News: Research

David Charbonneau, astronomer at Harvard University and recipient of an honorary degree from UChicago, has made it his life’s goal to search the stars for habitable planets and alien life. On this episode of Big Brains, he tells his fascinating story about the history of exoplanetary research, his journey as a planet hunter and the stunning discoveries he’s made along the way. 

Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and its international partners on Nov. 14 broke ground on an innovative experiment that aims to answer some of the biggest questions about the universe.

The Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility will one day produce the world’s most intense, high-energy neutrino beam, sending trillions of particles 1,300 kilometers underground to South Dakota as part of the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment. Hosted by Fermilab, a U.S. Department of Energy lab affiliated with the University of Chicago, DUNE brings together more than 1,000 people from 30-plus countries to tackle questions that keep physicists awake at night: Why is the universe full of matter and not antimatter, or no matter at all? Do protons, one of the building blocks of atoms (and of us), ever decay? How do black holes form? 

Quanta Magazine highlights three physicists--Stephen Parke of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Xining Zhang of the University of Chicago and Peter Denton of Brookhaven National Laboratory—who discovered a new mathematical formula while studying neutrinos. 

A new study from University of Chicago and University of California, Santa Barbara researchers finds that external attackers can use inexpensive technology to turn Wi-Fi signals into motion detectors, monitoring activity inside a building without being detected themselves. 

 With only a small, commercially available Wi-Fi receiver, an attacker from outside the target site can measure the strength of signals emitted from connected devices and monitor a site remotely for motion, sensing whether a room is occupied. The research, led by leading UChicago computer scientists Heather Zheng and Ben Zhao, reveals the technique of these attacks as well as potential defenses. 

Scientists at the University of Chicago, in collaboration with researchers at Cornell University and Argonne National Laboratory, have discovered an easy, efficient way to grow extremely thin films of organic materials. The findings, published Nov. 7 in Science, could be a stepping-stone to future electronics or technologies with new abilities. 

With a $4 million grant over five years, a team of researchers including Prof. Diana Franklin, research associate professor at UChicago CS and director of computer science education at UChicago STEM Education, will develop, pilot, and implement a new curriculum designed to promote both computational thinking and language arts in young students.

This month, PSD researchers have been featured for shaping the emerging field of AI, developing blood tests to detect diabetic complications and cancer, creating new models for moon formation, and more.

A year ago a trio of mathematicians solved what’s called Zimmer’s conjecture, which is named after mathematician and University of Chicago president, Robert Zimmer. Their proof stands as one of the biggest mathematical achievements in recent years. President Robert Zimmer discusses the original question and geometric symmetries with Quanta Magazine.

Conducted in the lab of Prof. Nicolas Dauphas, a study measured rubidium in both the Earth and moon and created a new model to explain the differences in their makeup. The breakthrough reveals new insights into a conundrum about the moon’s formation that has gripped the field of lunar science over the past decade, known as the “lunar isotopic crisis.”

In a new study, Asst. Prof. Malte Jansen and former UChicago postdoctoral researcher Alice Marzocchi lay out how an initial change in climate could start a chain of events that leads to an ice age. Their model shows how the increase in Antarctic sea ice in a colder climate could trigger a waterfall of changes that could contribute to tipping the global climate into glacial periods.

Three physicists at the University of Chicago and two national laboratories have discovered a fundamental identity in linear algebra—based on studying particle physics. 

Astronomers at the University of Chicago, MIT and elsewhere have used a massive cluster of galaxies as an X-ray magnifying glass to peer back in time, to nearly 9.4 billion years ago. In the process, they spotted a tiny dwarf galaxy in its very first, high-energy stages of star formation

Top experts in quantum technology from around the globe will gather at the University of Chicago on Oct. 25 to discuss the future of quantum information science and strategies to build a quantum workforce. 

 

University of Chicago Prof. Chuan He partnered with Northwestern Assoc. Prof. Wei Zhang to develop a simple blood test that accurately detects whether patients with diabetes have developed vascular complications, which are responsible for about two-thirds of diabetes deaths. 

Jacob Bean, associate professor of astronomy and astrophysics at the University of Chicago, led a project to build and install an innovative instrument that will scan the skies for new exoplanets—worlds in other solar systems that could potentially host life. Over the past eight years, Bean and his team had designed and built the instrument, called MAROON-X; this summer they finally attached it to a telescope at the Gemini Observatory at the top of Mauna Kea, Hawaii.