Life, Earth And Space

It is peak mosquito season, and while some lucky outdoor venturers seem unperturbed by the tiny insects, others appear to be relentlessly assaulted. Laurence Zwiebel, Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Biological Sciences, explains the most common culprits. Read More

A team of Vanderbilt researchers has provided important validation of maps of the brain at rest that may offer insights into changes in the brain that occur in neurological and psychiatric diseases. Read More

The reason dark matter, which makes up 85 percent of all the matter in the universe, is invisible could be because it possesses a rare, donut-shaped type of electromagnetism instead of the more exotic forces that have been proposed, according to an analysis of a pair of Vanderbilt theoretical physicists. Read More

A scientific team led by University of Louisville doctoral student Karen Collins has discovered a hot Saturn-like planet in another solar system 700 light years away. The discovery was made using inexpensive ground-based telescopes, including one specially designed to detect exoplanets and jointly operated by astronomers at Ohio State University and Vanderbilt University. Read More

A team of researchers, headed by Vanderbilt astronomer C. Robert O’Dell, has combined images from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope with images from ground-based telescopes to reconstruct the three-dimensional shape of the iconic nebula with unprecedented precision. In the process, they determined that it is considerably different than previously thought. Read More

Scientists at the Large Hadron Collider, the world's most powerful particle accelerator, may have created the smallest drops of liquid made in the lab. Read More

Vanderbilt phylogeneticists examined the reasons why large-scale tree-of-life studies are producing contradictory results and have proposed a suite of novel techniques to resolve the contradictions. Read More

A team of Vanderbilt astronomers will play a key role in the planet-seeking space telescope that NASA has just approved and scheduled for launch in 2017. Read More

Vanderbilt researchers have figured out how to set the mosquito's heart racing, helping them understand how the insect's immune system works and the methods that mosquito-borne parasites like those that cause malaria and yellow fever employ to circumvent it. Read More

This year the Fisk–Vanderbilt Master’s-to-Ph.D. Bridge program, directed by Keivan Stassun, professor of astronomy, will become the nation’s No. 1 producer of minority Ph.D. recipients in physics, astronomy and materials science. Read More

Samuel Friedman, a senior from Plymouth, Ma., majoring in molecular and cellular biology, recently won a Victoria Finnerty Undergraduate Travel Award from the Genetics Society of America. The award allowed Friedman to present his research at the 54th Annual Drosophila Research Conference in Washington, D.C. Read More

According to Seth Bordenstein, assistant professor of biological sciences, studying Wolbachia has yielded some surprising new insights on microbial evolution that could help us understand, treat and prevent certain infectious diseases. "It's what gets me up every day and keeps me excited about doing this work." Read More

Douglas S. Hall, professor of physics and astronomy, emeritus, died March 16 after a brief illness. Hall was a distinguished astronomer and scientist credited with several significant discoveries. Read More

NASA has awarded $4.4 million to a collaboration of scientists at U.S. universities, including a Vanderbilt professor, and NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center to help build a 2.5-meter ultraviolet telescope called the Extreme Universe Space Observatory for deployment on the International Space Station in 2017. Read More

Two astronomers from Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech, sharing a car after a snowstorm canceled their flights home from a conference, put together everything they had learned at the conference during that snowy drive and worked out that a collision between two black holes could explain most of what is known of a violent episode in the Milky Way's past. Read More

Kelly Holley-Bockelmann, assistant professor of astronomy and physics, wraps up this three-part podcast series with an interview about her specialty, supermassive black holes. Read More

Disruption in the body’s circadian rhythm can lead not only to obesity, but can also increase the risk of diabetes and heart disease. That is the conclusion of the first study to show definitively that insulin activity is controlled by the body’s circadian biological clock. Read More

In today’s Academic Minute, Dr. Larisa DeSantis of Vanderbilt University reveals what North America’s largest predators were eating just before they died out. Read More

(iStock) The circadian clocks that control and influence dozens of basic biological processes have an unexpected “snooze button” that helps cells adapt to changes in their environment. A study by Vanderbilt University researchers published online Feb. 17 by the journal Nature provides compelling new evidence that at least some species… Read More

Two Vanderbilt professors were among the energy experts at the inaugural SEC Symposium, and Vanderbilt’s Aerospace Club represented the university in the SEC showcase. Read More