Victoria Meadows, professor of astronomy at the 痳豆在线 and director of the UW’s Virtual Planetary Laboratory, talks about how upcoming missions like the James Webb Space Telescope will be able to characterize the atmospheres of potentially Earth-like exoplanets and may even detect signs of life. Meadows is delivering a talk on this subject on Feb. 15, 2020 at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting in Seattle.
At a Saturday afternoon session, researchers from the 痳豆在线 and federal agencies will discuss the emerging research on Pacific Northwest megaquakes.
Using 30 years of satellite data, UW researchers discovered that within one year of the opening of a major dam in the Mekong River basin, downstream river temperatures during the dry season dropped by up to 3.6 degrees F (2 degrees C).
Scientists and physicians have long known that immune cells migrate to the site of an infection, which individuals experience as inflammation 鈥� swelling, redness and pain. Now, researchers at the 痳豆在线 and Northwestern University have uncovered evidence that this gathering is not just a consequence of immune activation. Immune cells count their neighbors before deciding whether or not the immune system should kick into high gear.
Satellite tracking of adult females and visual monitoring of polar bears in Baffin Bay show changes from the 1990s to the period from 2009 to 2015. Bears in Baffin Bay are getting thinner and adult females are having fewer cubs than when sea ice was more available.
A team of chemical engineers has developed a new way to produce medicines and chemicals and preserve them using portable 鈥渂iofactories鈥� embedded in water-based gels known as hydrogels. The approach could help people in remote villages or on military missions, where the absence of pharmacies, doctor鈥檚 offices or even basic refrigeration makes it hard to access critical medicines and other small-molecule compounds. The team 鈥� led by Hal Alper, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Texas, and…
Researchers from the UW and Evergreen found that many species of animals and plants likely will need to migrate under climate change, and that conservation efforts will also need to shift to be effective.
Tiny meteorites that fell to Earth 2.7 billion years ago suggest that the atmosphere at that time was high in carbon dioxide, which agrees with current understanding of how our planet’s atmospheric gases changed over time.
Using a new “non-targeted” approach, UW and UW Tacoma researchers screened samples from multiple regions of Puget Sound to look for potentially harmful compounds that might be present.
Despite their reputation as blood-suckers, mosquitoes actually spend most of their time drinking nectar from flowers. Scientists have identified the chemical cues in flowers that stimulate mosquitoes鈥� sense of smell and draw them in. Their findings show how cues from flowers can stimulate the mosquito brain as much as a warm-blooded host 鈥� information that could help develop less toxic repellents and better traps.
Leaders are updating the laws for international waters that apply to most of the world’s ocean environment. This provides a unique opportunity, argues a UW Bothell marine scientist, to anticipate new techniques that allow protected zones to shift as species move under climate change.
When nearly one million common murres died at sea and washed ashore from California to Alaska in 2015 and 2016, it was unprecedented. Scientists from the 痳豆在线, the U.S. Geological Survey and others blame an unexpected squeeze on the ecosystem’s food supply, brought on by a severe and long-lasting marine heat wave known as “the blob.”
Recent honors to UW faculty and staff include an honorary doctorate from the University of Bern, an award for biodiversity conservation and a consulting assignment for the World Health Organization.
Nearly half of the fish caught worldwide are from stocks that are scientifically monitored and, on average, are increasing in abundance. Effective management appears to be the main reason these stocks are at sustainable levels or successfully rebuilding, according to a new study led by the 痳豆在线.
Life as we know it requires phosphorus, which is scarce. So, how did a lifeless environment on the early Earth supply this key ingredient? A new UW study, published Dec. 30 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, finds an answer to this problem in certain types of carbonate-rich lakes.
If you fear a trip to the dentist, you are among a majority of adults that report moderate to high levels of anxiety related to dental care, according to a review of research. And, if you鈥檙e afraid of getting into a dental chair, you are more likely to avoid going and are at risk of oral and overall health problems, such as worsened cardiovascular disease. Studies show that, of those adults with such fear, more than 70% say they started…
Large, old Chinook salmon have mostly disappeared from the West Coast. A new 痳豆在线 and NOAA study points to the recent rise of resident killer whales, and their insatiable appetite for large Chinook salmon, as the main driver behind the decline of the big fish.
An Antarctic field campaign last winter led by the U.S. and Australia has successfully extracted some of the largest samples of air dating from the 1870s until today. Researchers will use the samples to look for changes in the molecules that scrub the atmosphere of methane and other gases.
To better understand large, disruptive snowstorms, a 痳豆在线 atmospheric scientist will lead a NASA field campaign this winter to fly through major snowstorms along the East Coast. The multi-institutional team will observe snow as it forms in clouds to help with satellite monitoring of snowfall and ultimately improve forecasts.
