2019-02-27
- In many societies, teenagers are repeatedly told – by adults, peers and popular media – that teens are more likely than younger children to take risks, ignore their parents, skip schoolwork and succumb to bad influences. But stereotypes are not destiny, a new study of Chinese middle school students suggests.
In the study, reported in the journal Child Development, researchers talked with...
2019-02-26 - A scientist in the College of LAS is among 126 recipients of the 2019 Sloan Research Fellowships from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. According to the foundation, the awards “honor early career scholars whose achievements mark them as among the most promising researchers in their fields.” This year’s LAS recipient is chemical and biomolecular engineering...
2019-02-22 - What do you get when you add mathematics and chalkboards? Grant Cole, a building service worker from Facilities & Services who worked in Altgeld Hall, can answer that question: Dust, and lots of it. As a cleaner in one of the busiest buildings on campus—a mathematics building to boot—Cole knew how the learning process could be accompanied by clouds of dust as dense as the morning fog. The...
2019-02-21 - Termites are vilified as destroyers of all things wooden, but they are also misunderstood. “The one thing that everyone knows about these insects and seems to care about is they cause billions of dollars of damage by eating wood,” said May Berenbaum, a professor and head of the entomology department at the University of Illinois. “In reality...
2019-02-19 - E-cigarettes get teenagers hooked on nicotine. Or they aid cigarette smokers seeking to quit. Or they may be harmful in other ways. Those competing messages make the devices a tricky subject for health communicators, says Cabral Bigman, a professor of communication at Illinois whose research focuses on health communication issues around vaping....
2019-02-15 - Philippe Tondeur, professor emeritus of mathematics, has worked and studied at universities around the world, but the University of Illinois holds a special place in his heart and mind. Tondeur has donated in support of the Campaign for Altgeld and Illini Halls, which includes a plan to renovate Altgeld...
2019-02-13 - Six staff and academic professionals are being recognized for their particularly noteworthy efforts in advancing the mission of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences in 2018-19. Jenny Cox, Brad Petersen, and Jack Thomas have been selected by an awards committee to receive the LAS Academic Professional Award. The recognition comes with a $1,000 award, a $1,000 salary increment, and a...
2019-02-12 - Though separated by a world of ocean, and unrelated to each other, two fish groups – one in the Arctic, the other in the Antarctic – share a surprising survival strategy: They both have evolved the ability to produce the same special brand of antifreeze protein in their tissues. A new study describes in molecular detail how the Arctic fishes built the gene for their antifreeze from tiny fragments...
2019-02-08 - The Natural History Building has earned prominent distinction for energy efficiency and environmentally friendly construction practices in the wake of a recent $79 million renovation. The historic building received Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED ®) Gold certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, the most widely used green building rating program in the world. Built...
2019-02-08 - What better way to represent college life than as a long, winding—sometimes bumpy—and colorful journey? In the spirit of enhancing an encouraging atmosphere where students go for assistance on academic matters, the U of I has installed an art piece, "Journey Into Possibilities," by Indira Freitas Johnson, in LAS Student Academic Affairs. "Journey Into Possibilities” aims to demonstrate students...
2019-02-07 - For the past six years, the Department of Astronomy and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois have been closely involved with one of the most sensitive and comprehensive surveys of distant galaxies ever performed. Now that the survey is complete, they will...
2019-02-06 - Ten professors and staff members in LAS are among the recipients of the Presidential Initiative to Celebrate the Impact of the Arts and the Humanities. The $2 million initiative, launched by University of Illinois President Tim Killeen, is aimed at emphasizing the impact and influence of the arts and...
2019-02-05 - There’s plenty of sweet irony in a new partnership between Illinois and St. Louis-based Anheuser-Busch, LLC, that will raise money for bee research at the university. Anheuser-Busch has pledged $5,000 to The Healthy Bee Fund at Illinois. In addition, the company will donate $1 to the fund for every case sold of b, a new alcoholic honey beverage scheduled to go on sale in the Northeast U.S. in...
2019-02-04 - Mara Wade, a University of Illinois professor of Germanic languages and literatures, has received the Reimar Luest Prize for International Research Cultural Exchange, a competitive prize given to scholars whose research has shaped academic and cultural relations between Germany and their own countries. Wade is one of two winners this year of the award...
2019-01-31 - How do you make a difference? It’s not a simple question when you think about it, like George Reveliotis has. He’s in his mid-40s now, with a wife and four children, and he runs his own property tax and real estate law firm, Reveliotis Law, P.C. in Park Ridge, Illinois. He’s seen enough to know the kind of things that carry significance. Reveliotis (BA, ’96,...
2019-01-29 - The clock struck 12:50 p.m. and the Quad teemed with students during passing period. High above them, in Altgeld Hall, Jonathon Smith moved quickly, organizing his sheet music. He knew what many of them would think—that a machine was playing the chimes in the tower. They couldn’t be more wrong. Purposefully, with passion, Smith began to “play the tower,” so to speak. Playing the chimes is...
2019-01-24 - Telemarketing isn’t for everyone, but it was a great place to start for Chicago resident DJ Paoni (BA, ’93, speech communication), who used what he learned in college and on the job to connect with people and eventually become president of SAP North America, a software company. Degree: BA, ’93, speech...
2019-01-18 - The School of Chemical Sciences at Illinois hosted a celebration of diversity in the fields of chemical sciences and chemical engineering with two public events honoring an LAS alumnus who was the first African-American to receive a PhD in chemistry in the United States. In early February, the American Chemical...
2019-01-17 - The University of Illinois is moving forward with plans to expand its leadership in the mathematical sciences by constructing a new building west of the Main Quad by 2022 and renovating Altgeld Hall by 2024. Derek Fultz, director of facilities for the College of LAS, said the university is negotiating an architect contract for the project which...
2019-01-16 - For thousands of years, large rivers and their floodplains have been essential to civilization. They still are—with billions of people living around the world’s major rivers—and an Illinois scientist has published the most up-to-date summary of the critical issues facing these vital regions. Jim Best, the Jack and Richard Threet Professor of Sedimentary...
2019-01-14 - Our images of mushroom clouds came from its cameras. So did many shots of missile tests, space missions and the Korean and Vietnam wars. At one point it was the largest self-contained film studio in Hollywood, enlisting such stars as Jimmy Stewart and Marilyn Monroe, as well as Disney animators and other movie industry talent. It made an estimated 900 films. Yet the story of Lookout Mountain...
2019-01-10 - Larry Harris is the type of man who you can practically hear smiling through the phone. He’s quick to joke and has an infectious laugh—you’re bound to hear it often. If you ask Larry (BA, ’15, political science), he’ll say that’s the Chicago in him. He grew up on the south and west sides of Chicago before moving to Chicago Heights at fourteen and says the...
2019-01-09 - A research group at Illinois has found that a protein previously thought to be active only in cell repair is required for DNA replication, a transformational discovery recently published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of...
2019-01-03 - Researchers from the University of Illinois and U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service report in the journal Science that crops engineered with a photorespiratory shortcut are 40 percent more productive in real-world agronomic conditions. Plants convert sunlight into energy through photosynthesis; however, most crops on the planet are plagued by a photosynthetic glitch, and...
2018-12-20 - Gillen D’Arcy Wood, English professor at the University of Illinois, wants to reveal to readers a wonderland — Antarctica. Wood’s upcoming book, “First Ice: The Antarctic Discovery Voyages and their Legacy,” delves into three expeditions to Antarctica between 1838 and 1842. Through it, Wood explores the history of South Polar discovery in...