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Welcome to the NatSci news page! Check back often to learn about the latest innovations, discoveries and accomplishments of our faculty, staff, students and alumni.
September 21, 2022
As climate change causes more frequent drought conditions, MSU researchers are learning more about the biology of plants, fungi and microscopic animals that survive on very little water in a drought or desiccation state. This research is part of a $12.5 million multi-institution and cross-disciplinary National Science Foundation grant as part of the NSF Biology Integration Institutes.
September 19, 2022
Nitrogen, like it’s neighbors carbon and oxygen in the periodic table, is an element we can’t live without. Although science has developed much of the nitrogen cycle’s big picture, MSU chemist Timothy Warren and his team are drilling down into its fundamental chemical details to create a more intimate understanding of the nitrogen cycle that could lead to holistic solutions for ensuring a healthy balance of nitrogen, wherever it’s needed. The team recently released two peer-reviewed reports on that front in the journals Nature Chemistry and the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
September 16, 2022
Angela K. Wilson, John A. Hannah Distinguished Professor of Chemistry at MSU, is recipient of the 2022 National Honorary Member Award from Iota Sigma Pi, a national honor society for women in chemistry. The award is the organization’s highest honor, bestowed triennially on an outstanding woman chemist. Wilson, a professor in the Department of Chemistry in the MSU College of Natural Science, is also NatSci associate dean for strategic initiatives and current president of the American Chemical Society.
September 12, 2022
Affirmation from the MSU Council of Deans to the MSU Board of Trustees and other members of the MSU community reaffirming their commitment to the University's values and to applying and upholding the University's policies, procedures and core values of integrity, respect, excellence, equity and collaboration.
September 12, 2022
Gemma Reguera and Amy Ralston have joined the Michigan State College of Natural Science (NatSci) leadership team as associate dean for faculty affairs and development and associate dean for graduate studies, respectively. Their appointments were effective Aug. 16.
September 2, 2022
When thinking about why breast cancer develops, it is critical to understand how normal development works. Recently, the National Institutes of Health awarded MSU physiology professor Eran Andrechek a five-year, $2.5 million grant to fund his research project of defining the role of the repressor E2F5 gene in mammary gland development. in addition to a providing better understanding of the developmental biology, Andrechek hopes the findings will lead to further research on breast cancer.
August 31, 2022
MSU researchers and colleagues at the University of California Berkeley, the University of South Bohemia and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have helped reveal the most detailed picture to date of important biological “antennae.” The findings, published Aug. 31 in the journal Nature, shed new light on microbial photosynthesis, and could also help researchers remediate harmful bacteria in the environment, develop artificial photosynthetic systems for renewable energy and enlist microbes in sustainable manufacturing that starts with the raw materials of carbon dioxide and sunlight.
August 29, 2022
Michigan State University researchers, led by earth and environmental scientist Jeffrey Freymueller and his team, could help predict seasonal changes in the Great Lakes Basin by developing a new groundwater model to monitor surface and groundwater flow with a $960K grant from the National Science Foundation.
August 25, 2022
MSU ecologists in Elise Zipkin's Qualitative Ecology lab in the College of Natural Science have developed a mathematical framework that could help monitor and preserve biodiversity without breaking the bank. This framework or model takes low-cost data about relatively abundant species in a community and uses it to generate valuable insights on their harder-to-find neighbors. The journal Conservation Biology published the research as an Early View article on Aug. 25
August 23, 2022
The Brandizzi lab at MSU is sending seeds to space aboard NASA’s Artemis I mission to explore how humanity can sustain itself outside of Earth. In previous experiments, scientists have learned that plants grown in space make lower levels of amino acids that keep their seedlings strong on Earth. The same amino acids would also be nutritious for people who eat the plants. Brandizzi’s lab has selected seeds that are enriched with those amino acids and is sending those into space along with regular seeds, allowing them to see if fortifying the seeds on Earth could create a more sustainable path to growing healthier plants — and food — in space.
