Research at RWU

Dr. Lillian Jeznach is an Associate Professor of Engineering and her research focuses on water quality in the natural and built environment. A current study conducted by Jeznach and collaborators at the Narragansett Bay Estuary Program is assessing freshwater and atmospheric microplastic contributions to the Narragansett Bay.

Dr. Kamille Gentles-Peart is a Professor of Critical Communication Studies and a critical cultural studies researcher whose work centers Afro-Caribbean feminisms, racialized body politics, and embodied decolonization practices. With the support of a Fulbright Fellowship, Dr. Gentles-Peart visited Trinidad and Tobago to interview Black women in the English-speaking Caribbean on their experiences living with thick bodies.

Dr. Sargon Donabed focuses on the notions of re-enchanting, re-wilding, and importance of storytelling. He is interested in Assyrian history and culture as well as mythology, folklore, and wisdom literature of the ancient, medieval, and modern world. His contemporary focus consists of indigenous and marginalized communities but also threads of continuity from the ancient to the modern period.

Dr. Jacob Bueno de Mesquita is a trans-disciplinary environmental health scientist-educator focused on improving the environmental conditions to promote human, animal, ecosystem, and planetary health. Some of his current research investigates the relationship between animal agriculture and pandemic viruses and monitors indoor environmental quality by evaluating the infection control benefit of germicidal ultraviolet air sanitation and filtration systems.

Dr. Anne Corbin is a law-trained industrial/organizational psychologist whose multidisciplinary lens emphasizes equity in the workplace. Her research focuses on role conflict among justice system and higher education professionals and related equity implications. She is committed to the trauma-informed promotion of equity and optimal performance in the workplace.

Dr. Jimoh Fatoki focuses his research on conducting empirical and analytical studies in the fields of supply chain management and sustainability. He investigates how new technologies help to coordinate and integrate supply chain activities to become more agile, robust, and resilient.

Dr. Bernardo Motta is an Associate professor at Roger Williams University interested in researching, practicing, and teaching better ways to do journalism, including community-driven, empowerment, solutions, social justice and restorative approaches to reporting. Motta is currently a 2021 Solutions Journalism LEDE Fellow developing a community-driven solutions journalism news service in Rhode Island.

Dr. Koty Sharp is an Associate Professor of Biology & Marine Biology and Director of the RWU Center for Economic and Environmental Development (CEED). She is the founder and leader of the RWU Coral Microbial Ecology Lab. Her research on coral microbiomes and shellfish aquaculture is funded by both NSF and NOAA.

Dr. Issa Ramaji is the Director of the Cummings Institute for Real Estate at Roger Williams University, where he leads academic programs, industry partnerships, and research initiatives to advance real estate education.

Dr. Brian Wysor is a Professor of Biology and Interim Dean of the Feinstein School of Social and Natural Sciences. He specializes in marine phycology and was funded by a Fulbright Fellowship to conduct research on seaweed in Panama. Dr. Wysor has continued a short-term study abroad course to Panama to further study the species Bryopsis in collaboration with local Panamanian scholars and RWU students.

Dr. Ahmet Emin Akosman is an Associate Professor of Engineering specializing in ultrafast optics and THz biosensors for early cancer detection. His research has received support from agencies such as NIH RI-INBRE, NASA RI Consortium, and NSF RI EPSCoR. These grants have enabled his laboratory to host over 15 undergraduate researchers, contributing to numerous journal articles and conference presentations globally.