Everyone has heard the term “pounding the pavement”. Little did Jessi Eichberger, 11A, know the new lands she would discover by doing just that.

“La La Land” to be exact. Eichberger was part of the costume team nominated for the Oscar in Achievement in Costume Design for “La La Land,” the 2016 movie musical starring Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone.

Eichberger is one of several UofL alums who have taken their chances in L.A., but her accomplishments in such a relatively short period of time after graduation and the path that she took to get there, make her story an inspiring one.

So how did she get from UofL to La La Land? One step at a time and with a little luck.

Learning the Ropes

Eichberger’s journey started at her hometown university.

“I chose to go to UofL, and honestly, it was the best decision I could have ever made and the perfect fit for me,” she said.

The first costume team she worked on was for the play “Betty’s Summer Vacation” for UofL’s Theatre Department, and she credits UofL assistant professor, Zhanna Goldentul, and Melissa Shepherd, costume shop coordinator, as being instrumental in helping her focus and refine her skills.

Goldentul saw Eichberger’s potential from their initial meeting.

“She came to us in a really good place; her advantage was that she was a double major,” Goldentul said. “She knew human body proportions. She was trained in studio art.”

“Her drive also made her stand out,” Shepherd added. “Jessi was constantly redoing her work to make it better.”

Her dedication resulted in a dual degree with both a bachelor of science as well as a bachelor in fine arts. Eichberger next attended the Edinburgh College of Art in Scotland to pursue her master’s after being awarded a Mary Churchill Humphrey Scholarship.

“The fact that I was trained in two different fields helped me get accepted into the Edinburgh College of Art,” Eichberger said. “Also, every designer to whom I have shown my resume felt my degrees gave me the potential to be a more well-rounded costumer and person, because I developed skills in multiple areas at UofL.”

Shepherd, her former mentor, said it’s more than just technical skill that makes Eichberger a success. Her personality is what got her through any obstacles in her way.

“It takes an incredible amount of courage and self-confidence to accomplish what Jessi did in the amount of time that she did it,” Shepherd said.

Landing in La La Land

After receiving her MFA, Eichberger worked as a costume shop assistant at the Pennsylvania Renaissance Fair and then faced a big decision – moving to either Los Angeles or New York City. Thanks to advice from well-known costume designer Eduardo Castro, who works on the ABC fairytale show “Once Upon a Time,” she took a leap of faith and moved to L.A.

“I made the move. It was a risk,” she said. “I sent out emails and would literally drive house to house and drop off my portfolio in designers’ mailboxes, just hoping to get a call back.”

At one house, Eichberger left a portfolio for Mary Zophres, a longtime and well-respected designer in Hollywood who created costumes for movies including “O Brother Where Art Thou,” “The Big Lebowski” and “Iron Man 2.” Another portfolio went to Dan Lester, the assistant costume designer for the third film in the Divergent series, who had an opening for a production assistant. Eichberger began working with Lester on “Allegiant.”

Later that year, Eichberger received an email from Zophres, who asked her to interview for a production assistant position for a new movie. The project was “La La Land.” Eichberger was thrilled to get the email, let alone the position. It was only her second job since moving to L.A.

“It’s about being persistent, but it’s also about luck,” Eichberger said. “ ‘La La Land’ was the result of me putting my portfolio out there, and it just happened to be at the correct time.”

Zophres’ team worked closely together to create the costumes, and Eichberger gained invaluable experience by listening to how Zophres guided her crew, conducted fittings, and exchanged ideas with director, Damien Chazelle.

“As someone new to the industry, I think this experience was instrumental to my understanding of how a film is created. There’s something magical about seeing distinct departments creating these separate elements that fit together seamlessly when the cameras start to roll,” she said.

“On any given day I could see Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone rehearsing one of their dance routines just outside our office with the choreographer or catch glimpses of concept art and miniature models being created for the iconic traffic scene at the beginning of the film.”

The crew’s work on “La La Land” resulted in the Oscar nomination for costume design, one of 14 nominations for the film.

“I will always be grateful for [Jessi’s] hard work on “La La Land” which was a complicated film to design with such a small crew and budget,” Zophres said.

Eichberger, who calls herself a very small cog in the Hollywood machine, was honored to be working with such a team.

“Working on “La La Land” was thrilling; there is no other word to describe it,” Eichberger said. “It was great to see the cast and crew receive the recognition they deserved.”

Dressing for Success

Eichberger is not slowing down. She has spent the past year as a costume production assistant for Emmy award winning costume designer Lyn Paolo, working on shows including “Scandal,” “How to Get Away With Murder,” and “Shameless.” Under Paolo’s guidance Eichberger recently joined the Costumer’s Union, a major accomplishment in the field.

