News Bureau

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Self-administered surveys are a vital tool for researchers who gather sensitive information about adolescents. But young people who provide untruthful answers on questionnaires as pranks have the potential to throw researchers' findings way off track, particularly studies that involve minority groups.

Ancient animal herders added to the ecological richness and diversity of the African savanna thousands of years ago – an effect that persists to the present day, a new study finds. The herders’ practice of penning their cattle, goats and sheep at night created nutrient-rich grassy glades, called hotspots, that still attract wildlife and have increased habitat diversity in the region, researchers report in the journal Nature.

A new exhibit at the U. of I.’s Spurlock Museum offers a glimpse of the artistic and spiritual legacy of the American Indian people who built Cahokia, a great, thousand-year-old urban center on the Mississippi River. “Cahokia’s Religion: The Art of Red Goddesses, Black Drink and the Underworld” displays artifacts recently returned from the St. Louis Art Museum, including three of more than a dozen red carved-stone goddesses that the Illinois State Archaeological Survey found in our excavations of this ancient metropolis. You can view these figures alongside other cultural objects that reveal a civilization’s core beliefs and values. 

“Hive” – a combination of 18-foot-tall inflatable sculptures and an immersive sound installation – is on view for the coming year at Krannert Art Musem.

Dozens of people buried in mass graves in an ancient mound in Cahokia, a pre-Columbian city in Illinois near present-day St. Louis, likely lived in or near Cahokia most of their lives, researchers report in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology. 

Some 27,000 years ago in central Belize, a giant sloth was thirsty. The region was arid, not like today’s steamy jungle. The Last Glacial Maximum had locked up much of Earth’s moisture in polar ice caps and glaciers. Water tables in the area were low.

The sloth, a beast that stood up to 4 meters tall, eventually found water – in a deep sinkhole with steep walls down to the water. That is where it took its final drink.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A 115-million-year-old fossilized wasp from northeast Brazil presents a baffling puzzle to researchers. The wasp's ovipositor, the organ through which it lays its eggs, looks a lot like those of present-day wasps that lay their eggs in figs. The problem, researchers say, is that figs arose about 65 million years after this wasp was alive.

50 million years ago in what is now northwestern Colorado, a katydid died, sank to the bottom of a lake and was quickly buried in fine sediments, where it remained until its compressed fossil was recovered in recent years. When researchers examined the fossil under a microscope, they saw that not only had many of the insect’s hard structures been preserved in the compressed shale, so had several internal organs and tissues, which are not normally fossilized.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - University of Illinois anthropology professor Ripan Malhi looks to DNA to tell the story of how ancient humans first came to the Americas and what happened to them once they were here.

James D. Anderson, the interim dean of the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, will become the dean effective Aug. 16.

James D. Anderson, the head of the department of education policy, organization and leadership and the executive associate dean for the College of Education, will become the interim dean of the College of Education effective Aug. 16.

Illinois education scholar and dean James Anderson will deliver the Center for Advanced Study Annual Lecture on the 14th Amendment and citizenship, immigration and national identity.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill - Andreas C. Cangellaris, the head of the department of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, has been chosen to be the next dean of the College of Engineering.

A Minute With™... computer science professor Sheldon H. Jacobson and collaborator Ruben A. Proano, a professor of industrial and systems engineering at the Rochester Institute of Technology

Like the dad in “Finding Nemo,” anemonefish fathers will do almost anything to support their offspring. Their parenting instincts are so strong that if you give a bachelor anemonefish a scoop of anemonefish eggs from an unrelated nest, he will care for them – constantly nipping at them to remove debris and fanning them with oxygen-rich waters – as if they were his own. (Any other fish would eat them, researchers say.)

A Minute With™... Stephen P. Long, Illinois' lead investigator on a new Energy Biosciences Institute

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Assembling chemicals can be like putting together a puzzle. University of Illinois chemists have developed a way of fitting the pieces together to more efficiently build complex molecules, beginning with a powerful and promising antioxidant.

A Minute With™... Steve Hilberg, the senior climatologist/meteorologist for the Midwestern Regional Climate Center

Anger-prone children may benefit most from caregivers who are sensitive to their emotional needs and behavioral cues, University of Illinois researchers Nancy McElwain and  Xi Chen found in a new study.

We spent last night in Yellowstone’s backcountry, at Grebe Lake, a lovely lake at the base of the Washburn Range. For most of the students, this was their first experience backpacking: carrying a tent, sleeping bag and food into the backcountry. They had to learn a few new skills, like how to hang food from a bear pole. Some also had to adjust emotionally to the idea of sleeping in the middle of grizzly country.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - In early 2014, just before Ebola surged in West Africa, leaders of Scientific Animations Without Borders visited with faculty and students at Njala University in Sierra Leone. The SAWBO team was looking for potential collaborators to help create and distribute its animated health and agricultural videos in Sierra Leone. A few months later, the Njala students asked SAWBO to work with them on animated videos about Ebola.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Animation is a proven vehicle for biting comedy, a la "The Simpsons" and "South Park."

