The 天美影院 149th Commencement is scheduled for Saturday, June 8, at Alaska Airlines Field at Husky Stadium. This year, the 天美影院will recognize best-selling author Daniel James Brown and Susan Solomon, a professor of environmental science and chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Both will receive honorary degrees for their contributions to the humanities and sciences.
A detailed reconstruction of climate during the most recent ice age, when a large swath of North America was covered in ice, provides information on the relationship between CO2 and global temperature. Results show that while most future warming estimates remain unchanged, the absolute worst-case scenario is unlikely.
The 天美影院 has been named one of the world鈥檚 top universities, according to the QS World University Rankings by Subject released Wednesday.
Forests could also be potential bulwarks against climate change. But, increasingly severe droughts and wildfires, invasive species, and large insect outbreaks 鈥� all intensified by climate change 鈥� are straining many national forests and surrounding lands. A report by a team of 40 experts outlines a new approach to forest stewardship that 鈥渂raids together鈥� Indigenous knowledge and Western science to conserve and restore more resilient forestlands. Published March 25, the report provides foundational material to inform future work on climate-smart adaptive management practices for USDA Forest Service land managers.
天美影院 researchers have shown that levels of anisakid worms — a common marine parasite — rose in two salmon species in the Gulf of Alaska and Bristol Bay over a 42-year period. The team discovered this by studying salmon caught, killed and canned from 1979 to 2021. Since anisakid worms have a complex life cycle involving multiple types of hosts, the researchers interpret their rising numbers as a potential sign of ecosystem recovery, possibly driven by rising numbers of marine mammals thanks to the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act.
Baptiste Journaux, a 天美影院faculty member in Earth and space sciences, and four graduate students will travel to Arkansas on Monday to view the total solar eclipse. They will use a special telescope to capture images of solar features that can be viewed most clearly during an eclipse.聽
Could life be found in frozen sea spray emitted from moons orbiting Saturn or Jupiter? New research finds that life can be detected in a single ice grain containing one bacterial cell or portions of a cell. The results suggest that if life similar to that on Earth exists on these planetary bodies, this life should be detectable by instruments launching in the fall.
An AI-powered analysis of 25 years of satellite images yields the surprising finding that methane emissions in Turkmenistan, a former Soviet republic and major oil-producing region, actually increased in the years following the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Cherry trees on the 天美影院鈥檚 Seattle campus are waking up and getting ready to say hello. For the 29 iconic Yoshino cherry trees in the 天美影院Quad, peak bloom will likely begin after March 20.
Natural history museums have entered a new stage of discovery and accessibility 鈥� one where scientists around the globe and curious folks at home can access valuable museum specimens to study, learn or just be amazed. This new era follows the completion of openVertebrate, or oVert, a five-year collaborative project among 18 institutions to create 3D reconstructions of vertebrate specimens and make them freely available online. The team behind this endeavor, which includes scientists at the 天美影院 and its Burke Museum of Natural History & Culture, published a summary of the project March 6 in the journal BioScience, offering a glimpse of how the data can be used to ask new questions and spur the development of innovative technology.
New research documents the fastest-known large-scale breakage along an Antarctic ice shelf. In 2012, a 6.5-mile crack formed in about 5 and a half minutes, showing that ice shelves can effectively shatter, though the speed of breakage is reduced by seawater rushing in. These results can help improve ice-sheet models and projections for future sea level rise.
Scientists at Friday Harbor Laboratories, a 天美影院 facility in the San Juan Islands, are working to help sunflower stars 鈥� a type of sea star 鈥� grow and thrive once again after their populations along the West Coast were devastated by a mysterious disease called sea star wasting syndrome.
Scientists at the 天美影院 have discovered that nighttime air pollution 鈥� coming primarily from car exhaust and power plant emissions 鈥� is responsible for a major drop in nighttime pollinator activity. Nitrate radicals (NO3) in the air degrade the scent chemicals released by a common wildflower, drastically reducing the scent-based cues that its chief pollinators rely on to locate the flower. The findings, published Feb. 9 in Science, are the first to show how nighttime pollution creates a chain of chemical reactions that degrades scent cues, leaving flowers undetectable by smell. The researchers also determined that pollution likely has worldwide impacts on pollination.
New research confirms the cause of slow slip along the Cascadia Subduction Zone and other faults that is accompanied by intermittent tremors or “pops” at the surface. Co-authors Marine Denolle and Joan Gomberg discuss the role of fluid-driven fracturing deep underground.
Field observations from an unusual lake show that in environments known as 鈥渟oda lakes鈥� phosphate can concentrate at the very high levels needed for the basic molecules of life to emerge. A shallow, salty lake in western Canada gives new support to Charles Darwin鈥檚 idea that life could have emerged in a 鈥渨arm little pond.鈥�
Two 天美影院professors teamed up to study how climate change will affect predator-prey interactions in snowy landscapes. Together with a group of researchers, the two measured snow properties that led to a “danger zone,” where prey would sink but predators would not.
Three new faculty books from the 天美影院 cover wide-ranging topics: life in the Rio Grande Valley, fossils of Washington state and the colonial roots of contemporary intersex medicine. 天美影院News talked with the authors to learn more. Collection highlights life in Rio Grande Valley 鈥淧uro Pinche True Fictions鈥� is a collection of short stories and comics from Jos茅 Alaniz, professor of Slavic languages and literature at the UW. The works are mostly set in the Rio Grande Valley…
Around Anchorage, communications among the critically endangered population of Cook Inlet beluga whales聽may be masked by ship noise in their core critical habitat, accordingly to the first repertoire of their calls.
