Featured Research

Researchers analyzed data from the Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) used by the George W. Bush administration to grade the effectiveness of federal programs. Read More

A brain-mapping study of patients with schizophrenia has found that areas associated with the ability to imitate are impaired, providing new support for the theory that deficits in this basic cognitive skill may underlie the profound difficulty with social interactions that characterize the disorder. Read More

An ultra-fast and ultra-small optical switch has been invented that could advance the day when photons replace electrons in the innards of consumer products ranging from cell phones to automobiles. Read More

The Vanderbilt Kennedy Center will serve as the lead site for a $500,000 grant focused on building capacity of faith communities, such as churches, mosques, synagogues and other religious organizations, to support employment for members with disabilities. Read More

Doctors and other health care workers need to be advocates for improving not just biological conditions, but also social ones, said the director of Vanderbilt University’s Center for Medicine, Health and Society. Read More

Vanderbilt University has been awarded a Cooperative Agreement with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and the Army Research Office that is worth up to $16.5 million over five years. Read More

Vanderbilt's LAPOP researchers say people who have been asked to pay a bribe or been the victim of a crime are more likely to leave their Central America homeland seeking a new life. Read More

The mechanical forces generated by the rhythmic expansion and contraction of cardiac muscle cells play an active role in the initial stage of heart valve formation. Read More

Premature babies who receive an interventional therapy combining their mother’s voice and a pacifier-activated music player learn to eat more efficiently and have their feeding tubes removed sooner than other preemies, according to a Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt study published today in… Read More

Soldiers in Afghanistan are experimenting with smartphones engineered to better protect operational data designed by scientists at Vanderbilt University’s Institute for Software Integrated Systems. Douglas Schmidt, professor of computer science, is quoted. Read More

Some scholars still believe that romantic love was invented by European troubadours in the Middle Ages, and that people outside of the western tradition don’t really experience it. Ted Fischer, professor of anthropology, decided to test that theory. The verdict? Everybody loves. Read More

When an Aztec child was born, soothsayers would consult the birth almanacs contained in codices to determine the most auspicious date to initiate the child into the Aztec community. Read More

Vanderbilt biologists have discovered that mosquito sperm have a “sense of smell” and that some of same chemicals that the mosquito can smell cause the sperm to swim harder. Read More

A study has found that the time it takes neural networks in the brain to make decisions is remarkably stable regardless of size: a finding that could make it easier to achieve the goal of the President's BRAIN Initiative established last spring. Read More

A Vanderbilt study is investigating whether therapy dogs can have a positive effect on children undergoing chemotherapy. Read More

It might be possible to generate a “metabolically healthy” state of obesity by targeting signaling pathways that improve insulin sensitivity. Read More

It may take repeated and varied exposure to anti-spear phishing messages before employees get the message, according to research. Read More

A Vanderbilt economist turned his expertise back onto his own discipline and has published a 15-year analysis of graduate economics education in the United States. Read More

According to annual figures available through the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Vanderbilt University School of Medicine (VUSM) is now ranked ninth in the nation among U.S. medical schools in total grant support provided through the nation’s medical research agency. Read More

Support for political tolerance remains strong in many Latin American and Caribbean nations, but in others a move in the opposite direction “represents alarming news,” concludes a study by Vanderbilt University’s Latin American Public Opinion Project. Read More