Experts in the News

This story about three alumni from Ohio Northern University's School of Science, Technology, and Mathematics who are making a mark in the world of physics and mathematics include Matthew Golden, who is now a postdoctoral researcher in the School of Physics. Golden's research in the Extreme Astrophysics lab focuses on the interface of machine learning and physics.

Chemical disequilibrium quantified using the available free energy has previously been proposed as a potential biosignature. However, researchers remotely sensing exoplanet biosignatures have not yet investigated how observational uncertainties impact the ability to infer a life-generated available free energy. This study's researchers pair an atmospheric retrieval tool to a thermodynamics model to assess the detectability of chemical disequilibrium signatures of Earth-like exoplanets, focusing on the Proterozoic eon when the atmospheric abundances of oxygen–methane disequilibrium pairs may have been relatively high. One of the study's authors is Chris Reinhard, associate professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. 

Expedition cruises are the choice of adventurous, nature-loving and sustainability minded passengers who want to visit remote places, while also having a luxury experience. The locations of these expeditions are often threatened by climate change, giving travellers a chance to see endangered landscapes or species, possibly before they disappear. But burning fossil fuels to visit threatened environments definitely feels ironic. The desire to witness these endangered landscapes like Greenland, which is experiencing record melting, is sometimes labelled “last-chance tourism.” Meghana Ranganathan, a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, is quoted in this article 

By lassoing lizards, putting tiny chips on their legs, and tracking them for three years, Georgia Tech’s James Stroud revealed why species often appear unchanged for millions of years despite Charles Darwin’s theory of constant evolution. Darwin said that evolution was constantly happening, causing animals to adapt for survival. But many of his contemporaries disagreed. Everything changed in the past 40 years, when an explosion of evolutionary studies proved that evolution can and does occur rapidly — even from one generation to the next. Evolutionary biologists were thrilled, but the findings reinforced the same paradox: If evolution can happen so fast, then why do most species on Earth continue to appear the same for many millions of years? Stroud, an assistant professor in the School of Biological Sciences, set out to investigate it. (This research was also covered at Scientific American, Study Finds, India Education Diary, BNN Breaking, SciTechDaily, ScienceDaily, Earth.com, and Washington University/St. Louis.) 

Silicon has long reigned as the material of choice for the microchips that power everything in the digital age, from AI to military drones. Silicon chips have been bumping against the limits of miniaturization for years, dividing chip makers on whether Moore’s law, the longstanding assumption that transistors will steadily get smaller and computers more powerful, is already dead. But the global semiconductor industry is still under just as much pressure to produce ever more powerful chips, and keep up the pace of technological progress. This month, researchers at Georgia Tech, led by Walter de Heer, Regents' Professor in the School of Physics, created the world’s first functional graphene-based semiconductor, marking what de Heer dubbed a “Wright brothers moment” for the next-generation materials that could make up the electronic devices of the future.  (This research was also covered at Physics World, Tech Briefs, TechSpot, Freethink, McGill Daily, and Fudzilla.)

What a strain is and how many strains make up a natural bacterial population remain elusive concepts despite their apparent importance for assessing the role of intra-population diversity in disease emergence or response to environmental perturbations. A research team sequenced 138 randomly selected Salinibacter ruber isolates from two solar salterns and assessed these genomes against companion short-read metagenomes from the same samples. In its paper published in Nature Communications, the team says its methodology and ANI thresholds outlined should represent a useful guide for future microdiversity surveys of additional microbial species. The researcher include Ph.D. Scholar Roth E. Conrad and Professor Kostas Konstantinidis, both in the School of Biological Sciences. Konstantinidis is also the Richard C. Tucker Professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering. 

The pandemic changed how we work and how we think about commuting. Workers are now more likely to see the daily commute as part of their workday. In this episode of WBUR Radio's On Point program, panelists are asked if employees should get paid for their commute. Included on the panel is Christopher Wiese, assistant professor of industrial/organizational psychology in the School of Psychology. 

