Page 29 - RFCUNY-2010AnnualReport

Yelena Melikian, Director, Business & Industry Training Center

NYC College of Technology

NYC has a large public transportation system that continuously integrates new technology and innovation. After recognizing a need among unemployed transportation workers to upgrade their technology skills and knowledge base, Professor Melikian received a one-year, $1.7 million Transport Workers Union award, MOVE 21: An Industry/Education Collaboration for 21st Century in Transportation Technology. The project incorporates a four-semester certificate that qualifies participants for higher level transportation positions, bridging the gap between management and labor. “We are creating frameworks where students essentially have the opportunity to grow with technological advances and changes.”

David F. Gruber, Assistant Professor, Biology & Environmental Sciences

Baruch College

Professor Gruber is a marine biologist studying bioluminescent creatures (jellyfish and corals) in diverse ecosystems. His two-year $200,000 NSF grant, Isolation, Characterization and Evolution of Fluorescent Proteins from Indo-Pacific and Caribbean Marine Organisms takes him on nighttime scuba dives in coral reefs to obtain the proteins and compounds found in biolu-minescent organisms. These florescent proteins can be injected into any living cell and used as a communication tool in genetic and biotechnology research. “Now we can begin seeing communications inside the cells and protein trafficking in a way we could not see before.”

Yelena Melikian David F. Gruber

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