“It has been my pleasure to mentor Jessi and to pave the way for her to join the Costumer’s Union here in Los Angeles,” Paolo said. “She is professional, intelligent, and truly talented. I look forward to working with Jessi for many more years.”

Eichberger’s long-term goals include working her way up through the ranks, gaining experience in every role in the costume world and eventually reaching the title of designer. Right now, Eichberger just counts herself as lucky to be working among such esteemed coworkers and supervisors.

“I haven’t made this journey alone,” she said. “If I’m ever fortunate enough to see my designs on the silver screen, it will be because I’ve had the incredible support of so many.”

Her UofL mentors have no doubt Eichberger will accomplish her dream.

“She was meant to work in no other business,” Shepherd said. “It’s only a matter of time, and she’ll be there. She’ll walk the red carpet.”

Story by Lindsay Wehr and Erica Walsh. 

Joey McFarland, 97A — An American film producer from Louisville, McFarland co-founded Red Granite Pictures in 2010 where he manages daily operations, business divisions, personnel and creative development. He has produced multiple films, which include “Friends With Kids” and “Wolf of Wall Street” for which he received an Academy Award nomination; was executive producer of “Daddy’s Home;” and his latest film “Papillon” debuts this year.

Matt Battaglia, 88B — Battaglia has excelled in acting, producing, real estate and collegiate and professional football. An All-American Cardinal middle linebacker, Battaglia played in the NFL for two years. Since then, he has acted in over 90 films, network pilots and 30 national commercials. He won his first Daytime Emmy as executive producer for the show, “Last Shot with Judge Gunn,” appeared on HBO’s “True Detective” and was a guest lead in “NCIS: New Orleans.”

Brad Ritchie, 07MU — Currently on staff with the UofL School of Music as an engineering stage technician, Ritchie has prepared music for Halo 2 video game and television shows “The Flash” and “Supergirl.” In his role at UofL he provides back-of-house technical support for concerts, including audio recording, editing and CD production, and oversight and maintenance of the recording booth and lighting system.

You may think you alone inhabit your body. In reality, you support an ecosystem of bacteria, viruses, fungi and other microorganisms on your skin and in your ears, eyes, nasal passages, and urinary, genital and digestive tracts. By far the largest number of these microbes is found in the intestines, collectively known as the gut microbiota, where they perform vital roles in digestion, produce critical metabolites, control the immune system and even affect the brain.

Every human is home to a unique microbiota containing trillions of bugs in thousands of varieties. The microbes cannot survive without their host home, but the host is dependent on the bugs as well. Scientists have recognized the presence of microbes in the gut for hundreds of years, but only in the past decade have they been able to engage in more detailed research into the microbes it contains and their functions. Relatively recent research has shown the content of the microbiota has a significant impact on the health of the host, but the mechanisms by which it causes or prevents diseases still are to be discovered.

“The microbiota is very critical in regulating biology, physiology and pathology,” said Haribabu Bodduluri, PhD, vice chair and professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology (M&I) in the UofL School of Medicine. “The interaction between bugs and humans is pivotal for human health and is very well established — except we still don’t know how it works.”

Bodduluri is one of a large number of researchers throughout the School of Medicine and the university conducting research into how these organisms influence health. If they can determine which microbes interact with the body’s immune system, what metabolic products they generate and the roles of those metabolites, it could present opportunities to develop new therapies for cancer, malaria, autoimmune diseases, neurodegenerative disease and metabolic disorders.

It is no small undertaking. The array of microbes inhabiting each individual and their relative populations are unique and change over time, and each of the thousands of different organisms may play a different role in health and disease.

Most of the bacteria that coexist with us are considered beneficial, including strains of Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium, common citizens of gut microbiota. However, when the relative populations of microbes shift out of balance, referred to as dysbiosis, harmful
microbes that normally are controlled by competing bacteria can run amuck, leading to illness.

Antibiotic medications can kill off these malicious bacteria, but they annihilate vital good bacteria as well. The sacrificed beneficial bacteria may not be missed at first, but when the body needs them to address other diseases, their absence becomes a problem.

“You are cured of your infection, but the long-term consequences of destroying the useful bacteria become apparent when you are attacked by cancer or obesity. Then the influence starts showing up as a lack of immune response,” said Venkatakrishna Jala, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of M&I. “It’s like an ecology. Once one is eliminated, you may not see the effect immediately, but in the long term, they may not grow back.”