An informatics approach can help prioritize chemical combinations for further testing by determining the prevalence of individual ingredients and their most likely combinations in consumer products.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Two chatty critters and one very verbal vehicle - that is, a wolf who cried "boy," a worm who kept a diary and a garbage truck who talked and talked and talked - are among the protagonists, probable and less so, who made it into this year's "Guide Book to Gift Books," an annual annotated list of recommended books for children.

Teachers who have just completed their first year in the classroom are invited to attend the annual Beginning Teacher Conference  on July 17-18 at the University of Illinois.

Two Chicago educators who recently received Golden Apple Awards for their innovative teaching practices will be the keynote speakers at the 2018 Beginning Teacher Conference at the University of Illinois.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The annual fall open house at Japan House, an educational and cultural center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, is planned for Oct. 19.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. Guest artist Isao Takahashi will exhibit the art of hanga woodblock print-making at the annual fall open house at the University of Illinois Japan House on Oct. 20.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The sixth annual Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities (IPRH) spring conference at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign kicks off on April 1 (Thursday) with a keynote address by Dominick La Capra.

Helping early career teachers improve their instructional practices while fostering skills and relationships that promote professional development are the foci of the Illinois New Teacher Collaborative’s upcoming Induction and Mentoring Conference.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A variety of traditional Japanese arts will be demonstrated and displayed April 17 at the annual spring open house at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's Japan House.

An annual statewide conference that focuses on helping new teachers prepare students to compete in science, technology, engineering and math fields in the global economy is expanding this year to include the arts.The STEM Beginning Teacher Conference, July 28-29 in Champaign, will be the third such event organized by the Illinois New Teacher Collaborative – but the first time that the agenda will include sessions focusing on instructional strategies for the arts.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A first-time performance by pianist Ian Hobson, and performances by jazz artist Jon Faddis, violinist Stefan Milenkovich and Grammy Award winners Nathan Gunn and the Pacifica Quartet will be among the highlights of the fourth annual Allerton Music Barn Festival, Sept. 2-6.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Even as many schools face tightening budgets, their recruiters will be out in force Thursday (April 17) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, for the annual Teacher Placement Day.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Another multi-billion-dollar taxpayer bailout could lie ahead, this time to rescue a cash-strapped government program that insures pensions of 44 million American workers and retirees, a University of Illinois finance professor warns.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - While harnessing more energy from the wind could help satisfy growing demands for electricity and reduce emissions of global-warming gases, turbulence from proposed wind farms could adversely affect the growth of crops in the surrounding countryside.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Despite his roving bohemian soul, his penchant for abandoning people and places, and his radical politics, which kept him one step ahead of intelligence agents, Claude McKay could not outrun one thing: fame.

CHAMPAIGN, lll. - In two new works, an anthropologist tackles a perplexing question relating to the enormously successful "Body Worlds" exhibits: How does society tolerate - and even celebrate - the public display of human corpses?

Scientists report that they now know how to build a molecular Trojan horse that can penetrate gram-negative bacteria, solving a problem that for decades has stalled the development of effective new antibiotics against these increasingly drug-resistant microbes. The findings appear in the journal Nature.

Rates of antibiotic-resistant infections in companion animals are rising at an alarming rate. An Illinois veterinarian discusses what can be done about it.

People infected with the original strain of the virus that causes COVID-19 early in the pandemic produced a consistent antibody response, making two main groups of antibodies to bind to the spike protein on the virus’s outer surface. However, those antibodies don’t bind well to newer variants, a new study from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign found.

CHAMPAIGN, lll. - Girls with poor self-control become as physically aggressive as the average boy when they're bullied, suggests a new study by psychologists at the University of Illinois.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Why do moviemakers seem to delight in raking big business over the coals, a law professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign asks.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A well known anti-cancer agent in certain vegetables has just had its reputation enhanced. The compound, in broccoli and other cruciferous vegetables, has been found to be effective in disrupting late stages of cell growth in breast cancer.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- After former University of Illinois student Benjamin Smith went on a hate-filled killing spree last July through Illinois and Indiana, UI students and staff members wanted to counter the negative message that Smith sent.

A drug widely used to treat fungal infections improved key biomarkers in lung tissue cultures as well as in the noses of patients with cystic fibrosis, a clinical study by researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the University of Iowa found.

CHAMPAIGN, lll. - Think of it like sourdough. Or beer. Or yogurt. These popular products are all created through a process that involves using bacteria to systematically break down organic matter. Even though the process relies on living microorganisms, it can be mechanized or industrialized for large-scale production.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The Argentine ant, Linepithema humile, is one of the most successful invasive species in the world, having colonized parts of five continents in addition to its native range in South America. A new study sheds light on the secrets of its success.

The Racism Untaught framework is used in the classroom and in workshops for universities and corporations to identify design that perpetuates racism.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Adults who are highly anxious can perceive changes in facial expressions more quickly than adults who are less anxious, a new study shows. By jumping to emotional conclusions, however, highly anxious adults may make more errors in judgment and perpetuate a cycle of conflict and misunderstanding in their relationships.