The Biology of Eco Health
After his first journey to Tanzania with Global Knowledge Initiative, Doug Cavener knew he needed to design a way for students to experience it.
“The first time I visited Tanzania, I thought, this is really special. Our students need to experience this,” he said.
Cavener designed BIOL 498A: Biology of Eco-Health as a result of that inspiration. He brought in Paul Shaffner, who was then director of the Office of Career and International Education in the Eberly College of Science, and Anna Estes, then a research associate in the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, to help him. Shaffner and Estes both had vested interests in Tanzania, Shaffner having lived there previously and Estes having conducted research in the geographical region.
The class was created as a short-term study abroad experience for Penn State students, taking place annually during the summer term. The class topics focus on exploring the relationships between human health and African ecology.
Students meet briefly before embarking on the trip to Tanzania to learn some foundations of the class, like introductory Swahili, the history and culture of the area, and about relevant research studies that have been recently conducted in the area.
When the students arrive in Tanzania, they visit a variety of places to learn about the intersection of ecology and human health, including Arusha, analytics site Altmetrics. Cavener estimates that members of national and international media have interviewed him more than 25 times about this project.
Agaba and NMAIST have felt the enormous success as well. “The international, global coverage of the publication was a huge point for NMAIST,” said Agaba. “It cast a bright light on our young institute.”
Cavener attributes much of their press to the topic they covered: “In terms of being able to identify clues to a major developmental change in mammals, there’s nothing that comes close to giraffe—it is so awe-inspiring. The fact that we identified the most likely genes and genetic changes behind giraffe’s unique adaptations was the major reason for all of the attention.”
Agaba hopes to channel the attention to showcase the importance of basic research: “I guess my challenge is to translate the attention into more interest and need by policy makers to invest in basic research,” he said. “When you have a generation of people that have been raised on a menu of battling poverty, disease, and hunger, it can be daunting to sell them a story of the origins of the giraffe’s long neck. The reflex or gut response is more like, ‘where is the food, or how does this cure a disease?’”
Challenges like this are why the Global Knowledge Initiative exists, and why they facilitate partnerships like the one between Penn State and NMAIST.
