MECCA (Memphis Educational Computer Connectivity Alliance) was originally organized to (1) provide WAN (Wide Area Network) connectivity or improved connectivity to its member institutions, (2) establish and facilitate a consortium for technical and programmatic relationships with Memphis institutions of higher education and one K-12 school , (3) setup a central UNIX based gateway computer for network administration, netnews, email, advanced network training, construct a multi-campus information server network and provide spooling for shared academic program development.
Member institutions currently within the consortium include the University of Tennessee, Memphis (UTM) and associated teaching hospitals, Memphis State University (MSU), Rhodes College (RC), Christian Brothers University (CBU), LeMoyne-Owen College (LOC), State Technical Institute (STI), Shelby State College (SSC), Memphis City Schools (MCS)-East High School and the Memphis/Shelby County Public Library (PL). STI, SSC, MH, PL have been added since the original MECCA proposal was written. UTM and MSU had Internet and inter-institutional connectivity at the time the original proposal was written, but currently all the members of MECCA with the exception of the public library are connected to the Internet and as a result to each other. These connections vary between T1 and 56 KBaud. Talks with a local fiber network company (City Signal) are being to conducted to provide a 100 megabit per second switched ethernet ring to connect all MECCA members. Not only will this give our municipal network a potential for higher transmission speed, but also internet connectivity could potentially be consolidated to reduce expenditures on network connections and at the same time retain our Point of Presence (POP) configuration.
The MECCA consortium is currently holding meetings at monthly intervals. These meeting are designed to facilitate cooperative programmatic initiatives between MECCA members and to extend programmatic initiatives into the larger Memphis area. These activities have included a MECCA super computer project (MSU), education of high school and college students on Internet utilization for biomedical research (UTM), preparing a cooperative agreement proposal for Digital Libraries research along with a private sector defense contractor TASC who specializes in applied information technology and a potential Durham Foundation project for bringing a piece of cyberspace to one or more of our senior citizen establishments via a Freenet type environment. At present the super computer project areas are being identified within the community to assess the local need for such an instrument. Regular reports are being collected and a proposal will be prepared.
The Department of Physiology and Biophysics (UTM) directed two programs last Summer which were designed to promote minority student involvement in science and mathematics and more specifically in the biomedical sciences. The Young Memphis Scholars (YMS) program populated predominately by minority Memphis area high school students grades 9 through 12, and the Graduate Achievement Program (GAP) solicited minority undergraduate students from various colleges and universities throughout the country. Both these programs, YMS and GAP were funded by the NSF, the Pitt Hyde Foundation and the University of Tennessee, Memphis. Each program provided for both hands-on biomedical laboratory experience as well as classroom studies. Included in the classroom enrichment for both groups was a course directed and taught by MECCA's associate director titled "The Internet: Resource Discovery and Utilization". Four of the students in the YMS program were from the high school targeted by the MECCA proposal. UTM provided a MacIntosh classroom with 20 networked LCII computers. Popmail, Turbogopher (gopher client), Telnet and Fetch (ftp) were installed on each machine. Students learned network fundamentals by working with "The Internet Tour" a Hypercard application written at NSFnet. The student learned the basic Internet functions: email, telnet and ftp (file transfer protocol). They also learned to use extended Internet functions such as gopher (mulitfunctional network information resource), archie (ftp locator) and wais (topic oriented resource locator). These classes were conducted (primarily) using the MECCA gopher server and other server resources. A classroom information area was established on the MECCA gopher for providing classroom input such as "take home" assignments, test and general classroom information. Answers to assignments were delivered via email to the course director. Email groups were organized to discuss "Powershift" by Alvin Toffler which deals with the importance of computer networks in both academic and business environments today and in the future. The final assignment was a biomedical oriented Internet Hunt using the MECCA gopher and associated utilities. All of the students taking part in this class became proficient at using the network functions described above for the discovery and extraction of scientific information.
Since funding of the MECCA proposal was delayed until July 1993, the Department of Physiology server (DECstation 5000/240 - Ultrix) at UTM has been temporarily used for the home of the MECCA gopher server and currently a Mosaic - WWW server for MECCA is being designed on this platform. A Digital Equipment Corp. Alpha AXP has been purchased and is being configured to replace the temporary MECCA server. Space has also been identified by the UTM administration to house MECCA, its server and network routing equipment. We have negotiated with SuraNet, our mid-level network provider for the T1 connection to the Internet. City Signal is delivering fiber to the primary switch box at UTM and from there a connection will be made to the MECCA routers and server. Our server computer will also function as a secondary name server for MECCA members requesting this service.
Shared academic network program development is being conducted between UTM and LOC relative to the teaching of Human Physiology by the UTM Dept. of Physiology faculty.
In summary MECCA has completed much of what it proposed to NSF in its first six months of funded activity.
Network information servers (gophers and/or www) are being provided by the following MECCA members: UTM, MSU, RC and STI. Within the next few weeks LOC will also have a functional server.
