The Franklin College of Arts and Sciences has awarded eight seed grants to support multidisciplinary research and teaching projects through its Rapid Interdisciplinary Proposal (RIP) and Innovation in Interdisciplinary Instruction (I-Cubed) programs and seven seed grants through its Research-Intensification System (RIS) program. RIP supports early-stage research through rapid idea generation, data collection, and team building. The I-Cubed program funds cross-disciplinary faculty partnerships to develop and implement new courses. RIS supports projects that catalyze deeper scholarship within and across disciplines, forge new collaborative opportunities, explore innovative concepts or methodologies, and engage in critical data collection or field work.  

“One of the most exciting developments for the college in recent years has been our deepened commitment to multidisciplinary collaboration, bringing together academic excellence, innovative research, and meaningful industry engagement to address complex challenges,” said Anna Stenport, dean of Franklin College. “I’m grateful to these faculty members for the care and intellectual curiosity they bring to their scholarship. Thanks to the generosity of our donors, we are able to support their work as they explore new perspectives across disciplines and tackle some of the world’s most pressing issues.”

Seven projects received RIP funding across a broad range of multidisciplinary research, including: 

• Anthropology: Don Nelson principal investigator (PI), A Transdisciplinary Approach to Extreme Weather Forecasting and Disaster Risk Reduction in the Caribbean: This team’s work will target extreme weather forecasting in order to reduce disaster risk and contribute to a more informed, engaged, and resilient Caribbean region. 
• Biochemistry and Molecular Biology: Belen Cassera (PI), Novel Therapeutic Discovery for Chagas Disease: This project seeks safer, more effective treatments for Chagas disease, a serious illness transmitted by insects known as kissing bugs. 
• Genetics: Zheng Zhang (PI), Cloning of Cell-Type-Specific Regulatory Elements by Integrating Single-Cell Multiomics: This project will advance genetic engineering to make crops more disease and stress resistant. 
• Geography: Amy Trauger (PI), Optimizing Soil and Forage Health for Horse and Ruminant Farms in Northeast Georgia: This research will identify soil management practices that improve forage systems and increase carbon sequestration on small-scale farms. 
• Geology: Mattia Pistone (PI), Critical Minerals vs. Energy Independence: Resolving the Conundrum via Phytomining of Metals: This team will study how native plants absorb high-demand metals to better support U.S. technological development while reducing vulnerability to geopolitical instability. 
• History: Stephen Mihm (PI), Lost and Found: The Missing Person’s Project: This initiative will develop advanced methods for locating and recovering human remains lost to war violence, natural disasters, and other tragedies. 
• Physics and Astronomy: Wassie Takele (PI), Liquid-Phase Nanoscopy of Interfacial Interactions in Stimuli-Responsive Polymersomes: Researchers will investigate how synthetic, bubble-like structures behave in water when triggered by stimuli such as light, with applications in targeted drug delivery and smart materials.

The I-Cubed Program will fund Ryan Ka Yau Lai from the Department of Linguistics and Tianming Liu from the School of Computing to support two linguistics courses: Demystifying Conversational AI: Language, Mind, and Societyand Large Language Models. Students will examine the strategies used by conversational AI systems and their users to communicate effectively, why those systems sometimes fail to achieve their goals, and the potential risks and harms that result from both their failures and successes. The new computer science course will introduce students to the technical principles behind large language models.

Although this program is in its third year, past winners already are pursuing new external funding, publications, and presentations to further develop their projects. 

This year’s grantees in the RIS program include:

• Sujata Iyengar, English
• Sharina Maillo-Pozo, Romance Languages
• Michael Marshall, Art
• Michelle Momany, Plant Biology
• Mattia Pistone, Geology
• Amanda Spivak, Marine Sciences
• Jin Xie, Chemistry

“Our seed grants are producing results on many fronts through the development of multidisciplinary teams, new grant proposals, and instruction,” said Marshall Shepherd, associate dean for research in Franklin College. “They have thoroughly exceeded our expectations.”