Skip to content

The latest news from the UW

October 13, 2020

ArtSci Roundup: Beyond Guilt Trips, Washin Kai: Rakugo by Katsura Sunshine, Protests for the Soul of a Nation, and More

During this time of uncertainty and isolation, find solace in digital opportunities to connect, share, and engage. Each week, we will share upcoming events that bring the UW, and the greater community, together online.  Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All UW faculty, staff, and students have access to Zoom Pro via UW-IT.  Beyond Guilt Trips: Mindful Travel in an Unequal World October 20, 4:00 PM | Online via Zoom Join author and Professor of English and Comparative History…

October 12, 2020

New Chinook art piece welcomes visitors to the Burke Museum: Guests from the Great River

A new art installation, Guests of the Great River, now greets visitors to the Burke Museum. The piece consists of 11 large-scale bronze paddles representing the arrival of a Chinookan canoe carrying cultural heroes of the Columbia River region, and with them the knowledge they embody.

UW awarded NIH grant for training in advanced data analytics for behavioral and social sciences

With a grant from the National Institutes of Health, a five-year, $1.8 million training program at the University of Washington will fund 25 academic-year graduate fellowships, develop a new training curriculum and contribute to methodological advances in health research at the intersection of demography and data science.

October 7, 2020

UW books in brief: Children’s books on STEM professionals, a courageous personal memoir — and UW Press looks back at 100

New books by UW faculty members include children’s works profiling STEM researchers and a personal memoir of an immigrant’s journey to freedom. Also, UW Press remembers a century of publishing, and a book on British colonialism is honored.

Turning hotels into emergency shelter as part of COVID-19 response limited spread of coronavirus, improved health and stability

A King County initiative to relocate people from homeless shelters to hotel rooms during the pandemic not only limited the spread of COVID-19, but also improved people’s mental health and well-being, and allowed them to focus on long-term goals.

October 6, 2020

ArtSci Roundup: From Ally to Antiracist, Re/Frame: Abandoned, and more

During this time of uncertainty and isolation, find solace in digital opportunities to connect, share, and engage. Each week, we will share upcoming events that bring the UW, and the greater community, together online.  Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All UW faculty, staff, and students have access to Zoom Pro via UW-IT.  Curating in Conversation October 13, 6:00 PM | Online via Zoom Marking the one year anniversary of the opening of the New Burke and Northwest Native…

All together now: Experiments with twisted 2D materials catch electrons behaving collectively

In a paper published Sept. 14 in the journal Nature Physics, a team led by the University of Washington reports that carefully constructed stacks of graphene — a 2D form of carbon — can exhibit highly correlated electron properties. The team also found evidence that this type of collective behavior likely relates to the emergence of exotic magnetic states.

‘Neither Free Nor Fair’: New UW podcast takes on election security in US and abroad

Election security is the theme of a new podcast by James Long, an associate professor of political science at the University of Washington. “Neither Free Nor Fair?” features experts from the UW and elsewhere on topics such as mail-in voting, foreign interference and the role of social media, and resolving disputed elections.

UW secures competitive $1 million Luce Foundation grant to advance Southeast Asian research and community engagement

The Southeast Asia Center at the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies and the Libraries at the University of Washington will spearhead a new initiative of innovative collaborations to explore the effects and consequences of authoritarianism in Southeast Asia and on Southeast Asian American communities in the United States.

Women, workers of color filling most ‘high-hazard/low-reward’ jobs in Washington

When exploring data on Washington workers during the pandemic — demographics, working conditions, wages and benefits, and risks of exposure to disease — the authors of a new report found that women hold two-thirds of the jobs in the harshest category of work. “The big takeaway from our research,” said David West, a co-author of the report and an analyst at the Washington Labor Education and Research Center, “is how particularly women are working under precarious conditions — a large…

October 1, 2020

UW COVID-19 testing reveals few positives on campus; new outbreak in Greek community

FINAL UPDATE Jan. 11: For more than two months, this post has been updated regularly as cases have been added to the Greek community outbreak. The updates will continue to be provided on the UW COVID-19 Case tracking dashboard, which can be found here. Updates on the Greek community outbreak can be found by hovering over the question mark icon near the top-right corner of the dashboard on that page. UPDATE at 10:30 a.m. Monday, Jan. 11: As of Monday morning,…

Faculty/staff honors: Teaching and mentoring award; three Aeronautics & Astronautics professors recognized — and state dance educator of the year

Recent honors to UW faculty have come from the American Institute for Aeronautics & Astronautics, the American Society of Composites, the Coalition for Excellence in Maternal and Child Health Epidemiology and the Dance Educators Association of Washington.

Official notice: Northwest Behavioral Health Teaching Facility — adoption of existing document and addendum

The proposed UW Medical Center – Northwest Behavioral Health Teaching Facility is intended to provide innovative and integrated behavioral health care and teaching services to address the shortage of such services in the state of Washington. It would include the construction of a new building on the site of the existing D-wing building, would be up to seven stories tall, and provide approximately 210,000 square feet of above grade building space.

September 30, 2020

UW receives $1.5 million CDC grant to study handgun carrying among rural adolescents

With roughly 109 people dying every day and many others treated in emergency rooms from firearm-related injuries — which are the second leading cause of death among adolescents — the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has, after decades, stepped in to fund critical firearm research. The CDC announced on Sept. 23 it would fund 16 studies for a total of more than $7.8 million to understand and prevent firearm violence. The University of Washington’s proposal to study handgun carrying…

Greenland is on track to lose ice faster than in any century over the past 12,000 years, study finds

A new study combines ice cores, geologic records and computer models to understand the past, present and future of the Greenland Ice Sheet. The results show that emissions this century have a big influence on how much ice will be lost from Greenland.