Outlined in the following proposal is a description of prototype projects which we expect to continue and/or function as models for additional programmatic content in the future. These descriptions are organized to provide the intent, structure, implementation and evaluation for each project. MECCA and its members will function as a catalyst for these activities. MECCA will be the primary supervisor for the projects outlined in this proposal. We will provide 1) technical assistance when needed, 2) suggest content organization, 3) teach methods of information delivery and 4) insist on a regular evaluation relative to the goals of each project. Each project leader or leaders have extensive knowledge in their own discipline and the ability to impart that knowledge through traditional methods of delivery. A brief background description of each project leader is provided in appendix A.
By facilitating these supplemental projects MECCA will forge academic relationships relative to the delivery of education that have not existed in this community prior to the programs described in this grant. It is the intent and ability of MECCA to deliver a variety of educational programming via information tools and connectivity in a multi-institutional environment that is unique to this municipal area network (MAN). Models for this type of inter-institutional cooperation are exemplified by the MSU-UTM biomedical engineering courses, the SSC-UTM nutrition education project, the LOC-UTM human physiology course, and the MECCA workshop which combines the knowledge and experience of our senior citizens with the ability of our Memphis city school teachers to assist in the education of Memphis children. Also MECCA will assist in the connection of an under served minority by working with LOC to connect the LeMoyne-Owen Garden housing project whose residents will receive both usable information and educational content. Senior citizen education in preventive medicine will be provided by the Planetree Center and our UTM medical staff as well as affiliated MECCA member hospitals.
MECCA compliance and cooperation with current initiatives in networking for education and the Memphis Urban Systemic Initiative plan for rebuilding math and science education Tennessee networking for K12 education has taken on a new sense of urgency in the past year. The Tennessee Education Network (TEN) was organized to provide network connectivity to all K12 schools by the year 2000. This is a major effort which is projected to spend nearly 300 million dollars. Estimated expenditures for Memphis from January 1994 to June 1998 will be approximately $36,000,000.00. The Memphis TEN budget for the current year is projected to be nearly $3,000,000.00. The educational and technical goals of TEN are synergistic with those of MECCA and the projects in this proposal. TEN suggest that "Higher Education provides local access to TEN from their campuses, operation of a TEN server ("the TEN gateway"), development of the K12 user interface menu and information utilities access to libraries and other resources, user training, and long term network planning (with the office for Information Resources). Two Higher Education members of MECCA (UTM and MSU) are already involved in developing much of the connection and content relative to the above items which were presented to the Tennessee Information Systems Council, Dec. 16, 1993. The following table illustrates the areas of common intent between this MECCA supplemental proposal and TEN goals. TEN Goals MECCA Project Goals
"Tennessee classrooms will be connected to TEN through a series of easy-to-use local and wide area networks". Through the MECCA senior citizen project, and existing connectivity along with a planned ethernet MAN we are positioned to provide simple and fast network access. "Education delivery to the homebound and to others with special needs will be greatly enhanced." By sponsoring the graduate course "Product Design for People with Disabilities" via network delivery we will be constructively addressing this problem. "On-line homework help and course tutoring will be commonplace." The senior citizen-teacher connection addresses this need directly. "TEN will offer courses, degree programs, and career development for Tennessee educators." We are proposing continuing education for teachers by offering a summer workshop to teach the teachers as well as others how to utilize the MECCA MAN. "Opportunities will be available to connect student work with real-life problems associated with the work of other students and adults." By developing a Memphis Freenet MECCA will facilitate student to student and student to adult problem solving activities. "Tennessee teachers will be able to network with their peers to share ideas and to explore creative learning approaches." Through MECCA both list server and Freenet connections will provide local, state, national and international peer interactions.
The Urban Systemic Initiative (USI) National Science Foundation RFP request proposals from the 25 urban centers in the U.S.A. who have the greatest total number of K12 students under the poverty guidelines. These proposals are to be directed to reconstructing and revitalizing K12 math and science education. A USI planning proposal was submitted by the Memphis City Schools and subsequently funded. Issues to be studied by this grant as compared to the MECCA supplement project goals are shown in the following table.
Memphis USI Goals MECCA Expected Outcomes from Proposed Projects "Do courses include the use of modern technology?" "Does course work integrate technologies to empower students to collect, display, analyze, and store data as plots or more sophisticated computations and explorations?" MECCA will develop prototypes employing modern technology to deliver computer based distance education ... not just information. K12 students and teachers involved in these projects will receive advanced network utility instruction. "Cite connections of other projects with the school system. Articulate the need for continuous interaction with the private sector/business and community." By joining the USI planning group the directors of MECCA are committed to encouraging K12 and Higher Education project collaboration with the sole objective of bettering the educational experience of the K12 students of Memphis. "Do all students have access to an appropriate learning environment including a sufficient quantity of manipulative and laboratory facilities and equipment?" "Are computers calculators, and multimedia apparatus available and used as instructional methods in mathematics and science?" All of the proposed projects for the MECCA supplement address possible solutions to the question of sufficient and equitable access and use of available equipment and professional staff. K12 teachers and senior adults will be instructed on the use of high tech equipment and networks. MECCA members will collaborate in developing appropriate strategies for maximum utilization of Memphis City School networking and computer resources.
