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Author: James Urton

May 13, 2016

UW researchers unleash graphene ‘tiger’ for more efficient optoelectronics

In traditional light-harvesting methods, energy from one photon only excites one electron or none depending on the absorber’s energy gap, transferring just a small portion of light energy into electricity. The remaining energy is lost as heat. But in a paper released May 13 in Science Advances, Wu, UW associate professor Xiaodong Xu and colleagues at four other institutions describe one promising approach to coax photons into stimulating multiple electrons. Their method exploits some surprising quantum-level interactions to give one photon multiple potential electron partners.

April 14, 2016

Scientists crack secrets of the monarch butterfly’s internal compass

Monarch butterflies.

Each fall, monarch butterflies across Canada and the United States turn their orange, black and white-mottled wings toward the Rio Grande and migrate over 2,000 miles to the relative warmth of central Mexico. This journey, repeated instinctively by generations of monarchs, continues even as monarch numbers have plummeted due to loss of their sole larval food source — milkweed. But amid this sad news, a research team believes they have cracked the secret of the internal, genetically encoded compass that the…

April 5, 2016

UW joins public-private partnership for flexible electronics

An example of flexible hybrid electronics.

The University of Washington has joined NextFlex, a consortium of 30 academic institutions and industrial partners to develop the next generation of flexible electronic devices. As a founding member of this alliance, the UW will seek local and regional partners in the electronics and manufacturing industries to develop and produce flexible electronics for applications from medicine to transportation. Flexible electronics are inherently thin and designed to be bent, rolled, folded or incorporated into new technologies or products in ways that…

February 23, 2016

Four UW scientists awarded Sloan Fellowships for early-career research

Four faculty members at the University of Washington have been awarded early-career fellowships from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. The new Sloan Fellows, announced Feb. 23, include Bingni Brunton, assistant professor of biology; Christopher Laumann, assistant professor of physics; Matthew McQuinn, assistant professor of astronomy; and Emina Torlak, assistant professor of computer science and engineering. The 126 Sloan Fellows for 2016 were nominated by senior colleagues in their field, department or institution. Committees with the Sloan Foundation then examined each…

UW scientists create ultrathin semiconductor heterostructures for new technological applications

An illustration of the strong valley exciton interactions and transport in a 2-D semiconductor heterostructure.

University of Washington scientists have successfully combined two different ultrathin semiconductors — each just one layer of atoms thick and roughly 100,000 times thinner than a human hair — to make a new two-dimensional heterostructure with potential uses in clean energy and optically-active electronics.

February 8, 2016

UW biology professor is a finalist for top conservation prize

Dee Boersma

P. Dee Boersma, a University of Washington professor of biology and Wadsworth Endowed Chair in Conservation Science, is one of six finalists for the prestigious Indianapolis Prize for conservation. Boersma is the first UW faculty member nominated for this prize — the highest honor for animal conservationists — which has been awarded every other year since 2006.

January 8, 2016

Stir no more: UW scientists show that draining speeds up bioassays

HeLa cells stained with an antibody against beta-tubulin.

Three scientists at the University of Washington have proposed a way to speed up common bioassays used in research and diagnostics. Their solution, reminiscent of the magic behind washing machines, could reduce wait times to a fraction of what they once were. As they report in the journal Small, biological assays that once took hours could instead take minutes.

December 15, 2015

UW conservationists celebrate new protected areas for Argentine penguins

Adult Magellanic penguin and two chicks begging.

On Dec. 3, the legislature for Argentina’s Chubut province established a new marine protected area off Punta Tombo, which would help preserve the feeding grounds for about 500,000 Magellanic penguins that make their home along this rocky stretch of Argentine coast. This is welcome news for the UW scientists who have studied these penguins for decades and advocated for their conservation.

December 10, 2015

Trees either hunker down or press on in a drying and warming western U.S. climate

Trembling aspen.

Two University of Washington researchers have uncovered details of the radically divergent strategies that two common tree species employ to cope with drought in southwestern Colorado. As they report in a new paper in the journal Global Change Biology, one tree species shuts down production and conserves water, while the other alters its physiology to continue growing and using water.

November 19, 2015

After Nobel win, neutrino endeavors snag Breakthrough Prize in Physics

Neutrinos may be small, but when it comes to prizes, they pack quite a punch. In October, it was announced that two scientists who headed international projects to study these miniscule, seemingly ephemeral subatomic particles will share the Nobel Prize in Physics. On Nov. 8, these same scientists joined five of their colleagues from other neutrino projects to accept the 2016 Breakthrough Prize in Physics. The $3 million prize will be shared among the over 1,300 scientists, including University of…

November 6, 2015

Swartz Foundation grant to boost UW research in computational neuroscience

Two University of Washington faculty members have been awarded a grant from The Swartz Foundation to support research in theoretical neuroscience. The award establishes the UW as the latest of the Swartz Foundation-supported centers for innovation in this growing field, which spans mathematics, statistics, physics and biology. “This award is a recognition of what is happening here at the UW in theoretical neuroscience research,” said Adrienne Fairhall, a UW associate professor in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics. “It is…

October 29, 2015

Now you see it: cloaking technology arrives sooner than UW mathematician expected

In science, decades can pass between a proposed theory and its real-world application. That is precisely what University of Washington mathematics professor Gunther Uhlmann was expecting when he and three colleagues proposed a means to develop an electromagnetic wormhole in a 2007 paper in Physical Review Letters. Their theoretical wormhole — an invisible tube for electromagnetic fields — would cloak an electromagnetic field while it passed through the tube, creating a “secret” connection between the entry and exit point. Uhlmann…

October 19, 2015

In astronomy-themed concert, Benaroya Hall launches audience to the cosmos

Andromeda galaxy.

