022 - NatSci News Rewind April 2021 Transcript You're listening to NatSci News Rewind a podcast that looks back at the monthly news headlines in the world of NatSci. Let's take a look back at the news for the month of April 2021. NatSci seniors honored with MSU Board of Trustees Awards Twenty-seven (27) Michigan State University College of Natural Science students were among 130 students who received an MSU Board of Trustees Award for earning a 4.0 GPA — the highest scholastic average — at the close of their last semester before graduation. NatSci undergraduates impress at 2021 UURAF Forty-two (42) MSU College of Natural Science (NatSci) undergraduate students were among those receiving first-place honors for their 2021 University Undergraduate Research and Arts Forum (UURAF) entries. The annual event, which took place virtually this year from April 15 through April 19, provides students with an opportunity to showcase their scholarship and creative activity. Student-led research yields important discovery about clinical stroke trials Two Michigan State University students – one an undergraduate, the other in her second year of medical school – analyzed a decade’s worth of stroke studies and found a glaring flaw: women patients were significantly underrepresented. That two students made such an important finding is impressive enough. Even more so is that their study was published in JAMA Neurology, a prestigious journal of the American Medical Association. A "virtual" success: NatSci's 11th annual Classes Without Quizzes held online More than 260 alumni, friends and guests registered for the MSU College of Natural Science's virtual Classes Without Quizzes held on April 24. The day’s “classes” featured three presentations about what researchers have been working on in NatSci labs. In addition to the three faculty presentations, two Dean’s Research Scholars presented their work to attendees.The 12th annual Classes Without Quizzes will be held April 23, 2022. MSU College of Natural Science names 2021 award winners The MSU College of Natural Science has selected several alumni, faculty and students for outstanding achievements and excellence. Patrick Lukulay (Ph.D., analytical chemistry, ’95) received the 2021 Outstanding Alumni Award; Shannon Morey (B.S., chemistry, ’10) received the 2021 Recent Alumni Award; and Shannon Manning, MSU Foundation Associate Professor of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, received the 2021 Meritorious Faculty Award. To check out my interviews with these fantastic individuals, be sure to catch the latest episode of the NatSci Chronicles podcast. Bringing neutron stars down to Earth An international research team led by Michigan State University has helped created cosmic conditions at RIKEN's heavy-ion accelerator in Japan to better understand this extreme science. The team, which included MSU's William Lynch and Betty Tsang recently shared its results in the journal Physical Review Letters. Understanding our restoring force An expansive project led by MSU plant biologist Lars Brudvig is examining the benefits, and limits, of environmental restoration on developed land after humans are done with it. Although humans can heal some of that damage by working to restore the land to its natural state, questions remain about how far restoration can go in overcoming a land’s past.. Brudvig and his collaborators now have some answers that they’ve published April 19 online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. MSU NatSci names new assistant dean for diversity, equity, and inclusion The MSU College of Natural Science (NatSci) has named Amber Benton as its assistant dean for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Benton, who was most previously director of diversity programming and student engagement in MSU’s James Madison College, stepped into her new role on April 12. Learning what makes the nucleus tick MSU theoretical nuclear physicist Witold Nazarewicz has a simple way to describe the complex work he does at the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams, or FRIB. In a new paper for Physical Review Letters, Simin Wang, a former research associate at FRIB, and Nazarewicz show how FRIB can spot signatures of unusual nuclear events and use those as windows into the nucleus. Evidence of new physics: Unexpected behavior from fundamental particles MSU researchers have helped catch particles called muons behaving in a way that’s not predicted by the Standard Model of particle physics — the best theory that scientists have for explaining the universe’s fundamental particles and forces.The results from this experiment, called the Muon g-2 experiment, confirm a discrepancy that has been gnawing at researchers for decades. The team published its landmark result in the journal Physical Review Letters on April 7. Discovery rewrites the evolutionary history textbook, shapes future health studies The network of nerves connecting our eyes to our brains is sophisticated and researchers have now shown that it evolved much earlier than previously thought, thanks to an unexpected source: the gar fish. MSU’s Ingo Braasch helped an international research team show that this connection scheme was already present in ancient fish at least 450 million years ago, making it about 100 million years older than previously believed. The work was published in the journal Science on April 8. First EEB postdoctoral fellows bring accomplishment, ambition Three stellar early-career scholars bringing multi-disciplinary scientific exploration, collaboration and community engagement have been selected as MSU Presidential Postdoctoral Fellows in Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior. Cinnamon Mittan, Daniela Palmer and Olivia Smith will be the first cohort of the fellowship, created to increase the breadth and potential of research embracing ecology, evolution and behavior at MSU. They will begin their work in the 2021-2022 academic year. To intervene or not to intervene? That is the future climate question Should humans use technology to cool Earth? How would organisms and ecosystems respond? Every month since September 2019, a team of internationally recognized experts in climate science and ecology, the Climate Intervention Biology Working Group, has gathered remotely to bring science to bear on the important question of climate intervention. The pioneering group, co-led by the MSU community ecologist Phoebe Zarnetske, published their seminal paper in the most recent Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States. Gemma Reguera named editor-in-chief of microbiology journal Gemma Reguera, Michigan State University environmental microbiologist, was named editor-in-chief of Applied and Environmental Microbiology (AEM), one of two new editors for two of the 16 peer-reviewed journals published by the American Society of Microbiology (ASM). Reguera will begin her term on July 1. And that will wrap up the rewind for the month of April 2021. To read more about these stories, head on over to our website at natsci.msu.edu/news. 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