At the invitation of the Memphis City superintendent of schools (Dr. Gerry House) both the director and associate director of MECCA attended a select conference which featured a presentation by Dr. Luther Williams, Director of USI. The MECCA representatives to this conference have been asked to be members of a committee to assist in planning the development and implementation of math and science opportunities for Memphis K12 students. MECCA will work closely with the principals of the USI in Memphis to coordinate our common interest. Many of the applications and methods relating to the supplemental MECCA projects will provide valuable information and potential tools toward the USI objectives. Semiannual progress reports will be submitted to the planning committee of the Memphis USI so that teaching and technical transfer will occur between MECCA and USI planning.
The MECCA senior citizen efforts will be coordinated with the Durham Foundation, Inc., of Memphis. This grant making foundation was established in 1988 to "improve the quality of life for older citizens and their communities". This foundation provides funding to establish projects to 1) improve potential productivity of older persons, 2) improve the quality of life for senior citizens and 3) empower older persons to contribute to their communities. All three of the above criteria are being meet by the nature and intent of the senior citizen segment of this supplemental proposal. MECCA will submit a proposal to the Durham Foundation, Inc., (due April 1) to assist in funding a portion of the older citizen segment of this proposal. Equipment and supplies needed at the provider site (MECCA) will be budgeted in this MECCA supplemental proposal.
Our initial efforts will be directed to a didactic course (Biomedical Instrumentation, which has been traditionally taught from John Webster's text of the same title) and a project-oriented design course (Product Design for People with Disabilities (PDPD), which is taught from a curriculum devised by Dr. Michael Rosen). Through development efforts focused on these two courses, we will cover most of the general needs for the other engineering courses. Each course and its needs are described in more detail below. First, we describe the general aspects of what we have termed network-enhanced education.
New features to be implemented in the courses include electronic recitation sections, hypertext-based note servers, and support for group-based design projects in which the students fabricate a working prototype. Each of these features is built about use of the network for communication among the class and teacher and for access to computers. Note that our goal is to enlarge the scope and enhance the learning experience while reducing the need for commutation. Total elimination of traditional lectures and laboratory exercises is not a goal; indeed, we feel that contact time among students and faculty is crucial: our goal is to maximize the utility of that time.
Instructors' notes and problems for the students will be transferred to Mosaic documents. The supplemental grant will fund an expert on using networks and Mosaic, who will aid the faculty in transferring typical class notes and material from word processor programs to a central course computer for the department. Here, synergy between the expertise of the faculty, who know the sources and the expert, who knows how to use Mosaic effectively, should allow us to deliver educational material that is appropriate for students with different backgrounds and to ensure the availability of all material crucial to the course. Such notes could include short reviews of material from courses that were taken in previous years, glossaries defining new terms or illustrating important underlying concepts, or perhaps even a short course allowing the student to learn some topic for the first time. An example of the latter that fits well with a design course is material about particular technologies, e.g. C-rings for fasteners, or use of embedded controllers. Ultimately, Mosaic could lead the students to catalogs of applicable materials from companies that provide product information over the Internet. For the initial offering, a part of these sources will be citations to books and other materials held as reference in the local libraries. As the availability and scope of digital libraries increases, these citations and sources will be changed to materials readily accessible on the network or Internet.
Another simple, but educationally powerful use for Hypertext is to provide a series of hints that the student can uncover as needed; by providing particular values of parameters in the hints, it would be possible for the instructor to estimate how many hints a given student had to use to solve the problem. We would expect that the student use a computer with windowing so the answer can be composed in one window and the problem contained in another. Return of answers via e-mail and maintenance of a bulletin board for discussion of the answers and issues related to modeling will encourage a group learning experience. We would also expect that the students would come to use the network to search on their own for information. Use of tools such as Veronica would be encouraged for this purpose. Another important use for the network will be to collect information about the students' reaction to the course and its materials.
Biomedical Instrumentation would have a traditional lecture format. The desire would be to provide students with notes over an electronic format and make these notes multidimensional through hypertext annotation. Other important aspects would be provide electronic recitation sections, thereby removing the need for physical presence at a section, and to manage the paper aspects of the curriculum. The last item has been done for courses on both our and other campuses, but to our knowledge, the linking of materials has not been done extensively over a city-wide network. For us, the desire would be to encourage the submission in standard formats, e.g. as MathCAD documents. Such software is routinely available in student computer labs and for home use through inexpensive student versions of the program.