Jala is investigating how metabolites produced by bacteria in the gut affect inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and colon cancer, a disease that affects Kentuckians at a higher rate than any other state. His goal is to use metabolites called urolithins to repair damage to the intestinal barrier, or epithelial cells, in order to decrease inflammation that contributes to IBD and colon cancer and to increase the cancer’s sensitivity to chemotherapeutic drugs, increasing the drugs’ effectiveness.

IBD, autoimmune diseases and many other disorders are the result of inflammation in the body. Inflammation can occur when epithelial cells are damaged, allowing bacteria or other contents of the intestines out into the body, or as the result of an imbalance in the bacteria and their metabolites that naturally cross the intestinal barrier and enter the bloodstream.

Michele Kosiewicz, PhD, associate professor in the Department of M&I, is exploring how gut
microbiota and gender are related to systemic lupus erythematosus, an autoimmune disease that predominantly affects women.

“We know that the gut microbiota seems to have an influence on autoimmune diseases — on rheumatoid arthritis and on type 1 diabetes,” Kosiewicz said. “An imbalance between beneficial bacteria and pathogenic bacteria — specifically, a decreased Firmicutesto-
Bacteroidetes ratio — is associated with and may predispose people to autoimmune
and inflammatory disease.”

Working with mice in which the females are genetically programmed to develop lupus, Kosiewicz has determined that gut microbiota in young male and female mice are
similar. However, once the mice are older — the age at which the females start to develop lupus — the males’ microbiota changes. When Kosiewicz transplants microbes from the males to the females, the females do not develop the disease. She is working to determine what it is about the microbiota that protects the female mice with the transplanted microbiota from developing lupus and what role male and female hormones may play in microbiota populations.

Her team has identified about 90 metabolites produced by gut microbes that differ in males and females. “It could be that one or more of those metabolites is having a protective effect in males, and could be used to prevent or treat the females,” Kosiewicz said.

UofL researchers also have linked malaria to gut microbiota. Nathan Schmidt, assistant professor in the Department of M&I, is investigating the gut microbiota’s impact on the level of sickness suffered from an infection by Plasmodium, the parasite that causes malaria. Schmidt has published research showing that gut microbes can affect the severity of malaria illness in mice, and is investigating how the bacteria modulate the response to the parasite.

“We are hoping to determine which bacteria or metabolites are interacting to influence the severity or lack of severity of illness in the individual,” Schmidt said. “If we can identify the bacteria, it raises hope that we can target those mechanisms to prevent severity of the disease.”

Building Resources for Future Research

Given the significance and therapeutic potential of this area of research, UofL has committed to investing in research infrastructure and supportive data.

To facilitate a greater understanding of the interrelationship of gender, age, diet, socioeconomic status and the structure of an individual’s microbiota, Nejat Egilmez, chair of the Department of M&I, along with Richard Lamont, chair of the Department of Oral Immunology and Infectious Disease in the School of Dentistry, and Riaan Van Zyl, associate dean for research at Kent School of Social Work, are leading a 21st Century University Initiative project, funded by UofL, to compile a microbiota data repository. The three-year project involves collecting microbiota samples along with social and health information from thousands of individuals into a database for future research.

“The discovery of a link between commensal microbiota and health is a major paradigm shift in medicine,” Egilmez said. “The UofL initiative is not only timely but extends the current paradigm into the social arena, investigating a potential link between social determinants and the microbiomehealth axis. This database will not only be a valuable resource for the university, but could benefit researchers across the nation and the world.”

In addition, Bodduluri and Jala are working to establish a functional microbiomics core research facility at UofL. Existing state-of-the-art capabilities in gene sequencing will be augmented with a center for raising germ-free mice, those that have no microbes in their system, and maintaining gnotobiotic mice, those with a well-defined set of microbes. An anaerobic culture facility for growing microorganisms that require an oxygen-free environment will allow the germ-free mice to be colonized with specific microbes, enabling the researchers to more thoroughly study the effects and functions of individual bacteria and develop potential therapies.

For the researchers, sorting out the gut’s inhabitants and their roles is an epic task, but the potential rewards are invaluable.

“We are really excited about this line of work. It is just starting and has tremendous potential,” Bodduluri said.