A Nov. 7 concert in Seattle’s Benaroya Hall promises to offer the audience a decidedly stellar musical experience. The event, “Origins: Life and the Universe,” will pair live performances of new compositions with video and slideshow scenes depicting cosmic events like the Big Bang, as well as scenes from distant worlds and Earth’s own life-filled history. The Northwest Sinfonia, under the direction of Grammy Award-winning conductor David Sabee, will perform the eight works by Pacific Northwest composers while the projected…

October 11, 2015

UW physicists celebrate contribution to Nobel-winning neutrino discoveries

At 2:45 a.m. on Oct. 6, bleary-eyed Nobel Prize enthusiasts on the West Coast were treated to an unexpected lesson about fundamental particles and forces in our universe. Across the globe in Stockholm, a panel of scientists announced that the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physics would honor two scientists who led international collaborations to understand mysterious particles called neutrinos. The prize recipients, Takaaki Kajita and Arthur McDonald, respectively led the Super-Kamiokande Collaboration in Japan and the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Collaboration…

September 29, 2015

UW computer science alumnus wins a MacArthur Foundation ‘genius grant’

Computer scientist and University of Washington alumnus Christopher Ré is one of 24 recipients of “genius” grants this year from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the organization announced Sept. 28. Ré, an assistant professor of computer science at Stanford University, pursues new approaches to help computers analyze large, complex datasets. The diverse array of applications for Ré’s approach range from discovering new drugs to fighting human trafficking. “He has taken the area of database research to a…

September 28, 2015

A new single-molecule tool to observe enzymes at work

nanopore channel

A team of scientists at the University of Washington and the biotechnology company Illumina have created an innovative tool to directly detect the delicate, single-molecule interactions between DNA and enzymatic proteins. Their approach provides a new platform to view and record these nanoscale interactions in real time. As they report Sept. 28 in Nature Biotechnology, this tool should provide fast and reliable characterization of the different mechanisms cellular proteins use to bind to DNA strands — information that could shed new light on the atomic-scale interactions within our cells and help design new drug therapies against pathogens by targeting enzymes that interact with DNA.

September 24, 2015

Cooled down and charged up, a giant magnet is ready for its new mission

The fully assembled magnet at Fermilab.

The Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory — or Fermilab — announced that a 680-ton superconducting magnet is secure in its new home and nearly ready for a new era of discovery in particle physics. This achievement follows the delicate, 3,200-mile transport of the magnet’s 17-ton, 50-foot-wide housing ring to the U.S. Department of Energy facility outside Chicago two years ago. The fully assembled magnet will drive high-energy particle experiments as part of an international partnership among 34 institutions, of which the University of Washington is a leading contributor.

September 10, 2015

UW scientists will continue studies of evolution ‘in real time’ with five-year grant renewal

Faculty members from several departments at the University of Washington will share $2.25 million in research funds from the National Science Foundation to study and apply the principles of evolution “in real time.” Their studies are a part of the BEACON Center for the Study of Evolution in Action. Founded in 2010, this NSF science and technology center is a partnership among five universities to better understand evolutionary processes and apply concepts such as adaptation and selection to new and…

Grant will help Native American undergraduates attend first scientific meeting

Two professors from the University of Washington and Oklahoma State University have been awarded a grant from the National Science Foundation to bring six Native American undergraduate students to their first scientific meeting. The students will attend the Jan. 2016 annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology in Portland, Oregon. Known commonly by its acronym, SICB, this broad scientific research society of 3,500 members promotes research and collaboration on diverse topics within biology such as evolution, developmental…

August 25, 2015

Rare nautilus sighted for the first time in three decades

Nautilus pompilius swimming next to Allonautilus scrobiculatus off of Ndrova Island in Papua New Guinea.

In early August, biologist Peter Ward returned from the South Pacific with news that he encountered an old friend, one he hadn’t seen in over three decades. The University of Washington professor had seen what he considers one of the world’s rarest animals, a remote encounter that may become even more infrequent if illegal fishing practices continue. The creature in question is Allonautilus scrobiculatus, a species of nautilus that Ward and a colleague had previously discovered off of Ndrova Island…

August 17, 2015

UW researchers model tsunami hazards on the Northwest coast

The Pacific Northwest from space.

Recent press and social media coverage have reminded residents of the Pacific Northwest that they live in a seismically active region. Stretching offshore from northern California to British Columbia, the Cascadia subduction zone could slip at any time, causing a powerful earthquake and triggering a tsunami that would impact communities along the coast. Scientists from multiple disciplines at the University of Washington and other institutions are learning more about this hazard. Dozens of UW scientists are part of the M9…

July 23, 2015

UW astronomer, students report irregularities in ‘rare, exotic’ binary system

The galaxy NGC 300

UW astronomers were recently reminded that the diplomatic axiom to “trust, but verify” also applies to scientific inquiry when they analyzed fresh data from a distant galaxy. As they reported in July in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, a puzzling stellar phenomenon may not be what other astronomers had reported. They studied a binary star system called NGC 300 X-1, nestled within a far-flung galaxy in the constellation Sculptor. Starting in 2007, scientists reported that this system…

July 8, 2015

UW’s Conservation magazine snares top writing honors

The UW-based Conservation magazine has won a gold award in a national competition sponsored by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, or CASE. Conservation shares this top honor with a magazine from Stanford Medicine. The award recognizes magazines produced by universities or colleges for special external constituencies, including publications affiliated with individual colleges or devoted exclusively to an institution’s scholarly research. CASE judges noted Conservation’s dedication to stories of the “highest caliber,” as well as an “outstanding” layout…