UA SBRP Associate Director Raina Maier received the 2007 UA, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Research Faculty of the Year Award

The UA SBRP is proud to announce that Associate Director Raina Maier received the 2007 UA, College of Agriculture (CALS) Research Faculty of the Year Award.

The UA CALS Research Faculty of the Year Award recognizes and honors Dr. Maier for her outstanding research achievements andcontributions that have made an impact at the local, state and national level in the field of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Outstanding achievement is defined by the selection committee as an investigator who is producing high quality and quantity of work over an extended period of time, pursuing interdisciplinary efforts, providing exceptional service to department or discipline and making special efforts to recognize excellence in others.

Dr. Maier has published over 70 scientific journal articles and authored 14 book chapters as well as a textbook “Environmental Microbiology” that is used in universities around the country. Dr. Maier’s research interests range from investigating the ability of bacteria to survive in extremely oligotrophic environments like the Sonoran and Atacama Desert soils, Kartchner Caverns surfaces, and mine tailings from sites in southern Arizona, to elucidating the role of biosurfactants in microbial survival and there potential biomedical and environmental applications. In addition, she is studying the biological factors and processes influencing the transport and fate of bacteria and contaminants in the environment. The information gained from this research is used in the development of innovative remediation approaches, which can be tested at a range of scales, from the pore-scale to the field-scale.