Tags: Earth


AAAS on Climate Change: What We know

"We're the largest general scientific society in the world, and therefore we believe we have an obligation to inform the public and policymakers about what science is showing about any issue in modern life, and climate is a particularly pressing one," said Dr. Alan Leshner, CEO of AAAS. "As the voice of the scientific community, we need to share what we know and bring policymakers to the table to discuss how to deal with the issue." The Nobel…


Faculty in the Media, March 2014

Our faculty continue to do an outstanding job of offering comments and quotes in a variety of media. A sampling from this month: Chimps outsmart kids at computer games – News Track India article quotes professor of psychology Dorothy Fragaszy, director of UGA’s Primate Cognition and Behavior Laboratory  Athens Banner Herald article, Little flying machine is new research tool for UGA scientists , quotes Tommy Jordan, director of…


Assessing the Gulf

instrument in ocean
Sulfur into clouds

In a naturally-occuring process, sulfur makes its way from microbes in the ocean up into the atmosphere where it plays a part in the formation of clouds. The phenomenon has long been know, but now scientists are learning more about how it actually happens: A new $2 million National Science Foundation grant will allow the UGA-led research group to further document how genes in ocean microbes transform sulfur into clouds in the Earth's atmosphere…


Hopkinson awarded Sloan Foundation Fellowship

“As CO2 in the atmosphere increases, CO2 increases in the ocean and evidence suggests these increases cause higher rates of photosynthesis in the ocean,” said Hopkinson. “The molecular details of how that works were not very well understood.  But in some of our recent research, we established a decent explanation for how that happens.” A very prestigious award - the Sloan Foundation announced the awards in a full page ad in the New York…


Marshall Shepherd on CBS' Face the Nation

Atheltic Association Professor Marshall Shepherd was a guest on CBS' Face the Nation yesterday. He not only represented UGA extraordinarily well, as usual, he also made a great deal of sense talking about weather and climate:     The blog Living in the Real World offered some thoughts and critiques on Shepherd's interview: [Dr.] Shepherd makes navigating such interviews seem deceptively easy. The reality? The questions come fast,…


Athens Science Café

And as if on cue from the post below, another terrific collaboration that has been in the work for a while comes to fruition. This one is aimed at taking science into the community - the Athens Science Café: Regular meetings held in various locations around Athens where people can come learn about interesting scientific topics in a fun, interactive environment. Each meeting will be led by a professional scientist who is there to introduce some…


World's Most Influential Scientists

If you wanted to create a list of the 50 most influential scientists in the world today, and someone has, the list would be incomplete without UGA computational chemist Henry F. Schaefer. The Graham Perdue Professor of Chemistry and director of the Center for Computational Chemistry, Schaefer was named in thebestschools.org list of influential scientists at number 38. A Humboldt Award winner and slated to receive the Peter Debye Award from the…


Focus on the faculty: Lisa Donovan

Great Q & A on the UGA homepage with professor of plant biology Lisa Donovan:   When did you come to UGA and what brought you here? I came to the University of Georgia in 1995 and was attracted by the diversity and excellence of the plant biologists here. What are your favorite courses and why? At the undergraduate level, I enjoy contributing to BIOL 1108, “Principles of Plant Biology II” for biology majors, because it provides the…


Student Reports from Antarctica

 


Two genetics professors receive CAREER awards

The National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development Program supports junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars, providing crucial laboratory support to promising young researchers. Congratulations to assistant professors Andrea Sweigart and Dave Nelson of department of genetics, who were each awarded five-year, $1 million grants by this program: Sweigart is an evolutionary biologist who studies quantitative genetics…


Shepherd on PBS' Nova: Killer Typhoon

On November 8, 2013, Typhoon Haiyan slammed into the Philippines, whipping the low-lying and densely-populated islands with 200 mph winds and sending a two-story-high storm surge flooding into homes, schools, and hospitals. The PBS NOVA dcomentary Killer Typhoon featured perspectives from some of the world's leading climate scientists, including AMS president and UGA professor Marshall Shepherd. The program aired last night. The…

chicago with ice
Shepherd to be part of White House discussion of 'Polar Vortex'

Professor of geography and president of the American Meteorological Society J. Marshall Shepherd will join weather and climate experts in a White House discussion on the 'Polar Vortex' at 2 pm ET on Friday, Jan. 10: "We the Geeks: ‘Polar Vortex' and Extreme Weather" will be a conversation with leading meteorologists, climate scientists and weather experts about why temperatures dipped to such frigid lows this week, how weather experts turn raw…