Our course PDPD will only function if there is strong communication among the students and the faculty. This course is sufficiently unusual (it is taught by Dr. Michael Rosen, who, when at MIT, was involved with similar courses, including the "New Product" curriculum) that a thorough depiction of it facilitates understanding why networking is crucial to its implementation on a city-wide basis. The course is built about a design experience that involves producing a working prototype; modern concurrent engineering is stressed throughout the course. During the first section of the course, the students attend a series of lectures, often including talks by outside experts, that are crucial to prepare them for a group effort in design. Early in the course, a "warm-up" design problem is provided so the students can see and experience the entire process in miniature. Then, the students are presented with the major design problem, are grouped into design teams, begin to formulate criteria and goals, brainstorm for possible solutions, select a possible solution to pursue, and ultimately work as sub-teams to build the prototype. For semesters where a sufficient number of students register, multiple project teams and prototypes are used.
Throughout the above process, the exchange of information is crucial. The modern design process stresses concurrent work; students must be able to communicate readily and often. Equally important, the supervising faculty must monitor and comment on this communication. When Dr. Rosen offered this course at MIT, he and the students used the Athena network and its e-mail features for these ends. Our goal is to build a suitable vehicle for a city-wide implementation.
Considering the student's activity in the design course provides a simple example of the type of communication that is needed. A sub-team will reach what they perceive as a reasonable solution to the design problem; they will send electronic mail notifying all other persons (other sub-teams and the faculty) of their approach, and expect that unless a reply is returned within a set period that the solution is acceptable. Such solutions are meaningless unless a great amount of detail can be provided, e.g., drawings of mechanical parts and circuits, assembly drawings, requirements of interfaces and operators. Each of these may be in a different format, since the students will use tools that are available. E.g., a student who has taken a course in finite elements will both want and be encouraged to use the software used in the course; those who have used student versions of packages like MathCAD (which is also available together with other general purpose mathematical software on the departmental network of workstations) will use that package for estimating answers. Our goal is to make these tools useful to the students when they work as teams rather than simply as a way to produce end-results that they show to justify. One way to do this is by making available a small number of scanners and software so simple black and white drawings can be fed into e-mail and other network services. (A process, which can be built either a list server or Mosaic, would allow a user to automate this entry of drawings, whether in electronic or physical format; the process could also record the entering person's identity and keep track of those who access it.) Through such means, we envisage a discussion over the network that approximates the richness that occurs in face-to-face meetings. We also expect to grow with the advances of technology. For example, the availability to use 3-D graphics with features such as shading and contrast will greatly increase with the maturation of the PEX system (PHIGS extension to X; PHIGS = Programmer's Heirarchical Interactive Graphis System).
The lecture material for individual lectures in PDPD will be prepared and made available in the same fashion as for Biomedical Instrumentation. A case can be made for very extensive use of hypertext annotation in design lectures for two interlinked reasons: today's technology is sufficiently broad that no single person is likely to know all aspects and the students in a design class are likely to have been trained in various specialties, each with a limited view. Thus, the electrical engineer who knows little about mechanisms or the mechanical engineer who has minimal understanding of phase-locked control circuitry all can benefit from annotated lectures. These reasons are particularly salient with today's engineering students, who unlike their parents, have not had the experience of tearing apart and repairing common household technology. Some material for the annotations can be pulled from existing sources. For example, both MathCAD and Mathematica support "notebook" style of applications, which allow a person to build applications from existing programs that they either sell or provide through bulletin-boards/Internet. It would be a rather simple task to find the correct material, assemble it in their format (MathCAD and Mathematica) and make it available through a batch file that is accessed through Mosaic. Use by the students would be restricted by the number of licenses for the main programs that are available on the server, however, campus-wide adaptation of the languages is becoming more common, so no problem is expected in the initial phases. Two other useful features of such an annotation system is that the students can write annotations as a part of their training. and that national use of the materials is encouraged.
Following practices of modern design, we seek evaluation of concepts, criteria, and designs from the potential users. Modern networking methods will be particularly useful in some situations, since a portion of people with disabilities have access to and have been trained to use computers. Obviously, the feedback from them will greatly depend upon the presentation of information to them. In this sense, Mosaic, with hypertext features that provide definitions and more importantly, images, whether scanned-in photographs, line drawings or 3-D computer renderings of concepts, will greatly enhance our communication of the new design and can be expected to generate more meaningful evaluations.
2. Establishing a central course computer and purchasing / implementing solutions via both hardware and software to overcome the inconsistencies among machines available at various sites*. We expect to need at least a large hard disk for an existing Unix work station, several ethernet cards, software for particular purposes, e.g. X-Share or HiJack (a program that transforms images among various formats, which would allow use of convenient standard forms for inclusion in Mosaic documents), a larger monitor for one of the local computers so group and classroom display of drawings can be readily accomplished.
*We will try to make as large a range of computers available as possible for the students. Many types of computers are in use on the two campuses, ranging from networked workstations (Sun SparkStations, DECStations, and a DEC Alpha) to various MacIntosh systems to clusters of Intel 386 served by a 486 for student computer lab and teaching labs. The degree of networking varies among laboratories, departments, and campuses. We expect to have no more than 24 students in a class and to implement network-aided education for no more than one course per semester for the first two years. Our estimate of the computer need is that we will have to have about 12 seats available for the students. This can be done out of existing computers, but will need small parts to enhance connectivity and compatibility of software.
