GradzetteTHE UNIVERSITY OF MANITOBA’S GRADUATE STUDENT MAGAZINEJULY 2012

GradzetteThe UNIVERSITY OF MANITOBA’S GRADUATE STUDENT MAGAZINE

Gradzettec/o The Manitoban Newspaper Publications Corporation105 University CentreUniversity of ManitobaWinnipeg, MB, R3T 2N2

General inquiries and advertisingPhone: (204) 474.6535Fax: (204) 474.7651Email: publisher@gradzette.comEditor: Sheldon BirnieCopy Editor: Leif LarsenDesigner: Leif LarsenContributors: Grace Romund, Beibei Lu, Foster LyleCover: Ben Clarkson

The Gradzette is the official student magazine of the University of Manitoba’s graduate student community and is published on the first Monday of each month byThe Manitoban Newspaper Publications Corporation.

The Gradzette is a democratic student organization, open to participation from all students. It exists to serve its readers as students and citizens.

The magazine’s primary mandate is to report fairly and objectively on issues and events of importance and interest to the graduate students of the University of Manitoba, to provide an open forum for the free expression and exchange of opinions and ideas and to stimulate meaningful debate on issues that affect or would otherwise be of interest to the student body and/or society in general.

The Gradzette serves as a training ground for students interested in any aspect of journalism. Students and other interested parties are invited to contribute. Please contact the Editor for submission guidelines.

The Gradzette reserves the right to edit all submissions and will not publish any material deemed by its editorial board to be discriminatory, racist, sexist, homophobic or libelous. Opinions expressed in letters and articles are solely those of the authors.

The Gradzette is a member of the Canadian University Press, a national student press cooperative with members from St. John’s to Victoria.

All contents are ©2012 and may not be reprinted without the express written permission of the Manitoban Newspaper Publications Corporation.

Yearly subscriptions to the Gradzette are available, please contact publisher@gradzette.com for more information.

t’s been almost a year without a student pub on the University of Manitoba’s campus, but the wait is finally over. The Hub, the new University of Manitoba Students’ Union’s (UMSU) bar, opened up

Thursday, May 24 with a low-key kickoff that allowed a smooth transition into

its new operations. % The Hub replaces former student pub Wise Guys on Campus, which was shut down last year. Wise Guys’ lease was not renewed when the charity which held their liquor license declined to continue the agreement. A valid license was

a requirement for their lease. % “The Hub has a different structure set up which makes it more accountable to students through the students’ union”, said UMSU President Bilan Arte through e-mail correspondence. Additionally a Pub Advisory committee has been set up so that issues arising between UMSU, The Hub’s management and administration can be handled through mediated channels,

she added. % The first weeks of Hub’s activities have been smooth, “but with any new business, there have been a few bumps along the road, but nothing that we

couldn’t handle” said Arte. These bumps don’t show though. % Upon a recent visit, The Hub looked clean and professional, ready for an evening of excitement. The space has been designed in a way that allows various types of events to take place. Having a stage and a wide open dance floor shows it is ready to take on the rowdiest of beer bashes, while a chic and

Hub opens doors

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Did I hear someone say ‘finally?’By Foster Lyle

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Photo by Beibei Lu

modern décor still makes it possible to host wine and cheeses, or classy

receptions. % The great location — on the third floor of University Centre — paired

with lots of windows also makes for a great view of campus during the day. % The Hub may actually become “the hub” of student-influenced music. Having a cabaret license, The Hub will have live music playing nightly, making it a great venue for campus musicians and other local artists alike to express

themselves. % “It’s a really good addition to campus student life,” said first year Masters of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine student Shanel Susser. “The music is great

and you always run into someone you know.” % The Hub has also been designed with students and their budgets in mind. Having a menu that provides an array of traditional pub snacks such as bruschetta, chicken wings and nachos, it also highlights new fusion foods such as tempura cod bites and gyoza — a pork dumpling with a peanut sesame sauce — all for under $10. Lunch and dinner options are also available ranging from sandwiches to pizza to

pasta averaging at just over $10. % Drinks include a selection of Fort Garry and Rickard’s products, as well as a house beer appropriately named The Hub Lager on tap; there is also a good

selection of bottled beer. The wine list is small but appropriate for a student pub and comes in at below bar prices like most other drinks on the menu. A number of beer cocktails have also been created by mixing The Hub Lager with liqueurs There is also a section of drinks simply called “Signature” that is comprised of shots with amusing names such as Winterpeg Heat Wave, Charging Bison and

