Sept. 16 Research Bulletin (Texas A&M University)

News-Media Articles

Andrew Dessler (Arts and Sciences), Associated Press, about how the Earth’s record-breaking heat was forecast by scientists decades ago and whether or not humanity is going to try to stop the upward trend.

Carter Racine (Engineering), JWEasyTech and MSN, about producing rocket fuel from resources available at astronauts’ destinations, including the thin air on Mars.

Eva Johnson (Medicine), Dallas Morning News, about the Lindsay Clancy case, the differences between some postpartum mental health conditions, and how to best support and care for new mothers. (Paywall)

Joel White (Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences), DVM360, about how cognitive dysfunction is increasing in aging dogs and cats as pets live longer, and how owners are becoming better at recognizing the signs.

Jonathan Jensen (Education and Human Development), The New York Times, about the University of Notre Dame’s decision to add a jersey patch featuring fintech brand Sofi to their uniforms, highlighting Notre Dame’s long history of corporate sponsorships and citing Knute Rockne’s early partnerships with companies such as Studebaker. (Paywall)

Kevin Crisman (Arts and Sciences), Mashed, about historical insight into the diets and food-preservation practices of sailors on long sea voyages, including their use of salted meats, grog, ship biscuits, dried peas, plum duff and cheese.

Kirby Goidel (Government and Public Service), USA Today and El Paso Times, about how polls show the contest between Gina Hinojosa, a Democratic state representative, and long-time Republican Governor Greg Abbott remains close and how Hinojosa could become the state’s first Latina governor.

Kranthi Mandadi (AgriLife Research), Houston Public Media, about citrus greening, a bacterial disease spread by the Asian citrus psyllid that has destroyed citrus crops, and a new spinach-based treatment developed to combat the disease.

Nasir Gharaibeh, Stephanie Paal, Maria Koliou, Ali Mostafavi (Engineering) and Nicolaas Deutz (Education and Human Development), California Insider, about how people should focus less on meeting a specific protein target and more on getting the amino acids their bodies need. (Paywall)

Peter Fix (Arts and Sciences), Wood Central, about the 14-year conservation and reconstruction of the Revolutionary War-era gunboat recovered from the World Trade Center site, which is now on permanent display at the New York State Museum.

Articles From Colleges and Schools

Adi Joshi (Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences) and team have identified a promising new therapeutic target for metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis and developed an experimental compound that reduced liver fat, inflammation, injury and fibrosis in preclinical models, advancing a potential new treatment for the disease. Texas A&M Researchers Help Advance Promising Therapy for Fatty Liver Disease

Morgan Farnell and Ziteng “Tim” Xu (Agriculture and Life Sciences) are testing far-UVC light as a potential tool to reduce airborne pathogens, including highly pathogenic avian influenza, in commercial poultry houses without harming birds. Texas A&M AgriLife Tests Far-Ultraviolet Light To Prevent Bird Flu in Poultry

Samba Reddy (Medicine) found that younger and older brains respond differently to traumatic brain injury, with younger brains more vulnerable to developing post-traumatic epilepsy and older brains more susceptible to inflammation, circuit changes and memory loss. Younger Brains Recover Better Than Older Brains After Traumatic Injury, Right? Maybe Not

Sanjay Mathew, Nicholas Murphy, Krisha Shah and Rahul Balakrishnan (Medicine), as well as a team at the Baylor College of Medicine, found that ketamine produces time-specific changes in brain-wide information sharing in older adults with treatment-resistant depression and identified potential biomarkers associated with later antidepressant response. Study Explores How Ketamine Reshapes Brian Activity in Older Adults

Sarah White-Springer and Kayli Woodward (Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences) studied the long-term effects of β-2 agonists in horses to identify biomarkers that could improve drug-testing protocols and help protect the health and safety of equine athletes. Racing Toward Answers for Equine Health

Accomplishments

Kevin Kelly (Arts and Sciences) received the 2026 Universities Research Association Honorary Early Career Award during the 59th Annual Fermilab Users and Affiliates Meeting.

Karen Wooley (Arts and Sciences) received two American Chemical Society (ACS) honors — the Pauling Medal Award from the ACS Puget Sound Section and the William H. Nichols Medal — for her contributions to the chemistry field.