DINE Healthy is an interactive computer program which was developed to be used with individuals whose background may be limited in formal education or not have access to trained professionals for interpretation or application of the results. The program completes a dietary assessment of an individuals diet, presents the results in terms of how it meets the goals established by Healthy People 2000. An interactive pathway is provided to experiment with how different food selections may promote healthier eating patterns. The food data base provides 8000 food items which represent the various ethnic and cultural foods consumed in the U.S. Since the data base is expandable, additional food items can be added which describe foods in a culturally sensitive fashion, thus allowing for a better assessment of an individuals diet. However, this programs also require the use of sophisticated personal computers, therefore limiting its use in specific settings.
A municipal network provides an opportunity for educational institutions to access such a program that they may otherwise not have available. The interactive computer based program permits an instructor to combine personal diet habits with scientific principles to illustrate physiological processes. Thus making the diet and health information more relevant to the intended audience as well as provide a knowledge base for engaging in health promotion activities. In addition, economically disadvantaged individuals who reside in housing projects would also have access to this same information. This project is intended to determine the feasibility of offering a preventive medicine or health promotion interactive computer program to groups who may otherwise not have access to the program, technology to run the program, and technical (MECCA) or content expertise (Dr. Tylavsky) for resources.
The following table highlights key milestones in the school's technology implementation plan:
By extending its networking services into the Garden via the community center or Garden Initiative, LeMoyne-Owen college will begin to offer services that are either unavailable at neighboring schools or are inaccessible from the nearest library.
Classes will be offered to Garden students teaching them such internet services as Gopher and Mosaic and internet skills such as FTPing and TELNETing. Classes will also instruct students on creating internet searches and adopting the computer as a knowledge tool.
Through cooperation with the MECCA Consortium, LeMoyne-Owen College hopes to make a gopher server available that will store recent job announcements that might be ÒpipedÓ directly from the Commercial Appeal (a community newspaper). Alternatively, articles and postings may be scanned into text files using OCR technology. Classes will be open to all garden residents and will culminate in the creation of a resume and cover letter that heads-of-households to use in securing jobs or research papers/articles that students have obtained via network searches. When classes are not in session, the community center will offer its internet access to Garden residents and will be available for users to log on to the Library of Congress and other electronic libraries, or to conduct queries using Archie or Veronica search engines.
Thought has been given to the evolving role of digital libraries and as such, each station will be able to take advantage of media-rich data formats such as QuickTime (for audio/video compression and playback), object linking and client/server technology.
The internet standard, TCP/IP (staticly addressed) will be loaded on all systems in the center. A shared printer and server will offer printed output and gopher/mosaic/mail server functions, respectively.
A full-time center support person will be housed in the center and will report directly to the LeMoyne-Owen College computer center. The center support person will be responsible for the teaching of classes and will provide status reports to the computer center for software and hardware support. Minor upkeep and preventive maintenance will be handled by the center support person and student staffing.
1. Have the teachers, senior citizens and students become accomplished in using the MECCA computer network and associated utilities?
2. Do the students and teachers use this service provided by the senior citizens (how often are the senior citizens asked to assist students or teachers)?
3. Do the senior citizens seek to find a network place for involvement in this process?
4. By teacher evaluation of student performance directly associated with network tutoring and senior citizen interaction.
5. Computer accounting procedures will be established and reviewed on a regular basis.
Participation in a class such as described will be student driven rather than faculty-schedule driven. Instead of a scheduled lecture, students will be free to interact with the "lecture" materials and participate in group discussion at their discretion limited only by the time constraints of major events such as class demonstrations and exams (which will require the presence of faculty).
Traditionally Black minority institutions such as LeMoyne-Owen, other small community colleges and advanced placement K12 programs will benefit from this initial prototype effort. Once the networked delivery has been adjusted to network environmental constraints at LeMoyne-Owen the possibility of extending this course to other MECCA institutions will be exceedingly simple.
An administrative secretary will be required to transcribe the class syllabus and figures into html along with suitable links and references. A glossary of terms will be generated along with the transcription of the class syllabus. Also a computer graphics person will be needed to convert graphics into appropriate formats for in-line displays and Mosaic ISmaps.
Monies are anticipated from the Durham Foundation, Inc., for the senior citizen project which will be computers, routing equipment, ISDN line charges and Freenet software. This total is $30,000.
Negoiations are currently underway with the City of Memphis to obtain an additional housing unit at LeMoyne Gardens to house the MECCA - LeMoyne-Owen project. The value of this unit is estimated to be $30,000. Total cost sharing from these items is $91,800. This constitutes amost 33% of the total proposal figure.
