Imagine a politician battling accusations of corruption leading up to an election, accusations so serious that they are likely to impact how people cast their ballots. How do you account for the wide range of factors that can determine who a person votes for — partisanship, age, gender, race, educational level — to gain insight into the influence of the corruption allegations on Election Day? That challenge is being taken up by Jiawei Fu, a new assistant professor of Political Science who develops tools to help… read more » about Jiawei Fu Develops New Tools to Unravel the Complexities of Political Decision-Making
As he peers into the past, Francisco Garfias counts upon the meticulous record-keeping of colonial Spain during the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries to shine a light so he can better understand the present and anticipate the future. “The way that Spanish authorities governed their colonies, particularly in what’s now Mexico, created a lot of records,” said Garfias, who joined the Department of Political Science as an associate professor. “That highly bureaucratized approach, as a side product, allows researchers like myself to… read more » about Francisco Garfias Looks to the Past for Insights into How Governments Take Shape
A question that resonated with Allison Anoll as an undergraduate is now reflected in her research as a political scientist — could many of society’s problems be solved if more people participated equally in the democratic process? “I said it so much that I convinced myself it might be true,” said Anoll, who joined the Department of Political Science this year as an associate professor. “That question I started asking when I was 18 is the question that I’m still trying to fundamentally answer in the work that I do.”… read more » about Allison Anoll Seeks to Understand the ‘Why’ Behind Political Participation
Career pathways often don’t follow a straight line. When Neena Mahadev, assistant professor of Religious Studies, first traveled to Sri Lanka as an undergraduate on a study abroad program, she wasn't thinking about religion. She was interested in studying ethnicity and labor in relation to the economy and politics. Mahadev specializes in the anthropology of religion with a particular focus on South Asia. She is the author of “Karma and Grace: Religious Difference in Millennial Sri Lanka,” for which she was awarded… read more » about Neena Mahadev Examines Karma, Grace and What Connects Us
Edwin Alfonzo, assistant professor of Chemistry, really wanted to make molecules. He discovered this passion in an organic chemistry class at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell. “I was a sophomore, and I remember sitting in that classroom, putting together chemical routes to target the molecules the professor assigned to us, and thinking with amazement, ‘Wow, we humans really have an incredible level of control.’” Deeply moved by the realization that chemistry allows us to control matter to such a high level… read more » about Edwin Alfonzo Uses Biology to Tackle Chemistry’s Hard Problems
When Raffaella Taylor-Seymour first visited Zimbabwe in 2012 as an undergraduate, she didn’t know it was the start of a lifelong commitment. Taylor-Seymour, assistant professor of Religious Studies, has returned to Zimbabwe almost every year since. “It felt like the natural place for my work,” she said. “Over the last 13 years, it really has become a commitment. I view my research as a conversation and collaboration with my partners in Zimbabwe, and the work I do is as much for them and with them as it is for academic… read more » about Raffaella Taylor-Seymour Unpacks Complex Religious Identities
British authors of the 18th century often were influenced by their natural surroundings, a parallel that resonates with Assistant Professor Timothy Heimlich, who joined the Department of English this fall. Heimlich’s inspiration to explore how Wales fits into the landscape of British literature came from an unlikely muse: Wisconsin. Growing up in the Milwaukee suburbs, Heimlich frequently rode his bike to Wales, a tiny village founded by Welsh immigrants in the 1840s. The forested route included street names like… read more » about Timothy Heimlich Follows Wales into 18th Century British Literature
Early in the afternoon of March 24, 1999, my wife, Angélica, and I were seated high up in the gallery overlooking the chamber of the House of Lords in London, where a panel of law lords (the English equivalent of a Supreme Court) was to decide whether there were grounds to extradite General Augusto Pinochet, Chile’s eighty-three-year-old former dictator, to Spain to face charges of torture, for which he was alleged to have been responsible during his seventeen years of terror from 1973 to 1990. I had been following the case… read more » about Ariel Dorfman: Pinochet and the Vans of Death
Sung Eun Kim is an historian of modern Korea whose scholarship examines how race and gender shaped the experiences of colonial soldiering, particularly at the intersection of Korean militarism and U.S. imperialism in the Asia-Pacific region. His research centers on the Korean Augmentation to the United States Army Soldier, or KATUSA. The program was created in 1950 at the outbreak of the Korean War to embed South Korean soldiers into U.S. Army units in the region. Remarkably, this form of conscription continues in South… read more » about Sung Eun Kim Explores the Military Ties Between Korea and the U.S.
