October 24, 2024

Get ready for a hefty dose of creepy clowns as Michigan Tech Theatre presents its annual haunted experience. This year’s theme is Haunted Hoist: Fears and Phobias. The event runs from 7-10:30 p.m. nightly, tonight through Saturday, Oct. 24-26, at Quincy Mine Hoist.

The haunted experience has experimented with multiple locations and themes over nearly a decade, and that variety is essential to the learning experience of Department of Visual and Performing Arts (VPA) students involved in the production.

“Our hope is if you do not have any fears or phobias, you will have by the time you leave,” said Kent Cyr (VPA).

Find out more about the challenges and rewards of a project that gets our students ready for careers at Michigan Tech News.

Research is complete and deadlines met for 50 graduate students, whose 21 dissertations, 20 theses and nine reports are now available on Digital Commons, Michigan Tech’s institutional repository for scholarly research. You can download their work at the Digital Commons @ Michigan Tech website and watch as others around the world do the same. Last month, the work of MTU alumni was documented island-hopping from Hawaii to Iceland to Madagascar to New Zealand.

The Graduate School website is a great place to find information about all of the steps leading up to successful completion of your theses and dissertations.

Candidates will find helpful recorded seminars that will make the document formatting process easier. Here’s a tip: Use the template.

Michigan Tech won second place in the Heavy Civil division of the 2024 Associated Schools of Construction (ASC) Great Lakes Region (Region 3) Construction Competition, held Oct. 16-19 in Downers Grove, Illinois.

Two teams competed in the Heavy Civil division: Michigan Tech and the Milwaukee School of Engineering.

MTU received great feedback from the division sponsor, F.H. Paschen Contractors. They were extremely impressed with our team's final presentation. FHP also praised the team's thorough approach to their safety plan and quality plan. They gave the team advice and some industry insight on how to improve their estimate and schedule in the future.

Overall, our team did an excellent job for first- and second-year students who haven't had any courses in estimating or scheduling yet. Most importantly, the team members had a great time, learned a lot, and are all interested in returning next year.

Thank you so much to everyone who took the time to help the team prepare for this year's competition and help us to continue the long-standing tradition of taking Michigan Tech teams to this competition.

Our goal for next year is not only to compete in the Heavy Civil division, but to also bring a Commercial division team as well.

Again, thank you so much for your help, advice and encouragement!

Join the Michigan Tech Transportation Institute (MTTI) for a general members and friends luncheon on Nov. 11 from 12-1 p.m. in Ballroom B1 of the Memorial Union Building.

We welcome all researchers on campus to join us to learn more about the institute and our services, and for a chance to meet our members — many of whom may have research topics in common with yours.

We kindly ask that you RSVP by Nov. 5 for the luncheon count.

The meeting will also be available via Zoom.

A Card Services production system maintenance window is scheduled for Nov. 7 from 3-5 p.m.

During this time, CS Gold access readers, meal readers and access to some Keywatcher Kiosk rooms will work in their offline mode. After the maintenance is complete, transactions will be uploaded back into CS Gold.

The following services will be affected:

• cardservices.mtu.edu website
• Mobile Readers
• Dining Point of Sale Systems
• Husky Print (color printing only)

If you have any questions or concerns about this maintenance window, we can help. Contact us at it-help@mtu.edu or call 906-487-1111.

The Michigan Tech football team is set to host U.P. rivals Northern Michigan for the 22nd installment of the Miner's Cup on Saturday, Oct. 26. The game is slated for a 12:05 p.m. kickoff at Kearly Stadium.

The game also marks Hall of Fame Weekend. At halftime, former Michigan Tech players Tim Bedenis and Tom VanWagner, longtime voice of the Huskies and public address announcer Mitch Lake, and seven others will be recognized as the Michigan Tech Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2024.

Saturday's game will be aired locally on TV6, and will also be streamed on FloSports (subscription required — a discount is available for students).

Read the football preview at Michigan Tech Athletics.

Kristin Brzeski (CFRES/ESC) is a co-principal investigator (co-PI) on a collaborative project that has been awarded a $2,120,752 research grant from the National Science Foundation and the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation.

The project is titled "Collaborative Research: PACSP TOOLS: Identifying unique genotypic and phenotypic characteristics of Gulf Coast canids to revive genomic variation in the endangered red wolf."

This potential five-year project is part of a new joint funding initiative designed to extend basic science into on-the-ground conservation. The project includes co-PIs from Princeton University, Mississippi State University, and conservation partner the Endangered Wolf Center.

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Donald Lafreniere (SS/GLRC) is the principal investigator (PI) on a project that has received a $172,636 research and development contract from Pennsylvania State University.