ArtSci Roundup: Velvet Sweatshops and Algorithmic Cruelty, Social Movements & Racial Justice, the Vice Presidential Debate Preview, and More

During this time of uncertainty and isolation, find solace in digital opportunities to connect, share, and engage. Each week, we will share upcoming events that bring the UW, and the greater community, together online.  Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All UW faculty, staff, and students have access to Zoom Pro via UW-IT.  Velvet Sweatshops and Algorithmic Cruelty: Labor in the Global Tech Economy October 6, 5:00 PM – 6:15 PM | Online via Zoom As the tech economy…

September 28, 2020

Soundbites: UW researchers examine deceptive ads on news websites

In this video: Franziska Roesner, associate professor in the Allen School Eric Zeng, graduate research assistant in the Allen School Journalists: download soundbites here With the election season ramping up, political ads are being splashed across the web. In the age of misinformation, how can news consumers tell if the ads they’re seeing are legitimate? USA Today and other mainstream news sites might seem like they would limit access to deceptive ads. But a study by University of Washington researchers found that both…

Q&A: UW researchers clicked ads on 200 news sites to track misinformation

A study by UW researchers found that both mainstream and misinformation news sites displayed similar levels of problematic ads. UW News had a conversation with the team about this research, where ads on news sites come from, and how things might change leading up to the election.

Book notes: A talk with UW English professor, author Shawn Wong about his UW Press book series for Asian American authors

UW English professor Shawn Wong discusses his UW Press book series. “We’re interested in all Asian American authors, particularly classic works that have gone out of print. We are open to anything — fiction, poetry and nonfiction,” Wong said. “But we’re also interested in new works.”

September 24, 2020

Colleges with primarily in-person instruction leading to thousands of COVID-19 cases per day in US

As universities and colleges struggle to find the right combination of in-person and online classes combined with protective measures to help prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus, a new study by researchers from four institutions has reached a troubling conclusion. Reopening university and college campuses with primarily in-person instruction is associated with a significant increase in cases of COVID-19 in the counties where the schools are located. “Consequently, we are able to predict between 1,000 and 5,000 additional cases…

Age restrictions for handguns make little difference in homicides as US deals with ‘de facto availability’ of firearms

In the United States, individual state laws barring 18- to 20-year-olds from buying or possessing a handgun make little difference in the rate of homicides involving a gun by people in that age group, a new University of Washington study has found. “The central issue is that there’s a very high degree of informal access to firearms, such as through family members or illicit channels,” said Caitlin Moe, the study’s lead author and a doctoral student in epidemiology in the…

Some polar bears in far north are getting short-term benefit from thinning ice

The small subpopulation of polar bears in Kane Basin were doing better, on average, in recent years than in the 1990s. The bears are experiencing short-term benefits from thinning and shrinking multiyear sea ice that allows more sunlight to reach the ocean surface, which makes the system more ecologically productive.

UW Podcasts: ‘Coastal Café’ explores marine, shoreline issues — and ‘Voices Unbound’ on racism in COVID-19 responses

A talk with the hosts of Washington Sea Grant’s “Coastal Café” podcast, which is also a radio show. And EarthLab’s podcast “Voices Unbound” releases a new season of timely topics.

Muslims, atheists more likely to face religious discrimination in US

A new study led by the University of Washington found that Muslims and atheists in the United States are more likely than those of Christian faiths to experience religious discrimination. Researchers focused on public schools and tested how principals responded to an individual’s expression of religious belief.

ArtSci Roundup: Community and Solidarity on the Frontlines, Election 2020, and More

During this time of uncertainty and isolation, find solace in digital opportunities to connect, share, and engage. Each week, we will share upcoming events that bring the UW, and the greater community, together online.  Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All UW faculty, staff, and students have access to Zoom Pro via UW-IT.  Community and Solidarity on the Frontlines: A Case Study of Seattle, WA September 30, 11:00 AM – 12:30 PM | Online via Zoom and YouTube This…

September 17, 2020

Watching over whales: Online tool detects whales and ships in California’s Santa Barbara Channel in near real-time

Whale Safe — an online tool launched Sept. 17 by scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara, the University of Washington and other partner institutions — allows users to detect and better protect these endangered animals in the Santa Barbara Channel. It is a mapping and analysis tool to help prevent ships from running into whales.

Environmental health professor emeritus Sverre Vedal serves on committee studying respiratory effects of Southwest Asia military service

Dr. Sverre Vedal, UW professor emeritus of environmental and health sciences, served on an expert committee for the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine studying the long-term respiratory health impacts of military service in Southeast Asia.

September 16, 2020

Most landslides in western Oregon triggered by heavy rainfall, not big earthquakes

Researchers at the University of Washington, Portland State University and the University of Oregon have shown that deep-seated landslides in the central Oregon Coast Range are triggered mostly by rainfall, not by large offshore earthquakes. The open-access paper was published Sept. 16 in Science Advances. “Geomorphologists have long understood the importance of rainfall in triggering landslides, and our study is simply driving home just how important it is,” said first author Sean LaHusen, who did the work as part of…