Manitoba Frostbite. % Though there is a lot of good to be said about The Hub not all students are onboard. “You want to ask me a question?” shouted second year Asper School of Business student Chris Mather. “Maybe we should go outside to talk. It’s impossible to have a conversation over how loud this music is.” Outside Mather continued about how he was outraged a student bar would charge cover to its own students, how he waited over 10 minutes for service — finally going to

the bar himself — and that his drink was made wrong. % According to UMSU President Bilan Arte, “Industry standard is to charge cover. We also charge a lot less than the usual dollar amount. It’s also to encourage being early.” Additionally, it helps pay for live entertainment that the HUB’s

liquor license requires. % The Hub is located on the third floor of University Centre and is open Thursday, Friday and Saturday 6 pm – 2 am and Sundays 3 pm to 12 am.

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Photo by Beibei Lu

f it has to do with food, and you can s tudy i t in a human — that ’s us , ” explained University of Manitoba

graduate student and registered dietician Kathleen McCl inton about the depar tment o f human nutritional sciences. % % McClinton currently holds a bachelor ’s degree in human nutritional sciences from the Faculty of Human Ecology at U of M. After completing her first degree she went on to partake in an internship program and then took her licensing exams to become a registered dietician. From there became an operations manager for food services at the Health Sciences Centre, followed by

Grace Hosp i ta l . % “I decided [that] although I liked food service I missed the clinical side of things and I always wanted to come back and do a master ’s degree,” said McClinton, who is currently in the final months of her master’s degree in human nutritional sciences. % When choosing what research she would do for her graduate project and thesis, McClinton was not lacking in choice. She noted, “We study nutrition as it relates to humans in health and disease. We have

a wide variety of different research in our faculty. Some people look at specific compounds in food product to see how they might affect the body in health or in a diseased state, for example. Some people work with other departments to develop food

p r o d u c t . ” % McClinton’s research, based out of the St. Boniface Research Centre, focuses on the effects of carrot powder (dehydrated carrots) supplementation in diabetics and how that relates to visual function. She set out to scientifically put to the test what all children have heard from their mothers: “Eat your carrots because they are good for your eyesight!”% In the first study of its kind, McClinton looked at carrots and visual dysfunction in diabetes to see

what might happen .% “We also wanted to look at something novel

l ike d iabet ic re t inopathy, ” she sa id . % “In Type 1 diabetes, over time 99 per cent of indiv idua l s wi l l deve lop some leve l of v i sua l dysfunction or blindness. It’s actually the leading cause of blindness in adults. People with Type 2 [diabetes] will also develop blindness — that’s in

RESEARCHER PROFILE

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Kathleen McClintonBy Grace Romund

“I

about 60 per cent of patients. So it’s a huge problem and there are huge

hea l thcare cos t s a t tached to that . ”% Using a rat model, McClinton developed an experiment in which she had four groups of rats: healthy rats that did and didn’t have a carrot powder diet

and d iabet ic r a t s that d id and d idn’t ha ve a ca r rot powder d ie t . % The rats were on the carrot powder diet were fed carrot powder as 15 per cent of their daily food intake. This is, in fact, a fairly large dose. For a human to have a daily diet of 15 per cent carrots that person would have to eat a lot of

c a r r o t s . % After 12 weeks of the carrot powder diet, McClinton began evaluating the effects of the diet in the rats: “We used different measures to look at what effect this [diet] would have on visual function, one of them is something called an electroretinogram, which is a [. . .] piece of equipment where we had the animals go on it and it basically flashes different intensities of light and it tells us the electrical conductivity of the eye. So all the cell types actually respond,

depending on the size of the wave length . . . [and] tell how strong the vision is.”% The findings of this study, McClinton admitted, were actually not what she was expecting. She explained, “In the healthy animals carrot powder actually improved their eyesight, which is great, but what perhaps was more interesting was that in the diabetic animals that received this high amount of carrot powder

