Alumni News

“What Are Native Hawaiian Babies Eating? UH Researchers Want to Know” was the title for a segment on Hawaiʻi Public Radio this past Monday, featuring an on-air interview with Marie Kainoa Fialkowski Revilla of the Dept. of Human Nutrition, Food and Animal Sciences. Kainoa says there isn’t enough information about what guides feeding decisions for Native Hawaiian mothers during their baby’s first year. So she’s leading a study, “Exploring Diet Diversity of Native Hawaiian Infants,” with the UH John A. Burns School of Medicine, the UH Cancer Center, and Purdue University.

The researchers hope to recruit pregnant Native Hawaiian women, who will be asked to download the study’s app and upload photos of their meals and their baby’s meals at certain intervals over the course of a year.

“It’s all about improving the health of the next generation – and they’re going to be planting those seeds,” says Kainoa. “And it’s super easy; it’s on your smartphone. We’re always taking pictures of our food anyways and as moms, we’re always wanting to take pictures of what our babies are eating.”

The Sunday evening before, Kainoa was the guest on KITV Island News to discuss the study and recruit participants. She says the data collected can make a difference in the daily health and wellness choices among the Native Hawaiian community.

“Ultimately, I want the work that I do to promote a healthy lahui – a thriving Native Hawaiian community,” says Kainoa, “I believe a way I can do that is through promoting healthy thriving families, healthy thriving babies, and healthy thriving mommies who are giving birth to babies.”

Study participants must be 18 years of age or older, Native Hawaiian, and must feel comfortable using a mobile phone application to take photos of meals throughout the first year of babies life. To sign-up, call (808) 375-3785 or email whrc@ucera.org. The study is funded by the National Institutes of Health through JABSOM and Ola HAWAIʻI.

Photo: Kainoa and Laʻakea Mekaleoalohamaikalewalani Revilla having fun with their food.

Ty Shitanaka and Soch Tork are students in the Dept. of Molecular Biosciences and BioEngineering who meet regularly in the laboratory of professor Samir Khanal. Like the rest of UH, they’ve learned to weather Zoom classes and partial in-person labs due to Covid – on top of affording the rent and a square meal. But there’s one thing neither is worried about right now, and that’s scraping together enough dough to pay tuition. Ty was recently awarded a Dean’s Scholarship from the UH Graduate Division, while Soch has been selected to receive a Foreign Language and Area Studies Program Fellowship from the East-West Center.

Ty

“The award covers almost all my tuition for this semester, which I’m very happy for,” says Ty. “This makes it so much easier to focus on my 4.0 GPA, which I’m very determined to maintain.”

The grad student’s enthusiasm is obvious as he explains nanobubble technology, the research adventure he’s pursuing to enhance the biomass and fatty acid production of an algae species found in Hawaiian waters.

“It’s pretty novel, I believe, using tiny bubbles to improve algae growth, which will lead to higher amounts of valuable fats, which we can then use for feeding tilapia, salmon, shrimp and other organisms, as well as extract these products as supplements for people,” he says. “My project has promise to reduce the economic cost of aquafeed, provide a higher nutritional basis, and reduce the ecological pressures on fisheries.”

He adds, “CTAHR has definitely allowed me incredible opportunities to pursue my education, and I’m thankful for everyone’s support.”

Soch

A bioengineering undergrad, CTAHR Student Ambassador, and volunteer in Samir’s lab, Soch “always felt a disconnect between myself and Cambodian-American community because I lost the language at an early age and was not able to talk with them, especially my mom,” he says.

Just for fun, and because UH is a rare institution that teaches the Cambodian language, Soch decided to take a class – and realized he liked it.

“It is an opportunity to reclaim my language and my identity, so when I became eligible for the fellowship, I thought it could be another great opportunity to dive even more into my history and my language,” he says.

His main courses are still in MBBE, as are his career goals, but there’s always time for family. Soch’s goal is to someday bring his mom back to Cambodia – which she fled during the genocide – to show his mom her roots and together, better understand their family.

“I strongly encourage other CTAHR students to pursue anything you’re passionate about, or even curious; the reward opportunities will come your way,” he says. “The FLAS is one of those big scholarships I never thought I could get. And instead of me taking out loans, it will pay for my whole schoolyear.”

