2025-02-18
- CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Lisa Ainsworth has been named Director of the internationally acclaimed Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency project, which is led by the University of Illinois.
"Lisa is pre-eminent in the fields of crop sciences and plant biology, continually leading IGB's research...
2025-02-17 - Seven alumni of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences will receive recognition during the college’s 2025 alumni awards at a celebration in April. They are researchers, volunteers, and political thinkers who have made incredible impacts in their fields and communities. Doug Schemske (BS, '70; MS, '72; PhD, '77, zoology) Doug Schemske...
2025-02-12 - The 42nd Annual Insect Fear Film Festival (IFFF) will be held on Saturday, February 22, 2025, at Foellinger Auditorium, on the campus of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Hosted by the Entomology Graduate Students Association in the Department of Entomology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, this year's theme is Tarantulas: Hairy, Scary Spiders...
2025-02-10 - The College of LAS has selected 16 professors, graduate students, lecturers, and advisors as the recipients of the 2025 teaching and advising rewards. Additionally, earlier in the year the college announced it was recognizing seven staff members and academic professionals for their outstanding professional contributions. "We are honored and fortunate to have so many amazing teachers and...
2025-02-03 - After decades of impactful and prolific research, two photosynthesis trailblazers are passing the torch, Stephen Long and Donald Ort are retiring from their leadership roles for the Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE) project at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. They have created a legacy...
2025-01-31 - At this year’s Society for Integrative & Comparative Biology (SICB) Conference, Entomology Assistant Professor Marianne Alleyne and graduate student Yutao Chen showcased their research on the unique properties of insect wings. Their work, part of Yutao's graduate studies, explores how microscopic...
2025-01-27 - A University of Illinois team recently published new research in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences based on their ongoing work on Barro Colorado Island (BCI), a key research site in the Panama Canal's Gatun Lake. Their new paper discusses the important question of how tropical...
2025-01-25 - Nitrous oxide (N2O) has long been agriculture’s sustainability Achilles heel. While only making up 6% of U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, N2O has 300 times the heat-trapping ability ofcarbon dioxide (CO2) and stays in the atmosphere for about 100 years. This greenhouse gas is produced by soil microbes whose activity depends on ...
2025-01-13 - A story 60 years in the making ended recently with a peculiar occurrence at the College of LAS winter convocation in December: The final bachelor’s degree recipient to cross the stage was bestowed with a bachelor’s degree in zoology, which hadn’t happened since the 1970s when the Department of Zoology was renamed (it now exists as the ...
2024-12-23 - The Royal Entomological Society (RES) shared its journal award winners from the 2021-2023 publication years. These awards are dedicated to the best articles led by early career entomologists. Amongst the winners is the Entomology Department’s Assistant...
2024-12-18 - The Center for Advanced Study at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign has appointed seven new members to its permanent faculty. CAS professors are selected based on their outstanding scholarship, and the appointments are one of the highest forms of campus recognition at...
2024-12-17 - As global food demand continues to grow, researchers are exploring multiple strategies to boost crop productivity. While engineering plant enzymes and biochemical pathways that are more efficient remains a transformative goal, this review highlights another promising approach: increasing Rubisco content. Rubisco is the plant enzyme that captures atmospheric CO2 and converts it into organic...
2024-12-04 - A team from the University of Illinois has engineered potato to be more resilient to global warming, showing 30% increases in tuber mass under heatwave conditions. This adaptation may provide greater food security for families dependent on potatoes, as these are often the same areas where the changing climate has already affected multiple crop seasons. “We need...-
2024-12-02 - Globally recognized as one of the most influential modern scientists, Elizabeth “Lisa” Ainsworth has been named Professor and C.A. Ewing Chair of Crop Physiology in the Department of Crop Sciences and the ...
2024-11-22 - A new greenhouse custom-designed to support research at the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (CABBI) is now open at the University of Illinois Research Park. The Plant Biology Innovation Greenhouse (PBIG) features unique cutting-edge capabilities that are already benefiting plant and microbial science researchers on the U. of I. campus. It will propel research by CABBI —...