Latest News

September 21, 2020

The Center for Nanoscale Science, a National Science Foundation Materials Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC), has again successfully renewed its NSF support in the highly competitive MRSEC program. The new iteration of the center encompasses two of NSF’s Big Ideas — Quantum Leap and Harnessing the Data Revolution.

September 20, 2020

Wastewater sampling for coronavirus on campus and in the surrounding community could alert University decision makers to a potential outbreak several days before individuals exhibit symptoms of an infection. The initiative — part of Penn State’s multilayered approach to test, monitor and mitigate for COVID-19 — could enable leaders to take swift actions to minimize the virus’s spread with the goal of helping to protect the health and safety of the community.

September 17, 2020

Do birds find the spotted lanternfly to be a tasty treat or a nauseating nibble? That is one of the questions researchers at Penn State hope to answer, and they are seeking citizen scientists, especially bird watchers, to help in their quest for knowledge.

September 9, 2020

A grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture will enable Penn State researchers to study the potential for SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19, to infect and spread among livestock.

September 9, 2020

Food safety training, developed by Penn State Extension and delivered to food industry professionals and university students and faculty members in Ukraine, resulted in a significant and lasting improvement in participants’ food safety knowledge, behavior, attitude and skills, according to researchers.

September 8, 2020

The newly launched Insect Biodiversity Center at Penn State will create a focal point for the study and conservation of insects and the ecosystems with which they interact. The center brings together faculty researchers and educators from eight Penn State colleges.

September 8, 2020

As the 2020 election draws closer, political content on social media is becoming more and more prevalent. A group of researchers, being led by principal investigator S. Shyam Sundar, James P. Jimirro Professor of Media Effects at Penn State, is examining spontaneous sharing of political content on Facebook.

August 25, 2020

With a $1.2 million grant from Fondation Botnar, an international team of researchers will assess the feasibility of creating and launching a global-scale artificial-intelligence app for mobile devices that diagnoses diet-related problems and offers nutritional advice to adolescent girls living in urban settings in Ghana and Vietnam.

August 25, 2020

Dairy cows that received a short course of anti-inflammatory medication after calving had lower metabolic stress and produced more milk than untreated cows, according to researchers, who say the regimen they tested could be adopted more easily by producers than previously studied treatment strategies.

August 25, 2020

Plant-based biofuels can play a key role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and removing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and growing these crops in certain landscapes offers net climate benefits compared to other land use options, according to a team of international scientists.

August 24, 2020

According to a new study, the risk of transmitting the livestock virus PPRV, which threatens 80% of the world’s sheep and goats, increases with certain husbandry practices, including attendance at seasonal grazing camps and the introduction of sheep and goats to the herd.

August 19, 2020

The rapid pace by which invasive shrubs have infiltrated forests in the northeastern United States has made scientists suspect they have a consistent advantage over native shrubs, and the first region-wide study of leaf timing, conducted by Penn State researchers, supports those suspicions.

August 17, 2020

Researchers who developed an improved method of gene editing for the study of arthropods will expand the technology for use in vertebrate species such as mice, fish and birds after receiving new funding from the National Science Foundation.

August 17, 2020

Penn State researchers, in a recent study, were surprised to learn that they could take the exact same number of seeds from the same plants, put them in agricultural fields across the Mid-Atlantic region and get profoundly different stands of cover crops a few months later.

August 13, 2020

A new way of looking at the fungal pathogen, Colletotrichum fioriniae, as a leaf endophyte — bacterial or fungal microorganisms that colonize healthy plant tissue — was the outcome of a two-year study conducted by researchers in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences.

August 12, 2020

To judge the overall effectiveness of cover crops and choose those offering the most ecosystem services, agricultural scientists must consider the plants’ roots as well as above-ground biomass, according to Penn State researchers who tested the characteristics of cover crop roots in three monocultures and one mixture.

August 10, 2020

Flavonoid compounds — produced by the roots of some sorghum plants — positively affect soil microorganisms, according to Penn State researchers, who suggest the discovery is an early step in developing a frost-resistant line of the valuable crop for North American farmers.

August 4, 2020

Research aimed at helping growers improve efficiency, reduce costs and overcome labor shortages will be enhanced with the recent completion of a new agricultural engineering shop at Penn State's Fruit Research and Extension Center.

July 29, 2020

A team led by Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences researchers is almost a year into a five-year study aimed at creating economically and environmentally sustainable agricultural systems in the face of development pressures and other challenges of urbanization.

July 24, 2020

Surinder Chopra, professor of maize genetics in the College of Agricultural Sciences, has been awarded funding from the U.S Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture to study the improvement of corn defenses against the fall armyworm.

July 24, 2020

The first robotic cutting mechanism — or “end-effector” — for a fully automated, computerized pruning system for modern apple orchards has been designed by a Penn State research team, an early step in the creation of a technology aimed at easing challenges facing tree-fruit growers.

July 22, 2020

A recent study, led by researchers at the Clearinghouse for Military Family Readiness at Penn State, is the first to examine the relationship between moral injury and social well-being over a long period of time.

July 21, 2020

The optimum amount of a methane-inhibiting supplement in dairy cattle feed has been determined by an international team of researchers, indicating that widespread use of the compound could be an affordable climate change-battling strategy, if farmers embrace it.

July 21, 2020

Paul Esker, a plant pathologist in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, has received a $455,000 grant from the U.S Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture to support a five-year integrated research and extension project designed to improve management recommendations for wheat.

July 21, 2020

A $10 million federal grant will power a multi-institutional consortium aiming to create new value chains on U.S. farms, including methods for farmers to make more efficient use of resources with an emphasis on the generation of renewable natural gas, improved rural economic outcomes and protection of the environment.

July 20, 2020

In their zeal to promote the importance of climate change as an ecological driver, climate scientists increasingly are ignoring the profound role that indigenous peoples played in fire and vegetation dynamics, not only in the eastern United States but worldwide, according to a Penn State researcher.

July 15, 2020

The Ecology Institute has awarded 11 proposals from across the University as part of its Flower Grant program, including five projects submitted by faculty at Commonwealth Campuses. The funds provided by the Flower Grant aim to support ecology research focused across the institute’s five core themes.

July 13, 2020

A grant of more than $1 million from the National Science Foundation will support a researcher in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences in a study of mechanisms that induce sterility in social insects. Etya Amsalem, assistant professor of entomology, received the award from the prestigious NSF Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program.

July 9, 2020

A team of researchers led by a Penn State agricultural economist will receive $500,000 over three years to study agritourism in the United States and to develop research-based information and guidance for farmers looking to diversify their incomes through agritourism activities.