School of Biological Sciences students are currently getting a taste of a New Zealand summer during their studies. The students are participating in the Pacific Study Abroad Program in Biology. They are spending the first six weeks in Dunedin, staying at Hayward College, and will spend a second six-week block in Australia. It is part of their spring semester program, and they will take classes in subjects such as physics, public policy and conservation biology. Professor Michael Goodisman said Georgia Tech brought over its own faculty lecturers. When they're not studying, the students and faculty will get a chance to explore New Zealand and Australia during the weekends. 

In the 21st century, there is a need to develop electronic devices that are both smaller and faster, whether for applications in the medical sector or robotics. Experts have been busy working on producing advanced materials for modern electronic devices to meet this demand. A significant milestone in this endeavor has been achieved by a team of researchers at Georgia Tech, who have successfully engineered the world's first functional semiconductor using graphene. "To me, this is like a Wright brothers moment," said Walter de Heer, Regents' Professor in the School of Physics, who led this development. Silicon, commonly used in semiconductors, is nearing its limits in the face of increased demand for quicker processing and smaller electronic devices. Graphene is a two-dimensional honeycomb-like structure formed by a single layer of carbon atoms organized in a hexagonal lattice. It is well-known for having strong electrical conductivity, mechanical strength, and flexibility. "It's an extremely robust material, one that can handle very large currents and can do so without heating up and falling apart," said de Heer. (This story was also covered at Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, Fox5 Atlanta, LiveScience, ScienceDaily, Semiconductor Engineering, Chemistry World, Global Times, ScienceX, The Print, New Scientist, Technology Networks, Tom's Hardware, South China Morning Post, AZO Nano, SystemTek, Gearrice, Connexionblog, Innovation News Network, EENews, Medriva, MintLounge, Engineering and Technology, Inceptive Mind, BNN Breaking, Cosmos Magazine, TechXplore, JagranJosh, ABPLive, ChinaDaily, WinBuzzer, and Sportskeeda. ) 

Unlike some pretty metal plants that thrive in the darkness, yeast generally doesn’t function well in the light. This fungi turns carbohydrates into ingredients for beer or bread when left to ferment in the dark. It must be stored in dark dry places, as exposure to light can keep fermentation from happening all together. However, a group of School of Biological Sciences researchers have engineered a strain of yeast that may actually work better with light that could give these fungi an evolutionary boost in a simple way. The findings are described in a study published January 12 in the journal Current Biology. Co-authors are Research Scientist Anthony Burnetti, Ph.D. Scholar Autumn Peterson, Associate Professor and Co-Director of the Interdisciplinary Ph.D. in Quantitative Biosciences William Ratcliff, and Carina Baskett, Head of Grant Writing and Trainee Development for Georgia Tech's Center for Microbial Dynamics and Infection. (This research was also covered at Technology Networks, New Atlas, ScienceDaily, Interesting Engineering, Biofuels Digest, Infobae, and Phys.org.)

Spring, summer, fall and winter – the seasons on Earth change every few months, around the same time every year. It’s easy to take this cycle for granted here on Earth, but not every planet has a regular change in seasons. So why does Earth have regular seasons when other planets don’t? Gongjie Li, assistant professor in the School of Physics, explains about axial tilts of planets, which have big implications for everything from seasons to glacier cycles, since that tilt can determine just how much sun a planet will get. The magnitude of that tilt can even determine whether a planet is habitable to life. (This article by Li was also reprinted in in IFL Science, Qrius, and the Longmont (Colorado) Leader.) 

In the cosmos, the rhythm of seasons is a dance choreographed by the distinct axial tilt of each planet. The study of these celestial ballets has been the focus of astrophysicist Gongjie Li, assistant professor in the School of Physics. Funded by NASA, Li’s research delves into the reasons behind seasonal patterns, centering on the effects of a planet’s axial tilt or obliquity. Earth has an axis tilted about 23 degrees from vertical, a feature that triggers the varying intensity of sunlight across different hemispheres, resulting in changing seasons. Li articulates that planets ideally aligned axially with their orbit around the sun, assuming a circular orbit, wouldn’t bear witness to seasons due to a constant influx of sunlight.