The College of Engineering said good-bye to Marston Muses, the college’s alumni publication, paving the way for Innovate, an new alumni publication with a different spin.

“What we published before for our alumni was not a magazine so much as it was a tabloid,” said Dennis Smith, communications specialist for the College of Engineering’s communications and marketing department. “It was a newsletter. A very nice newsletter – but a newsletter nonetheless.”

Smith said the magazine will be published twice a year coinciding with Homecoming and Veishea celebrations, much like Marston Muses. Content of the magazine will differ, however, putting research content above all others.

“[The newsletter] focused mostly on alumni activities that were not necessarily research-oriented,” Smith said. “Ten to 20 percent of the content might have looked at research. The rest was academic initiatives, academic programs, new faculty members and contributions to the college.”

With the realization that all departments publish news that was going in Marston Muses, Mark Kushner, dean of the College of Engineering, Smith and others developed Innovate to be the exact opposite.

“Kushner wanted to turn [the original format] on its head, basically,” Smith said.

The first issue of the magazine focuses on the vaccination research performed by Balaji Narasimhan, associate professor of chemical and biological engineering, and Krishna Rajan, professor of materials science and engineering.

“It is an honor,” Narasimhan said, “[because] we were able to launch a big initiative in this research area and we were able to attract top-notch researchers like Professor Rajan. We were glad the college chose to highlight it.”

Smith said the magazine will be sent out to alumni of the College of Engineering all across the nation.

In addition to the alumni, Innovate will reach legislators and leaders of business and industry.

He said Innovate will do a better job of promoting the college to outside sources and showcase the work done in the college.

“The research being done here is some of the highest level research being done anywhere in the world,” Smith said. “Iowa State has been historically known for its teaching of engineering and technology.”

He said the magazine will also serve as a useful tool for increasing enrollment.

“Technology is what we are about here,” Smith said. “It all comes down to technology and the difference it makes in the lives of people worldwide.”