University of Arizona in the News

Scientists around the world are warning governments that will be gathering in Montreal this week for COP15, the United Nations biodiversity summit, to not repeat past mistakes and are urging officials to "avoid trade-offs" between people and conservation needs in a report published Monday in the One Earth Journal.

Richard W. Stoffle, a professor of anthropology at the University of Arizona, writes that Native Hawaiians' beliefs hold that Mauna Loa and other volcanoes are alive, and their eruptions are how the Earth is reborn.

The new documentary "LUTE" – focusing on the life and career of the late Lute Olson, who coached the University of Arizona men's basketball team to four Final Fours and the 1997 national championship – premieres Wednesday on the CBS Sports Network.

Following a wave of protests, the government of China recently relaxed some of its most stringent zero-COVID protocols, and regional authorities trimmed back a slew of requirements for mass testing, quarantine and isolation. "Eventually, just like everyone else on Earth, everyone in China should expect to be infected," said University of Arizona professor of ecology and evolutionary biology Michael Worobey.

Agrivoltaics – a renewable energy approach that shares agricultural land with solar panels – is a powerful way forward in energy innovation and could help reduce agriculture's impact on climate change. Researchers are still working out which plants and animal relationships experience the most benefit from AV systems. A study from the University of Arizona found crops that grow well in partial shade – like sweet potatoes, lettuce, alfalfas, kale and chard – respond best. So far, shade-resistant crops like wheat and crops grown in greenhouses have not responded well.

Orbital observations of Mars reveal the presence of an enormous mantle plume pushing the surface of the planet upward and driving intense volcanic and seismic activity. "Our study presents multiple lines of evidence that reveal the presence of a giant active mantle plume on present-day Mars," said Adrien Broquet, a postdoctoral research associate in the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and co-author of the study with Jeff Andrews-Hanna, an associate professor of planetary science at the LPL.

In a National Science Foundation video, University of Arizona professor of astronomy Chris Impey explains most of the elements that make up the Earth, humans, and all living creatures were formed in powerful stellar explosions.

This preview of upcoming exhibits at the National Museum of Natural History recommends readers who visit attend "Our Places" by Kelsey Hanson, an anthropological archaeologist at the University of Arizona, to learn about the ancient and complex techniques Indigenous people of the desert Southwest. During this presentation, Hanson will dive into how natural pigments are reflections of creators and their environments and share her research using the circulation of paint technology to understand changing power relations.

During the White House Tribal Nations Summit this week, the Biden administration made new commitments on something Native leaders have been pushing for for a long time: tribal co-management of public lands, such as national parks and forests. Indigenous people whose ancestral land is now federally managed didn't just hand over their territory in the 19th century, according to Andrew Curley, a professor of geography at the University of Arizona. "A lot of it historically has been through violent removal of Indian nations from their traditional home bases, he said.

University of Arizona professor of atmospheric sciences Xubin Zeng's forecast for the 2022 Atlantic hurricane season came very close to the target. Zeng's model predicted 14 named storms and seven hurricanes to develop over the Atlantic Ocean, with three classified as major. At the official end of the season the numbers were 14, eight and two, respectively.