Denise Hernandez-Figueroa, ’13, was named Chief Nursing Officer at Coral Gables Hospital, a premier acute-care facility in South Florida. She previously served as Director of Emergency services at Palmetto General Hospital in Hialeah, Florida.

Alecia Muwonge, ’18, Adjunct Professor of Pharmaceutics and Industrial Science, co-authored a paper that was published in Current HIV Research. The study analyzed chemical design changes caused by resistance associated mutations in combination antiretroviral therapy, used to suppress viral loads in HIV patients. Muwonge also serves as Associate Researcher at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

The Cartographic Journal awarded the 2020 Henry Johns Award for most outstanding article to LIU professors Christopher League, Computer Science, and Patrick Kennelly, Geography. “Cartographic Symbol Design Considerations for the Space-Time Cube” uses shading techniques from terrain representation to visualize data that evolve over cycles of time at particular locations, such as daily temperature readings or hourly transit usage. The award is administered by the British Cartographic Society and mapmaker Lovell Johns.

The work of Paige Bonavito, ’20, garnered discussion on the popular crime podcast Crimeficionados. The show cited her honor’s thesis “Exploring the Scott Peterson Case,” which has been widely cited in academic circles. Bonavito is currently working toward her Master of Science degree in Criminal Justice.

Former LIU basketball student-athlete Julius Van Sauers, ’19, is continuing his professional career overseas. Van Sauers signed with the Glasgow Rocks, Scotland’s top team in the British Basketball League.

The National Institutes of Health awarded Dr. Bhaskar Das, Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences, a $1.2 million grant to fund research on treatments of microsporidiosis, an emerging zoonotic infection. Dr. Das leads the University’s Core Facility in Medicinal Chemistry and has conducted groundbreaking research in cancer therapy, obesity, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases, and Alzheimer’s disease.

Suffolk County Legislator Susan A. Berland selected Linda Beigel Schulman, ’94, as the 2020 “Woman of Distinction.” Schulman was instrumental in the passage of the “Red Flag Law” in Florida, which calls for the removal of firearms from people deemed by a court to be a present danger to themselves or others. She advocated for a similar law in New York that has been regarded as the most comprehensive gun safety legislation in the country.

The American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists awarded LIU student Vishal Rathod’s research a 2020 Best Abstract Award. Rathod’s study reviews the computational predictability of anti-solvent precipitation process and nanoamorphous micellar dispersion. It will be published in the prestigious International Journal of Pharmaceutics,the second most cited journal in the field of pharmaceutical sciences out of 168 journals.

The National Science Foundation awarded the prestigious Research in Undergraduate Institutions award to Dr. Cheng Zhang, Associate Professor of Chemistry. LIU students frequently work in Dr. Zhang’s research group and often present their work at both national and regional conferences. Last year, senior David Triger co-authored a paper that was published in The Journal of Chemical Thermodynamics.

Chairman of the Theodore Roosevelt Institute and LIU professor Tweed Roosevelt, great-grandson of America’s 26th President, will deliver the third lecture in the four-part series “TR and the River of Doubt.” The lecture chronicles President Roosevelt’s iconic scientific expedition to Brazil in 1914 and the journey Tweed Roosevelt made retracing his great-grandfather’s steps nearly a century later. Click here to learn more or register.