University of Arizona in the News

There is no government data yet on whether health authorities' 10-day halt in administration of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine soured people on the product, and the company declined to discuss the matter. But in spot checks across the country, people seeking vaccines and officials dispensing them appear eager to resume using the vaccine, which is also easier to store and transport. At the University of Arizona, the vaccination campaign has relied heavily on the Pfizer shots because the school has the substantial special freezer capacity required to store those doses.

Following updated guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, federal health officials announced that fully vaccinated Americans can forgo masks while outside, except in crowded settings. Kacey Ernst, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Arizona College of Public Health, acknowledges that breakthrough transmission risks outdoors are much lower than indoors, but "not all outdoor spaces are the same."

A day after the government released the first results from the 2020 Census, some states and civic organizations were reeling from unexpected results, and wondered if the differences between projections and actual data might be an indicator of problems with the count. George Hammond, director of the University of Arizona's Economic and Business Research Center, said that "census population estimates tend not to be particularly close, even in percentage terms, to what the actual population count might be."

Doug Hockstad, assistant vice president of Tech Launch Arizona at University of Arizona, said the Tucson-based university launched a record number of startups in fiscal 2020, despite the pandemic.

University of Arizona President Robert C. Robbins writes about the university's plan to hold an in-person commencement ceremony and how the university used innovative methods of testing and tracing to stop the spread of COVID-19 on campus last year.

Prior to the start of the University of Arizona's annual spring football game, Rob Gronkowski set a Guinness World Record for highest altitude catch of an American football. A helicopter hovering 600 feet in the air dropped a football down to the ground for Gronkowski to catch.

Scientists know that the intense stress of grieving can affect the body in various ways, but much remains a mystery. Mary-Frances O'Connor, a psychologist who researches grief at the University of Arizona, studies both the psychology of grief and its biological changes in the laboratory and is one of the few researchers who straddles both fields. "Humans are predisposed to form loving bonds, and as soon as you do, your body is loaded and cocked for what happens when that person is gone.

For the sixth year in a row, University of Arizona experts predict an above-average hurricane season over the Atlantic Ocean.

A new study finds that overconsumption, overpopulation and uncertainty about the future are among the top concerns of those who say climate change is affecting their reproductive decision-making.

Bacteria are helping corals in lab tests, but experts say risks rise as treatments are applied in the wild. To help ease some minds, including her own, Raquel Peixoto – who published the first probiotics experiments in 2015 – is planning contained experiments this year at the 700-square-meter artificial ocean in the University of Arizona’s Biosphere 2. The tests will give a clearer look at how probiotic treatments might affect other ocean life.