Contact: Maridith Geuder
STARKVILLE, Miss.--The head of Mississippi State's academic programs in engineering and the director of the university's Social Science Research Center are receiving the highest professional recognitions of the world's largest general scientific society.
Sarah A. Rajala, dean of the Bagley College of Engineering, and Arthur G. Cosby recently were elected Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Rajala also holds the college's Earnest W. and Mary Ann Deavenport Jr. Chair in Engineering, while Cosby is a William L. Giles Distinguished Professor of Sociology at the land-grant institution.
The Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit organization has more than 120,000 institutional and individual members and serves more than 10 million scientists. First begun in 1874, its Fellows program recognizes individuals whose work is scientifically or socially distinguished.
Rajala and Cosby join three other MSU administrators holding the rank of Fellow. They include Kirk Schulz, vice president for research and economic development; Peter Rabideau, provost and vice president for academic affairs; and David Shaw, director of the Geosystems Research Institute.
"This is recognition of the outstanding work Drs. Rajala and Cosby have done in their respective fields," Schulz said, adding that each has helped enhance MSU's national standing.
Rajala was head of Bagley's electrical and computer engineering department before being promoted to dean. Prior to that, she was associate dean for research and graduate programs at North Carolina State University.
The author of nearly 200 scientific and research publications, she has focused her research primarily in the areas of digital- and color-image processing and digital-signal processing. She also is a Fellow of the American Society for Engineering Education, and served as its president this year.
AAAS is recognizing both Rajala's contributions to engineering education and signal processing, and service in national leadership positions.
Cosby is the longtime leader of the Social Science Research Center. In promoting its development and professional, interdisciplinary research, he has gained a national reputation for published reports covering such major topics as children's health and tobacco control, among others.
His investigations primarily have focused on the social climate for the improvement of American health and well-being. The social and cultural dimensions of pain, healthiest and unhealthiest locales throughout the United States, and geographic and racial disparities are among his more widely recognized areas of study.
The American Cancer Society, Bower Foundation, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, National Institutes of Health, and National Science Foundation are some of the many organizations and agencies that have supported his work.
In 2005, Cosby was the primary editor of "About Children," a comprehensive report released by the American Academy of Pediatrics on the occasion of its 75th anniversary.
For more information about Mississippi State University, see http://www.msstate.edu/.