New Faculty Seed Grant

New Faculty Seed Grant is sponsored by Washington State University (WSU) Office of Research. This grant encourages new, junior level faculty to develop research, scholarly, or creative programs that lead to sustained professional development and extramural funding.

New Faculty Seed Grant | Advancement & Strategy | Washington State University A grant to encourage new, junior level faculty to develop research, scholarly, or creative programs. The New Faculty Seed Grant Program helps junior faculty develop research, scholarly, or creative programs that lead to sustained professional development and extramural funding.

View a recorded Information Session about the New Faculty Seed Grant Program The 2027 application cycle begins November 1. A Notice of Intent is required and must be submitted by 5pm December 1, 2026 in order to be considered for this program. Late NOIs will not be accepted.

Full proposals are due February 1, 2027 by 5pm. If you have any questions concerning the guidelines, proposal or review process, please contact us at or. orap.

servicedesk@wsu. edu . Review the New Faculty Seed Grant RFP Submit a Notice of Intent for 2027 Funding As examples of the types of projects that received New Faculty Seed Grants, browse the lists below.

Erin Benson (School of the Environment) – Agriculture and Environment emphasis Title: The composition of mineralizing fluids in Rare Earth Element deposits Abstract: Critical minerals such as rare earth elements underlie modern society, with uses in energy, defense, and electronics.

Demand for rare earth elements is projected to exceed supply in coming decades, and supply chain vulnerabilities emphasize the need to locate and evaluate domestic sources of these critical minerals. Carbonatites are unusual rocks that host over half of global rare earth element resources. Of known carbonatite occurrences, only around 10% are economic, and identification of economic carbonatites is both time-consuming and costly.

Mineralization in carbonatites is linked to the composition and path of fluids in the system. To date, such fluids have remained underdeveloped as a potential exploration indicator.

This project will investigate the composition and path of fluids at the Mountain Pass carbonatite locality, which is the only actively producing rare earth element mine in North America, to ascertain the role that fluids played in developing world-class mineralization.

By constraining fluids at Mountain Pass, we may develop a broadly applicable genetic model for carbonatite-hosted rare earth element deposit genesis and refine exploration approaches for discovery of future deposits.

Caio Figueiredo (Department of Veterinary Clinical Science) – Agriculture and Environment emphasis Title: Mechanisms of subfertility in cows: an integrated view of uterine disease Abstract: Metritis is one of the most common and costly diseases affecting dairy cows after calving.

It significantly reduces milk production, delays the establishment of pregnancy, increases the risk of early pregnancy loss, leads to higher rates of antimicrobial use, and increases the risk of cows leaving herds. Although some cows affected by metritis become pregnant quickly, most experience prolonged infertility, and the biological reasons for these differences remain unclear.

This project will investigate how the uterine environment, semen, and early embryo interact in cows previously affected by metritis. We will use advanced techniques to compare the molecular and metabolic differences between cows that conceive at first breeding with those that fail to conceive, and with cows that never experienced metritis.

By identifying biological pathways associated with successful pregnancy, this study will generate foundational knowledge to guide the development of new management, diagnostic, and therapeutic strategies aimed at improving fertility, animal welfare, and economic sustainability of the dairy industry.

Ryan Booth (Department of History) – Arts/Fine Arts emphasis Title: The Long US-Indian Wars Abstract: Americans typically remember the “Indian Wars” as a short post-Civil War episode ending at Wounded Knee in 1890, a framing that obscures nearly 150 years of sustained warfare against Indigenous peoples from the founding of the United States through the extension of US citizenship in 1924.

The Long US-Indian Wars challenges this historical erasure by proposing a book-length monograph that centers Indigenous perspectives while reinterpreting the US Army as an institution primarily shaped by wars against Native nations. The project situates Indigenous resistance as foundational to US national development rather than peripheral to it.

While some earlier scholars adopted a longer view of the conflicts, their analyses relied largely on elite military and political narratives.

This project builds on that scholarship by employing a bottom-up methodology that foregrounds Indigenous motivations, strategies, and experiences by carefully examining archival records at major research libraries across the US Aaron Hill (School of Music) – Arts/Fine Arts emphasis Title: The Charm of Impossibilities Abstract: Dr. Hill will compose multiple works for 10-piece jazz ensemble.