The project is titled "Protected Areas Research Collaborative (PARC) Listening Lab."

Ryan Williams, Daniel Lizzadro-Mcpherson and Robert Cowling (all GLRC) are co-PIs on this project.

Chelsea Schelly (SS) and Jay Meldrum (VPR) traveled to Beaver Island, Michigan, last week as part of their efforts to support energy resilience for the island.

During their visit, they hosted an engagement event for residents and gathered input on the island's critical infrastructure and energy needs. This collaboration is currently funded by a DoE SolveIT Prize.

The Detroit News mentioned Michigan Tech in a story about the slight overall enrollment increase at Michigan’s public universities this fall. Michigan Tech News reported in September that Tech’s enrollment grew by just over 100, reaching 7,430 students.

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Cottage Life published an article written by Adjunct Professor Joshua Pearce (MSE) about the economic advantages and risks of going off-grid with solar and battery systems. This story was originally published by The Conversation.

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Detroit’s 760 WJR-AM featured Michigan Tech on their College Tour 2024 segment, which aired on Oct. 22 as part of the “JR Morning with Guy Gordon, Lloyd Jackson, and Jamie Edmonds” show. Guests included undergraduate students Logan Sandell and Audrey Fanning, along with Marika Seigel (PHC/AA), Briana Bettin (CS/PsyHF), and Kellie Raffaelli (SA), who discussed the MTU programs and initiatives shaping the next generation of leaders.

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University President Rick Koubek was quoted by DVIDS in a story about Michigan Tech’s Keweenaw Research Center receiving the Jack Donnelly Award for Excellence in Counterintelligence. The award was presented by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA) in recognition of the University’s leadership in national security research and counterintelligence efforts.

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The Iron Mountain Daily News mentioned Michigan Tech’s Department of Visual and Performing Arts in a story about its upcoming Haunted Hoist House: Fears and Phobias. The event is hosted in partnership with the Quincy Mine Hoist Association and will run from Thursday to Saturday, Oct. 24-26.

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Alabama’s CBS 42 and 14 additional outlets mentioned Michigan Tech in a story about the completion of the first-ever lunar road built in a simulated space environment. The project, a collaboration between SpaceFactory and MTU, successfully demonstrated the use of lunar regolith and innovative materials to construct a durable road in a vacuum.

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Crain’s Grand Rapids mentioned Michigan Tech alumni Jeff Helminski ’97 (B.S. Mechanical Engineering), Jeff Schumaker ’92 (B.S. Civil Engineering) and Ben Wickstrom ’98 (B.S. Civil Engineering) among the 200 Most Influential Leaders in West Michigan for 2024.

APA PsycTests Database Trial

For a limited time, the Van Pelt and Opie Library is providing access to APA PsycTests. This American Psychological Association database contains psychological tests and measures (many unpublished), as well as descriptive information about each test and its development and administration. A wide range of instrument types, including batteries, questionnaires, rating scales and surveys, are also included. The database is updated monthly.

APA PsycTests will be available until Nov. 9. Please send any feedback to library@mtu.edu.

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Laura Walikainen Rouleau Presenting 'Private Spaces in Public Places'

Come join the Friends of the Michigan Tech Library to hear Associate Teaching Professor Laura Walikainen Rouleau, Department of Social Sciences, Michigan Technological University, discuss her new book, “Private Spaces in Public Places.”

The presentation is planned as part of the Friends of the Michigan Tech Library annual membership meeting today, Oct. 24, from 4:30-6 p.m. in the East Reading Room of the J. Robert Van Pelt and John and Ruanne Opie Library. The event will include a short business meeting and elections before the presentation.

Rouleau's research explores the history of privacy in the United States from 1880-1930 through a series of “private” spaces newly emerging in public facilities. Her research uses spatial case studies to uncover how these sites were both physically and socially constructed. The similarities across geographical locations, from the industrializing Copper Country to urbanizing New York, demonstrate the ubiquity of social norms that informed these spaces. These spaces emerged embedded in several concurrent social transformations that altered both the public and private landscapes of the turn-of-the-20th-century United States.

The presentation is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be served.

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BioSci Seminar Series Speaker: George Wheeler

George Wheeler, postdoctoral researcher, Department of Biological Sciences (BioSci), Michigan Technological University, will present as part of the BioSci Seminar Series at 3 p.m. today, Oct. 24, in GLRC 202 and virtually on Zoom.

Join the BioSci Seminar on Zoom.

Wheeler's presentation is titled "Interacting effects of nutrient availability and environmental change on grassland plant communities."

