News

2021

Assistant Professor Chao Gao receives 2021 IMS Tweedie New Researcher Award

March 16, 2021

Chao Gao

Assistant Professor Chao Gao receives 2021 IMS Tweedie New Researcher Award for "groundbreaking contributions to robust statistics, including establishing connections with generative adversarial networks, network analysis, and high-dimensional statistical inference.” 


Asst. Prof. Edwin Kite finds exoplanets may have water-rich atmospheres

March 15, 2021

An artist's illustration of the exoplanet WASP-121b, which appears to have water in its atmosphere.

Assistant Professor of the Geophysical Sciences Edwin Kite has co-authored a paper finding there might be many planets with water-rich atmospheres. His study finds way that hot, rocky planets in other systems could form and keep atmospheres.


Using powerful lasers, scientists recreate how magnetic fields grow in clusters of galaxies

March 15, 2021

A colorful simulation showing the growth of magnetic fields through laboratory plasmas.

An international collaboration co-led by UChicago managed to recreate—for the first time in the laboratory—the growth of magnetic fields at extreme conditions similar to those in the hot plasma that fills clusters of galaxies. Using powerful lasers, the pioneering experiments capture how physical process called turbulent dynamo grows these fields.


PSD Spotlight: Qiti Guo

March 11, 2021

Dr. Qiti Guo

PSD's March spotlight is Qiti Guo, PhD, Senior Scientist with the James Franck Institute. Qiti has been with UChicago for over 28 years, since 1992.


Prof. Krishnan develops precision diagnostics for Alzheimer’s using patented DNA nanotech

March 10, 2021

Yamuna Krishnan

Professor of Chemistry Yamuna Krishnan founded start up Esya Labs with funding from UChicago Polsky. The pioneering effort develops tools for the early, precise, and cost-effective detection of neurodegenerative diseases to support drug discovery and personalized medicine efforts.


Core Knowledge from UChicago News: The solar wind, explained

March 10, 2021

This article from UChicago News explains the solar wind, or the complex swirls and eddies of particles that travel about a million miles per hour as they pass Earth. Famous UChicago astrophysicist Eugene Parker first hypothesized solar wind and now current research by Profs. Olinto and Rosner carry this work forward.


Bacteria know how to exploit quantum mechanics, UChicago study finds

March 10, 2021

illustration of magnified orange bacteria on green backdrop

Bacteria know how to exploit quantum mechanics, UChicago study authored by Professor Greg Engel finds. Photosynthetic bacteria adapt to environment by using quantum mechanics to steer energy.


Meet statistics student, Ahmed Bou-Rabee

March 9, 2021

Ahmed Bou-Rabee

Ahmed Bou-Rabee was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and spent the first half of his life in Kuwait and the second in the United States, mostly in California. Before coming to the University of Chicago, he received an undergraduate degree in math and a master’s degree in statistics from Stanford. He has been at UChicago for five years as a doctoral student in the statistics program. Ahmed studies probability and partial differential equations.


UChicago physicist William Irvine selected for inaugural Brown Investigator Award

March 8, 2021

William Irvine

The Brown Science Foundation today announced physicists David Hsieh of Caltech and William Irvine of the University of Chicago as recipients of the inaugural Brown Investigator Award. The award, which recognizes curiosity-driven basic research in chemistry and physics, supports the investigators’ research with $2 million over five years to their respective universities. Hsieh and Irvine were nominated by their institutions and chosen from a candidate pool of mid-career scientists at 10 top-rated research universities.
 


Engineering marvel: in major step for UChicago partnership, sixth mirror cast for Giant Magellan Telescope

March 5, 2021

Giant Magellan Telescope

The Giant Magellan Telescope announces fabrication of the sixth of seven of the world’s largest monolithic mirrors. This is a major step for the partnership for which UChicago is a founder.


Scientists confirm third-nearest star with a planet—and it’s rocky like Earth

March 4, 2021

Illustration of a planet's terrain, orange with black mountains

UChicago team that built MAROON-X instrument confirm third-nearest star with a planet—and it’s rocky like Earth.
 


UChicago Global Digest spotlights geophysical scientist Clara Blättler

March 4, 2021

Clara Blattler on a throne of fossils

UChicago Global Digest spotlights geophysical scientist Clara Blättler in a faculty profile.


The statistician in the library: Stephen Stigler’s four decades crossing disciplinary lines

March 1, 2021

headshot of Stephen Stigler, taken in front of a white building. Stigler is wearing a suit.

Prof. Stephen Stigler retired after over forty years at the University of Chicago. Over his long career, he has investigated the history of the development of mathematics and statistical methods, in relation to problems in many fields—from astronomy to medicine to social sciences and psychology. 


UChicago, Argonne scientists zero in on molecules that could fight COVID-19

February 26, 2021

Krysten Jones in a chemistry lab

A unique partnership among biologists, chemists and X-ray scientists at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory has zeroed in on several molecules that could be used to create drugs to fight COVID-19.


Beneath the AVS Surface spotlights chemist Rachael Farber, PhD

February 26, 2021

Rachael Farber

Chemist Rachael Farber, PhD, the Kadanoff-Rice Postdoctoral Scholar in the Sibener lab, has been featured in Beneath the AVS Surface, a newsletter for the professional society for sciences related to materials, interfaces, and processing.