UW News


July 9, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Early career honor in communication, distinguished service award in theoretical computing

The International Communication Association has given Kristina Scharp, UW assistant professor in the Department of Communication, its 2021 ICA Early Career Scholar Award.

Recent honors and achievements by UW faculty include an early career award for study of family communication and a distinguished service award for decades in support of theoretical computing.


July 8, 2021

Remotely-piloted sailboats monitor ‘cold pools’ in tropical environments

red sailboat on blue ocean

A UW-led study uses data from remotely-piloted sailboats to better understand cold air pools — pockets of cooler air that form when rain evaporates below tropical storm clouds. These fleeting weather phenomena are thought to influence tropical weather patterns.


June 29, 2021

From the Jackson School: Endowed scholarship for India study, book on angels in ancient Jewish culture

In her new book, "On My Right Michael, On My Left Gabriel: Angels in Ancient Jewish Culture," Ahuvia explores the ancient Jewish practice "centered on humans' relationships with invisible beings who acted as intermediaries, role models and guardians." The book was published this month by University of California Press.

Recent news from the Jackson School of International Studies includes a new endowed scholarship for study of India made possible by two alumni, and a book on angels in ancient Jewish culture by Jewish Studies professor Mika Ahuvia.


June 17, 2021

Washington formally recognizes Juneteenth as a paid holiday in 2022

A large 'W' is at the north entrance to the UW campus.

President Joe Biden’s signature on legislation Thursday making Juneteenth a federal holiday is a welcome recognition. Our state — including the University of Washington — looks forward to marking Juneteenth as a paid holiday beginning June 19, 2022.


Interim deans named in UW College of the Environment and University Libraries

University of Washington Provost Mark A. Richards has announced interim deans for both the College of the Environment and University Libraries.


June 14, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Humanitarian award, early career research support, literary journal guest editor

Richard Anderson, professor in the UW's Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, has received the 2020 ACM Eugene L. Lawler Award for Humanitarian Contributions Within Computer Science and Informatics from the Association for Computer Machinery.

Recent honors and achievements for UW faculty include an award for humanitarian contributions to computer science, early career research recognition and support, and the guest-editing of a new anthology of Black American literature.


June 8, 2021

English professor, author Shawn Wong honored by Association of University Presses

Shawn Wong, UW professor of English and longtime advocate for Asian American literature, has received the 2021 Stand UP Award from the Association of University Presses.

Shawn Wong, UW English professor and longtime advocate for Asian American literature, has received the 2021 Stand UP Award from the Association of University Presses.


June 1, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Allen School’s Shyam Gollakota, Anna Karlin honored by Association for Computing Machinery

Associate professor Shyam Gollakota has received the association's 2020 Grace Murray Hopper Award, given annually to the most outstanding young computer professional of the year by the Association for Computing Machinery

Two professors with the UW Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering — Shyam Gollakota and Anna Karlin — have received 2020 honors from the Association for Computing Machinery.


May 26, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Theoretical computer science award, early career faculty innovator in environmental studies, fellowship in Jewish history

Recent honors for UW faculty include the 2021 Presburger award for theoretical computer science, an Early Career Faculty Innovator research grant for a collaboration in environmental studies with the Karuk Tribe in California, and a fellowship to explore war regulations and raiding norms among early Arabian Jewish communities.


May 20, 2021

Creative Destruction Lab joins UW Foster School of Business, establishing CDL-Seattle

Creative Destruction Lab, a nonprofit organization for massively scalable, seed-stage, science- and technology-based companies, will launch its third U.S.-based location, CDL-Seattle, this fall. Based at the UW’s Foster School of Business, CDL-Seattle will be a partnership with Microsoft Corporation, the UW College of Engineering, Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering and CoMotion, UW’s collaborative innovation hub. The initial area of focus for CDL-Seattle is computational health.


May 18, 2021

Ascend program at UW’s Foster School of Business expands to further support diverse-owned small businesses thanks to $8 million investment from JPMorgan Chase

group shot

In 2016, the Consulting and Business Development Center at the UW’s Foster School of Business partnered with global financial services firm JPMorgan Chase to launch Ascend, a national network of business schools, non-profit lenders and suppliers focused on a goal of accelerating growth of businesses owned by people of color, women and military veterans, especially those operating in inner cities.


May 10, 2021

Former Interior Secretary Sally Jewell named Fritzky Chair in Leadership at UW’s Foster School of Business

head shot

Sally Jewell, U.S. Secretary of the Interior under President Barack Obama and former CEO of REI, has been appointed as the Edward V. Fritzky Endowed Chair in Leadership at the UW Foster School of Business for the 2021-2022 school year. Established in 2002, this prestigious faculty position is designed to bring distinguished leaders to campus to share their expertise with faculty and students.