From the abstract: 
Nutrient availability plays a key role in shaping the ecological dynamics of grassland plant communities, with nutrient addition commonly leading to increased productivity, reduced diversity and more acquisitive trait strategies. The specifics of this pattern, however, vary dramatically from site to site, and within a single site, they may shift based on changes in climatic conditions and disturbance regimes.

At Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve (Minnesota, USA), my research shows a shift in nitrogen responses based on fire and pine encroachment. In burned plots, where pine encroachment is inhibited, nitrogen addition shifts the herbaceous plant community from one dominated by perennial C4 grasses with native forbs and legumes to one where invasive C3 grasses are abundant. However, in unburned plots subject to pine encroachment, invasive C3 grasses are abundant regardless of nitrogen treatment. While this community pattern might be expected to alter ecosystem carbon and nitrogen dynamics, my results do not show such a pattern. Though several ecosystem carbon pools respond to fire, they do not respond to nitrogen addition or to fire-nitrogen interactions.

Alongside measures of species composition and resource cycling, plant functional traits can serve as valuable indicators of ecological strategies, not only through species-level differences but also through intraspecific variability. At Cedar Point Biological Station (Nebraska, USA), grassland plant species’ functional traits respond strongly to nutrient addition. I found, however, that these traits, and in some cases their nutrient responses, are also dependent on sampling year. Species display more acquisitive trait values both with nitrogen addition and in high rainfall years, and for leaf dry matter content, the effect of nitrogen is elevated in high rainfall years. Through experimental rainfall manipulation, I found that these patterns can be partially explained by total rainfall but that a substantial component remains to be explained by other components of annual environmental variation.

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Today's C-Cubed Luncheon Menu

Carved and Crafted Catering at Michigan Technological University invites you to join the C-Cubed Luncheon for the 2024-25 school year. The weekly luncheon is held from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. every Thursday in the Memorial Union Alumni Lounge (MUB 107). All faculty and staff, along with their guests, are invited.

Menu for Thursday, Oct. 24:

• Char Siu Pork Loin (AG)
• Thai Basil Tofu (VG) (PR)
• Asian Vegetable Stir Fry (VG)
• Vegetable Spring Roll
• Asian Salad (VG)
• Basmati Rice (VG) (AG)

The C-Cubed lunch buffet menus are created and prepared by Chef Luis Delgado and his culinary team. As the name suggests, the meals are meant to foster conversation, community, and collegiality. Attendees may bring their lunch instead of purchasing the buffet. Fruit-infused water, coffee, tea, and cookies are available free to all attendees. All vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free items on the buffet are labeled for easy identification. No takeout service or personal containers are permitted.

The buffet lunch is $15.50 per person. Cash, credit cards and gift cards are accepted. Gift cards can be purchased in the Memorial Union Office (MUB 101).

You can submit C-Cubed feedback using C-Cubed Survey/Comments form. To join the C-Cubed Luncheon Email List and receive weekly menus, please complete the sign-up form.

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Call for Judges: 3 Minute Thesis Competition

The Graduate Student Government (GSG) is soliciting faculty who are willing to volunteer as judges for one hour in the upcoming 3 Minute Thesis (3MT) annual competition, which will be held on Nov. 7 in the MUB Ballroom. The preliminary rounds and finals will be held from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and 6-8 p.m., respectively.

If you are interested in judging, please fill out the 3MT 2024 Judges Sign Up form so we can coordinate scheduling.

For more information on the competition, please see GSG's 3MT webpage or send an email to gsg-research@mtu.edu.

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GSG Halloween Party

The Graduate Student Government (GSG) is hosting a Halloween Party — join us for a Spooktacular Halloween Bash!

Event Details:

• What: GSG Halloween Party
• When: Thursday, Oct. 31, from 6-8 p.m.
• Where: Grad Commons
• Dress Code: Halloween-themed attire or colors (orange, black, purple and green).

Activities include a costume contest (prizes for winners!), campfire, Halloween-themed snacks/drinks, and the chance to strike a pose with our spooky decor!

Costume Contest Categories:

• Master of Disguise: Best overall
• Bone-Chilling: Spookiest look
• Wickedly Hilarious: Funniest costume

Don't miss out on a night of frightful fun! Check our flyer for more information.

If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to reach out to gsgsocial@mtu.edu.

Organized by the Graduate Student Government.

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MAE Graduate Seminar Speaker: Jon Rogers

The next Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE) Graduate Seminar Speaker will present at 4 p.m. today, Oct. 24, in MEEM 112.

Jon Rogers will present “National Laboratory and Professional Society Perspectives.”

Rogers has worked on a variety of studies, including advanced manufacturing, the impact of technology on the economy, and many studies involving the weapons program and underground facilities. He retired from Sandia National Laboratories in November 2023 but continues to support the lab as a consultant.

