Louisiana Board of Regents

John Snyder, whose career has spanned such roles as a Grammy-winning producer, record company executive, attorney, and university professor, has worked with some of the brightest lights in the music industry and now provides essential services,

John Snyder, Conrad N. Hilton Eminent Scholar in Music Industry Studies, Loyola University New Orleans

support and advice to professional musicians and students throughout the region. Recruited to Loyola University New Orleans as the Conrad N. Hilton Eminent Scholar in Music Industry Studies, a chair funded jointly by the private donor and the Board of Regents Support

Fund Endowed Chairs for Eminent Scholars program, Professor Snyder acts as coordinator of Loyola’s Music Industry Studies program as well as serving on its faculty. In addition, he founded and is president of the nonprofit Artists House Foundation, which provides support and guidance to musicians to help them succeed in the industry.

As Principal Investigator for a million-dollar Research Competitiveness and Educational Enhancement Program (RC/EEP) award, Professor Snyder leads the

New Orleans Music, Entertainment and Educational Consortium. The project brings together a consortium of institutions, including Loyola, Dillard University, the University of New Orleans and Delgado Community College to prepare students to work in the music industry and explore novel approaches to develop career and professional skills of local musicians.

Given the challenges faced by musicians across the region in the aftermath of the 2005 hurricanes and the need to quickly regain stability in the local industry, Professor Snyder’s recent work has been vitally important. He does much more than just provide training opportunities to Loyola’s students; he brings his exceptional skills and drive into the broader community, to keep the music playing throughout south Louisiana.

Dr. Tabbetha Dobbins

Dr. Tabbetha Dobbins is the kind of renaissance woman universities and students love.A dedicated teacher and a celebrated researcher who holds appointments through EPSCoR’s Joint Faculty Appointments Program (JFAP) at Louisiana Tech and Grambling, Dr. Dobbins radiates a vitality and commitment to all aspects of her work. This is reflected in the remarkable breadth of her success. As a junior researcher, she received funding for her project “Engineering Dopant Local Atomic Structures in Complex Metal Hydrides” through the BoRSF Research Competitiveness Subprogram, designed to both enable her to pursue her cutting-edge research and assist her in becoming competitive for federal funding. In addition, Dr. Dobbins has served as a Co-PI for Traditional Enhancement awards which have provided essential equipment and support for education and training programs at Louisiana Tech and Grambling. Clearly BoRSF funding has proven to be an excellent investment. Her twin dedication to cutting-edge research and student learning has helped Dr. Dobbins to achieve one of the most prestigious awards available to a young university scientist: the NSF CAREER award.

Endowed Chairs Programs FY 2009-10 Request for Proposals.

Download RFP & Policy as PDF document
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Spotlight: December 2009

Black holes. You hear about them, read about them, but never see them. There is a good reason for that. While supermassive in size, with hundreds or even billion times the mass of the Sun, black holes are invisible; so compact that even the speed of light can’t escape them. They can only be found indirectly, via their effects on the matter that surrounds them.

A team of 13 researchers and students from Louisiana State University Center for Computation & Technology (CCT), many of whom participate in Louisiana EPSCoR’s NSF-funded CyberTools project, has produced a black hole simulation project involving equations written by Albert Einstein that are so complex they can’t be written down on paper. It was the top winner in an international competition, the SCALE 2009 challenge at CCGrid09, a conference for scalable computing, in which scientists use computer systems that can easily adapt, or scale up, to provide greater performance and computing power and give them greater capability to solve complex problems.

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NASA EPSCoR FY 2010 RFP

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Spotlight: November 2009

For nearly fifteen years, the Louis Stokes – Louisiana Alliance for Minority Participation (LAMP) has focused Louisiana’s effort to increase the number and quality of underrepresented minority students pursuing and completing baccalaureate degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Led by Southern University and A&M College in Baton Rouge, LAMP is a consortium effort of eleven public and private universities, including Dillard University, Grambling State University, Louisiana State University and A&M College, McNeese State University, Nunez Community College, Southern University at New Orleans, Southern University at Shreveport, Tulane University, the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, and the University of New Orleans. Other participants include the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium and the Louisiana Board of Regents.

LAMP, funded by the National Science Foundation with a significant match from the Board of Regents Support Fund, provides a systemic approach to increasing minority participation and success in post-secondary education.

Dr. Diola Bagayoko, LS-LAMP Project Director, works with a student in his lab.

Through initiatives like recruitment, mentoring, retention and graduate school attendance, the program interacts directly with students and the institutional structures that guide their studies. LAMP also seeks to address institutional issues, such as curriculum reform and infrastructure development, which contribute significantly to student success.

LAMP is committed to providing services for Louisiana in the long term and actively seeks resources to continue and expand its initiatives. Because of its efforts, minority participation in STEM disciplines continues to increase and the academic culture across the State is adapting to a new, more supportive and success-driven model of education.

To learn more, visit the LAMP website!

Summary of Notices of Intent Submitted to the Industrial Ties Research Subprogram (ITRS) for the FY 2009-2010 Review Cycle

Summary of Notices of Intent Submitted to the Research Competitiveness Subprogram (RCS) for the FY 2009-2010 Review Cycle

Summary of Notices of Intent Submitted to the Awards to Louisiana Artists and Scholars (ATLAS) for the FY 2009-2010 Review Cycle

R&D (including ATLAS), Graduate Fellows, and the Traditional, Undergraduate, and Two-Year Enhancement Programs

At its September 24 meeting, the Board of Regents approved a new Endowed Chairs for Eminent Scholars program policy, as well as a model campus agreement and reporting format. These program revisions were developed based on the recommendations of the programmatic review panel, and subsequent discussions with campus and system representatives. The new policy goes into effect immediately and will apply to all proposals submitted in the current fiscal year and thereafter.

Dr. Yuri Lvov, Tolbert Pipes Endowed Chair on Micro and Nanosystems at Louisiana Tech’s Institute for Micromanufacturing has pioneered the delivery of medicine to diseased human cells via tiny vessels smaller than a cell and is an internationally recognized expert in nanotechnology. And it’s about to get better. Dr. Lvov and his team of researchers have a patent pending for a novel nano-encapsulation technology system that may be used to substantially enhance the ability to treat cancers and their metastases.

Dr. Yuri Lvov (right) and LA Tech biomedical engineering graduate student Shantanu Balkundi.

“The novel system has several advantages over current chemotherapy approaches,” says Dr. Lvov. “These include minimal side effects for the immune system, high specificity and selectivity for target cells, and easy administration of the nanometer-sized particles.”

Dr. Lvov has made impressive use of the many resources Louisiana offers to support his cutting-edge research and promote educational development. Recruited to Louisiana Tech as an endowed chair established through the BoRSF Eminent Scholars program, he has been a highly productive member of the faculty and a model of scholarly and academic collegiality.  Already the recipient of six U.S. and Japanese patents, Dr. Lvov has another five pending. Two of those five were funded in part by LA EPSCoR. In addition, Dr. Lvov has served as co-PI on several BoRSF research awards, including junior faculty members’ Research Competitiveness Subprogram (RCS) projects and a large Post-Katrina Support Fund Primarily Research partnership with UNO’s Advanced Materials Research Institute. Dr. Lvov’s engagement, moreover, stretches beyond the lab to the classroom: he has served as PI on a BoRSF Enhancement award supporting curriculum development for nanosystems engineering, molecular science and nanotechnology programs.

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