Alumni News

When you thank our healthcare heroes for braving this deadly pandemic, be sure to include Courtnie Yokono. Courtnie graduated in December 2019. With a freshly-minted degree from CTAHR’s Molecular Biosciences and Biotechnology program, she planned to follow her original goal of working in a laboratory and pursuing a career in biomedical research. “My labwork at UH was medical-based, and I wanted to do something the human race would benefit from, to help people,” she says. “But during my interview, Diagnostic Laboratory Services told me they had openings either in lab research or as a phlebotomist, my choice. I wanted patient care experience, which would be good to have on my resume. So I stepped out of my comfort zone and took the phlebotomist job.”

She chose Queen’s Medical Center because “it’s the biggest hospital and Level I trauma center – and I wanted to be where the action is” –  but Courtnie had no idea that within weeks, she would be showing up daily on the frontlines of a global pandemic.

“In the ER, everyone is treated as if they have Covid until their test comes back negative – it’s for our protection,” she explains. “If a patient was in a car accident, we have to treat them right away, but we won’t know right away if they have Covid. So we assume they have it.”

May You Live in Interesting Times

At first, Courtnie was nervous. It took 45 minutes (yes, she timed herself) to draw blood from just two patients – most of it spent putting on and taking off the N95 mask, face shield, hair nets, gloves, plastic gown, scrubs, covered shoes, booties over shoes – and washing and sanitizing her hands after every step. Protecting herself, patients and colleagues is priority one, and besides that, Courtnie has two older parents at home.

“It was nerve wracking, but this job has opened my eyes to what I’m capable of,” she says. “I never thought I could handle blood and gory stuff, but now I’m able to see myself in my patients.”

Due to the pandemic, Queen’s has a one-visitor-per-patient-per-day policy, but Covid patients aren’t allowed any visitors.

“Sometimes the good moments are connecting with a patient,” she says. “Especially very old patients; they don’t know why they’re here. They tend to hold my hand, and I’m the only person who can give them that contact and be in the room with them. I do everything I can to make them comfortable and let them know what’s going on. Just answering their questions is huge for many patients – and I think the world needs more of that right now.”

She adds, “Having compassion and patience for others is the biggest thing I’ve learned,” she says. “Dr. David Christopher’s MBBE 304 class in Ethics really helps me now, to understand how people process things through their personal values, how they make a certain meaning of it, and we all have to respect that. His class helped me prepare for this job.”

Being a kid during Covid is tough enough, but if your parent was wounded or killed serving our country, the additional challenges, stressors and difficulty can be significant, to say the least. Hawaiʻi 4-H Military Partnership, a CTAHR program, is proud to host an exciting camp this summer for the dependent youth of Wounded Warriors. Youth campers will enjoy recreation and respite at YMCA Camp Erdman, located on the beautiful North Shore beaches of Oʻahu, the week of June 13-18. This adventure will include high ropes courses, surfing, swimming, yoga, hiking, Hawaiiana-based environmental activities, crafts, and recreational camp games.

Through these outdoor activities and adventures, youth will learn from the setting and environment much of what Hawaiʻi has to offer. They’ll have a rare opportunity to use Hawaiian studies and practices to learn about sustainability through a focus on ʻāina a me kai (land and sea), as well as mālama ponoʻī (self-care).

“The youths will benefit from this opportunity to relax, learn, grow, and be challenged, as well as connect with other youths who have gone through similar situations with a lost or wounded parent,” says Kate Eickstead, Military 4-H Program Coordinator. “They’ll not only have a fun time but will also learn coping skills, go outside their comfort zone, and make real human-to-human connections. This will benefit their surviving parent, too.”

She adds, “This expense-free, high-quality program is made possible by a grant from the US Army and the 4-H Military Partnership, and CTAHR coordination. This summer will be an unforgettable adventure for the kids.”

For more info, visit the Hawaiʻi State 4-H Program or contact Kate Eickstead.

by Darren Park. The UH Seed Laboratory is excited and proud to partner with City Mill, which has always been a strong supporter of CTAHR. A select assortment of our high-quality seeds are now on sale at the new Simply Garden Store at Kahala Mall Shopping Center. Simply Garden is a brand-new pop-up store, and part of the City Mill Family of Companies, which also includes City Mill and Simply Organized. Many of the UH seeds offered by Simply Garden were developed by CTAHR researchers to grow well in Hawaiʻi’s climate, as well as resist diseases. In addition to UH seeds, which will be available in limited quantities, Simply Garden will carry beautiful, modern, sophisticated and unique indoor and outdoor planters and easy-care indoor live plants, including succulents and air plants. Stop by the store and you’ll also find an assortment of adult and children’s gardening products and grow kits, herb garden kits, planters and other gardening accessories, such as gloves, hats, small tools, small river rocks, sea glass and some organic soils.

Doing some shopping? Or just in the Kahala area? Please stop by Simply Garden and support a Hawaiʻi company that has perennially supported our college, and our community.

by Rajesh Jha. When macadamia nut oil is produced, what’s left is a byproduct called macadamia nut cake. Until recently, “MNC” was considered a waste product and therefore, went straight to the landfill. Fortunately, the Dept. of Human Nutrition, Food and Animal Sciences saw an opportunity to put this waste to good use. We explored the nutritional and functional values of MNC as a potential alternative feedstuff for animals, which could potentially reduce production costs and the need for imported feeds. MNC is one of several alternative feedstuffs we are investigating for their nutritional and functional value. Oils of Aloha, the only producer of macadamia nut oil on Oʻahu, was eager to provide the MNC needed for this investigation. I’m proud to say our work so far has been successful! After a series of experiments and studies, our research group was able to convert what was previously thought of as a “waste and environmental burden” into a “valuable animal feed ingredient.”

You can read about the nutritional value of MNC in pig and poultry feeds in our published papers, most recently Macadamia nut cake as an alternative feedstuff for broilers: Effect on growth performance, which appears in Science Direct.

We’re currently working on additional papers that explore the role of MNC in modulating the intestinal microbiota of pigs and poultry, and the use of MNC in pastured chicken. And if you’re interested in several other alternative feedstuffs for animals, please visit my lab website. I believe their potential is great, and could potentially contribute to healthy and environmentally-friendly animal production, while maintaining the competitiveness of the industry.

Tenure and promotion is based on objectivity, correct? But what if the metrics they use are biased in favor of men? With a growing body of evidence that bias does exist in nearly all traditional academic evaluation metrics, a new study from the Dept. of Molecular Biosciences and Bioengineering and Dept. of Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences is testing whether modern, digital “altmetrics” can reduce those biases, especially in STEM fields. “Our goal is for UH to become a national leader in the next-generation of equitable practices for recruitment and promotion,” says Bjarne Bartlett, MBBE grad student and lead researcher. “UH prides itself on diversity and inclusion. This study offers new knowledge that can be leveraged for more equitable hiring and promotion practices.” Adds Michael Kantar of TPSS, “This adds to the body of literature showing that we don’t value contributions equally. Actively choosing to use metrics that do a better job would help the University of Hawaiʻi live up to its goals.”