Funding

John Tomecek (Agriculture and Life Sciences) received a $4 million grant from the Texas Department of Agriculture to support a project titled, “Advancing Feral Hog Management in Texas.”
Rebecca Seguin, Alexandra MacMillan Uribe, Chad Rethorst, Mark Faries (Agriculture and Life Sciences), Jason Maddock and Elena Andreyeva (Public Health) received a $3.7 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to support a project titled, “StrongPeople Together: a multi-site, church-engaged randomized trial to achieve cardiovascular disease and cancer prevention.”
Henry Bryant, Bart Fischer, Joe Outlaw and Pourya Valizadeh (Agricultural and Life Sciences) received a $3.4 million grant from the United States Department of Agriculture to support a project titled, “Analysis of Farm and Food Policy, FY2026.”
Mathew Kramm and Jacob Lampman (Natural Resources Institute) received a $2.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense to support a project titled, “TO 002: Vegetation, Bat and Bird Monitoring and Management at U.S. Army Garrison Fort Sill, Oklahoma.”
Dan Zhang (Education and Human Development) received a $2.5 million grant from the Texas Workforce Commission to support a project titled, “TAMU Work-Based Learning Project.”
Abhishek Jain, Jyothi Menon and Feng Zhao (Engineering) received a $2.3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to support a project titled, “A Multifunctional Nanoparticle Platform for Galectin-3 Targeted Pulmonary Fibrosis Therapy.”
Natalie Johnson (Public Health) and Rajesh Miranda (Medicine) received a $2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to support a project titled, “IRACDA at Texas A&M University.”
Georges Naufal (Arts and Sciences) and Emily Naiser (Public Health) received a $2 million grant from the Texas Workforce Commission to support a project titled, “RESEA IEP Response.”
John Hamilton, Katherine Davis, Nicholas Duffield, Nitesh Saxena and Donald Leiden (Engineering) received a $2 million grant from the National Science Foundation to support a project titled, “CyberAI SFS: Building an AI-Powered Government Workforce.”
Thomas Taylor, Phillip Kaufman, Jordan Raquel Salomon (Agriculture and Life Sciences) and Mustafa Akbulut (Engineering) received a $1.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to support a project titled, “Botanical Synthetic Synergy for New World Screwworm Control: Novel Foam, Spray, and Immersion Wash Larvicide Formulations for Dose-Sparing Efficacy and Residue Minimization.”
Melisa Finley (Texas A&M Transportation Institute) received a $1.8 million grant from the Texas Department of Transportation to support a project titled, “0-7288 Traffic Control Device Analysis, Testing, and Evaluation Program.”
Adrien Robin (Nursing) and Jeffery Chancellor (Medicine) received a $1.8 million grant from NASA to support a project titled, “Aerospace Health Education and Workforce Development: Scaling the Dream Saver Concept at the TAMU Aerospace Medicine Hangar.”
Akhilesh Gaharwar and Tanmay Lele (Engineering) received a $1.8 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to support a project titled, “Heritable clonal selection by ECM stiffness in cancer.”
Mathew Kramm and Jacob Lampman (Natural Resource Institute) received a $1.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense to support a project titled, “TO: Fy27- Fort Irwin Cultural, Natural, and GIS Support.”
John Connolly (Engineering) received a $1.2 million grant from the National Reconnaissance Office to support a project titled, “Maturation of SIGINT DoA Flight Hardware Testing, Vector Data AI Optimization, and Collaborative Expanded Capabilities Development.”
D. Samba Reddy (Medicine) received a $1 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to support a project titled, “Novel Anticonvulsants for Nerve Agents and Refractory Status Epilepticus.”
Yossef “Joe” Elabd (Engineering) received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation to support a project titled, “Project: Airborne Collison Avoidance System for Rotorcraft (ACAS Xr) 1 – Operational Evaluation Framework.”
The School of Public Health and its Together for a Better Tomorrow program received a $1 million grant from the Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas for the Aqua Segura, Comunidad Fuerte project.

Professional Development

Research Development Services offers faculty development programs and research funding workshops to assist in the process of applying for grants.             

Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) offers virtual workshops that meet the face-to-face requirements of University SAP 15.99.99.M0.04. Please note that it is the responsibility of each college or school (with support or information from individual principal investigators) to ensure that all student and postdoctoral researchers associated with them are compliant with the RCR training requirements.             

High Performance Research Computing offers an ongoing series of short training courses for beginning, intermediate and advanced researchers.             

University Libraries presents a series of online workshops in research-related subjects, such as managing citations, managing research data, searching databases, and publishing and copyright.

The Animal Welfare Office (AWO) offers virtual workshops that meet the continuing education requirements for investigators as described in the  “Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals” (“the Guide”). Common topics include understanding and applying Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) guidelines and crafting a well-written animal use protocol. Course offerings change quarterly.

How to Submit an Item to Research Bulletin 

Send: Research-related news about Texas A&M faculty, staff or students at our colleges, schools or member agencies, including honors, publications, presentations and appearances in news media.        
Note: The Research Bulletin does not publish links to scholarly or peer-reviewed journal articles. If your work appears in a journal, please work with your college or school communications team to develop a news story, then submit the link to that story for inclusion.        
Include: A URL that links directly to your news coverage, research story or professional development.        
Email: rcomm@tamu.edu

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