It may have been brought to the United States from Europe in the 1860s for its flavor, but garlic mustard, a member of the Brassicaceae plant family, is now an invasive species in the forests of North America that is negatively impacting native flora and fauna. To help discover ways to eradicate the intrusive plant, California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) biology student Karina Martinez spent the first 11 weeks of her summer in Harvard Forest, a 4,000-acre ecological research site and outdoor laboratory that has been administered by Harvard University since 1988. Her research focused on if the “Eurasian invasive duo,” garlic mustard and exotic earthworms, work in tandem to ... Read More
Research
Excessive cellphone use may cause anxiety, experts warn
Spending too much time on your phone may be causing you to feel stress and anxiety, experts are warning. "The more people use their phone," Dr. Nancy Cheever, who spearheaded research on the relationship between cellphone use and anxiety at California State University, Dominguez Hills, told ABC News, "the more anxious they are about using their phone." Cheever's research suggests that phone-induced anxiety operates on a positive feedback loop, saying that phones keep us in a persistent state of anxiety and the only relief from this anxiety is to look at our phones. She warns that there is little known about the long-term effects that phone-induced anxiety can have on your overall ... Read More
Mervyn M. Dymally Institute Awards $120,000 in Research Grants
(Carson, Calif.) California State University, Dominguez Hills' (CSUDH) Mervyn M. Dymally African American Political & Economic Institute (MDAAPEI) has awarded $20,000 research grants to six faculty researchers/teams at four institutions in California. This is the first time MDAAPEI is awarding research grants. “We are very excited to provide these awards to explore and document the impact of political, social, and economic issues in African American and other disadvantaged communities,” said CSUDH President Willie J. Hagan. The funding will support the following research projects: Nancy Deng, principal investigator, CSUDH: “How Do African American Men Succeed in the ... Read More
Still Laboratory Seeks ‘Novel Lead Compound’ to Help Treat Cancer
“Does anyone have a cardiac pacemaker or medical device implants? How about keys, a mobile phone, or even a wallet? We wouldn't want anything to get damaged or erased.” These are questions Patrick Still, assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry at California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH), gingerly asks people who venture into the new campus Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) Facility and approach the new JEOL 400 MHz NMR spectrometer, which the Still Lab uses for cancer research. Still uses the NMR spectrometer to conduct his research on plant extracts he procured from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Active Repository Program. The extracts were prepared from ... Read More
Student Researcher Dhanushka Kumarasinghe Takes 1st Place, Twice
For Dhanushka Kumarasinghe, winning 1st place at the 31st Annual CSU Student Research Competition at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo (SLO) in late April 2017 was “surreal,” in part because he almost didn't present at California State University, Dominguez Hills' (CSUDH) 12th Annual Student Research Day in February, where he needed to win to compete at SLO. Two days before Kumarasinghe was to give his talk, “Come Catch Pokémon at the Celadon City Department Store!: Player Perceptions Toward Businesses Within Pokémon Go Hotspots,” at the university's research day, his father had a stroke and he rushed him to the hospital. “There was a lot on my mind. I thought, 'I have no time for this. There ... Read More
