Camille Reding ’15 won the 2013 Nicole S. Basbanes ’04 Student Book Collecting Contest.

Camille Reding ’15 is this year’s winner of the Nicole S. Basbanes ’04 Student Book Collecting Contest. The contest is sponsored by Sweet Briar College Friends of the Library and author Nicholas Basbanes in honor of his daughter.

Reding won a prize of $400 for her collection. Similar contests are held at three dozen colleges and universities across the United States. Winners are eligible to enter the National Collegiate Book Collecting Contest.

In the essay and bibliography Reding submitted for the contest, she lists more than 30 titles ranging from Alexandre Dumas’ “The Count of Monte Cristo” to Marvel Comics’ “X-Men.” The common thread among them is that they are also all movies.

Reding titled her essay “The Book is Better,” but it’s often the movie that sends her looking for the book, she says. That’s how she discovered J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy and others. In the case of H.G. Wells’ “The Invisible Man,” a contemporary movie led her to the book, which led her to the 1933 film.

“It is a never ending cycle,” she wrote. “Books lead to movies, movies lead to books, then books lead to more books.”

Reding, a psychology major with minors in biology and chemistry from Evington, Va., is still expanding her collection, but with greater focus as a result of participating in the Basbanes contest. She is actively seeking original comics in sequence, especially the X-Men and Wolverine books. She also will skip over newer works such as “The Hunger Games” and “Twilight” to concentrate on acquiring literature that has “stood the test of time.”

New or old, whether it’s part of her collection or not, the book is always worth reading, however.

“Every book, whether I read it before or after seeing the movie, enriches the movie,” she says.

— Jennifer McManamay

Dr. Mary Witt, SBC Class of 1974

A Sweet Briar alumna is the first woman to be named Outstanding Alumnus of the University of Virginia Medical Alumni Association. Dr. Mary Witt, Sweet Briar Class of 1974, was presented the 2012 award by the association and its financial arm, the UVa Medical School Foundation, at their 47th Annual Meeting in Williamsburg in February. The award recognizes leadership and loyalty to the alumni association and foundation.

Witt earned her bachelor’s in psychology at Sweet Briar College before entering medical school. She is a board-certified pediatric endocrinologist. She completed her residency and fellowship at UVa and Washington University in St. Louis. Prior to moving to Richmond in 1988, Witt was in private practice in Atlanta. She is a former medical director with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Virginia and currently holds a position with United Health Care.

Witt also serves as the secretary-treasurer of the Richmond Pediatric Society. She is an active member of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Lawson Wilkins Pediatric Endocrine Society.

She resides in Richmond with her husband, Fritz Will, and volunteers as a clinician at Cross Over Ministry health center.

Witt represents the Class of 1978, and over the past decade, has provided tremendous service to the medical school’s alumni association and foundation. She was a member of the association’s board of directors from 2003-2012, serving as secretary from 2008-2009 and becoming the first female president in 2009. After her service to the Medical Alumni Association, she was appointed as a trustee to the Medical School Foundation.

Witt spoke about her career in the fall 2012 issue of Vitals magazine.

— From www.uvamedalum.org

Image courtesy of Alexandra DiFeliceantonio

Alexandra Gold DiFeleceantonio ’08 is the lead author behind a recent study that explains why we can’t stop eating chocolate — among other things. The study, undertaken by scientists from the University of Michigan, was published in the journal Current Biology and is featured in an article in the Smithsonian’s online magazine and at scientificamerican.com.

The question they asked was: What is it in our neural system that prevents us from knowing when we’ve had enough? To find out, the researchers measured enkephalin levels in rats. Enkephalin is an opium-like chemical naturally occurring in the neostriatum, an area of the brain supposedly related to craving.

In the first step, the rats were offered unlimited amounts of M&Ms, while their enkephalin levels were monitored. When they started to eat, enkephalin levels surged. In the second step, the researchers injected synthetic enkephalin into the neostriatum to determine whether the chemical might actually cause the rats to eat more. The results were astonishing. With the stimulation, the rats ate twice as many candies as they did before.

“They ate the equivalent of a 150-pound human consuming seven pounds of M&Ms,” said DiFeliceantonio, who is a Ph.D. candidate in biopsychology at the University of Michigan.

But there was more to find out.

“We then asked whether the injection was making the rats just want to eat more or actually making the M&Ms taste better.”

Through a test in which lip-licking is used as an indicator, the researchers found that while the rats ate more, they didn’t like the M&Ms any more than before.

“So, enkephalin in this area is a purely motivational signal saying, ‘Eat more now!’ ” DiFeliceantonio explained.

“This means that the brain has more extensive systems to make individuals want to over-consume rewards than previously thought,” she said in the Smithsonian article. “It may be one reason why over-consumption is a problem today.”

Alexandra Gold diFeliceantonio ’08 is a Ph.D. candidate
at the University of Michigan.

The study may also explain some of the underlying mental reasons behind other addictions, the magazine notes.

“It seems likely that our enkephalin findings in rats mean that this neurotransmitter may drive some forms of over-consumption and addiction in people,” DiFeliceantonio said.

She began the study two years ago in collaboration with several chemists, as well as pharmacologist Omar Mabrouk and his mentor, Robert Kennedy, who measured the enkephalin levels using mass spectrometry. Kent Berridge, DiFeliceantonio’s current mentor and dissertation advisor, is the final author of the study.

DiFeliceantonio was accepted into the psychology program at the university immediately after graduating from Sweet Briar in 2008 with a double-major in psychology and Spanish. She will complete her Ph.D. next spring and is looking for a post-doctoral research position.

— Janika Carey

Patricia Martin Rodier ’66 (right) with her laboratory technician, Melanie Obara. Photo courtesy of the University of Rochester.

Patricia Martin Rodier, Ph.D., Sweet Briar College Class of 1966, died Thursday, May 3, at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, N.Y. She was 68.

A professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Rochester Medical Center, Rodier was the “first scientist to formulate and study the idea that autism can originate long before a child is born,” according to an article on the university’s website. Her research, along with advanced clinical work conducted at the medical center, earned the autism program national recognition. From 1998 to 2008, the program was designated by the National Institutes of Health as one of 10 Collaborative Programs for Excellence in Autism in the United States.

Rodier was also a world expert on mercury toxicity, analyzing how single exposures to the chemical during pregnancy influence a baby’s brain development. Much of the research on mercury exposure and birth defects continues to rely on Rodier’s early findings. Rodier served as a key government witness for the highly publicized court cases regarding vaccines containing thimerosal, a mercury-containing preservative. She played a key role in determining that the preservative and vaccines are not linked to autism.

A native of Roanoke, Va., Rodier received her bachelor’s degree in psychology from Sweet Briar, where she graduated in 1966 alongside her twin sister, Donna Martin Zahorik. Rodier later completed her master’s and doctorate degrees in psychology at the University of Virginia. Her career at the University of Rochester began in 1980, where, after studying anatomy and embryology as a post-doctorate fellow, she taught anatomy until the early 1990s.

Rodier was a passionate traveler and loved art, frequently visiting museums around the world with her husband, Robert Kern. She also enjoyed the opera and was an avid sports fan “able to recite statistics on any sport, from professional baseball to NCAA basketball,” according to the article.

Aside from her husband, Rodier is also survived by her twin sister, as well as a younger brother and two stepchildren.

It was Rodier’s wish that her body be donated to the Anatomical Gift Program at the University of Rochester Medical School to further medical education. A memorial to honor and celebrate her life will be held this summer at a date yet to be determined.

To read the full obituary in The Roanoke Times, please click here.