Faculty Research Interests

My main research interest is in C*-algebras and their use in mathematical physics and non-commutative (differential) geometry. More specifically, my interest is automorphic group actions on C*-algebras and their associated fixed point sub-algebras and crossed-product algebras, with particular interest in rotation algebras and their generalizations. Recently, however, I have been looking at some ideas in the intersection of probability, linear algebra, and elementary number theory involving the notions of independence and roundness.

My research interests focus on molecular mechanisms, that is the activities at the DNA, RNA, or protein level that influence cellular and thereby organismal properties. I also have long standing interests in embryonic and post-embryonic development. In my research here at Widener, I have applied molecular biological techniques to the study of the embryology of horseshoe crabs, the muscle physiology of fish, and the immune responses of frogs.

My research projects have been undertaken with the twin goals of increasing biological knowledge in these areas and supporting participation by undergraduate students. My students and I have an enormous amount of fun learning together, and I take great pride in the accomplishments of each and every one of them.

My current project is on gene expression in horseshoe crab embryos (Limulus polyphemus). My students work to identify previously unknown genes and determine their expression patterns during embryonic development in these organisms.

My clinical research interests relate to providing best practice and evidence to enhance occupational therapy practice in the acute care, rehabilitation and stoke and brain injury populations.

My research focuses on sexual health behavior and the social, developmental, contextual, and psychological factors that influence sexual decision-making, particularly in substance-involved contexts. My overarching professional goals are to produce theoretically grounded research that informs understandings of sexual health behavior, thus providing specific targets on which to intervene to improve sexual health outcomes.

To address these research aims, I conduct research wherein I employ a variety of methodologies, including quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods designs. In the pursuit of these goals, I apply social psychological perspectives to investigate two overarching questions that guide my research agenda: (1) What are the social influences on sexual health behaviors and for whom and how are those factors influential? and (2) What are the psychosocial factors involved in sexual decisions and relationships and what are the mechanisms of action and interaction among these factors?.

I am interested in management accounting and financial accounting topics including control systems, judgment and decision making of managers and other financial statement users, ethical management practices, and sustainability and financial reporting. My research addresses accounting issues with interdisciplinary perspectives drawn from strategy, management, sociology, and psychology, using both qualitative and quantitative methods.

My primary research focuses on moral language and its practical significance. What do we use it to do? Why would we have a discursive practice with this function? And how does its function shed light on the norms that structure the practice? This was the topic of my dissertation, which I'm now working to turn into my first book.

I also work on our practices of holding one another accountable to shared moral norms. I'm interested in what kind of standing one has to have in order to successfully hold someone to the oughts that bind them and the social practices that either support or undermine this standing. My present project aims to understand how the fragmentation of thick community relations instigated by the rise of social media, the decline in civic organizations and organized religion, and changing economic realities has made it more difficult for us to hold one another accountable. 

I'm also interested in jokes, and, in particular, how jokes can be used to ease communication about difficult subjects.

• Pharmacology
• Neuropsychology
• Cannabis Medicine
• Pharmacy Technician CE

My areas of expertise include organizational leadership, collaborative inquiry communities, and developing mentor practices. My current research focuses on how to develop and support productive learning communities within schools and classrooms, including how to support faculty and graduate student success. In addition, I focus on the development of these ideas through the use of instructional technology in online spaces, such as through online and hybrid courses, and faculty and school-based professional development.

My research focuses on the Romantic period, examining how what we think we know about authorship at this time is challenged and rewritten by the wealth of periodicals--magazines, book reviews, and newspapers--that dominated the market at this historical moment. In my book project, "Publishing Personality: Romantic Periodicals and the Paradox of Living Authorship," I argue that periodicals understand authors not simply as legal constructs supported by copyright, but as personalities publishing in real time. The periodical therefore emerges as a site of both dangerous and utopian possibilities, as its writers explore what it might mean to practice authorship in an iterative, conditional space. Underlying this exploration is a shift in what the author represents, from being an exception to the everyday person to a model for them. Recent new work examines in more detail the dynamics of periodical production. Focusing on William Gifford's editorship of the Quarterly Review, I explore the workflows necessary to produce a quarterly periodical, as well as how the circumstances of Gifford's chronic illness and disability lead to innovations in periodical style.

My research interests include violence prevention and reentry; clinical social work practice; treatment of serious mental illness; children and adolescents; critical incident stress management with emergency service workers; trauma; crisis intervention; collaborative work with criminal justice; social and emotional competence; interagency collaboration; and organizational management.

My primary research interests lie in commutative algebra and its interactions with algebraic geometry. I have worked on plucker formulas, generalized Hilbert functions, and multipolicies as well as Chunovsky's conjecture. My secondary research interest focuses on the active control of beam and string systems.

Green chemistry, also known as sustainable chemistry, is the design, development and implementation of chemical products and processes to reduce or eliminate the use and generation of substances hazardous to human health and the environment. Under the principles of green chemistry, my research focuses on the design, synthesis, characterization and modification of solid-state inorganic or inorganic-organic hybrid materials for sustainable energy application, particularly in the area of gas storage, rechargeable batteries and thermal energy storage.

• Applied Microeconomics
• International Trade
• Labor Economics

I'm interested in Web technologies, large scale computing, data mining, and bioinformatics.

• Community Organizing
• Economically Just Community Development
• Affordable Housing
• Youth and Culturally Responsive Macro Practice
   

My research investigates the impact of cognitive deficits, specifically attention and memory, on communication in individuals with traumatic brain injury.