RSVP Open Enrollment

The Retirement Supplemental Voluntary Program (RSVP) is a voluntary retirement program offered to eligible Michigan Tech employees. The enrollment period during which an employee may sign their RSVP election begins today (July 1) and ends Oct. 31.

Employees electing the monetary retirement option must retire on or before June 30, 2023. The monetary retirement option provides a benefit equal to 30% of the eligible employee’s annual salary (nine-month salary for faculty), up to the cap amount of $65,000 at the time of their actual retirement date.

For further clarification, please see the RSVP policy and the RSVP matrix, which explains the gradual phase-out of all RSVP options.

Prior to electing RSVP, employees must meet with the Benefits Office for a confidential meeting to verify eligibility. RSVP program information may be found online.

RSVP questions may be directed to Benefit Services at 906-487-2517 or benefits@mtu.edu.

North Coast Grill and Deli Friday Fish Fry Special

The North Coast Grill and Deli will feature beer-battered Alaskan pollock, fries, slaw and a beverage for $9.95 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. today (July 1).

Located in the Memorial Union Building, the North Coast also features burgers, grilled sandwiches, salads made to order, and stir fry. We are open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Dan Yeager Receives DoD SMART Scholarship

Ph.D. in Physics candidate Dan Yeager, who is working with Raymond Shaw (Physics), has been awarded a Department of Defense Science, Mathematics, and Research for Transformation (DoD SMART) Scholarship.

Yeager will be affiliated with the Naval Oceanographic Office in Mississippi.

The DoD SMART Scholarship provides students with full tuition for up to five years, mentorship, summer internships, a stipend and full-time employment with the DoD after graduation.

In Print

Sangyoon Han (BioMed) and undergraduate students Sue Kim and Sam Haarman are co-authors of a paper published in PLOS ONE.

The paper is titled "Particle retracking algorithm capable of quantifying large, local matrix deformation for traction force microscopy."

Kim and Haarman performed the main simulation work, and Haarman is now in a graduate program with Han.

The paper presents a tracking method specialized in a specific application called traction microscopy where gel deformation is induced by only sparse contact points called integrin-based adhesions. When gel is very soft or cells are transmitting a huge amount of force, the gel is deformed a lot in a way that a conventional correlation-based tracking method fails to detect. The new method iteratively finds the missing vectors after the initial run using a median of its neighboring vectors.

The code of the implementation is included on the Han Lab website.

In the News

A statement by Kristin Brzeski (CFRES) was used in an ABC News story on research that supports reviving dwindling red wolf populations using "ghost" red wolf alleles present in coyotes. The red wolf is critically endangered, with only 20 to 30 left.

The research was published June 29 in Science Advances, with Brzeski listed as a co-author of the paper.

The research was also highlighted by outlets including Phys.org, The Wildlife Society, UK Today News, MSN, Yahoo! News, New Scientist.

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The Michigan.gov Newsroom mentioned Michigan Tech in a story about the increasingly common practice of using rubber from scrap tires to resurface roads around the state.

In 2019, Michigan Tech received state funding for a project in Dickinson County to see how an asphalt-rubber mix would hold up to extreme Upper Peninsula weather, and Tech researchers are currently involved in project design and testing for repaving projects in Bay and Clare counties.

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Urban Milwaukee picked up a Wisconsin Public Radio story about higher risks of industry-sourced toxins contaminating Wisconsin’s Lake Michigan shoreline. The story featured research by Pengfei Xue (CEGE/GLRC).

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WLUC TV6 aired a story on Michigan Tech's fourth annual GenCyber summer camp for K-12 students, held June 27 to July 1 at MTU. 

The one-week residential camp teaches youth about computing, safe online behavior and cybersecurity careers. The GenCyber camp was also featured on the Computing News Blog.

Reminder

No Tech Today on Monday

Tech Today will not publish on Monday (July 4) in observance of the Independence Day holiday.

Submissions for the Tuesday (July 5) issue of Tech Today are due by noon today (July 1).