The primary inspiration for these works will be compositional techniques of twentieth-century French composer Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992), whose novel approaches to rhythm, harmony, and melody resulted in a unique compositional voice that helped make him one of the centuries most influential composers.

Hill has deciphered many of the compositional traits that typify Messiaen’s sound and developed techniques for deploying them in jazz arranging and composition. Hill will refine his previous work adapting Messiaen’s work and compose new pieces.

He will record a complete album and perform the works regionally and nationally, as well as present his developed techniques at conferences, broadening the awareness and appreciation of Messiaen’s work in the jazz world, while contributing to the continued evolution of the art form.

This project is the expression of blending of two genres musically and academically, and of the benefits of embracing music and knowledge outside of one’s primary discipline.

Ethan Smith (Department of Teaching and Learning) – Education emphasis Title: Multidisciplinary Noticing: Bridging Worlds of Math and Science Teacher Noticing Abstract: Because teaching is a complex activity, teachers tend to selectively notice only certain aspects of students’ thinking in-the-moment. If some students’ contributions go unnoticed, this can stifle learning opportunities and exacerbate academic disparities.

As such, addressing issues of teacher noticing is necessary for ensuring equitable educational outcomes for all students. However, teacher noticing research has been hindered by often focusing only on single subject areas (e.g., mathematics teacher noticing) and by understudying social and cultural factors that influence what teachers notice.

To address these issues, we will conduct an innovative series of instructional activities, observations, and interviews with a cohort of middle school teachers who teach both mathematics and science to better understand how they notice and respond to students’ thinking in exclusionary or inclusive ways.

These findings will help illustrate how teachers can better recognize contributions from diverse groups of students and develop their noticing skills ways that are equitable and asset-oriented toward all students.

Such contributions will strengthen approaches to professional development around teacher noticing and present robust opportunities for future investigations into teacher noticing across multiple subject areas and educational contexts Heather McNamee (Department of History) – Education emphasis Title: Unfinished Business: The Fight for Education Equality Abstract: Despite landmark legal victories in the mid-twentieth century, educational inequality remains deeply entrenched in the United States, in part because scholars and policymakers have insufficiently examined how inequity persisted after formal desegregation.

This project supports completion of Unfinished Business: The Fight for Education Equality in Jonesboro, Arkansas, a book manuscript that traces the multi-generational Black freedom struggle for educational justice from the 1920s through the 1990s.

By centering post-desegregation activism in a small southern city, the project challenges dominant civil-rights narratives that frame educational equality as a settled achievement of the 1960s. Drawing on archival records, newspapers, and oral histories, the manuscript demonstrates how white supremacy adapted through disciplinary policies, curricular exclusion, and the school-to-prison pipeline.

It highlights how Black students, parents, and community organizations continually reshaped their strategies to confront these evolving forms of discrimination. Situating educational inequality uncomfortably close to the present, this research provides essential historical context for contemporary debates about schooling, racial justice, and policy reform.

Haifeng Wang (Civil and Environmental Engineering) – Engineering emphasis Title: Toward Real-Time Wildfire Digital Twins: Adaptive AI for Short-Horizon Prediction Abstract: Wildfires in the western United States are changing faster than current forecasting tools can track. When winds shift or flames move into a new fuel type, existing models either run too slowly to update or rely on fixed assumptions that quickly become inaccurate.

This project develops a prototype “wildfire digital twin”, a computer simulation that continuously corrects itself using satellite observations. A small artificial-intelligence module monitors the difference between what the simulator predicts and what satellites actually observe, then adjusts a handful of interpretable parameters (such as how fast fire spreads through different vegetation) to bring the forecast back in line.

Using one primary Washington State wildfire as a controlled test case, we will measure whether this adaptive approach consistently reduces forecast errors compared to a conventional fixed model. The resulting prototype and validation results will directly support competitive proposals to NSF and USDAfor larger-scale research on adaptive wildfire forecasting.