i t ac tua l l y dama ged the i r eyes , which wa s a surpr i se to us . ”% The damage to the eyes of the diabetic rats was in its very early stages; however, there weren’t any significant changes to the eyes by the end of the

s t u d y . % “Another interesting thing that we found, that perhaps is related, is that the animals that were diabetic who received carrot powder had the highest amount of beta carotene, which is a precursor of carotenoids and the vitamin A cycle for vision, which we need. They had the highest build-up, whereas the

hea l thy an ima l s were conver t ing i t rea l l y we l l . % She said that the beta carotene was building up in the liver and wondered if these carotenoids, which are used to help vision, can’t get converted in a

d iabet ic s ta te .% McClinton noted that, because she saw a positive effect in the healthy animals and damaging one in the diabetics, she wants to go back and do another study of Type 1 diabetes with different doses of carrot powder to see if she

obser ves the same e f fect s .% McClinton concluded from her research, “I think the key message, if anything, from this study is that right now we have dietary guidelines and recommendations for different nutrients, and they’re for healthy people, but they don’t necessarily apply in diseased conditions.”

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Each month the Gradzette celebrates University of

Manitoba research by profiling a researcher from our

community.

If you know a graduate student, post-doc or professor

who is doing exciting work who you think should be profiled

here please let us know.

Email your nominations for researcher profiles to

editor@gradzette.com. Feel free to nominate yourself

(we won’t tell).

Is there a researcher you think we should profile?

reshwater scientists and graduate students are reeling from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans decision to eliminate $2 million in

annual funding to the Experimental Lakes Area (ELA) research facility. % In a press conference held on June 15, David Schindler, of the

University of Alberta, denounced the decision. He told reporters: “The real problem is we have a bunch of people running science in this country who don’t

e ven know what sc ience i s , ” accord ing to the Globe & Mai l . % Many graduate students from universities across the country will be

affected by the closure of the ELA facility. Some may even have their work

interrupted before they are able to complete their primary research. % Matt Martens is a master’s student at the University of Manitoba. His research took place at the ELA where he studied the behavioural and

physiological differences between escaped farmed and wild rainbow trout. % “I was probably one of the few lucky ones that had actually completed the field component of my research at the time of the closure announcement,”

Mar tens to ld the Gradzet te .

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By Sheldon Birnie

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Feds pull the plugOn world-class research facility

Photo by Dominic Alves

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% “A number of master’s, PhD students and post-doctoral fellows were in the process of designing and implementing experiments at the ELA. Since fieldwork is an huge component to ecology and life sciences in general, closing the ELA in the midst of active student research, leaves students with little

options to salvage invested time and data that went into their research.” % First opened in 1969, the Experimental Lakes Area is a series of connected lakes in Northwestern Ontario that have been purposely polluted over the years in order to study ecosystem wide effects of such things as eutrophication, acidification, increased mercury levels and other problems encountered in fresh water systems. The research done at the ELA is recognized globally, and has far ranging implications to scientists, industry, and go ver nments ; not on l y in Canada , but a round the wor ld .% Martens believes that the ELA is important for a number of reasons. % “It is at the forefront in contributing to global policy on water quality issues,” he told the Gradzette. “It is highly productive in producing graduate theses, thousands of peer-reviewed articles in world renown scientific journals and reports . . . By closing this facility I feel that we are eliminating an extremely important entity in the scientific community that cannot be replaced once

g o n e . ”% “Doing grad research at ELA is a wonderful opportunity to learn about how whole-ecosystem research is done and a lot about all the disciplines required to make that research happen,” says Jason Venkiteswaran, a researcher with the University of Waterloo. “No matter what happens next year with [the] ELA, there will be a break in the work to develop new whole-ecosystem

exper iments , a s suming they cont inue . ”% Venkiteswaran did his master’s and PhD work out of the ELA for the University of Waterloo in the late ‘90s, focusing on the effects of upland

flooding caused by hydroelectric developments. Venkiteswaran worries that without the ELA, graduate students and researchers will lose out on a one of a

k ind oppor tun i ty.% “We would immediately lose the ability to draw the best students, the best faculty, the best researchers in fresh water science in the country,” he told

