University of Arizona in the News

The $324 million Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, mission got under way early Wednesday, when NASA launched a space probe designed to deflect a distant asteroid in a test of technology that might one day save the world. University of Arizona astronomer and project leader Amy Mainzer discusses the possibility of whether an undetected asteroid could damage the planet. "While this is not something that is very likely to happen, it is not something we want to completely ignore either. This is designed to find near-Earth asteroids large enough to cause regional damage.

While Thanksgiving will be a time to gather again this year for many people,thanks to COVID-19 vaccines, it may for other people be the start of a difficult holiday season. Some people may be home alone on Thanksgiving by choice, following safety guidelines, while other families will be missing loved ones at the Thanksgiving table who are hospitalized with COVID-19 or who have passed away from the virus over the past nearly two years.

Turning your camera off during virtual meetings can help reduce "Zoom fatigue," suggests new research by Allison Gabriel, McClelland Professor of Management and Organizations and University Distinguished Scholar in the University of Arizona Eller College of Management.

NASA is preparing to conduct the world's first planetary defense test mission. Amy Mainzer, principle investigator on the Surveyor team, said it should be able to spot a 460-foot asteroid from at least 50 million miles away.

A unique partnership among the University of Arizona, Microsoft's World's Edge studio and Relic Entertainment will allow current and future UArizona students to "make history their story" while they earn credit toward their college degrees. Starting in early 2022, Age of Empires IV players will be able to interact with special educational content on the Age of Empires website.

In a new paper published in Science, University of Arizona virus expert Michael Worobey connects the dots from the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak and shows that an origin other than the Huanan Seafood Market is extremely unlikely.

People in rural American say things are back to normal, even though rural America is precisely where the COVID-19 pandemic is worst. According to a recent Atlantic/Leger poll, compared with people in urban or suburban areas, people in rural areas are most likely to feel like things are "back to normal" where they live – 45% thought so, compared with 30% of urbanites and 36 percent of suburbanites. In some rural places, vaccination rates might be low not because people are hesitant but because pharmacies are scarce in their area, or residents had to move for work.

This story spotlighting the science of dendrochronology and its importance to understanding climate change prominently features the groundbreaking work and history of University of Arizona Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research. Interviews include Valerie Trouet, Distinguished Scholar of Dendrochronology; and Peter Brewer, curator of collections at the Tree-Ring Lab. "We're really sitting on this nexus between climatology, ecology, and then human history," Trouet said.

A privately funded telescope called Toliman will seek habitable worlds in Alpha Centauri, our nearest neighboring star system, potentially sparking a new wave of exoplanetary exploration. The scientific payoff could be tremendous given the relative proximity of that solar system to our own. "We have this unique opportunity to reveal if there is a 'habitable zone' planet in the system," says Olivier Guyon from the University of Arizona, part of the telescope's team. "This is something that has never been done before."

As eligibility for COVID-19 boosters widens in parts of the U.S., some people wonder when they should time their shots to maximize protection. It might make sense for healthy, non-elderly people to time a booster shot to a couple of weeks before a big event, such as an international trip or a wedding, said Deepta Bhattacharya, a professor of immunobiology at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson. But timing depends on the circumstances of your life and community.