Hats on for Easter Island statues
How do you put a 13-ton hat on a giant statue? That's what a team of researchers is trying to figure out with their study of Easter Island statues and the red hats that sit atop some of them.
Research
Research
IST researcher's new book explores the world of 'digital refugees'
5/29/18
With nearly 100 million refugees and displaced persons around the world, a new book by Carleen Maitland, associate professor of information sciences and technology, explores how information and communication technologies are being used to provide humanitarian aid and connect refugees with family and friends.
Climate change forced zombie ant fungi to adapt
5/29/18
Zombie ants clamp on to aerial vegetation and hang for months spewing the spores of their parasitic fungi, but researchers noticed that they do not always clamp on to the same part of the plant. Now the researchers know that the choice of leaves or twigs is related to climate and that climate change forced the fungi to adapt to local conditions.
Posttraumatic stress affects academics
5/28/18
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) caused by traumatic military experiences is associated with feelings of anxiety, anger, sadness and/or guilt. New Penn State research is evaluating how PTSD symptoms increase risks for academic difficulties as well.
Reimagining manufacturing: Penn State campus paving way for industry's future
5/25/18
A Penn State New Kensington-led partnership including MIT and Arconic has been awarded one of 10 Clean Energy Smart Manufacturing Innovation Institute grants to study smart manufacturing initiatives throughout the United States.
New clues may help improve speech for people with ALS
5/25/18
New clues may help improve speech for people with dysarthria, a type of speech disorder commonly found in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
$2.3 million grant will fund research on oxytocin neurons and social behavior
5/24/18
A team of Penn State researchers is planning to create a new map of the brain that will establish a neural circuit diagram of oxytocin, a compound often associated with affection and emotional behavior. Researchers hope the map will give them insight into how oxytocin in the brain drives social behavior.
Alternative inflation rate may offer more accurate economic guidance
5/24/18
Estimates of inflation rates guide decisions on a range of policy moves, from cost-of-living adjustments in Social Security to whether interest rates should be raised or lowered. A team of economists are suggesting that the way housing rents are assessed in official inflation indexes may mean the actual inflation rate is inaccurate. They are working to create an alternative inflation rate index that addresses this inaccuracy.
Research supports restrictions on opioid-containing cold medicines for children
5/22/18
Prescription cough and cold medicines containing the opioid hydrocodone are more likely to cause serious side effects in children than those containing codeine, according to a new study from Penn State College of Medicine. The research supports recent U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) restrictions on prescription hydrocodone- and codeine-containing cough medicines for children and suggests that opioids in general should not be prescribed for coughs and colds in pediatric populations.
Ties between oral vocabulary and STEM difficulties to be investigated
5/21/18
Young children with early vocabulary difficulties in turn often have difficulty with reading during the primary grades. Penn State researchers will investigate if these oral vocabulary difficulties also lead to math and sciences difficulties throughout elementary school in a three-year, $1.5 million National Science Foundation-funded research project.
Flexible, highly efficient multimodal energy harvesting
5/21/18
A 10-fold increase in the ability to harvest mechanical and thermal energy over standard piezoelectric composites may be possible using a piezoelectric ceramic foam supported by a flexible polymer support, according to Penn State researchers.
Detective Work: An interdisciplinary dive into the history of American art
5/21/18
Maggie Davis doesn’t look like a detective. She doesn’t wear a trenchcoat, a fedora or carry a magnifying glass. But the art history major at Penn State is solving a mystery that dates back to the early years of the United States and the birth of the American artistic tradition.
IST doctoral student receives NASA Space Grant Graduate Fellowship
5/21/18
Scott Pezanowski, a doctoral candidate in the College of Information Sciences and Technology, has received the NASA Space Grant Graduate Fellowship given by the Pennsylvania Space Grant Consortium for 2018-2019. The mission of the program is to expand opportunities for Pennsylvanians to learn about and participate in NASA’s aeronautics and space programs by supporting and enhancing science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education, research and outreach programs.
Solar Turbines Inc. selects Penn State to establish center of excellence
5/18/18
After completing an extensive evaluation of institutions of higher learning, Solar Turbines Incorporated has chosen Penn State as a university partner to establish a center of excellence in gas turbines. The center involves numerous faculty across Penn State’s College of Engineering.
New research to identify what makes conversations supportive
5/18/18
Researchers from Penn State, the University of Mississippi and the University of Minnesota aim to clarify how conversations about everyday stressors convey support and how they lead to different emotional outcomes in a new three-year project funded by the National Science Foundation.
Mechanical force controls the speed of protein synthesis
5/16/18
As cells create proteins, the proteins modulate synthesis speed by exerting a mechanical force on the molecular machine that makes them, according to a team of scientists who used a combination of computational and experimental techniques to understand this force.