News: Research

2023

Climate change will prompt expansion of farming in northern wilderness

October 19, 2023

Farmland in North Dakota

New Scientist highlighted the work of former Dept. of the Geophysical Sciences PhD student and postdoc James Franke on shifting agricultural regions under climate change (with Prof. Liz Moyer), and Moyer was quoted.


Research suggests that privacy and security protection fell to the wayside during remote learning

October 19, 2023

a child's hands on a laptop keyboard

A qualitative research study conducted by faculty and students at the University of Chicago and University of Maryland revealed key tensions and breakdowns in the sociotechnical infrastructure of emergency remote learning that contributed to elementary school children’s privacy and data being compromised.


Can language models replace programmers?

October 19, 2023

PSD against a white and turquoise background

MarkTechPost article highlights UChicago researchers' SWE-bench framework, which focuses on real-world software engineering issues, like patch generation and complex context reasoning, offering a more realistic and comprehensive evaluation for enhancing language models with software engineering capabilities.


FeetThrough tech guides walking users ... by shocking their feet?

October 13, 2023

bare feet wearing FeetThrough prototype

New Atlas article features FeetThrough, a prototype being developed by Assoc. Prof. Pedro Lopes.


UChicago researchers identify a novel function of RNA-binding protein RBFOX2 that drives leukemia

October 6, 2023

Image depicting DNA methylation, the main epigenetic modification of DNA

To understand how RBFOX2 modifies cell function, Chemist Chuan He and colleagues grew malignant hematopoietic stem cells with RBFOX2 deactivated in petri dishes and found that the proliferative capacity of the cells was markedly reduced, indicating that there might be higher expression of RBFOX2 in leukemia cells.


Illinois makes play for billion-dollar National Semiconductor Technology Center

October 5, 2023

Paul Alivisatos

In an Axios article, UChicago President Paul Alivisatos comments on the combined efforts of UChicago and University of Illinois to land a new flagship federal center of advanced semiconductor research and manufacturing, saying, "We have a long and deep history of being at the forefront of the study of quantum science, physics and chemistry."


Predicting spin defect formation for use in quantum technologies

October 4, 2023

Giulia Galli

AzoQuantum article highlights a computational analysis led by Chemistry Prof. Giulia Galli forecasting the circumstances necessary to produce certain spin defects in silicon carbide.


For first time, scientists follow sodium and potassium inside cell organelles

October 4, 2023

Junyi Zhou at work in the laboratory

UChicago chemists create sensors to track potassium, sodium in organelles.


Phase 1 of M-STAR Center gets investment from National Science Foundation

September 28, 2023

illustration of MXenes

The National Science Foundation has awarded UChicago’s M-STAR Center of Chemical Innovation program $1.8 million as a Phase 1 Research Center. M-STAR, which is short for MXene Synthesis, Tunability and Reactivity, will be designed as a incubator of MXene study and a major nexus for materials science research.


The Giant Magellan Telescope’s final mirror fabrication begins

September 26, 2023

Giant Magellan Telescope illustration

Seven of the world’s largest mirrors will search the Universe for life beyond Earth.


Why the US, Japan and South Korea should take the quantum leap together

September 22, 2023

Illustration of quantum infrastructure for computing

The Hill article mentions UChicago's quantum partnerships with University of Tokyo and Tohoku University.


From Israeli digs to Greenland villages, UChicagoans travel the world for research

September 19, 2023

Jérémie Bonneau (left) and Oscar Sepulveda perform an active seismic source experiment

Geophysical Sciences grad student Freya Chen shares how she spent her summer tapping glaciers to test seismological models.

Photo: Jérémie Bonneau (left) and Oscar Sepulveda perform an active seismic source experiment. Image courtesy of Yulia Antropova.


UChicago investigators synthesize new family of hybrid organic-inorganic mxenes

September 15, 2023

Talapin lab group

UChicago investigators have made progress with the synthesis of novel compounds, hybrid MXenes, that combine organic and inorganic materials, claims a new paper authored by The Talapin Group that was recently published in Nature Chemistry.


UChicago computer scientists design small backpack that mimics big sensations

September 15, 2023

Person wearing JumpMod backpack

JumpMod is a compact, wearable backpack that uses vertical force feedback to create the feeling of perceived jumping and landing. The untethered nature of the device has the potential to scale these full-body sensations for at-home use– a problem currently unsolved.


$50 Million to Northwestern, University of Chicago for a new center on mathematics and biology

September 15, 2023

a developing fruit fly eye shown in green and purple

Forbes article details the partnership between UChicago and Northwestern for the launch of the new National Institute for Theory and Mathematics in Biology, the first of its kind in the US.