PSU Magazine Fall 2013

cla room she can better model her workshops. Mingdi Yan, assistant professor of chemistry, was born in China in 1967, the second year of the Cultural Revolution. Her parents were scien– tists with appointments at the Chinese Academy of Agriculture. In 1976, at the end of the revolution, China began promoting science and technol– ogy in an effort to catch up with the rest of the world. However, by the time Yan was ready to attend college, much of the educational infrastructure was what she terms "wasted." Only five percent of the student-age popula– tion was allowed to attend institutions of higher education. To prepare for this steep competition, Yan took highly competitive exams in seven subjects, including English. The presti– gious University of Science and Tech– nology of China had only five openings for all of her province; Yan scored the second highest among the applicants. At the time, fields of study were hierarchically ordered and chosen for the student. Yan was placed in chem- istry, and the highest scoring student, a male, was slotted for biology. "Luck and accident," Yan says, "have shaped my career." Yan graduated from the University of Science and Technology in 1988 and continued with advanced study in poly– mer physics. She was accepted for doc– toral study at the University of Oregon when her thesis adviser left China. t the University of Oregon, Yan found a mentor in her thesis adviser, professor John Keana. He encouraged her and provided an atmosphere of independent explo– ration while teaching the in's and out's of research, publishing, grant writing, and patents. Keana's tutelage paid off. By the time Yan graduated with a Ph.D. in 1994, she had several patents on her research. She and her husband also became parents. Motherhood didn't appear to slow Yan down. Investors were interested in her research, and together with Keana, she formed Ikonos Corporation, a bioscience firm in Portland. "At Ikonos, I learned a lot about Mingdi Yan teaching,'' says Yan with a smile, "from having to explain the kinds of research we were doing to investors who weren't necessarily chemistry literate." Eventually, production dominated research at the company, and in 1998 Yan moved to Portland State where she could again do her own research– "within, of course, the limits of seek– ing and securing external funding," she says. Today, Yan is working with organic materials that possess the capacity for molecular recognition. The goal is to fabricate miniaturized devices using these materials on silicon chips for chemical separation and sensing. Potential applications include devices able to detect environmental pollu– tants. Yan enjoys working with gradu– ate students in her lab and teaching organic chemistry. When Sherry Cady, assistant professor of geology, came to Portland State in 1998, she brought with her two powerful electron microscopes and an international reputation for research on the fossil remains of microscopic life. Interviewed on CNN and named one of Time magazine's 100 innovators to watch in the new cen– tury, Cady heads the Geology Depart– ment's Geomicrobiology and Electronmicroscopy Lab. Together with fellow bacteria hunters Anna– Louise Reysenbach and David Boone of the Biology Department, Cady has proposed a new interdisciplinary cen– ter at PSU for the study of life in extremely hot and extremely cold environments. The oldest of six children, Cady grew up in rural Wisconsin, with horses, pets, and the freedom to explore nature. She describes herself as a self-motivator who sought out the right people and books to answer her many questions. Her parents, small town business people with close ties to their own parents, were great story– tellers. "We reminisced a lot in my family," she says. "It was our way of keeping together." Today Cady uncovers the stories behind the fossils that she studies, a process that brings a family analogy to mind. "The grandfather who took me FALL 2001 PSU MAGAZINE 9