A team led by University of Washington astronomers has discovered the fastest-ever spinning asteroid with a diameter over half a kilometer.
Tag: College of Arts & Sciences
Come curious. Leave inspired. While February might be just 28 days, the UW offers an exciting lineup of more than 40 in-person and online events. From thought-provoking art and music to conversations on culture, history, and science, the UW community invites you to explore, learn, and connect across disciplines throughout the University. And you don’t have to wait until February—take a look at everything still happening this January. In addition, sign up to receive a monthly notice when the ArtSci Roundup…
Come curious. Leave inspired. For those near and far, we invite you to start the year with us through a range of events, performances, exhibitions, podcasts, and more. In addition, sign up to receive a monthly notice when the ArtSci Roundup has been published. ArtSci On Your Own Time Podcast: Frequencies: The Henry’s Audio Companion (Henry Art Gallery) Frequencies is a creative audio project where a cohort of artists, writers, and community members are invited to contribute sonic responses to the…
New research led by the University of Washington suggests that two different climate transitions millions of years ago fueled the diversification of carnivoran body plans.
A new University of Washington study suggests that AI could learn cultural values by observing human behavior, similar to how children learn by watching and interacting with adults. Researchers had AI systems observe two cultural groups playing a video game. The AI systems were able to learn each group’s degree of altruism and apply this to a new situation.
The University of Washington is proud to announce that 56 faculty and researchers who completed their work while at UW have been named on the Highly Cited Researchers 2025 list from Clarivate.
The green hermit hummingbird, which lives primarily in mountain forests of Central and South America, fights to win a mate. New research found that these fights have shaped the species’ evolution, yielding significant differences in bill shape for male and female green hermits.
Come curious. Leave inspired. For those near and far, we invite you to end the year with us through a range of events, performances, exhibitions, podcasts, and more. As you begin to shape your December plans, don’t miss the inspiring events still to come this November. In addition, sign up to receive a monthly notice when the ArtSci Roundup has been published. ArtSci On Your Own Time Henry Art Gallery Exhibitions Closing in January: Christine Sun Kim: Ghost(ed) Notes Influenced by…
In the wake of One Ocean Week Seattle, participating University of Washington researchers share highlights, connecting the week’s events to ongoing efforts to understand and protect marine ecosystems and coastal communities.
University of Washington researchers analyzed data collected in the decade following the Paris Agreement, an international treaty signed in 2015 to limit warming by cutting emissions. The treaty has helped nations reduce the amount of carbon released per dollar, but emissions are still too high due to global economic growth.
Come curious. Leave inspired. We invite you to connect with us this November through a rich and varied schedule of more than 30 events, exhibitions, podcasts, and more. From chamber opera premieres and public lectures to Indigenous storytelling and poetry celebrations, there’s something to spark every curiosity. Expect boundary-pushing performances, thought-provoking dialogues on memory and identity, and cross-disciplinary collaborations—November is a celebration of bold ideas and creative energy. As you plan for the end of the year, take a look…
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Oct. 8 awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar M. Yaghi “for the development of metal-organic frameworks,” or MOFs. Both Dianne Xiao, a UW associate professor of chemistry, and Douglas Reed, a UW assistant professor of chemistry, use MOFs in their research at the UW. UW News reached out to them to learn more about the significance of these structures and how researchers use them.
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Tuesday awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics jointly to John Clarke, Michel H. Devoret and John M. Martinis, “for the discovery of macroscopic quantum mechanical tunneling and energy quantization in an electric circuit.” Clarke, a professor emeritus of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, collaborates with the Axion Dark Matter Experiment at the University of Washington.
The Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute on Monday awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly to Mary E. Brunkow — an alum of the University of Washington — along with Frederick J. Ramsdell and Shimon Sakaguchi “for groundbreaking discoveries concerning peripheral immune tolerance that prevents the immune system from harming the body.” Brunkow received her bachelor’s degree in molecular and cellular biology from the UW in 1983. UW News spoke with Martha Bosma, professor and chair…
The Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute on Monday awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly to Mary E. Brunkow — an alum of the University of Washington — along with Frederick J. Ramsdell and Shimon Sakaguchi “for groundbreaking discoveries concerning peripheral immune tolerance that prevents the immune system from harming the body.”
The University of Washington announced a transformative gift that solidifies the importance and vitality of the arts, humanities, natural sciences and social sciences. It recognizes the legacy of former Dean John Simpson, his late wife Katherine, and the Simpson family by creating a namesake deanship for the College of Arts & Sciences. The Katherine and John Simpson Endowed Deanship in the College of Arts & Sciences provides flexible funding to promote interdisciplinary teaching and research across the College. These critical…
In a new study, a team of scientists determined the minimum natural habitat on agricultural land that will allow insect pollinators — including bumble bees, solitary bees, hoverflies and butterflies — to thrive. UW News reached out to co-author Berry Brosi, UW professor of biology, to learn more about these results and how habitat is important to two types of bees native to Washington.
Bee experts wouldn’t have previously expected to find the likes of Osmia cyaneonitens, Dufourea dilatipes and Stelis heronae in Washington. But this year, while collecting pollinators in Chelan County to study how climate and wildfires affect native bee populations, Autumn Maust, a University of Washington research scientist of biology, discovered eight bee species never recorded in Washington.
Quantum dots, which are 10,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair, are unique materials that generate very specific colors of light. Researchers, including Brandi Cossairt, UW professor of chemistry, hope that quantum dots can one day be useful for more than just illuminating TV screens. UW News asked her to compare the quantum dots in QLED TVs with the ones her lab makes.
Sven Haakanson, a University of Washington professor of anthropology, worked with three Coast Salish carvers to install a story pole on campus. Story poles were specifically created to share and teach Coast Salish legends, histories and stories.
Come curious. Leave inspired. We welcome you to connect with us this autumn quarter through an incredible lineup of more than 30 events, exhibitions, podcasts, and more. From thought-provoking talks on monsters to boundary-pushing performances by Grammy-nominated Mariachi ensembles, it’s a celebration of bold ideas and creative energy. ArtSci On Your Own Time Exhibition: Woven in Wool: Resilience in Coast Salish Weaving (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture) Journey through the seasonal cycle of weaving, from gathering materials and…
The James Webb Space Telescope has revealed new details in the core of the Butterfly Nebula, known to astronomers as NGC 6302. From the dense ring of dust that surrounds the nebula’s core to the tiny but bright star hidden within, the Webb observations paint a never-before-seen portrait of the nebula’s inner workings. Researchers at the UW and around the world are studying the imagery to learn more about the origins of cosmic dust and its role in the formation of planets like ours.
New findings call into question one of the core assumptions about teeth. Adult male spotted ratfish, a shark-like species native to the eastern Pacific Ocean, have rows of teeth on top of their heads, lining a cartilaginous appendage called the tenaculum, in addition to those in their jaws. They used their tenaculum teeth to grip females while mating in water.
Physicists have floated numerous theories to explain what dark matter might be, but to date, no experiment has turned up compelling evidence to support any of them. An international team of physicists, including researchers from the UW, is now working on a new kind of dark matter detector with the goal of capturing the first direct observation of the puzzling material. Results from the detector’s prototype have already ruled out one of the leading theories of how dark matter originated.
A new study from the University of Washington shows that households enrolled in the City of Seattle’s Fresh Bucks program experience a 31% higher rate of food security and consume at least three daily servings of fruits and vegetables 37% more often than those assigned to a program waitlist. Fresh Bucks, a $40 a month benefit, works with local partners to help residents access fresh food.
A new book from David Armstrong, University of Washington affiliate instructor of drama, is an historical and cultural account of how the Broadway musical was predominantly created by people marginalized from mainstream society. The book, “Broadway Nation: How Immigrant, Jewish, Queer, and Black Artists Invented the Broadway Musical,” traces this history through four major eras.