Painting on paper and canvas are cool, but what about painting on a rock? It may sound a bit strange at first, but this is a fun activity! On April 18^th, we interns in the Dept. of Family and Consumer Sciences, Human Development and Family Studies Program, will be painting rocks to decorate the Home Garden Network’s Korner in Miller Hall. The purpose is to paint a rock to leave at the Korner, and paint a rock to take home. These ‘rocks of art’ will be used to decorate the many potted plants laying around, or for display. It will beautify our student spaces at UH, and allow people to see other individuals’ artwork. This event will bring individuals together for a relaxing morning of painting rocks. 

• April 18^th
• Workshops at 10:00 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. 
• Miller Hall, 3rd floor
• Please RSVP by April 14th to Jamie or Emma.

The Home Garden Network (HGN), part of HDFS, has been busy fixing up a new place to study and lounge in. This area is called the Home Garden Korner. It is located on the third floor of Miller Hall and is open to everyone. We want to brighten up the Home Garden Korner area with some color. What a better way to do it than by painting rocks!

As HGN interns, we’ve decided to do more activities that are engaging and meaningful for the community. Our last event, the Valentine’s Day Ikebana, was a huge success and proved that bringing people together and creating a workshop is incredibly fun.

Rock painting is calming and helps individuals feel relaxed. It is a simple activity that everyone can participate in. It can provide a much-needed ‘escape’ from a difficult and stressful year, and can bring a little bit of happiness to everyone through art. 

We hope this unique event will welcome the community to paint rocks with us, and allow people to leave their mark at the Home Garden Korner in hopes of coming back and seeing their rock still resting where they left it. We want people to be as creative as possible with their designs and encourage students to want to come back, again and again, to the Home Garden Korner.

“I am very proud of our HDFS student interns, Emma and Jamie, for their creativity and contribution to the development of our Home Garden Network program by bringing people from the campus and community at large together to carry out the activities (e.g., Ikebana and rock painting) that help ease all the tensions that most of us have gone through during this pandemic,” says Sothy Eng of HDFS.

So please join us April 18 and ‘Leave a rock, take a rock!’

For his research on Yarrowia lipolytica, a type of yeast commonly found in cheese, Winston Su of the Dept. of Molecular Biosciences and BioEngineering has found an unlikely sponsor: the Joint Genome Institute (JGI), a unit of the federal Department of Energy. “Biotechnology and synthetic biology offer enormous potential to manage and create value from wastes and byproducts that are derived from agriculture, as well as food production, processing, and consumption,” Winston explains. “My research aims to realize this potential by filling in the fundamental knowledge gaps, as well as developing practical process engineering technologies that are necessary for bringing lab research to industrial practice.”

From his approved proposal, JGI will provide RNA-sequencing and analysis of 92 samples from Winston’s lab to help elucidate the regulation of lipid metabolism in the industrially important oleaginous yeast.

Winston’s long-term goal, to develop bioengineered yeast biorefineries from lipid wastes derived from agriculture, involves RNA-sequencing – which is very costly and requires special instruments for next-generation sequencing.

“We are excited to receive this grant from the DOE Joint Genome Institute,” he says, “since RNA-sequencing has become a critical tool in revealing gene expression patterns which is highly useful in understanding cellular processes in living organisms.”

He adds, “I encourage my CTAHR colleagues who are conducting research in functional genomics to take advantage of funding opportunities offered by the JGI.”

View the JGI’s list of approved proposals, including Winston’s “RNA-seq analysis of Yarrowia lipolytica to decipher synthesis of acetyl-CoA derived oleochemicals from waste lipid feedstock for biomanufacturing of biofuels and bioproducts.” For further information, visit the JGI.

The ‘coffee berry borer’ and newly discovered ‘coffee leaf rust’ are two of today’s biggest threats to Hawaiʻi’s commercial agriculture industry. Tune into Zoom on April 16-17, 9:00 a.m.-12:30 p.m., as CTAHR and the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service team up to present the two-day “Coffee Berry Borer and Coffee Leaf Rust Conference 2021.” Farmers, researchers, Extension, and other Ag professionals will share their knowledge on managing the various coffee pest and disease issues. Topics include: CBB and CLR management, CLR monitoring, biological control, cultural practices, nematode management, new technology, and an intro to the Best Beans app.

Register now. For questions, please contact Roseann Leiner.