To have your event automatically appear, please submit them to the University Events Calendar.

that thing between my teeth is my foot Exhibit - Michigan Tech Art

Thursday, October 24, 8 a.m.–8 p.m. | Rozsa Center for the Performing Arts, Rozsa Art Galleries A-Space

MICHIGAN TECH ART SERIES EVENT Douglas Degges is presenting two parallel artistic explorations in the Rozsa A-Space Gallery. Since the fall of 2019, Degges has been creating...

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Connect with Cooper Farms: Open Office Hours

Thursday, October 24, 9:30–11:30 a.m. | Administration and Student Services Building, 220 Career Services

Join Cooper Farms, a third-generation family-owned food supplier from Northwest Ohio, as they host open office hours at Career Services! Specializing in producing healthy live...

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Flu Shot Clinic

Thursday, October 24, 11 a.m.–1 p.m. | Rozsa Lobby

Stay Healthy This Season: Come Get Your Flu Shot! As the flu season approaches, protecting yourself and your loved ones is more important than ever. In collaboration with UP...

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The Falling Tree Collaborative - A Transdisciplinary Research Success Story

Thursday, October 24, 12–1 p.m.

Join us for a special session of the VPR Research Series featuring Teaching Professor Libby Meyer (Visual and Performing Arts) and her collaborators from Michigan State...

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University Senate Meeting

Thursday, October 24, 12:30–1:30 p.m. | Chemical Sciences and Engineering Building, 102

Agendas available on the Senate website. Meetings every Thursday except during academic breaks.

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Biological Sciences Seminar Series - Interacting Effects of Nutrient Availability and Environmental Change on Grassland Plant Communities

Thursday, October 24, 3–4 p.m. | Great Lakes Research Center (GLRC), 202

Dr. George Wheeler, Postdoctoral Researcher Department of Biological Sciences, Michigan Technological University Abstract: Nutrient availability plays a key role in shaping...

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Department of Physics Colloquium

Thursday, October 24, 4:00–4:50 p.m. | Fisher Hall, 139

Title: Teaching and Research in Introductory Physics Classes at MIT Guest Speaker: Michelle Tomasik, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Abstract: Teaching Enabled Active...

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Huskies Swim Training - Session 2

Thursday, October 24, 4–5 p.m. | Student Development Complex (SDC), Pool

Huskies Swim Training is a program that provides additional attention and competitive guidance to advanced swimmers looking to focus on stroke technique and...

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Hybrid Physics Colloquium with Michelle Tomasik

Thursday, October 24, 4:00–4:50 p.m. | Fisher Hall, 139

Dr. Michelle Tomasik from MIT Online/Residential Physics Education, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will present at this week's Physics Colloquium. Tomasik's...

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National Laboratory and Professional Society Perspectives

Thursday, October 24, 4 p.m. | R. L. Smith Mechanical Engineering-Engineering Mechanics Building (MEEM), 112

MAE Graduate Seminar Speaker Series proudly presents Johnathan Rogers, PhD Sandia National Lab Abstract The presenta􀆟on provides some insights from 37 years spent at a...

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Prof. Laura Walikainen Rouleau presents “Private Spaces in Public Places.”

Thursday, October 24, 4:30–6:00 p.m. | J. Robert Van Pelt and John and Ruanne Opie Library, East Reading Room

Prof. Laura Walikainen Rouleau presents “Private Spaces in Public Places.” The Friends of the Michigan Tech Library annual membership meeting will include a short...

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Future Pathways: Linking Generations for Success

Thursday, October 24, 5–7 p.m. | Memorial Union Building (MUB), Alumni Lounge

You're Invited!Join us for an exciting evening of connection and conversation with the successful women alum. This is a fun opportunity to network and gain insights from...

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Python Workshop

Thursday, October 24, 5–6 p.m. | Rekhi 113

A free, in person, python workshop for beginners!

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Learn to Swim Levels 1-5 - Session 2

Thursday, October 24, 5:10–5:50 p.m. | Student Development Complex (SDC), Pool

Come make a splash in Huskies Group Swim Lessons! American Red Cross Learn-to-Swim Levels 1-5 are being offered at the SDC Pool. Ages 6-17 years Space will be provided for...

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Chicago Alumni Social

Thursday, October 24, 5:30–7:30 p.m. | Weather Mark Tavern

Calling all alumni and friends, both local to the Chicago area and visiting, to an exciting event in the Windy City! Whether you're in town for the WE24 Conference or a...

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Haunted Hoist House: Fears and Phobias - Michigan Tech Theatre and the Quincy Mine Hoist Association

Thursday, October 24, 7:00–10:30 p.m. |

A MICHIGAN TECH THEATRE SERIES EVENT