Two Appointed Associate Vice Provosts for Research and Economic Development

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Cynthia Sagers, Bob Beitle

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Cynthia Sagers and Bob Beitle have been appointed as associate vice provosts for research and economic development at the University of Arkansas.

Sagers and Beitle will both retain their faculty appointments in the departments of biological sciences and chemical engineering, respectively. They report to Jim Rankin, vice provost for research and economic development.

In their roles, Sagers and Beitle will help support faculty in research positions by identifying funding opportunities and working with them to develop grant proposals. They will also represent the University of Arkansas at state and federal agencies and consortiums, such as the Arkansas Space Grant Consortium and the National Science Foundation’s Office of Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research, known as EPSCoR.

“Dr. Sagers and Dr. Beitle are both greatly respected members of the University of Arkansas faculty who will strongly assist in building the campus’ research enterprise,” Rankin said.

Sagers was appointed interim associate vice provost for research and economic development in November 2012 after serving a two-year appointment as a program officer at the Office of International Science and Engineering at the National Science Foundation in Arlington, Va. In that capacity she worked with researchers and educators to leverage U.S. research funding for large-scale, international collaborative research efforts.

“Research development requires all of the skills I brought with me from my rotation at the National Science Foundation: building teams of researchers with complementary interests to develop projects that benefit our campus and our community,” said Sagers, a professor of biological sciences who has taught at the U of A since 1993.

Sagers’ expertise is in plant evolution and plant population. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has funded her research into the effects of genetically modified crops on native plant species. She is currently the principle investigator on a $520,000, five-year EPA/USDA grant on a project that seeks to identify emerging challenges to agriculture as a result of changes in climate and patterns of land use.

In addition to the Agriculture Department, Sagers has secured grants from agencies such as the National Science Foundation, Environmental Protection Agency, National Park Service, National Research Council and Arkansas Department of Higher Education, among others. She has taught field courses in Costa Rica with the Organization of Tropical Studies, of which the University of Arkansas is a member.

Sagers received her doctoral degree from the University of Utah and bachelor’s degrees in both biology and general sciences from the University of Iowa.

Beitle, like Sagers, joined the U of A faculty in 1993. His expertise in biochemical engineering positioned him to work on interdisciplinary projects over the past two decades with a diverse set of faculty. It is the interdisciplinary nature of the university, and the fostering of this spirit, that interested Beitle in applying to be associate vice provost.

“Virtually all of my research activities involve collaborators from other disciplines, including biological sciences, chemistry, food science, business, and psychology,” Beitle said. “These activities are best exemplified by externally supported work in the areas of biochemical technology directed towards pharmaceutical manufacturing/biomedical engineering, energy, adaptive technology, and food science.”

Beitle has received funding from NSF, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Arkansas Biosciences Institute and several national and international corporate sponsors. Grants from NSF and the biosciences institute led to the creation of Boston Mountain Biotech LLC, a company he founded with two of his former doctoral students with technology useful for the simplification of protein based pharmaceuticals.

Beitle holds two patents and was inducted into the National Academy of Inventors in 2013. He has served on the Program Advisory Board for the U of A’s Cell and Molecular Biology Program since its inception, and was part of the team that developed the biomedical engineering curriculum for the College of Engineering.

Beitle holds three degrees in chemical engineering from the University of Pittsburgh.