Joyce Yen 鈥� director of the 痳豆在线鈥檚 ADVANCE Center for Institutional Change, an NSF-funded body to promote female STEM faculty on campus 鈥� recently worked with the Heising-Simons Foundation to dismantle bias and promote diversity in a prominent grant that the Foundation awards to postdoctoral researchers in planetary science. In this Q&A, Yen shares the many, sometimes counterintuitive ways bias can work against goals toward greater diversity, equity and inclusion in STEM fields.
With 2019 on pace as one of the warmest years on record, a new international study reveals how rapidly the Arctic is warming and examines global consequences of continued polar warming.
UW researchers have found that warmer temperatures, at levels expected under most climate change projections, can lead to higher concentrations of arsenic in rice grains.
Researchers from the 痳豆在线 and Michigan Technological University have created the first comprehensive database of all the wildfire fuels that have been measured across North America. Ultimately, it can help scientists make more informed decisions about fire and smoke situations.
A new experiment by the 痳豆在线 has found that some corals are more likely to eat microplastics when they are consuming other food, yet microplastics alone are undesirable.
Using a mathematical framework with roots in artificial intelligence and robotics, UW researchers were able to uncover the process of how a person makes choices in groups. And, they also found they were able to predict a person鈥檚 choice more often than more traditional descriptive methods.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science has named six faculty members from the 痳豆在线 as AAAS Fellows, according to a Nov. 26 announcement. They are part of a cohort of 443 new fellows for 2019, all chosen by their peers for 鈥渟cientifically or socially distinguished efforts to advance science or its applications.鈥�
UW researchers have found that air pollution from electricity generation emissions in 2014 led to about 16,000 premature deaths in the continental U.S. In many states, the majority of the health impacts came from emissions originating in other states.
An interdisciplinary team of researchers from multiple institutions 鈥� including the 痳豆在线 鈥� has received a two-year $1.7 million National Science Foundation grant to study coral growth.
With a $106 million gift from the Weill Family Foundation, UC Berkeley, UC San Francisco and the 痳豆在线 have launched the Weill Neurohub, an innovative research network that will forge and nurture new collaborations between neuroscientists and researchers working in an array of other disciplines 鈥� including engineering, computer science, physics, chemistry and mathematics 鈥� to speed the development of new therapies for diseases and disorders that affect the brain and nervous system.
A team led by scientists from the 痳豆在线 and the University of Notre Dame used recent advances in electron microscopy to observe Fano interferences — a form of quantum-mechanical interference by electrons — directly in a pair of metallic nanoparticles.
A 痳豆在线 team is leaving to study how fall storms, dwindling sea ice and vulnerable coastlines might combine in a changing Arctic.
UW marine scientists are using high-tech tags to record the movements of swordfish 鈥� big, deep-water, migratory, open-ocean fish that are poorly studied 鈥� and get a window into the ocean depths they inhabit.
Researchers at the 痳豆在线 have developed a method that could make reproducible manufacturing at the nanoscale possible. The team adapted a light-based technology employed widely in biology 鈥� known as optical traps or optical tweezers 鈥� to operate in a water-free liquid environment of carbon-rich organic solvents, thereby enabling new potential applications.
After years of preparation, a tiny satellite built by UW students is scheduled to launch early Saturday, Nov. 2, from a NASA flight facility in Virginia. The launch will be broadcast live on NASA TV.
Researchers from the 痳豆在线 and the FOM Institute for Atomic and Molecular Physics in the Netherlands have developed a way to map strain in lead halide perovskite solar cells. Their approach shows that misorientation between microscopic perovskite crystals is the primary contributor to the buildup of strain within the solar cell, which creates small-scale defects in the grain structure, interrupts the transport of electrons within the solar cell, and ultimately leads to heat loss through a process known as non-radiative recombination.
A team led by the 痳豆在线 and Stanford University has discovered clues in the environment that help identify transmission hotspots for schistosomiasis, a parasitic disease that is second only to malaria in its global health impact.
An image captured earlier this year by the Hubble Space Telescope may look like a ghostly apparition, but it is not. Hubble is looking at a titanic head-on collision between two galaxies.
The National Science Foundation awarded the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and nine collaborating organizations, including the 痳豆在线, $2.8 million for a two-year 鈥渃onceptualization phase鈥� of the Scalable Cyberinfrastructure Institute for Multi-Messenger Astrophysics.
Scientists have discovered an extraordinary collection of fossils that reveal in detail how life recovered after a catastrophic event: the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago at the end of the Cretaceous Period.
This week a UW team is releasing a robotic surfboard to explore the surface ocean around Antarctica.