May 5, 2021

Ice core data show why, despite lower sulfur emissions in U.S. and Western Europe, air pollution is dropping more slowly

graphic of Earth with chemical pathways

Ice core data from Greenland shows why air pollution is dropping more slowly than sulfur emissions reductions. As cloud droplets become less acidic, the chemical reaction that turns sulfur dioxide into sulfate aerosol gets more efficient. The new results can improve the models that project air quality and climate change.


FASER is born: new experiment will study particles that interact with dark matter

The newest experiment at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is now in place at the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva. FASER, or Forward Search Experiment, was approved by CERN’s research board in March 2019. Now installed in the LHC tunnel, this experiment, which seeks to understand particles that scientists believe may interact with dark matter, is now undergoing tests before data collection commences next year.


May 3, 2021

Genetically engineered grass cleanses soil of toxic pollutants left by military explosives, new research shows

Grasses growing in tubes in the foreground. Two people stand behind them. Another person standing to the right.

A team, which includes researchers from the University of Washington, demonstrated that over the course of three years, a genetically engineered switchgrass could break down an explosive chemical in plots of soil at a military range.


April 29, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Golden Apple, Leading the Narrative awards

Patricia Shehan Campbell, professor and chair of music education in the UW School of Music, has been given a 2021 Golden Apple Award by Seattle public television station KCTS for her work on the musical education of children. The annual awards honor successful teaching models and programs in Washington state.

Recent honors to UW faculty include a Golden Apple Award for teaching innovation from Seattle television station KCTS and a Leading the Narrative award for community engagement from the Society of Behavioral Medicine.


April 28, 2021

Report: UW No. 4 in country for economic impact as a result of federal research investments

The University of Washington is the No. 4 higher education institution in the country in terms of total economic impact as a result of federal research expenditures. The UW alone contributed $306.8 million to the U.S. gross domestic product and helped to produce more than 3,908 jobs, according to The Science Coalition’s fourth Sparking Economic Growth report, released earlier this month.


UW Spokane Center to move into historic SIERR Building

inside of a warmly lit brick building

The University of Washington’s Spokane Center will soon serve the community and its constituents from new offices in Spokane’s historic Spokane Inland Empire Railroad (SIERR) Building, located in the heart of Spokane’s growing University District. The UW Spokane Center will relocate May 1, 2021, to new offices at 850 E. Spokane Falls Blvd. from its office at 201 West Main, where it has been housed since 2015.


People of color hardest hit by air pollution from nearly all sources

A picture of power lines at sunset. Everything is hazy.

A new study from researchers at multiple universities, including the UW, shows that exposure disparities among people of color and white people are driven by nearly all, rather than only a few, emission source types.


April 26, 2021

Four UW faculty named to American Academy of Arts & Sciences

Four University of Washington faculty members have been inducted into the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.


April 22, 2021

UW biology professors Jeffrey Riffell, David Perkel awarded research grants from Human Frontier Science Program

UW biology professors Jeffrey Riffell and David Perkel have received grants from the Human Frontier Science Program.


April 16, 2021

Official notice: Rule-making hearing for Chapters 478-116 and 478-161 WACs

Official Notice image

Notice is hereby given that a public hearing will be held from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Tuesday, April 27, 2021 via a zoom conference meeting. The details of the hearing are available on the University Policy and Rules Office website.


April 14, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Guggenheim fellowship, Fulbright award, cybersecurity policy advocate

Recent honors and achievements for UW faculty and staff include a Guggenheim fellowship in film history, a Fulbright fellowship for bioethics research in South Africa and membership in a new state cybersecurity team formed by the National Governors Association.


April 13, 2021

Deep earthquakes within the Juan de Fuca plate produce few aftershocks

cracked pavement on highway

In the Cascadia subduction zone, medium- and large-sized “intraslab” earthquakes, in which the slip happens within the oceanic plate and below the continental plate, will likely produce only a few detectable aftershocks, according to a new study from the University of Washington and the U.S. Geological Survey.


April 8, 2021

Official notice: UW accreditation evaluation by Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities

Official Notice image

Next week the UW will undergo a comprehensive evaluation visit by its accrediting body, the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities. This review will involve an assessment of the UW’s initiatives and efforts related to student success, its institutional effectiveness and mission, as well as governance, resources and capacity.


