Associate Professor of Biology Joseph Erlichman often involves undergraduate students in his grant-funded research, which he says helps them develop skills that will serve them well long after leaving the University.

Associate Professor of Biology Joseph Erlichman earned both his bachelor's and master's degrees at the University of Colorado at Boulder, then earned the Ph.D. at Dartmouth Medical School. He has been a postdoctoral fellow at Dartmouth Medical School as well as a research associate there and at Wright State School of Medicine in Dayton, Ohio.

Erlichman teaches courses in comparative vertebrate morphology and human biology.
His current area of research is the brain's glial cells, which in the past have been little studied; he's investigating how they provide metabolic support to neurons and modulate their activity.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has Erlichman a $315,000 grant to conduct research, assisted by two undergraduate students. They will study the role of medullary glial cells in the regulation of pH levels, beginning in June of 2006 and continuing for four years. According to Erlichman, "Undergraduate students participating in the research will be fully immersed in all aspects of experimental design, data collection, analysis and interpretation, thereby providing opportunities for the students to explore their own ingenuity and creativity within the context of a scientifically relevant problem.

One of the primary goals of this faculty-initiated, student-driven research is to establish a mentoring partnership between the student and faculty member that fosters the student's understanding of the process of scientific inquiry and the refinement of scientific questions through experimentation. The students will gain a clear understanding of the process of doing science and consequently hone many life skills – critical thinking, plus oral, visual and written communication – that will serve them well throughout their careers."

   Erlichman's work has been published in a variety of academic journals, including The American Journal of Physiology, Neuroscience Methods, Journal of Applied Physiology and Respiration Physiology and Neurobiology.