Minyoung Cerruti (School of Design and Construction) – Health & Life Science emphasis Title: Reducing stress: Outcomes from a multisensory intervention designed for nurses Abstract: Nurses are essential to healthcare, providing critical patient care and emotional support in high-stress environments.

However, they frequently face intense occupational stressors, including heavy workloads, emotional demands of patient care, and insufficient support systems. These challenges contribute to mental health issues such as burnout, decreased quality of patient care, and increased organizational costs.

Existing strategies for managing nursing stress (e.g., mindfulness, physical activity, and professional education) offer benefits but have limitations: mindfulness requires significant mental focus; physical activity demands time and effort; and education fails to address environmental stressors.

Given these limitations, there is a pressing need for innovative and accessible approaches tailored to nurses’ specific needs and circumstances. This study aims to evaluate an innovative intervention – a portable, meditative, and user-centric pod with multisensory features designed to promote stress relief through a relaxing sensory experience.

This intervention offers nurses an accessible, immediate, low-cost form of stress relief, enabling them to rejuvenate quickly during short breaks with convenient access in hospital settings Maria Charisi (Department of Physics and Astronomy) – Physical Science/Math/Computer Science emphasis Title: Paving the way for supermassive black hole binary discoveries with Rubin Abstract: Supermassive black holes (SMBHs), millions to billions of times more massive than the Sun, lie at the centers of most galaxies.

Because galaxies grow through mergers, many galaxies should host pairs of SMBHs orbiting one another, known as SMBH binaries. Despite their expected abundance, such systems have so far remained elusive. This is about to change!

The long-awaited Rubin Observatory will begin operations in early 2026 delivering an unprecedented volume of high-quality data. We will advance the most promising method to identify SMBH binaries, namely searching for quasars (extremely luminous galactic nuclei) that show periodic brightness variations driven by the binary motion.

We will develop new tools to analyze Rubin’s massive data sets, enabling the first ever SMBH binary discoveries. Detecting SMBH binaries is crucial for understanding how galaxies and their black holes form and evolve. These systems are also strong sources of low-frequency gravitational waves (GWs), allowing us to probe gravity (and Einstein’s General Relativity) at its extremes.

Rubin discoveries will also provide key targets for ongoing GW experiments and can accelerate the first detection of GWs from SMBH binaries, a monumental milestone in GW science. Finally, they open the door to multi-messenger observations, a new frontier that combines light with GWs.

Qian Huang (Department of Strategic Communication) – Social Science/Business emphasis Title: Empowering HPV Vaccine Communications from Rural Providers with AI agent Abstract: Human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination is an effective cancer-prevention tool recommended for children starting at age 9. Although U.S. HPV vaccine initiation has reached 78. 2%, persistent urban–rural gaps remain in both initiation and series completion.

These disparities are especially pronounced in the Pacific Northwest (Washington, Idaho, and Oregon), despite relatively high overall coverage in this region. Provider-reported immunization data may also underestimate rural shortfalls because patients in rural areas often have fewer healthcare visits.

Primary care providers’ (PCPs) recommendations are among the strongest drivers of HPV uptake, yet they occur less often and less consistently in rural settings. Key barriers among PCPs include limited visit time, discomfort discussing sexual health, anticipated parental resistance, and difficulty addressing safety concerns, along with fewer well-child visits and lower health literacy among parents.

To reduce these barriers and prompt PCPs’ recommendations, we propose an AI-powered, PCP-facing chatbot to support HPV vaccine recommendations during rural well visits. Using large language models and relevant technologies, the tool will provide context-specific prompts and strategies. The project will (1) identify and test tailored strategies and (2) develop and train the virtual agent.

Hannah Haemmerli (School of the Environment) – Agriculture and Environment emphasis Title: The Ripple Effect: Governance Transformations After Dam Removal Conflicts over natural resources, such as water, are becoming more prevalent as climate change, technological advancements, shifting societal values, and other changes amplify tensions. While often very costly, conflict can also be transformative.

For example, decades-long conflicts over the removal of dams from rivers have supported more inclusive and collaborative decision-making, emerging leadership, and negotiations of shared values. Such attributes can be considered characteristics of adaptive and collaborative governance. Despite this positive governance transformation, in some river basins, we see a return to conflict.

