Year: 2011

The reason Volkswagen’s Star Wars-themed Super Bowl ad featuring a lovable little Darth Vader worked so well may lie in its narrative complexity, says Vanderbilt marketing professor Jennifer Escalas. Read More

Karoly Mirnics and Krassimira Garbett, staff scientist in his laboratory (Susan Urmy / Vanderbilt). I arrived in the states 21 years ago as a student, from what was to become the war-torn country of Yugoslavia. Twenty-one years later I am holding a title of James G. Blakemore Chair and vice… Read More

New research from the National Center on Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College finds teacher salaries have significant consequences on school staffing and workforce quality. Read More

Vanderbilt researchers provide new information about how the genome inside our cellular “power plants” – the mitochondria – has evolved. Read More

Watch video of Bruce McCandliss, the Patricia and Rodes Hart Chair of Psychology and Human Development, speaking at the Commencement 2011 Faculty Seminars. McCandliss carries out research that seeks to connect our understanding about changes in children’s brain structure and function to specific aspects of education. This work asks questions… Read More

Watch video of G. Kane Jennings, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, speaking at the Commencement 2011 Faculty Seminars. He received his B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Auburn University in 1993, his M.S. in Chemical Engineering Practice from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1996, and his Ph.D. in Chemical… Read More

Watch video of James Maiello, senior lecturer in music at Blair, speaking at the Commencement 2011 Faculty Seminars. Maiello’s research interests include plainchant, medieval and Renaissance music, and the philosophy of music education. In addition to presenting research at both musicology and interdisciplinary conferences in the U.S. and Europe, his… Read More

Watch video of Edward Fischer, professor of anthropology and director of the Center for Latin American Studies, speaking at the Commencement 2011 Faculty Seminars. Professor Fischer has an impressive list of scholarly articles and has written or edited seven books, including Cultural Logics and Global Economies: Maya Identity in Thought and… Read More

In 2007, Vanderbilt students, faculty and staff retraced the 1961 Freedom Rides with some of the original Freedom Riders as they traveled to Montgomery and Birmingham, Ala. Among the participants was Congressman John Lewis, Diane Nash, Bernard Lafayette, the Rev. C.T. Vivian, Jim Zwerg, John Seigenthaler and the Rev. James… Read More

Vanderbilt researchers hope to uncover the mysteries of early aging in Down syndrome through a new study at the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center. Read More

Watch video from the May 4 Thinking Out of the Lunchbox event. Mark Schoenfield, professor of English, spoke on “Love, Death, and Form in the Modern Sonnet.” Since the Renaissance, the sonnet has been an especially beloved form for the writers and readers of English poetry, and if these 14… Read More

Watch video of Vanderbilt University’s class of 2011 Commencement ceremony. About 2,843 graduates were expected to attend Commencement. Degrees were scheduled to be awarded to 1,734 undergraduate and 1,904 graduate students. The main ceremony, featuring the annual address to graduates from Chancellor Zeppos, was moved to Memorial Gym due to… Read More

Watch video of Wangari Maathai, the 2004 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize and founder of the environmentally conscious Green Belt Movement, receiving Vanderbilt University’s prestigious Nichols-Chancellor’s Medal May 12 during Senior Day. The Nichols-Chancellor’s Medal, which includes a cash prize, is one of the university’s highest honors and is… Read More

Representative Phil Roe (R-TN) chatting with Prof. Sandra Rosenthal, front, graduate student Scott Niezgoda and Christina West, assistant vice chancellor of federal relations, in Washington D.C. at the 17th annual CNSF Exhibition & Reception. (David Scavone) Last Wednesday, Sandra Rosenthal and Scott Niezgoda accepted the invitation… Read More

The cellular factor Src helps reoviruses enter cells. Read More

Nobel Prize winner, Green Belt Movement founder, and this year’s recipient of the Nichols-Chancellor’s medal Wangari Maathai gave students an inspirational call to action at Senior Day. Hear from Maathai and the graduates. Read more >> [vucastblurb]  … Read More

Protein supplements often recommended after gastric bypass surgery may actually have undesirable metabolic effects, suggests a recent study led by Ronald Clements in the Vanderbilt Center for Surgical Weight Loss. Read More

Vanderbilt University’s acquisition of a 900 megahertz nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectrometer will accelerate studies on cancer and Alzheimer’s disease. Read More

The question of whether new discoveries about the human genome will cause racism to fizzle or flare was the topic of the two recent discussions at Vanderbilt. Read More

Listen to an interview with Robin Jensen, Luce Chancellor’s Professor of the History of Christian Art and Worship. This is part of a series of interviews with Vanderbilt University Divinity School faculty. Interviewed by Chris Benda, Divinity School librarian.      … Read More