The 天美影院 is proud to announce that more than 40 faculty and researchers who completed their work while at 天美影院have been named on the annual Highly Cited Researchers 2023 list from Clarivate.
Two 天美影院 geophysicists will travel to the Atacama Desert in Chile this month to study a fault system that’s similar to the Seattle Fault in Puget Sound, but in a much different climate that makes it easier to monitor its effects on the landscape.
Three 天美影院experts are among the authors of the newly released Fifth National Climate Assessment, an overview of climate trends, impacts and efforts to mitigate and adapt to climate change across the nation.
Six 天美影院 subjects ranked in the top 10, and atmospheric sciences maintained its position as No. 1 in the world on the聽Global Ranking of Academic Subjects聽list for 2023. The ranking, released at the end of October, was conducted by researchers at the ShanghaiRanking Consultancy, a fully independent organization dedicated to research on higher education intelligence and consultation.
To paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of declining phytoplankton in the North Atlantic may have been greatly exaggerated. Analysis of a Greenland ice core going back 800 years shows that atmospheric chemistry, not dwindling phytoplankton populations, explains the recent ice core trends.
The New York Climate Exchange, a first-of-its-kind organization working to implement innovative climate solutions in New York City and across the globe, on Nov. 9 announced Stephen Hammer as its founding chief executive officer. The 天美影院 is a core member of the exchange.
Five 天美影院 experts comment on the current El Ni帽o, its effect on Pacific Northwest winter weather, as well as on regional and global ocean temperature trends.
A project led by the 天美影院used genetic sleuthing to study how salmon were affected by two major culvert replacements near the city of Bellingham. One project, a major upgrade under Interstate-5, had a big impact, while the other old culvert may have been less of a barrier to fish. Authors from the 天美影院and NOAA are studying the use of eDNA in future environmental impact reporting.
The National Science Foundation has awarded the 天美影院 $52.4 million over five years to continue operating the Regional Cabled Array, a cabled deep-ocean observatory about 300 miles offshore from Newport, Oregon. The grant is part of a $220 million total investment that will fund the internet-connected ocean observatory, known as the Ocean Observatories Initiative, through 2028.
The American Geophysical Union announced Sept. 13 that five 天美影院 faculty members have been elected as new fellows, representing the departments of astronomy, Earth and space sciences, oceanography, global health, and environmental and occupational health sciences.
The frigid ocean surrounding Antarctica is home to much of the region’s photosynthetic life. A new 天美影院 study provides the first measurements of how sea-ice algae and other single-celled life handle dramatic seasonal swings, offering clues to how this ecosystem might adapt to climate change.
The 天美影院 is a lead partner on a new multi-institution earthquake research center that will study the Cascadia subduction zone and bolster earthquake preparedness in the Pacific Northwest and beyond.
A new paper from the 天美影院and Polar Bears International quantifies the relationship between greenhouse gas emissions and the survival of polar bear populations. The paper combines past research and new analysis to provide a quantitative link between greenhouse gas emissions and polar bear survival rates.
Researchers with the 天美影院 and the U.S. Forest Service have developed a new tool, REBURN, that can simulate large forest landscapes and wildfire dynamics over decades or centuries under different wildfire management strategies. The model can simulate the consequences of extinguishing all wildfires regardless of size, which was done for much of the 20th century and has contributed to a rise in large and severe wildfires, or of allowing certain fires to return to uninhabited areas to help create a more “patchwork” forest structure that can help lessen fire severity. REBURN can also simulate conditions where more benign forest landscape dynamics have fully recovered in an area.
Twenty-five undergraduates are among the participants on a 41-day cruise off the Oregon coast aboard the UW’s large research vessel, the R/V Thomas G. Thompson. Principal investigator Deborah Kelley, professor of oceanography, answers questions about the expedition to visit and maintain the cabled ocean observatory.
New research led by the 天美影院 uses data collected by coastal residents along beaches from central California to Alaska to understand how seabirds have fared in recent decades. The paper, published July 6 in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series, shows that persistent marine heat waves lead to massive seabird die-offs months later.
Three new faculty books from the 天美影院 cover wide-ranging topics: oysters, the moral contradictions of religion, and Cherokee creature names and environmental relationships.
Two years after the Pacific Northwest heat dome 鈥� the deadliest weather-related disaster in state history 鈥� a collaborative effort has drawn up recommendations for how people and groups across the state could prevent future heat-related illness and save lives. The effort involves a report led by the 天美影院Climate Impacts Group and an interactive risk-mapping tool led by the 天美影院Center for Health and the Global Environment,
An international team including a 天美影院scientist found that the water on one of Saturn鈥檚 moons harbors phosphates, a key building block of life. The team used data from NASA鈥檚 Cassini space mission to detect evidence of phosphates in particles ejected from the ice-covered global ocean of Saturn鈥檚 moon Enceladus.
New research shows that in Washington state, the presence of two apex predators 鈥� wolves and cougars 鈥� does indeed help keep populations of two smaller predators in check. But by and large the apex predators were not killing and eating the smaller predators, known as mesopredators. Instead, they drove the two mesopredator species 鈥� bobcats and coyotes 鈥� into areas with higher levels of human activity. And people were finishing the job.
The 天美影院鈥檚 graduate and professional degree programs were widely recognized as among the best in the nation, according to聽U.S. News & World Report鈥檚 2024 Best Graduate Schools聽rankings released late Monday.
天美影院will be a core member of a consortium led by Stony Brook University that will build and operate The New York Climate Exchange 鈥� a carbon-neutral international hub focused on climate action and adaptation