Posted 8:30 p.m. Tuesday, June 28, 2011
A National Science Foundation grant will help UW-L professor develop new statistical techniques and could potentially help other scholars with questions about evolution.
[caption id="attachment_3940" align="alignleft" width="162" caption="Melissa Bingham"]
[/caption]A National Science Foundation grant will help a UW-La Crosse professor develop new statistical techniques. That knowledge could potentially help other scholars on campus with questions about evolution and how joints in the body move.
Melissa Bingham, UW-L assistant professor of math, recently received the $121,900 grant.
Bingham plans to develop new statistical methods to better understand three-dimensional rotations. These complex mathematical formulas apply to objects that rotate around three different axes in space such as limbs moving around joints.
The grant also includes money for an undergraduate student researcher to assist Bingham starting next school year.
“This research will give undergraduates the opportunity to work with real-world data, collaborate with other fields such as physical therapy and learn statistical computing skills,” said Bingham.
Tom Greiner, associate professor of anatomy, hopes to use Bingham’s research to find a better way of describing the motion of foot joints in the human body and ultimately get a clearer picture of the range of normal motion. He could apply this to his study of evolution of the human foot.
“It’s getting a better way to describe variations in how the human body works compared to our close ape relative,” he said. “Is a human foot just a weird chimp foot or vice versa — or are they completely different?”
[/caption]A National Science Foundation grant will help a UW-La Crosse professor develop new statistical techniques. That knowledge could potentially help other scholars on campus with questions about evolution and how joints in the body move.
Melissa Bingham, UW-L assistant professor of math, recently received the $121,900 grant.
Bingham plans to develop new statistical methods to better understand three-dimensional rotations. These complex mathematical formulas apply to objects that rotate around three different axes in space such as limbs moving around joints.
The grant also includes money for an undergraduate student researcher to assist Bingham starting next school year.
“This research will give undergraduates the opportunity to work with real-world data, collaborate with other fields such as physical therapy and learn statistical computing skills,” said Bingham.
Tom Greiner, associate professor of anatomy, hopes to use Bingham’s research to find a better way of describing the motion of foot joints in the human body and ultimately get a clearer picture of the range of normal motion. He could apply this to his study of evolution of the human foot.
“It’s getting a better way to describe variations in how the human body works compared to our close ape relative,” he said. “Is a human foot just a weird chimp foot or vice versa — or are they completely different?”