Experts in the News

Plants, like animals and people, seek refuge from climate change. And when they move, they take ecosystems with them. To understand why and how plants have trekked across landscapes throughout time, researchers are calling for a new framework. The key to protecting biodiversity in the future may be understanding the past. Jenny McGuire, assistant professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences and the School of Biological Sciences, spearheaded a U.S. National Science Foundation-supported paper on the topic in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. McGuire and her collaborators highlight the outstanding needs for successful future conservation efforts. The paper brings together conservation research that illuminates the complex and constantly evolving dynamics brought on by climate change and the ever-shifting ways humans use land. These factors, McGuire said, interact over time to create dynamic changes and illustrate the need to incorporate time perspectives into conservation strategies by looking deep into the past. (This research was also covered in Time Magazine.)

A small but growing group of researchers is working to make science more accessible to scientists with limited vision. Innovative software and modes of presentation are helping to broaden access to scientific literature. Sonification provides a way for scientists with visual limitations to "see" data; by translating numerical values into sounds with certain parameters — for example, a star’s brightness might be encoded as pitch — researchers can home in on important changes. Highcharts, a charting library service, developed its free tool for exploring charts with sonification at Georgia Tech's Sonification Lab, an interdisciplinary research group based in the School of Psychology and the School of Interactive Computing.

Even if you failed chemistry in high school, there is guaranteed to be something that sparks your intrigue at the Atlanta Science Festival. With over 150 events taking place across the city leading up to one big scientific soiree in Piedmont Park, dive into myriad topics, from coding to astronomy, and enjoy the fresh air. Several College of Sciences faculty, staff, and students are taking part in many of the events. The Champion Newspaper in DeKalb County also previews the festival, as does the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. (More information on the Atlanta Science Festival can be found here.) 

A School of Mathematics alumna has been elected as the new chief insurance officer for GuideStone, which provides retirement solutions, insurance coverage and investment products and services to churches, ministries, organizations and institutions as well as ministry-minded individuals. Nadeena Kersey, B.S. MATH, will provide executive leadership and oversight to the insurance line of business, including product development, sales and marketing, services and operations of life and health plans, property and casualty coverage and ancillary products.

Even if you failed chemistry in high school, there is guaranteed to be something that sparks your intrigue at the Atlanta Science Festival. With over 150 events taking place across the city leading up to one big scientific soiree in Piedmont Park, dive into myriad topics, from coding to astronomy, and enjoy the fresh air. Several College of Sciences faculty, staff, and students are taking part in many of the events. The Champion Newspaper in DeKalb County also previews the festival, as does the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. (More information on the Atlanta Science Festival can be found here.) 

A School of Mathematics alumna has been elected as the new chief insurance officer for GuideStone, which provides retirement solutions, insurance coverage and investment products and services to churches, ministries, organizations and institutions as well as ministry-minded individuals. Nadeena Kersey, B.S. MATH, will provide executive leadership and oversight to the insurance line of business, including product development, sales and marketing, services and operations of life and health plans, property and casualty coverage and ancillary products.

Even as some parts of West Antarctica rapidly melt, raising sea level, large swaths of the ice remain stable for the time being. Scientists have now explored one of those stable spots — an isolated nook where the ocean meets the ice. This environment is “really at the edge” between melting and freezing, says Justin Lawrence, Ph.D. student with the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. The delicate balance between these two processes is shaping the ice into those strange textures, and the result, at Kamb Ice Stream, is that massive cracks in the underside of the ice appear to be freezing back together. Ben Hurwitz, Ph.D. student in Ocean Science and Engineering, and Anthony Spears, Ph.D. student with the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, also contributed to the study, published in Nature Geoscience. (The study was also covered at Astrobiology.com, AZO Robotics, Eos, and India Education Daily.) 

Even as some parts of West Antarctica rapidly melt, raising sea level, large swaths of the ice remain stable for the time being. Scientists have now explored one of those stable spots — an isolated nook where the ocean meets the ice. This environment is “really at the edge” between melting and freezing, says Justin Lawrence, Ph.D. student with the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. The delicate balance between these two processes is shaping the ice into those strange textures, and the result, at Kamb Ice Stream, is that massive cracks in the underside of the ice appear to be freezing back together. Ben Hurwitz, Ph.D. student in Ocean Science and Engineering, and Anthony Spears, Ph.D. student with the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, also contributed to the study, published in Nature Geoscience. (The study was also covered at Astrobiology.com, AZO Robotics, Eos, and India Education Daily.) 

Billions of years ago, before there were beasts, bacteria or any living organism, there were RNAs. These molecules were probably swirling around with amino acids and other rudimentary biomolecules, merging and diverging, on an otherwise lifeless crucible of a planet. Did one of those biomolecules lead to the development of 'protoribosomes' that would work their magic to kickstart life on early Earth? An Israeli biologist won a share of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for that theory. That scientist and another in Japan say they're closing in on building that protoribosome in their labs. Nature asked scientists to weigh in on that prospect, and one of them is Anton Petrov, research scientist and evolutionary biologist in the School of Biological Sciences and the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry. Petrov is also a member of Georgia Tech's Center for the Origins of Life (COOL).

Billions of years ago, before there were beasts, bacteria or any living organism, there were RNAs. These molecules were probably swirling around with amino acids and other rudimentary biomolecules, merging and diverging, on an otherwise lifeless crucible of a planet. Did one of those biomolecules lead to the development of 'protoribosomes' that would work their magic to kickstart life on early Earth? An Israeli biologist won a share of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for that theory. That scientist and another in Japan say they're closing in on building that protoribosome in their labs. Nature asked scientists to weigh in on that prospect, and one of them is Anton Petrov, research scientist and evolutionary biologist in the School of Biological Sciences and the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry. Petrov is also a member of Georgia Tech's Center for the Origins of Life (COOL).

Can washing your hands help stop the evolution of antibiotic resistance? Mathematically, it’s possible. While bacteria that are more sensitive to the antibiotics are killed off, those that are able to survive will continue to reproduce with less competition. This results in increasing abundance of resistant bacteria that can undermine the effectiveness of the antibiotic. Kristofer Wollein Waldetoft is a postdoctoral fellow in infection medicine for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and the School of Biological Sciences who researches in the lab of Sam Brown, professor and member of the Center for Microbial Dynamics and Infection. Woldetoft collaborated with Brown and other colleagues to develop a mathematical model of antibiotic resistance evolution to learn the role hygiene plays in that process.

Can washing your hands help stop the evolution of antibiotic resistance? Mathematically, it’s possible. While bacteria that are more sensitive to the antibiotics are killed off, those that are able to survive will continue to reproduce with less competition. This results in increasing abundance of resistant bacteria that can undermine the effectiveness of the antibiotic. Kristofer Wollein Waldetoft is a postdoctoral fellow in infection medicine for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and the School of Biological Sciences who researches in the lab of Sam Brown, professor and member of the Center for Microbial Dynamics and Infection. Woldetoft collaborated with Brown and other colleagues to develop a mathematical model of antibiotic resistance evolution to learn the role hygiene plays in that process.