Spring is late arriving this year, but that hasn’t kept us from being enthusiastic and productive. This newsletter highlights some of our work, but before you begin reading the feature articles, I’d like to share with you some updates.
“You never know when the phone rings what you might be up to do,” says Director of the Center For Applied and Translational Sensory Sciences Peggy Nelson. What began as wind turbine research for humans took a turn when Nelson was asked to test some other subjects--ones with feathers.
"My whole college experience changed because of one email." Sarah Rosen, a recent graduate of the speech-language hearing sciences department, fell in love with the world of speech-language-hearing sciences by taking a risk. That one email gave her the experience she needed to begin a career with passion.
Rebecca Lulai’s role in community outreach began when she arrived at the U of M in 2006. Most notably, Lulai oversees the ALS Speech Bank, a unique program receiving national attention for its work with patients who will eventually lose their voice to the disease. Learn how Lulai helps ALS patients preserve part of their identity.
After Lorrie Burton of Woodbury, MN was diagnosed with ALS in November, she decided not to allow the disease to define her. Often, a devastating effects of the disease is the loss of the ability to speak. Burton is using new technology called voice banking. It will allow her to preserve her voice in a way never before possible.
Sheri Stronach is working to optimize identification of autism spectrum disorder as well as expand the reach of implementation of intervention tactics learned through research to all communities.
Dr. Bert Schlauch and his graduate students Jocelyn Tzu-Ling Yu and Andrew Kersten partnered with entrepreneur Jackson Mann to minimize hearing loss through the creation of Vibes: affordable, high-quality earplugs that protect hearing while not impeding sound quality.
Eight faculty from across the liberal arts have been awarded Talle Research Funds to support major research initiatives. Learn more about each of these exciting projects.
University of Minnesota speech pathologists use new voice database technology to help restore the voices of those suffering from neurodegenerative illnesses.
Why does it matter if your toddler lisps? If your kid can’t say his Rs? Professor Ben Munson finds new links between childhood sounds, vocabulary, and educational success.
Jessica Brown, one our newest faculty members in speech-language-hearing sciences, is changing the way we look at traumatic brain injury and augmentative alternative communication.
Read undergraduate student-researcher Marcelina Grochulska’s first-person perspective on the opportunities and research happening in the Department of Speech-Language-Hearing Sciences.
A screening of "The Way We Talk,” a documentary about living with stuttering by Michael Turner, sparked meaningful conversations about building community and support—for people who stutter and those who care about them.
A shortage of research faculty threatens our capacity to prepare the next generation of clinicians, scientists, and educators, diminishing evidence-based innovation in speech, language, and hearing sciences and disorders.
A trio of University of Minnesota healthcare providers has been selected as one of 8 teams in the first 3-year cohort of Clinical Scholars, a new national leadership program, led by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), including our very own Mark DeRuiter.
This summer undergrad Sandra Osei participated in the MnDRIVE Brain Conditions research program. She was testing a prototype hearing device on participants with hearing loss
Our senses allow us to see, feel, smell and ultimately relate to the world around us. But what happens when those senses fade, or are lost altogether? How do you walk when you have lost your equilibrium? How do you connect to your family when you lose the ability to hear them? Peggy Nelson can tell you.