Alika Bourgette, assistant professor of History, is a native Hawaiian (Kanaka Maoli) with genealogical ties to the Waiʻanae Coast. Having spent his entire life between Hawaii, California and Washington state, Bourgette's move to Durham marks his first experience living on the East Coast. Bourgette’s research focuses on twentieth century Native Hawaiian history and the long struggle for land and water justice along the urbanized Honolulu waterfront. When he was younger, Bourgette would travel back and forth… read more » about The Long Struggle: Alika Bourgette Studies Native Hawaiian History
“Some teachers naturally get along with kids very well, but others need a lot of help to connect with students,” said Linlin Yao, who joins the Program of Education as a Lecturer. “If you want to be a great teacher, you need to be a person who understands others — especially your students.” As a young girl growing up in China, Yao was shy and quiet. A self-described introvert, Yao often doubted herself and her abilities until she had a teacher who believed in her and encouraged her to enter an essay writing contest.… read more » about Linlin Yao Nurtures Student Growth
“Culture and systems shape all of our psychological experiences, including those experiences pertaining to race,” said Phia Salter, a newly named 2025 Bass Chair. “I’m interested in how we identify. What it means to be Black and how we talk about what it means to be Black.” The Fred W. Shaffer Associate Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience identifies as a critical race psychologist, a blend of her training in social and cultural psychology and Africana Studies. Salter is interested in the ways… read more » about Phia Salter: How Culture and Systems Shape Racial Experiences
Automotive executives are bracing for a freefall in U.S. electric-vehicle sales following the disappearance of a critical $7,500 tax break for buyers. "It's a game-changer," Ford CEO Jim Farley said during a Detroit event on Tuesday, just hours before the federal subsidy expired. Electric-vehicle registrations could fall 27% without the tax credit, according to a joint study in November 2024 from professors at the University of California, Berkeley, Duke University and Stanford University. read more » about End of EV Tax Subsidy Sparks Worries of Collapse in US Electric Car Sales, According to Duke Research
Penn State students, scholars and community members joined together Tuesday to celebrate the centenary of civil rights activist Malcolm X’s birth. Held at the Hintz Family Alumni Center, the event was organized by a range of contributors including the Borough of State College, Penn State’s Department of African American Studies and Webster’s Bookstore Cafe. It featured panel discussions, poetry readings, refreshments and more. read more » about Ellen McLearney Honors Malcolm X’s Legacy at Penn State Event
The Albemarle-Pamlico Peninsula of North Carolina—Early last month, on the opening day of bow hunting season here on a swath of swampy state land, a team of researchers slipped bright orange safety vests over their waders so as not to be mistaken for deer. “We’re hunting too,” said Spencer Rhea, an ecologist at Duke University. “Hunting for trees.”Rhea and his colleagues had gathered to investigate “ghost forests”—otherworldly stands of bleached dead trees drowned by flooding or poisoned by saltwater that… read more » about AI Reveals Vast ‘Ghost Forests’ Along U.S. Coast
Do old statistical methods work with today’s big data? That’s one of the questions that drives Anya Katsevich, assistant professor of Statistical Science. “There are a number of classical methods — nice reliable methods — which work in the regime of small data,” she said, “but we’re not sure anymore whether we can rely on them.”She’s witnessed the confusion: “I’ve seen scientists use a method when it’s questionable, and I’ve also seen people lament in papers, ‘We wish we could use this method but we’re not sure it works… read more » about Anya Katsevich: Taming Big Data With Old Statistics
Most people know Jane Goodall, who died Wednesday, as a silver-haired conservationist who chatted with Stephen Colbert and gave speeches to the United Nations in defense of nature. For scientists, however, it’s the young Jane Goodall who followed wild chimpanzees for weeks at a time who endures as an icon.“There will always only be one Jane Goodall,” said Michael Tomasello, an expert on the origin of language at Duke University. read more » about Tomasello: ‘‘There Will Always Only Be One Jane Goodall"
For Shuyan Zhou, necessity really was the mother of invention.Zhou gifted her mother a Chinese version of Alexa, and while she loved it, the device was limited and unable to do much beyond executing simple commands. If her mother needed to book airline tickets, for example, she’d still call her daughter who would then walk her through the process, step by step. This got Zhou thinking about how many people — parents included — struggle with technology, even though today’s devices come packed with powerful features.… read more » about Shuyan Zhou: An AI Collaboration Agent
