News: Students

2020

UChicago campus full voter engagement helps boost Hyde Park-Kenwood voter turn-out to 88.19%

December 2, 2020

Students wearing blue Vote sweatshirts on UChicago campus

UChicago campus full voter engagement helps boost Hyde Park-Kenwood voter turn-out to 88.19 percent. Precinct 27, which covers campus, exceeded 100 percent voter turn-out


CS student, Tyler Skluzacek, invents vibrating smartwatch to stop nightmares

December 2, 2020

Tyler Skluzacek

CS student, Tyler Skluzacek, invented a vibrating smartwatch to stop nightmares affecting combat veterans. Now it has been given FDA approval as a therapeutic device


Meet Financial Mathematics student, Zachary Myers

November 30, 2020

Zachary Myers, financial math student

Zachary Myers was born in Michigan and grew up outside of Cleveland, Ohio. He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.S. in Mathematics in May. He began his studies at UChicago this Autumn Quarter as a master’s student in the Financial Mathematics program. 


ECHO game brings students together—and keeps them safe

November 20, 2020

Woman scientist in wig

This Autumn Quarter an alternate reality game created by an interdisciplinary group of UChicago researchers gathered 70 teams of students—and helped keep them safe. Culminating in an Oct. 30 livestream, the ECHO game brought together students and other members of the UChicago community through weeks of collaborative play


Astronomy and physics students featured in new UChicagoGRAD podcast

November 20, 2020

Three portraits of astronomy and physics students, plus the PSD logo

New ‘Expand Your Perspective’ podcast features PSD grad students studying space and the universe: ranging from exoplanets to galaxies to black holes. With Nora Bailey (Astronomy & Astrophysics), Gourav Khullar (Astronomy & Astrophysics), and Gautam Satishchandran (Physics)


PSD in the News - November 2020

November 19, 2020

PSD in white against a maroon background

This month PSD researchers have been featured for their efforts to turn an IBM computer into a quantum material, unlock why supersymmetry can solve problems in the Standard Model, and tune materials to launch a new computing paradigm inspired by the energy-efficiency of the brain.


In new step toward quantum tech, scientists synthesize ‘bright’ quantum bits

November 17, 2020

In new step toward quantum tech, scientists synthesize ‘bright’ quantum bits


A search for supersymmetric particles in the ATLAS detector at CERN

November 17, 2020

UChicago researcher Lesya Horyn inside of the ATLAS detector.

Supersymmetry is a proposed theory to expand the Standard Model of particle physics. Akin to the periodic table of elements, the Standard Model is the best description we have for subatomic particles in nature and the forces acting on them. But physicists know this model is incomplete—it doesn’t make room for gravity or dark matter, for example. Supersymmetry aims to complete the picture by pairing each Standard Model particle with a supersymmetric partner, opening up a new class of hypothetical particles to detect and discover. In a new study, UChicago physicists have uncovered limitations for what properties these superpartners, if they exist, could have.
 


Meet geophysical sciences student, Andy Heard

November 6, 2020

Andrew Heard

Meet geophysical sciences student, Andy Heard, who studies geochemistry and uses precise measurements of iron isotope ratios in sedimentary rocks to learn about the history of oxygen on the ancient Earth.


PSD in the News - October 2020

October 28, 2020

Physical Sciences data map logo

This month PSD researchers have been featured for their efforts to discover how a small molecule is the key to HIV forming capsules, adapt laboratory research during COVID-19, and design nanotechnology that provides hope for a personalized vaccination for treating cancer.


Three computer science students selected for Rising Star Program

October 28, 2020

Three PhD students from the Department of Computer Science, Yi Ding, Jean Salac, and Junwen Yang, have been selected for the 2020 edition of the Rising Stars workshop, a prestigious program for boosting the careers of women in CS and related fields. 


UChicago scientists reveal new clues into how Earth got its oxygen

October 23, 2020

Earth’s thin shell of oxygen atmosphere keeps us alive, though we still don’t know exactly how it formed. A new study from the University of Chicago reveals clues in the role that iron had to play. Image courtesy of NASA

In a new study published Oct. 23 in Science, UChicago graduate student Andy Heard, Prof. Dauphas and their colleagues used a pioneering technique to uncover new information about the role of oceanic iron in the rise of Earth’s atmosphere. The findings reveal more about Earth’s history, and can even shed light on the search for habitable planets in other star systems.


UChicago scientists teach a neural net to find baby star flares

October 23, 2020

An X-class solar flare from our sun in November 2013. Scientists trained a neural network to find such flares in data taken of distant planets around other stars.

Scientists with the University of Chicago and the University of New South Wales taught a type of artificial intelligence called a neural network to detect the telltale light patterns of a stellar flare, then asked it to check the light curves of thousands of young stars; it found more than 23,000 flares.


From outdoor art to laboratory COVID-19 research, a look at UChicago’s Autumn Quarter

October 13, 2020

Woman painting a canvas in a field

From outdoor art to laboratory COVID-19 research, a look at UChicago’s Autumn Quarter


Welcoming the largest class of graduate students in PSD history

September 25, 2020

Five new students to the PSD in 2020

Meet nine members of the incoming class and get behind the PSD Fellowship Challenge to support an unprecendented year for admissions. We are raising $3.6M to impact each student's graduate education.