2024 Research Faculty Award Recipients
UofM Alumni Association honors distinguished research faculty and excellence in engaged scholarship
For the UofM Alumni Association Distinguished Research Awards, the Alumni Association may make up to five awards annually to faculty who have brought honor and recognition to the University through their research or creative activities. Candidates must have been employed full-time by the University of Memphis for at least five academic years prior to the semester of their application or nomination. This year’s 2024 recipients are featured below.
Distinguished Research in the Humanities
Dr. Marcus Wicker is an associate professor of English, a First Horizons Foundation Distinguished Professor and the MFA program coordinator. He is the author of Silencer (Mariner, 2017) - winner of the Society of Midland Authors Award and the Arnold Adoff Award for New Voices - and Maybe the Saddest Thing (Harper Perennial, 2012), selected by D.A. Powell for the National Poetry Series. Wicker has received fellowships from the Harvard Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Poetry Foundation and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown.
His poems have appeared in various literary and commercial publications including The Nation, The Atlantic, Poetry, Oxford American, The New Republic and on PBS NewsHour. Wicker coordinates the city-wide Tom Lee Park Poetry Contest, underwritten by the Melon Foundation. He is completing work on his third collection of poetry, Dear Mothership.
Distinguished Research in the Social Sciences, Business & Law
Dr. Andrew M. Olney presently serves as professor in both the Institute for Intelligent Systems and Department of Psychology at the University of Memphis. Olney received a BA in Linguistics with Cognitive Science from University College London in 1998, an MS in Evolutionary and Adaptive Systems from the University of Sussex in 2001 and a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Memphis in 2006. He is the former editor of the Journal of Educational Data Mining (2017-22) and former director/associate director of the Institute for Intelligent Systems at the University of Memphis (2006-17), where he oversaw tenure track faculty, staff and approximately 40 faculty affiliates.
Olney has over 100 publications in the fields of artificial intelligence, education and psychology, with a particular focus on using natural language processing to assess and enhance learning from text and learning through conversation. He has been an investigator on $18 million in federal grants ($6 million as Pl) in these fields. His primary research interests are in natural language interfaces. Specific interests include language and knowledge acquisition (both human and Al) with applications in learning and performance support systems.
Distinguished Research in Science, Engineering & Mathematics
Dr. Xiaohua Huang is a Dunavant Professor in the Department of Chemistry. She is a bioanalytical chemist working in the field of cancer nanomedicine. Her research primarily focuses on the development of new technologies for cancer detection and treatment by exploring the unique structural and functional properties of plasmonic and magnetic nanomaterials in conjunction with high sensitivity optical tools including light scattering imaging and surface enhanced Raman scattering spectroscopy (SERS) and miniaturized devices such as microfluidic chips. One major achievement is the plasmonic photothermal therapy using biocompatible gold nanorods that preferentially accumulate in tumor after intravenous injection and quickly produce heat to destroy cancer cells under the illumination of harmless near infrared light, which avoids the systemic toxicity of conventional chemotherapy.
Another achievement is the simultaneous capture, single cell detection and multiplexed molecular profiling of rare circulating tumor cells in blood for sensitive detection and monitoring of metastatic breast cancer using dual functional magnetic-plasmonic iron oxide-gold core-shell nanoparticles in combination with SERS and microfluidics.
Huang developed a dual imaging single vesicle technology (DISVT) that can detect and quantify target specific individual EVs in plasma samples. Using DISVT, she and her collaborators in chemistry, physics and public health have shown that breast cancer can be detected at early-stage through surface protein profiling of individual EVs in patient plasma, which opens new opportunities for early cancer detection with easily accessible biofluids. Huang also seeks to predict the likelihood of cancer metastasis and recurrence by probing the tumor-derived EVs that precondition distance organs to promote the seeding and growth of incoming tumor cells into secondary tumors.
Huang has published over 60 peer-reviewed journal articles with more than 37,000 citations. She is a top 2% World's most-cited scholar based on Stanford-Elsevier Ranking. She was the first at the University of Memphis to receive Oak Ridge Associated Universities' Ralph E Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Award. She was an American Association for Cancer Research - Women in Cancer Research Brigid G Leventhal Scholar. She is an associate editor of Nanotheranostics and Editorial Board Member of Nanomaterials. Her research is continuously supported by National Institutes of Health, and she is frequently invited to serve on the review panels for National Cancer Institute.
Distinguished Research, Creative Achievement & Excellence in Engaged Scholarship
Dr. Laura Baylot Casey is a professor in the Special Education/Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) program in the Instruction and Curriculum Leadership Department in the College of Education. Her work embodies the University's engaged scholarship mission. She addresses the concerns and opportunities in our community, state, nation and internationally as it relates to individuals and families with special needs, as well as teachers, coaches and therapists. Her scholarship aligns with the University's 2023 strategic plan goals, specifically Goal 4, as she performs life-changing, interdisciplinary research and scholarship addressing the community and society's greatest challenges.
Casey is strategic and intentional with her work, which has garnered over $17 million in external funding, including federal, state and local foundation grants. Her work has thus far resulted in over 60 peer-reviewed articles in top journals, approximately 100 national conference presentations, and a leading textbook on its second edition. Of the $17 million in external funding, approximately $15 million were funded to provide evidence-based services to children and families with special needs.
Her work produces a real-world impact as it has brought awareness to burgeoning evidence-based techniques, the need for multidisciplinary teams, the importance of training future generations to ensure the early intervention workforce remains steady, and the role that parents play including the need to support parental mental health. In addition, her partnership with the community has resulted in the redesign of UoM degree paths and certificates to ensure that our coursework best meets the current needs and trends in preschool, K-12 schools, and early intervention. Each redesign was in collaboration with local, state and/or national partners. Casey teaches, researches and provides service with the mission of advancing UofM's engaged scholarship and local reputation as a flagship University giving back to the city/state we call home.