University of Arizona in the News

Across the United States, native plants have become an increasingly popular landscaping option, particularly in drier areas. In the Western United States, where irrigation is the norm, native grass will perform better, says master gardener Mike Hauser with the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension.

Ruxandra Guidi, an assistant professor in the University of Arizona School of Journalism, writes about how the Cochise County town of St. John's transformed an underused juvenile facility into a safe space for teens.

Six months after the FBI seized money and valuables from some 800 customers of a safe deposit box rental business in a Los Angeles strip mall, the Bureau and U.S. attorney's office in L.A. have produced no evidence of criminal wrongdoing by the vast majority of box holders whose belongings the government is trying to keep. Jane Bambauer, a law professor at the University of Arizona, said that under the restrictions [the judge] imposed on the search, the use of drug dogs to sniff cash inside the boxes was a 4th Amendment violation.

This fall, the University of Arizona will launch a Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship Program – which will provide early career scholars with faculty mentoring, professional development and academic networking opportunities – as part of an intentional effort to diversify its faculty.

Do you think you know the monsoon? Professional forecasters' predictions for this year's monsoon season are "basically a scientific shrug," according to UArizona climate researchers. Now, members of the public can put their own monsoon predictions to the test in a fantasy monsoon game.

The University of Arizona will partner with Native American nations to address the environmental challenges faced by those communities, offering expertise in environmental research, renewable technologies, and agriculture through the new Indigenous Resilience Center. "They are the ones identifying their priorities and there are indigenous scientists leading the way with indigenous students involved with the research," said center director Karletta Chief, an associate professor of environmental science.

A preliminary analysis of viral genomes suggests the COVID-19 pandemic might have multiple animal origins – but the findings still have to be peer reviewed. The authors suggest that a laboratory or computer error probably occurred in sequencing one of the two mutations in these "intermediate" genomes. "The more we dug, the more it looked like, maybe we can't trust any of the 'transitional' genomes," said study co-author Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona.

Marcia Rieke, a Regents Professor of Astronomy at the University of Arizona, writes that the James Webb Space Telescope is scheduled to head to space on Dec. 18. With it, astronomers hope to find the first galaxies to form in the universe, will search for Earthlike atmospheres around other planets and accomplish many other scientific goals.

Hundreds of scientists had worked on mRNA vaccines for decades before the coronavirus pandemic brought a breakthrough. Now, the debate over who deserves credit for pioneering the technology is heating up as awards start rolling out – and the speculation is getting more intense in advance of the Nobel prize announcements next month. But formal prizes restricted to only a few scientists will fail to recognize the many contributors to mRNA's medical development. In reality, the path to mRNA vaccines drew on the work of hundreds of researchers over more than 30 years.

The 2021 Southwest Monsoon has dropped record-setting rainfall and wreaked havoc, triggering flash floods, mudslides and dust storms in multiple states. During July, Tucson's official gauge recorded 8.06 inches of rain – the wettest calendar month in the city’s recorded meteorological history, which dates back more than 125 years. "Maybe the frequency is decreasing because we're getting less of those upper-air triggers to help the storms get organized.