This research seeks to understand how and under which conditions dam removal conflicts can lead to las ng governance changes that increase the adaptive and collaborative capacities of decision-makers to sustainably govern water resources.

The impacts of dam removal conflicts on long-term water governance in river basins will be investigated by (1) identifying attributes of adaptive and collaborative processes that emerge from conflict and (2) tracing their institutional impact over me. This grant will fund a case study of the Kennebec River in Maine as a proof-of-concept.

The results will help decision-makers ensure conflict resolution can sustainably transform water governance.

Martin King (School of Music) – Arts/Fine Arts emphasis Title: Cultural Preservation through the Wind Quintets of Southeast Asian Composers While music from Asia has grown more visible in the western concert hall during the early part of the 21st century, access to music from Asian composers has lagged behind the quality, quantity and diversity of their repertoire.

Works by US-based composers, such as Chen Yi and Xinyan Li, have been published and are performed occasionally in academic settings. But works by composers from Asia, and those focusing on localized musical traditions are not yet available via recording and performance for American audiences. Assistant Professor Martin King will use his unique position as a French horn player specializing in this music to address this problem.

Along with his quintet, the Pan Pacific Ensemble, Dr. King has been engaged with this music for the past decade. This project will expand Asian wind quintet repertoire by commissioning Macaoborn composer Bun Ching Lam and championing an under-appreciated wind quintet by the dean of Southeast Asian composition, the Cambodian-born Chinary Ung.

Bibhushana Poudyal (Department of English) – Arts/Fine Arts emphasis Title: Global South Solidarities and Community-Driven Open Scholarship Digital Storytelling and Global South Solidarities addresses the persistence of Eurocentric, colonial frameworks in academia by creating an open-access digital repository that amplifies the voices, histories, and perspectives of marginalized communities from South Asia and the Middle East and North Africa.

It will bridge scholarly and community knowledge through curated narratives, educational resources, and multimedia storytelling, fostering justice-driven scholarship and global solidarity.

Field research in Nepal, Pakistan, and India along with remote U.S.-based archival work, will unearth silenced histories, including Dalit movements, indigenous knowledge systems, feminist activism, colonial cartographic violence and anti-colonial resistance, ensuring ethical and diverse curation.

This initiative integrates marginalized perspectives into academia, reshaping educational practices, advancing inclusive pedagogy, interdisciplinary collaboration, and international partnerships. Aligned with decolonial goals, the project elevates these narratives to redefine knowledge production, fostering an inclusive academia, global solidarity, and transformative change.

Peng He (Department of Teaching and Learning) – Education emphasis Title: Building Community-Engaged Partnerships to Develop K-12 STEM Teacher AI Literacy Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming society, yet AI literacy remains underdeveloped in K-12 STEM education.

This project builds a Community of Practice (CoP) to co-design professional learning workshops that equip teachers with strategies to integrate AI literacy into their instruction. The project follows the Human Inquiry–AI–Human Empowerment framework to support teachers integrate AI literacy into their instruction and understand ethical AI use.

Through iterative design and collaboration with teachers in Eastern Washington, the project will develop, pilot, and refine AI literacy workshops. Teachers will gain resources to navigate algorithmic bias, data privacy, and equity challenges in AI education. A design-based research approach will guide the process.

Data will be collected through classroom observations, teacher feedback, and student work. The project will provide strategies for teachers to use AI tools effectively and responsibly. This work ensures that AI literacy becomes an equitable and integral component of K-12 STEM education, preparing students for an AI-driven future.

Qiaowan Chang (School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering) – Engineering emphasis Title: Advanced electrocatalytic upgrading of methane to liquid oxygenates Natural gas, primarily composed of methane (CH4), accounts for 47% of global petroleum reserves. Yet, in remote areas, low CH4 production rates make traditional collection and utilization cost prohibitive, resulting in flaring and wasted CH4.