the Gradzet te . % “It’s the only place in the world you can do whole ecosystem experiments and get really good data that is useful for policy makers. There are other places where people have some good long term data sets, but the ability to do

exper iments ju s t i sn’t there . ” % While the Gradzette contacted the office of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, no response was provided to our questions before press time. However, a spokesperson for Minister Keith Ashfield told the Globe & Mail that Fisheries and Oceans “hope to transfer the facility to another research agent . . . so that the important work can continue to be conducted by another party that will

benef i t f rom i t . ”% It has been suggested that either universities or the government of Ontario might take over the ELA research facility, but Venkiteswaran does not

be l i e ve that e i ther a re v i ab le opt ions .% “It’s an interesting idea,” he says. “But from the university side there is no chance that that will happen . . . Here in Ontario, we have a government that is battling a structural deficit that is not going to pony up more money for universities. Universities here are trying to deal with changing enrollments with no new money . . . The way that university granting systems is you’re only looking at three or four years at a time. That’s no way to run a long term, you can’t run a long term facility that way.”

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DMONTON (CUP) — Chicken eggs could become a new energy

resource, according to a research team at the University of Alberta. % Although eggshells are usually considered a waste product, the

David Mitlin research group at the U of A believes they can be used to charge

future electronic devices in minutes, or even seconds, instead of hours. % Aided by a discovery grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), the group has developed an eggshell “membrane” — a macroporous carbon film to charge supercapacitors far more quickly than

norma l bat te r ie s .% Post-doctoral member Zhi Li has been spearheading the egg shell membrane idea, and describes the ease by which he transformed his food waste in to a use fu l eng ineered mater i a l .% “I just tried a normal egg that I bought from Costco,” Li said. He added that he has long been an avid admirer of the biochemistry of egg shell

membranes and the i r inherent s t r uctures .% After Li washes and removes the hard shell with acid, the membrane is

ready for process ing a t h igh act i va t ion temperatures .% “I carbonize it, [which] makes it into carbon fibre [with] nitrogen on the

sur face , ” he exp la ined . “ It i s a pret ty coo l s t r ucture . ”% The high percentage of nitrogen in eggshell membranes is a core advantage of high capacitance. The higher the energy and power density promoted by a material, the more ideal it becomes for use in supercapacitors.

% “Nitrogen reacts with electrolytes and stores more energy,” Li said. “With nitrogen in our eggshells, compared to traditional carbon materials which have oxygen groups, we have 1 .5 to two t imes more energy.” % Li believes eggshell membrane supercapacitors have huge potential for a

number o f indust r ie s .% “Electrical vehicles need to charge and discharge quickly, [and] a battery simply cannot give the necessary energy,” he said. “Egg shell [membranes] have a very unique structure, and their cheapness and functionality allow for broader a p p l i c a t i o n . ”% Aside from structural and biochemical composition, eggshell membranes are ideal because of their abundance and ease of preparation. In addition, the source and processing of eggshell membranes are organic and environmentally friendly, a factor that could set it apart should the demand for such technology

e ver increa se .% “In general I use very few chemicals to get a useful eggshell membrane,"

s a id L i . "The process i s p ret ty g reen . ”% “There [are] definitely enough egg shells — more than I can imagine. The cooking industry uses processed eggs, but they just use the liquid egg. They separate the l iqu id f rom the eg g and ju s t throw the she l l away. ”% Perhaps the most overlooked property of the eggshell membrane is its durability over time. This may indicate that it is not only efficient, but

sus ta inab le in i t s u sa ge , accord ing to L i .% “I don’t want to say it lasts forever, but its life cycle is up to 10,000 cycles

Membranes identified as potential future green and efficient power source

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U of A research team probes charging powers of eggshells

Antony Ta — The Gateway (University of Alberta)

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— wh ich for norma l use cou ld be up to a coup le o f year s . ” % Li believes his eggshell research will encourage others to look into applications of natural systems and materials for solving future engineering problems. Although he used chicken eggs, it is possible that other eggs have the same potent ia l .

% “Every single natural material has an advantage and disadvantage, and you have to integrate them into a system to eliminate the disadvantages [and] emphasize the advantages,” he said. “This is especially true of egg shell membranes.”

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Photo by Dan McKechnie/The Gateway

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