Approximately 100 students attended the Academic Resource Center’s (ARC) Peer Education Symposium on Friday, September 5. This event, hosted in the Biological Sciences building, showcased a wide variety of Duke leadership professionals who instructed students working in peer education and support roles on ways to enhance their supportive and pedagogical skills. The student participants attended four fifty-minute sessions of their choice, allowing them to focus on the subjects best suited to their specific peer education… read more » about Peer Education Symposium Trains over 100 Students
Ingrid Daubechies, James B. Duke Distinguished Professor Emerita of Mathematics, was honored Thursday, Sept. 25, as a 2025 Citation Laureate, a global recognition of research excellence presented by Clarivate Plc. Daubechies, who received the National Medal of Science earlier this year, is among 22 researchers worldwide to be recognized by Clarivate, a global provider of transformative intelligence, with the honor this year. Since the program’s inception, 83 Citation Laureates have gone on to receive Nobel Prizes.… read more » about Ingrid Daubechies Earns Global Recognition as 2025 Citation Laureate
These vivid live music memories, that seem to come flooding back the moment a certain song comes on the radio, are not just a common experience, but a common psychological reaction.Eisha Naidu, a post-doctoral associate at Duke University in Durham, N.C., studied this very phenomenon. read more » about Duke Study Shows Live Music Creates Lasting Happiness Through Connection
Using a relatively young theory, a team of mathematicians has started to answer questions whose roots lie at the very beginning of mathematics. read more » about Duke Mathematician Helps Revive Geometry’s Oldest Problems
Anna Menon, who graduated from Duke in 2010 with a master’s degree in biomedical engineering, may be the first woman to touch down on the moon’s rocky, cratered surface.Menon was selected to be in the 24th NASA astronaut candidate class and will undergo about two years of training before joining the ranks of active astronauts available for future missions, which may include exploration of the moon and Mars. The class of ten candidates was chosen out of a pool of more than 8,000 applicants.Menon has embarked to… read more » about Duke Alumna Selected To Be in the 24th NASA Astronaut Class
Newly published research from Duke University’s Pontzer Lab, housed in the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology in Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, has found a strong link between higher stress in children and adverse health conditions for them later in life.In an article recently published by the journal PNAS, the study used measurable metrics of health over time to create a more quantitative view of how stress early in life affects health.“We’ve had an idea for a long time, since the ‘80s at least, that when… read more » about Childhood Stress Strongly Linked to Chronic Disease in Adulthood, Duke Researchers Find
Germain Choffart brought a group of students to his hometown of Saint-Avold, France, to work with local organizations trying to improve economic and social conditions in the community. read more » about For Students, a DukeEngage Program in a Small French Town Is a New Experience — But for the Faculty Director, It’s Home
Mildred Ruiz-Sapp and Steven Sapp, co-founders of Universes Theater Company, are in residence in Theater Studies from September 15-26 as guest artists for the Fall 2025 New Works Lab. A public performance, An Evening with Universes: Celebrating 30 Years of Art and Activism, will take place on September 26 at 5:30 pm in the Sheafer Lab Theater, Bryan University Center. Admission is free.Mildred and Steven, who met while attending Bard College, formed Universes Theater Company in the Bronx in 1995. They… read more » about Universes: 30 Years of Arts and Activism
Sophomore year is when things start to click, and the unknowns become the familiar. Classes feel more purposeful, friendships run deeper, routines develop and campus becomes home. As our four Trinity students return, the series picks back up to follow their next chapter focused on exploring new opportunities, choosing majors and finding momentum. Through stories, photos, videos and social updates, we’ll capture the energy as they lean in, step up — and hit their stride. Finding Their Stride: Fall Semester “It’s… read more » about Trinity in Four Acts: Tobias Williams
Sophomore year is when things start to click, and the unknowns become the familiar. Classes feel more purposeful, friendships run deeper, routines develop and campus becomes home. As our four Trinity students return, the series picks back up to follow their next chapter focused on exploring new opportunities, choosing majors and finding momentum. Through stories, photos, videos and social updates, we’ll capture the energy as they lean in, step up — and hit their stride. Finding Their Stride: Fall Semester“When I’m home… read more » about Trinity in Four Acts: Daniella Freedman