Dr. Mike Rosen: Biomedical Engineering Courses Dr. Michael J. Rosen is Director of Rehabilitation Engineering and holds Associate Professorships in the Departments of Biomedical Engineering and Orthopedics at the University of Tennessee, Memphis. He has taught aspects of biomedical engineering for twenty years. During his eighteen years in the Mechanical Engineering Department at MIT, he was responsible for teaching the required "capstone" design course (in addition to a seminar on Product Design for People with Disabilities and recitation sections of the sophomore design subject 2.70 in which students build machines that compete against each other in a climactic contest). The senior course, taught to over 100 students each fall, was "experiential" in that it taught students about design by requiring that they "do" design. Rosen (and his colleagues at MIT) often selected topics in disability. In offering a version of Product Design for People with Disabilities in Memphis, Dr. Rosen has encouraged enrollment and participation by students and faculty from the Memphis community in order to broaden and strengthen the design team and their instruction.
Dr. Frances A. Tylavsky: Disease Prevention/Health Promotion Strategies Dr. Tylavsky's main role as an Assistant Professor in Preventive Medicine at the University of Tennessee, Memphis is to develop and conduct nutrition related research as it relates to the development, occurrence and progression of chronic diseases. A secondary role is to provide ways to integrate applied nutrition principles into science education. During her 20 years as an health professional, she has practiced as a Registered Dietitian, taught undergraduate, graduate, and consumer level classes on dietary assessment and its relationship to disease. Her research efforts have focused on collecting dietary and physical activity information and correlating it to various health related outcomes. She has collected diet information using an interviewer-interviewee structure as well as with computer generated dietary assessment programs.
Mr. Gerald Flournoy: LeMoyne Gardens Connection Mr. Gerald Flournoy is currently Coordinator of Computing and Telecommunications at LeMoyne-Owen College. He has had extensive experience with computer management, network management and student training. At LeMoyne-Owen he has been responsible for design and implementation of local-area networking and telephony. He is also responsible for the training and support of administrative staff and faculty. He is the PI for a funded NSF connections grant to connect LeMoyne-Owen College to the Internet. He is the LeMoyne-Owen representative to the MECCA consortium. He also consults with MECCA staff concerning network matters. Previously at Grambling State University he was also responsible for advising the College of Education on computer related acquisitions, and he also provided custom programming services. He has been a supplemental programmer for IBM where he tested and evaluated programs in C and Rexx. At IBM he also studied host systems integration (SNA).
Dr. Tom Barton: Technical Program Director for all MECCA Projects Listed During 1975-1982 Dr. Tom Barton worked in the Physical Anthropology Lab at Kent State. While there he worked with a Digital Group Z80 micro system on which he developed numerous applications, including parallel printer drivers, digitizing tablet drivers (using a serial port I built), a database system, a biomechanics software package, a photo-analysis package for forensic applications, and a communications package for terminal emulation and file transfer with the campus mainframe. He also wrote a package for manipulating and analyzing 3-D images constructed from 2-D CAT scans which ran on a PDP-40 system with custom video hardware at the Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine. During that same period he did free-lance work for other research projects on the KSU campus and for two local businesses. He worked in the Computing Section at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, where he developed a package for solving elliptic systems of differential equations in non-rectangular regions. At LASL he also did abstract work in "chaotic processing", a form of distributed processing in which little synchronization between processors is required. He also developed a major micro biological package for analyzing cells in slide images. Since accepting a faculty appointment in the Department of Mathematics at Memphis State University he has developed the Novell and TCP/IP networks in the Department of Mathematical Sciences. That network has grown to about 150 nodes. He modified the popular KA9Q software package to meet special needs of their network, and later did a large upgrade on the PCroute software package for similar reasons. During this same time MSU joined SURAnet, and he helped in many ways to get the campus ready for and connected to the Internet. Recently his role has moved away from the Department of Mathematics and towards the campus in support of network development. He founded a human network of MSU LAN administrators and Computer Services staff called NetSIG. He developed and implemented a campus-wide email transport system. He developed and deployed an extended campus-wide BOOTP service which supports replicated BOOTP servers. He conducted a year-long training class for Computer Services personnel and LAN administrators to teach them about installing, maintaining, and troubleshooting LANs. In Spring of 1993 He was appointed by the President of MSU to the "Technology Transition Team" to work with an outside consultant to prepare MSU for fundamental administrative changes to better support and promote the use of technology. In May '93 he took leave of his faculty position to attend to these duties full time. In August '93 he was appointed Director of Network Services and began to work with the Vice Provost for Information Technology. He currently has responsibility for all forms of telecommunications on and off campus. During this period he has also begun serving as formal and informal telecommunications consultant to other institutions, including MECCA, the University of Tennessee at Memphis, Methodist Hospitals, the State of Tennessee, and the College of William and Mary.
