University of Arizona in the News

In a survey of 2,500 researchers in the U.S., Canada and Europe, Kyle Myers from Harvard and his team found that 32% had shifted their focus toward the pandemic. Neuroscientists who study the sense of smell started investigating why COVID‑19 patients tend to lose theirs. Physicists who had previously experienced infectious diseases only by contracting them found themselves creating models to inform policy makers. Michael D. L. Johnson at the University of Arizona normally studies copper's toxic effects on bacteria.

Arizona Arts Live recently hosted Manual Cinema's "Christmas Carol," a mixed-media adaptation featuring live performance, puppetry and animation, and live music.

A COVID-19 vaccine made by the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer was authorized for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration on Friday, following a 17–4 vote of confidence from an advisory panel of independent experts. "Overall, there is not much to argue with here in terms of efficacy," said Deepta Bhattacharya, an immunologist at the University of Arizona. "It just looks great no matter how you look at it."

Radio producer and oral historian Aengus Anderson of the University of Arizona Libraries talked to many people who knew and loved Agnese Haury to assemble an audio portrait.

Medical professionals acknowledge that – given the lack of available scientific data on how coronavirus vaccines interact with pregnancies – there is not yet sufficient evidence to safely recommend their use. But some also describe that as a symptom of a larger problem and are urging trials to begin including pregnant and breastfeeding women to ensure equitable coverage going forward.

Chef José Andrés writes that without food security for all, the United States will never fully recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. From the op-ed: At Fort Defiance, Arizona, our relief team helped prepare more than 1,500 family meal boxes each week. The effort included local students, such as Sophia Ynzunza, a psychology major at the University of Arizona. She quickly found that the job meant much more than just getting paid. "It's about giving to my people so they don't suffer anymore," she said. "Food is nature to my people. We grew our corn, way back when.

The new COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna seem to be remarkably good at preventing serious illness. But it's unclear how well they will curb the spread of the coronavirus. "Preventing severe disease is easiest, preventing mild disease is harder, and preventing all infections is the hardest," said Deepta Bhattacharya, an immunologist at the University of Arizona. "If it's 95% effective at preventing symptomatic disease, it's going to be something less than that in preventing all infections, for sure."

A pilot program at the University of Arizona provided what may be the first example of an app slowing the viral spread in the United States. During an outbreak there this fall, it sent alerts for as many as 12% of transmissions, researchers estimated. "We believe that the outbreak on campus had a flatter curve because of the app," said Joanna Masel, a mathematical biology professor who has helped supervise the rollout of the program, called Covid Watch.

A University of Arizona discovery suggests that the Maya civilization developed more rapidly than archaeologists once thought and hints at less social inequality than later periods. Archaeology Magazine named this one of the top 10 discoveries of 2020.

Tanning bed use in early adulthood is associated with an increased risk for endometriosis, according to a new study. Leslie V. Farland, an assistant professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics the University of Arizona, and colleagues examined the potential associations between ultraviolet radiation and endometriosis risk in a prospective cohort of 116,429 female U.S. nurses from the Nurses' Health Study II.