To improve natural gas utilization efficiency, it is crucial to develop sustainable technologies that convert CH4 into transportable liquid oxygenates at mild conditions. Active oxygen species (H2O2 and ·OH radicals) play a key role in achieving this conversion.

However, an ongoing debate over the effectiveness of H2O2 generation methods in CH4 conversion highlights the urgent need for a fundamental understanding of how H2O2 influences the reaction pathway. Furthermore, it is still unknown how to control the generation of active oxygen species to enhance CH4-to-oxygenates conversion.

Thus, to understand the role of H2O2 and ·OH radicals, and explore their potential in enhancing CH4 utilization at mild conditions, this project will integrate atomic-scale electrocatalyst design with advanced in-situ/operando spectroscopy techniques to bridge critical knowledge gaps and discover efficient catalysts.

Wheaton Schroeder (School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering) – Engineering emphasis Title: Building Metabolic Models for Astrocyte-Neuron Metabolic Coupling from FABP7 Lack of sleep is a strong trigger of seizures, the recurrence of which are a key symptom of epilepsy, a neurological disease that affects 65 million people worldwide.

The cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying the association between seizures and lipid metabolism are poorly understood. The proposed astrocyte-neuron lactate shuttle hypothesis (ANLSH) details the metabolic dependencies of these cells through lactate, glutamate (a “wake” signal), adenosine (a somnogen), and damaging reactive oxygen species.

Recently, our collaborator Jason Gerstner demonstrated that mice with impaired astrocyte fatty acid (lipid) shuttles (the protein FABP7) show no significant differences in protein expression to that of recently seized mice. Building on this work, I hypothesized that these two conditions have very similar metabolic states due to a “traffic jam” of lipids at the site of lipid exchange, the tripartite synapse.

I propose to use two metabolic modeling techniques to recreate in silico the ANLSH, investigate this hypothesis, and extend the ANLSH to incorporate the critical role of lipid metabolic coupling. These results will lead to investigation of FABP7 as a critical link between sleep, circadian rhythms, and metabolism.

Emily Qualls-Creekmore (Department of Integrative Physiology and Neuroscience) – Health/Life Science emphasis Title: The role of the amygdala in stress-potentiated irritable bowel syndrome In irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), stress often precedes flare-ups of symptoms and in turn, gastrointestinal discomfort can cause more stress.

The basolateral amygdala is activated during stress, receives direct input from the nucleus of the solitary tract, a key component of the gut-brain axis, and projects to brain regions implicated in interoception and gastrointestinal physiology.

We hypothesize that the basolateral amygdala is required for the conscious assessment of ascending sensory signals from the gut and potentiates IBS symptoms via activation of downstream brain regions that exacerbate gastrointestinal dysregulation. The goal of this project is to define the neural dynamics mediating the involvement of basolateral amygdala circuits in stress-potentiated GI dysfunction associated with IBS.

We will accomplish this goal using a mouse model of IBS to test the hypothesis that the BLA is responsive to interoceptive signals from the colon via vagal input to the NTS and that stress amplifies the ability of the BLA to exacerbate symptoms in IBS. The results from this project will reveal mechanisms by which discrete brain regions operate in concert with the gut-brain axis to exacerbate the symptoms of IBS in stressed individuals.

Amy Kemp (Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences) – Health/Life Science emphasis Title: Language Assessment in Context using Ecological Momentary Assessments (LACE) While memory loss is the hallmark symptom of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRDs), language impairments often emerge in the early stages as well.

These impairments progressively affect an individual’s ability to communicate, perform daily activities, and maintain meaningful interactions. This project explores the use of mobile technology to improve early detection of ADRDs in rural communities. By collecting speech and language samples through smartphones, we aim to identify early warning signs of ADRDs, such as changes in hearing and speaking.

Current methods for assessing these changes are time-intensive and difficult to access in underserved areas, making this research crucial for addressing health disparities. Our study will compare data collected via mobile devices to traditional in-person tests to ensure accuracy and reliability. Over 30 days, we will also analyze how speech and language patterns vary throughout the day to improve monitoring methods.

By creating a scalable, real-time tool for assessing communication health, this work will make it easier to detect and address ADRDs earlier, promoting healthier aging and greater equity in healthcare access.