Top science and space stories of 2013

AMS president and Georgia Athletic Association Professor of geography Marshall Shepherd is quoted in CNN's rundown of the top science stories of 2013. On climate change: Scientists are also hoping to help our own species understand the perils associated with climate change. The phenomenon raises the likelihood of severe weather events and is predicted to damage agriculture, forestry, ecosystems and human health. A key symbolic moment was when…


Newly sequenced genome addresses Darwin's 'abominable mystery'

The origin and early evolution of flowering plants, based at least in part on his frustration with the fossil record of the time, was a particularly puzzling subject for Charles Darwin. His correspondence between 1875 and 1881 reveals that he was deeply bothered by the apparent origins and rate of diversification of flowering plants in the mid-Cretaceous. A newly sequenced genome of the Amborella trichopoda plant addresses Darwin's mystery and…


Two faculty named AAAS Fellows

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an international professional organization founded in 1848 that published the journal Science, which has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world (approximatelt 1 million). AAAS also has two new members from the UGA: Two University of Georgia faculty members have been named Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement…


Students field tested during Hercules blowout emergency response

When the Hercules 252 rig blew out and began spewing gas, condensate and other hydrocarbons into the Gulf of Mexico on July 23rd earlier this year, UGA marine scientist Samantha Joye and colleagues from the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative quickly assembled a team and plan to assess the potential impacts of the accident. Graduate students involved with the project found themselves with the rare opportunity to participate in 'rapid…


Improving Sorghum

Through the new Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Climate-Resilient Sorghum, UGA and partner researchers will use new genomics tools to address urgent needs for a more drought-resilient food supply, increase rates of sorghum improvement to better meet long-term population growth, and investigate production systems that promote sustainable farming, particularly regarding preservation or restoration of soil resources and water quality.…


Choosing a path to medical school

10. Demonstrating an ability to remain calm under pressure   Still not sure if going to medical school is for you.? Don’t fret. Beyond the classroom and plethora of resources via advisors with the Premedical Studies Program, another good resource for exploring this career direction is a UGA publication called PreMed Magazine. Created by students at UGA the publication aims to inform students about preparing for medical school, but also…


Plant genome mapping with Andrew Paterson: Focus on the Faculty

I was trained as a conventional plant breeder but have been fortunate to participate in genome sequencing to reveal the entire genetic blueprint(s) of most of the crops that I study. Their unique attributes make crop plants valuable both commercially and as botanical models, thus linking increased fundamental knowledge to improving human lives. Genome sequences empower many new opportunities to improve plants to better suit human needs while…


Lynne Billard selected for Florence Nightingale David Award

We are fortunate to have so many faculty members who work diligently in the classroom, as well as the laboratory - whose scholarly research introduces innovation into their instruction efforts. Our students benefit and the institution grows as a result. Then there is a level of achievement even beyond those two types of outstanding contributions, when a faculty member has an outsized impact on a wide swath of their colleagues, on their careers,…


The Marine Institute at Sapelo Island

The appointment of Alber reflects a renewed focus on the pristine marine laboratory as a field station that supports world-class research and education in coastal ecosystems. UGAMI's international reputation, dating back to the 1950s, is based on groundbreaking ecological research by scientists from UGA and beyond.  An undeveloped barrier island on Georgia's coast, Sapelo is a national treasure as well as a unique living laboratory for…


Shepherd: shell game with climate science

As the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Science rolls out its fifth assessment report this week, Athletic Association Professor and president of the American Meteorological Society J. Marshall Shepherd weighs in on the need for common sense on climate change: For me, the hat with the ball from the IPCC report is that it continues to affirm that our planet is warming, and humans are a significant contributor to the warming. Andrew Dessler,…


More UGA women in STEM fields

  UGA touted for women in STEM programs By Jessica Luton jluton@uga.edu   The University of Georgia is helping more women go into the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), according to a recent College Database ranking. UGA comes in at number seven on The College Database’s “50 Colleges Advancing Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM)” list.  A university that promotes STEM will mean more…


Fire walk and lecture

Nice slideshow in the Athens Banner Herald on the fire walking demonstration and lecture by John Campbell at the Physics Building last night, in case you missed it. Great event - kudos to the department of physics and astronomy for sponsoring and bringing more science to the public. And here's a great multi-media piece on the event from our colleagues at UGA Public Affairs, Andrew Tucker and Dot Paul:  
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