Ms. Carolyn Holland: Projects Financial Management and Accounting Ms. Carolyn Holland is currently Assistant to the Chairman and Business Manager in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics. Ms. Holland is in charge of all of the administrative and financial aspects of a teaching/research department with an annual budget of approximately $4 million. In addition, she functions as the departmental Graduate Coordinator and Enrichment Program Director, the Administrator for the Brain Injury Research Center, and the Program Coordinator for the Educational LAN Consortium. Ms. Holland has had extensive experience in grantsmanship through management at the departmental level, functioning as a consultant on campus regarding large trial generation, and serving on the Clinical Trial Study Section of NHLBI and on various ad hoc program project and center study sections. Ms. Holland is very dedicated to enrichment programs, as evidenced by her leadership in developing and managing multi-institutional activities.
Mr. Larry Tague, Co-PI: Senior Citizen Connection and Human Physiology Course Mr. Larry Tague (curriculum vitae) is currently a research associate in Physiology and Biophysics and serves as the departmental network manager, coordinator for computer systems, and he is an active Gastrointestinal Physiologist. He is the Associate Director of MECCA and Co-Principal Investigator on the original NSF award which funded this consortium. He has configured numerous gopher and www (Mosaic) servers and clients for MECCA, the Department of Physiology and he is a consultant for other information server providers at U.T., Memphis as well as other institutions of Higher Education within Memphis. He serves as a network consultant for U.T., Memphis Computer Services and Telecommunications. He is working with the Tennessee Hospital Association (THA), Nashville, TN, to establish a THA information server on the Internet. He is currently teaching a graduate course which deals with the use of computers and computer network utilities in biomedical research. Prior to arriving in Memphis, Mr. Tague was Senior Research Scientist with the Department of Physiology and Biophysics at the University of Texas Medical School, Houston. For the past 16 years, he has been involved with physiological research applications and the human interface to computer workstations. He has engineered hardware connectivity and software for data acquisition and analysis. As a member of the Texas Health Science Center Committee for Coordination of Administrative Functions, he worked together with the central administrative computer center for the first health science center-wide computer interface to provide centralized word-processing, data base management, and purchasing activities. He was also active and consulted with the current Director of Academic Computing (Dr. William A. Weems) at that institution when TCP-IP protocols through UNIX workstations were being implimented. After arriving in Memphis, he participated in negotiations for and obtained the first dedicated TCP/IP LAN on this campus. He is currently managing 86 active TCP/IP network ports. These connections include a variety of computer platforms and operating systems including the Macintosh operating system with MacTCP, A/UX (Apple UNIX), DEC workstations running ULTRIX and a variety of PCs using DOS with TCP/IP communications software. With these systems, he maintains cross-platform file sharing, multi-platform printer sharing, departmental hard disk backup functions, and a variety of public domain utilities (i.e., POPmail, Eudora Mail (smtp), NetNews clients, ListServ, Gopher client/servers, www server/clients, wais and ftp utilities).
Dr. Jack Buchanan, PI: Program Director Dr. Jack W. Buchanan (abbreviated curriculum vitae) is the Director of the Memphis Educational Computer Connectivity Alliance. Dr. Buchanan is also Associate Professor Biomedical Engineering, Medicine, Health Informatics, and Physiology and Biophysics at UT, Memphis, and Staff Physician (Cardiology) at the Memphis Veterans Administration Medical Center. Dr. Buchanan is also Director of the Biomedical Engineering Distributed Computing Research Environment at UT, Memphis, which is investigating high-performance distributed computing for both scientific and clinical applications. At the VA, Dr. Buchanan is Vice Chairman of the Automated Information Systems advisory committee and is Co-Chairman of an ad-hoc committee to investigate and implement distributed image and text workstation technology within the hospital. Prior to moving to Memphis in October, 1990, Dr. Buchanan was Research Assistant Professor of Medicine and Biomedical Engineering at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and was Director of Computing for the Biomedical Engineering curriculum. He was also Co-Director of the Biomedical Engineering Communications Research Facility, which, along with Bell South, Fujitsu Network Switching of America, Inc. and other industrial sponsors, is undertaking project MICA, which combines advanced workstation technology, SONET transmission, Asynchronous Transfer Mode switching, broadband ISDN, and prototype IEEE 802.6 metropolitan area networks for remote physician consultation. He was also co-principal investigator and co-director of the Advanced Biomedical Computation and Display Facility at the University of North Carolina, a recipient of an NIH shared-instrument grant which provided a mini-supercomputer and associated network for a group of 10 NIH-funded investigators, including Dr. Buchanan. Dr. Buchanan also served from 1987-1990 as Biosensor Coordinator and member of the steering committee for the Duke-North Carolina National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center for Emerging Cardiovascular Technologies, a major University/Industry/Government partnership with well over $10 million of total funding. He was also a member of the UNC-Chapel Hill Office of Data and Video Communications advisory committee and the Microelectronics Center of North Carolina affiliated institutions advisory committee.