New faculty books from the University of Washington include those from Asian languages and literature, applied mathematics and the Jackson School of International Studies.
An international team of paleontologists, led by researchers at the University of Washington and the Field Museum of Natural History, is identifying the animals that thrived in southern Pangea — the planet’s single supercontinent at the time — just before the so-called “Great Dying” wiped out about 70% of terrestrial species, and an even larger fraction of marine ones.
University of Washington researchers recruited self-identifying Democrats and Republicans to make political decisions with help from three versions of ChatGPT: a base model, one with liberal bias and one with conservative bias. Democrats and Republicans were both likelier to lean in the direction of the biased chatbot they were talking with than those participants who interacted with the base model.
An international research effort, including scientists from the University of Washington, has finally revealed the cause of sea star wasting disease: a strain of the bacterium Vibrio pectenicida.
Election recognizes the new member’s “outstanding record of scientific and technical achievement and willingness to assist the Academy in providing the best available scientific information and technical understanding to inform complex policy decisions in Washington.”
“Communications & Design for the Environment,” a Communication Leadership course held for the first time this spring, University of Washington professors Adrienne Russell and Dominic Muren teach students how to examine the climate crisis and environmental problems from a perspective beyond the hard sciences.
Adrienne Fairhall and David Hertzog are among 120 new members and 30 international members elected “in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research.”
A new era of astronomy and astrophysics began Monday when the first images captured by the NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory were released, demonstrating the extraordinary capabilities of the new telescope and the world’s largest digital camera.
Brain-computer interfaces, or BCIs, can help people with severe injuries or impairments regain the ability to communicate or move their arms and legs through robotic substitutes. The devices, which are about the size of a dime and are implanted on the surface of a person’s brain, serve as a communication link between the brain’s neural activity and an external device, such as a computer or a robotic limb. In this episode, Sara Goering, a University of Washington professor of philosophy,…
Imagine sitting in a movie theater watching a film you’ve been anticipating for months. Suddenly, the screen goes blank. It only lasts a second, but that’s long enough to disrupt the experience. It’s also long enough, says Mal Ahern, to remind you of the physical infrastructure behind what we so often see as an immaterial experience. Ahern, a University of Washington assistant professor of cinema and media studies, researches glitches in everything from printers to projectors. In this episode, she…
Recent recognition of the University of Washington includes an EarthLab Innovation Grant, the Best Paper Award from American Political Science Association and honorable recognition mention from the American Society for Theatre Research. UW professor Richard Watts and team awarded EarthLab Innovation Grant Richard Watts, UW associate professor of French, is part of an interdisciplinary team from the UW that received an EarthLab Innovation Grant to support their collaborative project, “Life in Spite of It All: Water, Wetlands, and Reclamation in…
Recent faculty books from the University of Washington include those from linguistics, Slavic languages and literature and French. UW News spoke with the authors of four publications to learn more about their work. Scrutinizing and confronting AI hype Emily M. Bender, UW professor of linguistics, co-authored “The AI Con: How to Fight Big Tech’s Hype and Create the Future We Want” with Alex Hanna, the director of research at the Distributed AI Research Institute. The book looks at the the…
Virtual assistants, such as Apple’s Siri, can perform a range of tasks or services for users — and a majority of them sound like white women. Golden Marie Owens, assistant professor of cinema and media studies at the University of Washington, says there is much to learn about a person from how they sound. The same holds true for technology. In this episode, Owens discusses her research into why a white woman is the default voice for virtual assistants in…
Imagine an art class where you only did paint by numbers, or a music class where you weren’t allowed to play a song until you practiced scales for 20 years. This is often what it’s like to take a math class, where students spend most of their time learning to solve problems that have already been figured out. But while the basics are important in any subject, so is creativity. In this episode, Jayadev Athreya discusses mathematics as the language…