Life Sciences
Ancestral Plants
Claude dePamphilis and colleagues trace the genetic roots of the Earth's most ancient flowering plants.
Guarding the henhouse
Penn State poultry scientists are a key part of the state's aggressive program to protect the state’s flocks—and $750 million in poultry profits—from outbreaks of avian flu.
Pandemic evolution?
The United States is braced to join the 51 or more nations coping with a virulent strain of bird flu. Will the H5N1 virus remain an avian disease—or will it make the leap to human transmission?
Venture Deep Ocean: Expedition five
Biology professor Charles Fisher is exploring the South Pacific.
Venture Deep Ocean: The expedition continues
Ridge 2000 leaves on a voyage to explore the South Pacific ocean floor.
Fishy Disappearance
Why is the oldest living animal in North America disappearing from Pennsylvania 's rivers? Patrick Barry is hoping to answer this question.
Invasive Procedure
When plum pox virus turned up in Pennsylvania, it took a team effort to save the state's fruit industry. The experience could turn out to be invaluable.
Pathways for Life
The genetic code of a particular resourceful microbe offers important clues to how Earth's earliest organisms dealt with profound environmental change.
Feeding the Diabetic Brain
Ian Simpson has made a career studying the balance between energy supply and demand in the brain. He's particularly interested in how diabetes disrupts that balance.
How Disease Spreads
Ottar Bjornstad has been studying the history of contagious diseases, such as measles and smallpox, to develop a risk-map that will predict future travel patterns of epidemics. He believes this is especially important in an age faced with the threat of bioterrorism.
Breath of the Forest
Scientists believe that forests effect the cleansing of the Earth's air by releasing carbon dioxide. Kenneth Davis is working to determine exactly where and at what rate carbon dioxide is being stored in—or given off by—forests.
Footloose Bucks
When do young male deer break away from their mothers? How far do they wander? To answer such questions, Penn State wildlife biologists have begun the largest study of deer dispersal ever undertaken.
Four-Legged Exercise
You could say that LaToya Carson, a Penn State kinesiology major, runs a gym for rats, but that would completely undervalue the importance of her job.
Filling in the Gaps
In its late stages, breast cancer has an 85% chance of invading other tissues, the majority of these being either bone or lung. Once in the bone, the cancer can no longer be surgically removed.
Bad Morning Glories
Every time Joel McNeal leaves the greenhouse, he must thoroughly check himself for any seeds trying to escape to the outside world. This is because the plant he is growing is responsible for millions of dollars of crop damage.
Living Lawns
Most research on suburban lawns has focused on pest management and aesthetic conditions, says Loren Byrne, who prefers to study the lawn as an ecosystem.
The Pistachio Man
When it comes to nuts, the obvious choice for Omid Harandi is pistachios. His study of the nuts genetics has generated extensive knowledge on its genome along with the possibility of new, future strains.
Going Deep
A mile and a half below the surface of the Pacific Ocean, underwater hot springs are home to some of the world's most exotic creatures. So biologist Charles Fisher and his students dove in to explore the sites and the communities that survive there.
Where Iron and Immunity Intersect
Most of us are familiar with anemia, in which a lack of iron causes pallid skin, dizziness, and shortness of breath. However, fewer of us know what happens when the body gets too much iron.
Wakes on Lakes
Noise and turbulence caused by boats is bothersome to lakefront property owners, but it also stirs up lakebed sediment that can inhibit plant growth and kill fish.
Listening for Bats
Professor Michael Gannon and his bravest students visit a seemingly unexciting Altoona church, had it not been for the colony of about 20,000 bats, one of the largest in the US , which resides in its attic.
The Waters of the Nile
Evidence suggests that Hierakonpolis may have been the first capital of unified Egypt. But before they dig for clues to this ancient culture, Penn State geosciences professors must investigate and resolve the problems posed by a rising local water table.
Know the Rules
Working with chemicals requires knowledge in one's area of study, but also of the rules that govern a lab. Eva S. Pell, a Penn State researcher, learns this the hard way when 50 cc of mercury, about 100 times that in a thermometer, is spilled in an adjacent lab.
A Healthy Red
Free radicals, the reactive form of oxygen, attack the body's health in a number of ways, the worst leading to cancer or heart disease. Wine, whose high concentration of antioxidants reduces free radicals, may be beneficial to your health.
Genetic Heritage
"Biogeographical ancestry is separate from cultural identity," states Carrie Pfaff, Penn State graduate student. Her research in uncovering a person's true genetic heritage is important not only on a personal level but also across a wider area of scientific study.
Chicken Keel Yield
Chicken keel could be the answer to osteoarthritis, a condition that affects 2 million adults in the U.S.