A Wider Look

Groundbreaking research in the understanding of gut microbes’ role in health and disease also is being conducted in other departments at UofL, including:

• Robert Friedland, professor in the Department of Neurology, led an international group of researchers that was the first in the world to establish a link between gut microbiota and neurodegeneration. In 2016, he published research demonstrating that exposure to misfolded proteins produced by E. Coli in the gut leads to misfolded proteins in the brain characteristic of neurodegenerative diseases.
• Craig McClain, Shirish Barve, and Wenke Feng, PhD, in the Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, are studying the relationship between gut microbiota and alcoholic liver disease.
• Scott Whittemore, director of the Kentucky Spinal Cord Injury Research Center, is working with Barve to understand how spinal cord injury affects the gut microbiota, resulting in inflammation and health consequences elsewhere in the body.
• Jason Chesney, director of the James Graham Brown Cancer Center, is studying a novel class of immunotherapies, immune checkpoint inhibitors, that is reducing death rates in several types of cancer. He believes a patient’s gut microbiota may dictate resistance or responsiveness to these immune checkpoint inhibitors.

“We regard it as a golden opportunity falling from the sky,” said Williger, who joins his colleagues in seizing the chance to spread the excitement and knowledge about their field of study.

The physics and astronomy department primed an audience last fall when its annual Bullitt lecture in astronomy featured former NASA astrophysicist Fred Espenak, known as “Mr. Eclipse” for his many books and predictions on the phenomenon. Espenak, who has witnessed 26 total solar eclipses, talked about the upcoming one, which will be visible Aug. 21 from the contiguous United States for the first time since 1979.

The maximum viewpoint for the totality of the moon covering the sun will be near Hopkinsville in southwestern Kentucky starting around 1 p.m. CDT. The mid-afternoon effect will be “eerie twilight,” Espenak says, as stars appear, temperatures cool and birds and other animals act as though night has fallen.

“It’s pretty cool that Kentucky is the epicenter of it,” said Timothy Dowling, a professor who has seen two solar eclipses. In this state, where the moon will completely block the sun’s face for up to two minutes, 40 seconds, “it’s going to be one of the best ones ever.”

UofL students and faculty members are headed west to various spots in hopes of a clearer glimpse. The Society of Physics Students’ UofL chapter will set up at Mike Miller County Park near Benton. Williger said he and department colleague James Lauroesch intend to meet with UofL alumni chapters in western Kentucky or slightly below the state line in Nashville, Tennessee. Benne Holwerda, an associate professor who joined the department this year, is bound for Land Between the Lakes National Recreational Area, along with some Louisville Astronomical Society members and visitors. “I have friends coming who are probably going to be camping in my yard,” Holwerda said.

For those who cannot travel outside the city that day, plans to open to the public 1:30-3:30 p.m. EDT with people who can talk about the phenomenon and a chance to watch a live feed in the domed theater, according to Paula McGuffey, planetarium program manager. A solar telescope will be available so viewers in Louisville will be able to experience a partial eclipse where 96 percent of the sun is covered.

The planetarium gift shop also will sell $3 eclipse-viewing glasses.

People need to know when and how to safely observe the eclipse, and NASA, astronomers and doctors will spend much time until then educating the public about how to avoid permanent eye damage from intense brightness. People should avoid looking directly at the sun unless using protective eyewear – and that doesn’t mean regular sunglasses will suffice. Dowling suggests welder’s goggles with grade 14 glass or higher. Other options include eclipse glasses that use special filters, or viewers can make a simple pinhole camera for a projected view of the sun.

“Do try to make this one, as you’ll have to travel or wait awhile” for the next one, Williger said. The next total eclipse visible in part of the United States will be in 2024, and the next coast-to-coast one will be in 2045.

Of course, rainy or overcast weather still could be a spoiler Aug. 21. “We live
in Kentucky. There’s a 50-50 chance of having clouds,” he added.

The outreach is an important part of an astronomer’s work, according to Benne Holwerda, a new UofL associate professor who has been speaking to area school groups about the eclipse. “Your job is not complete until you go out in the community and share.”

Gerard Williger spoke about the eclipse in Louisville during the May “Beer with a Scientist” series about diverse scientific topics and also during a campus talk earlier.

When the news is full of examples and potential discoveries, it makes teaching interesting and rewarding. “I actually look for a lot of teachable moments in class,” Williger said. “I think it’s important to become science literate.”

Developments in space also can illuminate a professor’s career-long research interests. Timothy Dowling, who studies atmospheric physics, spent the spring anticipating insight from the final laps of the Cassini spacecraft mission and the first round of peer-reviewed papers from the Juno mission. He admits he has “skin in the game” — hoping for validation of research and methods he published in 1994 and in 2009.

“I’m on pins and needles to get the results of the ‘MRI’ on Saturn and Jupiter,” he said. “I’ve got pretty big predictions on both of them.”

“This is a really neat time in astronomy and astrophysics,” Dowling said. “There’s
a little bit of a renaissance right now.”