April 7, 2021

First results from Muon g-2 experiment strengthen evidence of new physics

A picture of the giant magnetic ring at the heart of a particle physics experiment

The first results from the Muon g-2 experiment hosted at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory show fundamental particles called muons behaving in a way not predicted by the Standard Model of particle physics. These results confirm an earlier experiment of the same name performed at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Combined, the two results show strong evidence that our best theoretical model of the subatomic world is incomplete. One potential explanation would be the existence of undiscovered particles or forces.


April 5, 2021

Retiring Alaska Airlines CEO, proud Husky Brad Tilden, honored with updated UW aircraft livery

Brad Tilden, a UW alum who retired as CEO of Alaska Airlines on March 31, looks at a Horizon Air Q400 aircraft with a special UW-themed livery.

The retirement of Alaska Airlines CEO Brad Tilden after a 30-year career with the company – at least in one way – had the University of Washington written all over it. Horizon Air recently unveiled a special Huskies-themed livery on a Q400 (tail number #N435QX) in honor of Tilden, who earned his MBA at the UW and has maintained a strong partnership with the University for several years. Tilden retired March 31.


March 24, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Energy-efficient computing, Cottrell Scholar, Google Inclusion Awards

An Intel Corporation award for work to make computers more energy-efficient, a Research Corporation for Science award for chemistry research and education, and two Google inclusion awards to create technology for underrepresented populations.


March 22, 2021

Warming temperatures tripled Arctic lightning strikes over the past decade

Lightning strike

Lightning strikes in the Arctic tripled from 2010 to 2020, a finding University of Washington researchers attribute to rising temperatures due to human-caused climate change. The results, researchers say, suggest Arctic residents in northern Russia, Canada, Europe and Alaska need to prepare for the danger of more frequent lightning strikes.


March 17, 2021

How five global regions could achieve a successful, equitable ‘Blue Economy’

three colored world maps

The future of an equitable and sustainable global ocean, or “Blue Economy,” depends on more than natural or technological resources. A new study finds that socioeconomic and governance conditions such as national stability, corruption and human rights greatly affect different regions’ ability to achieve a Blue Economy — one that is socially equitable, environmentally sustainable and economically viable.


March 12, 2021

Role of solvent molecules in light-driven electron transfer revealed

An artistic depiction of small molecules moving within a solvent

In a study published Feb. 15 in Nature Chemistry, a research team led by Munira Khalil, professor and chair of chemistry at the University of Washington, has captured the rapid motions of solvent molecules that impact light-driven electron transfer in a molecular complex for the first time. This  information could help researchers learn how to control energy flow in molecules, potentially leading to more efficient clean energy sources.


March 3, 2021

The UW is a Fulbright top producer

Suzzallo Library at night

The University of Washington is proud to be included on the list of U.S. colleges and universities that produced the most 2020-2021 Fulbright  students.


March 2, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Field research grant, staffer’s play streams, cartoon remembrance

Recent honors and achievements by UW faculty and staff include a grant for field research in the Middle East, a staffer’s play being streamed by a Seattle theater and a professor’s cartoon remembrance of a relative lost to COVID-19.


February 19, 2021

‘Small moon’ shapes allow DNA devices to attach in precise orientations

A black image with a white circle in the center. The circle has a hole that is slightly off center.

A team of engineers, including one at the University of Washington, has developed a technique that allows for the precise placement of molecules formed from folded DNA in not only a specific location but also in a specific orientation


February 18, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Polymer Physics Prize, anthropology dissertation award

The Polymer Physics Prize from the American Physical Society and a dissertation award from the Society for American Archaeology.


February 16, 2021

UW books in brief: Historian Anand Yang explores British ‘penal transportation’; world music textbooks by Patricia Shehan Campbell

Historian Anand Yang writes about the British history of shipping of convicted criminals to other continents; and new world music education books from ethnomusicologist Patricia Shehan Campbell.


February 9, 2021

Faculty/staff honors: Holocaust commemoration, new compositions, a top local album of 2020

Recent honors and achievements by UW faculty include a keynote address at a national Holocaust commemoration event, an album of new compositions and a best-of-2020 musical nod from the Seattle Times.


February 3, 2021

Public hearing notice: Rule-making hearing for Chapter 478-121 WAC

Official Notice image

Notice is hereby given that a public hearing will be held from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 16, 2021, via a Zoom conference meeting. The details of the hearing are available on the University Policy and Rules Office website.


February 1, 2021

UW books in brief: African American political theory, philosophy and migration, data science for health

Notable recent books written or edited by UW faculty include an exploration of African American political theory, a book on philosophy and migration and a textbook on health data science.


January 28, 2021

Official notice: UW determination of non-significance adoption of existing document

Official Notice image

The UW Bothell Husky Village Redevelopment project is being proposed in Development Area D of the campus to provide residence halls, apartments, dining, gathering and office space.



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