impacted countries.

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