1. Muller-Borer BJ, Erdman DJ, Buchanan JW. Electricalcoupling and impulse propagation in anatomically modeledventricular tissue. IEEE Transactions on BiomedicalEngineering, In Press
2. Buchanan JW. Effects of regional membrane changes onpropagation in a model of ventricular muscle.Proceedings of the 11th Southern Biomedical EngineeringSymposium 1992;20-21
3. Cardoso S, Newman K, Garrett E, Romano S, Buchanan J.Circadian profiles of heart rate variability (H.R.V.) incontrols and in heart transplant recipients. ClinicalResearch 1992;40:863A
4. Muller-Borer BJ, Erdman DJ, Buchanan JW. Discretebioelectric model of ventricular tissue. Proceedings ofthe 13th Annual International Conference, IEEE Engineeringin Medicine and Biology Society, 1991;510-511
5. Buchanan J, Thompson BG. Opportunities for the use ofbroad-band packet-switched data networks for direct patientcare. In Proceedings of the Third Annual IEEE Symposium onComputer-Based Medical Systems. Los Alamitos, CA, IEEEComputer Society Press, 1990;9-13
6. Buchanan JW, Fujino T. Ventricular muscle as a functionallycontinuous medium for electrical propagation: experiments andsimulations. In Imaging, Analysis and Simulation of theCardiac System, edited by S Sideman, R Beyar. London, FreundPublishing House, 1990:699-717
7. Buchanan JW, Gettes LS. Ionic Environment and Propagation.In Cardiac Electrophysiology: From Cell to Bedside, edited byDP Zipes, J Jalife. Orlando, WB Saunders, 1990:149-156
8. Ash RB, Wortman JJ, Nagle HT, Buchanan JW. Silicon basedelectrode arrays. Proceedings of the 11th Annual InternationalConference, IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society,1989;210-211
9. Buck RP, Buchanan JW, Kusy RP. Technology based systems:chemistry, physics, materials science and engineering ofchemical sensors/ biosensors for in vivo applications. Proceedingsof the 12th Annual International Conference, IEEE Engineeringin Medicine and Biology Society, 1990;637-638
10. Knisley SB, Maruyama T, Buchanan JW Jr. Interstitialpotential during propagation in bathed ventricular muscle.Biophysical Journal 1991;59:509-515
Graduate Teaching Assistantship; Department of Chemistry, University of Oklahoma; Norman, OK; 9/94 - 1/65
Research Assistant; Department of Pharmacology, University of Oklahoma Medical Center; Oklahoma City, OK; 1/65 - 1/68
Supervisor and Research Assistant; Department of Laboratory Medicine, University of Oklahoma Medical Center; Oklahoma City, OK; 7/68 - 3/72
Supervisor and Senior Research Scientist; Department of Physiology and Cell Biology, The University of Texas Health Science Center; Houston, TX; 3/72- 8/89
Supervisor and Research Associate; Department of Physiology and Biophysics, The University of Tennessee, Memphis (Medical School); Memphis, TN; 8/89 -Present
1. Tague, L. L., and E. D. Jacobson. Evaluation of [14C] aminopyrine clearance for determination of gastric mucosal blood flow. Proc. Soc. Exp. Biol. Med. 151: 707 710, 1976.
2. Tague, L. L., S. Amer, and E. D. Jacobson. Histamine, cyclic AMP, and gastric secretion in the dog. Am. J. Dig. Dis. 22: 13-15, 1977.
3. Tague, L. L., and L. L. Shanbour. Effects of ethanol on bicarbonate-stimulated ATPase, ATP and cyclic AMP in canine gastric mucosa. Proc. Soc. Exp. Biol. Med. 154: 37-40, 1977.
4. Mailman, D., L. L. Tague, A. P. Shepard, and E. D. Jacobson. Cyclic nucleotide metabolism and vasodilation in canine mesenteric artery. Am. J. Physiol. 232: H191-H196, 1977.
5. Pawlik, W., L. L. Tague, B. L. Tepperman, T. A. Miller, and E. D. Jacobson. Histamine H-1 and H-2 receptor vasodilation of canine intestinal circulation. Am.. J. Physiol. 233: E219-E224, 1977.
6. Weisbrodt, N. W., and L. L. Tague. Relationship between contractile and metabolite activities in esophageal muscle. In; Gastrointestinal Motility, edited by J. Christensen. New York; Raven Press, 1980
7. Ray, T. K., L. L. Tague. Secreatagogue-induced transport of H+ and K+ by in vitro amphibian gastric mucosa. Biochem. Pharm. 29: 2755-2758, 1980.
8. Sen, P. C., L. L. Tague, and T. K. Ray. Secretion of H+ and K+ by bullfrog gastric mucosa: characterization of K+ transport pathway. Am. J. Physiol. 239: G485 G492, 1980
9. McCormack, S. A., L. L. Tague, E. J. Cragoe, and L. R. Johnson. Regulation of ornithine decarboxylase activity in LoVo cells. Ame. J. Physiol. 258: G934 G941, 1990.
10. McCormack, S. A., M. J. Viar, L. L. Tague, and L. R. Johnson. Transglutaminase activity and cell migration in cells depleted of polymaines by DFMO. Am. J. Physiol. (revised).