Yefeng Mei (Department of Physics and Astronomy) – Physical Science/Math/Computer Science emphasis Title: Cold atomic ensemble antennas for distributed quantum computing We aim to develop a next-generation distributed quantum network by combining two powerful quantum technologies: single neutral atoms in optical tweezer arrays and cold atomic ensembles.

While single-atom systems offer precise control for local quantum tasks, connecting them over long distances is challenging due to weak atom-photon interactions. In contrast, atomic ensembles enable strong configurable interactions, which are crucial for long-distance quantum entanglement.

This proposal bridges their limits and creates a hybrid quantum system where atomic ensembles act as “quantum antennas”, linking single-atom qubits with flying photons. This synergy allows us to generate single photons for entanglement between distant quantum nodes while maintaining the precision of single-atom qubits.

We further demonstrate a scalable architecture for quantum networking – a critical step toward distributed quantum computing and secure communication. Our research paves the way for a future quantum internet, where remote quantum systems collaborate seamlessly to solve problems in complex systems beyond classical reach.

Long Nguyen (Department of Management, Information Systems, and Entrepreneurships) – Social Science/Business emphasis Vanessa Delgado (Department of Sociology) – Social Science/Business emphasis Title: Unequal Aging: Ethnicity, Legal Status, and Growing Old in Rural Washington This study examines the retirement plans of older low-income Latino/a immigrants (55+) in rural Washington.

In recent years, social scientists have raised concerns about the aging Latino/a immigrant population because this group is disproportionally more likely to live in poverty, have lower educational levels, own fewer financial assets, possess less wealth, and have very limited savings and retirement income. On top of this, Latino/a immigrants are more likely to be undocumented than other immigrant populations.

Undocumented Latino/a immigrants are less likely to be covered by employer retirement plans, cannot access the social safety net, most banking and retirement accounts, and healthcare coverage—all of which is likely to shape their retirement plans. To date, very few studies have explored how immigration laws shape the retirement plans of Latino/a immigrants.

This study will address this theoretical and empirical lacuna through 50 in-depth interviews with undocumented (N=25) and documented (N=25) Latino/a immigrants in rural Washington and elucidate how legal status shapes the life course.

Scott Jess (School of the Environment) – Agriculture and Environment emphasis Title: The breakup of North America: mapping extension across the central Cordillera Mountain belts form through the collision of tectonic plates, but all eventually begin to collapse and vanish over time.

We have always struggled to study their collapse and the risks this poses to local communities as ancient mountain belts leave behind only limited traces of their existence due to the destructive nature of their demise. Our best hope is to study mountain belts currently experiencing collapse, such as the North American Cordillera.

Previous work in the Cordillera has concentrated on two domains, one in the north (e.g., British Columbia) and one in the south (e.g., Nevada, Arizona). Unfortunately, we have difficulty correlating these domains due to an absence of work completed across the central domain (e.g., Washington, Oregon). Here, the rocks we need to study are covered by a blanket of lava up to 5 km thick.

Fortunately, from this lava rises small bedrock exposures full of information about the tectonic collapse of the region, though traditional methods of investigation are useless due to their size. This project will utilize innovative radiometric dating methods to study the tectonic history of the region prior to their burial and be the first to unravel the tectonic history of the Central Cordillera.

By studying the tectonic collapse of the entire Cordillera, we can better understand this major geological process and mitigate the risks it poses to society.

Cesar Haas (School of Music) – Arts/Fine Arts emphasis Title: WSU Brazilian Jazz Festival A guest artist residency focused on performances, workshops, and discussion panels that promote dissemination, teaching, and learning of Brazilian music at WSU and middle/high schools in the area free of charge to the community.

The team that leads the project is Três Mais, a new collaboration between American and Brazilian rhythm section musicians and educators marrying Brazilian music styles with American Jazz. The core rhythm section of Três Mais consists of three musicians and educators: Brazilian guitarist César Haas, Brazilian drummer Graciliano Zambonim, and American jazz bassist Wayne Moose.

Três Mais invites internationally acclaimed artists that share the same passion for diversity and collaboration. For the first year of the project, the featured artist will be Brazilian guitarist, arranger, and educator Nelson Faria.

One of the most important musicians in Brazil, he has released 12 CDs as a leader, 6 books (2 in the US, Japan, Brazil, and Italy), he has also recorded as guitar player and/or arranger or producer on over 200 CDs by Brazilian and international artists. The guest artists will perform concerts, teach clinics, and record a live video performance at WSU Recording Studios to be released on YouTube and other streaming platforms.

Jessica Williams-Nguyen (IREACH ) – Arts/Fine Arts emphasis Title: Blending Traditions: Indigenous Methodologies in Quantitative Health Research Quantitative health science (epidemiology, biostatistics, and related disciplines) plays a crucial role in research by supporting evidence-based strategies for individual and population health.

Tools such as the randomized controlled trial and null hypothesis significance testing are nearly universally accepted as gold standards for causal inference, but they are underpinned by dominant cultural worldviews that disregard or undervalue the experiences and knowledge of non-dominant cultures. In the context of Indigenous health, this status quo creates barriers to building and sustaining academic-community research partnerships.

Alternatively, an emerging literature promotes quantitative methods that are rooted in Indigenous ways of knowing, but these resources are siloed across niches of the global scientific community, with vanishingly low visibility and low likelihood of broad translation in public health.

The proposed study bridges this gap by 1) mapping the existing interdisciplinary and transcultural knowledge on Indigenous-centered quantitative science; and 2) assessing the readiness of academic and community stakeholders in applying these methods to real-world quantitative studies.

Anya Sheftel (Department of Teaching and Learning) – Education emphasis Title: Development of Motivational Enhancement Group Intervention – College and Beyond The proposed project, Motivational Enhancement Group Intervention – College and Beyond (MEGI-C), will support the development of an evidence-based career development and self-determination intervention designed to meet the needs of young adults with intellectual and development disabilities (IDD) enrolled in inclusive postsecondary education programs (IPSEs).

The overarching aim of this project is to reduce disparities in post-school outcomes between these young adults and their peers. Evidence-based practices are important in ensuring that the strategies used by educators and other professionals are effective and grounded in research.

With support from the WSU New Faculty Seed Grant, Dr. Sheftel will develop MEGI-C and test its efficacy by using a mixed methods randomized waitlist control study with a national sample of 80 young adults with IDD enrolled in IPSEs. She will disseminate the results of this project to scholars and practitioners.

Additionally, she will use these results to apply for a federal grant through the Institute of Education Sciences to establish MEGI-C as an evidence-based practice.

Kang Huang (Biological Systems Engineering) – Engineering emphasis Title: Multifunctional substrate-independent coatings derived from food grade phenolics Biofouling and biofilms in pipeline interconnects, such as joints, fittings, and seams, can lead to a variety of problems, impacting both the efficiency and safety of water distribution and food processing systems.

Considerable effort has been devoted to developing new antimicrobial materials to kill fouling organisms and prevent their settlement. However, concerns persist regarding the toxic biocides used in these materials, particularly their environmental impact and the associated health risks.

The overall goal of this research is to minimize biofouling accumulation and prevent biofilm formation in the interconnect zones of water distribution and food processing pipelines. This will be achieved through the development of a substrate-independent, highly adaptable hydrogel coating using food-grade materials derived from agricultural byproducts.

The success of this research will yield a nontoxic, environmentally friendly approach for addressing the biofouling and biofilm issues associated with pipeline interconnects, thus enhancing the safety and efficiency of water distribution and food processing systems.

Catherine Jarrett (Nutrition and Exercise Physiology ) – Health & Life Science emphasis Title: New anti-obesity medication and its effect on cardiovascular health The obesity prevalence in the US has grown substantially over the past 4 decades, and this rise is predicted to continue despite weight management efforts.

New anti-obesity medications (e.g., Ozempic, Wegovy, Zepbound), originally developed to treat individuals with diabetes, have recently been approved for weight loss. Impressively, clinical trials demonstrate more than double the amount of weight loss seen with intensive lifestyle changes (diet and exercise). These findings coupled